Government publishes new approach to ensure regulators and regulation support growth, including removing reference to the BCT Guidelines

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Earlier this week, Government published a new policy paper for England on ensuring that regulators and regulation support economic growth.

The Government posits that “the current regulatory landscape is not functioning as effectively as it should. Our system now too often holds back growth and inhibits private sector investment. Whilst countries such as Singapore and Australia have continued to improve their regulatory systems, the UK has fallen behind.” And that “One of the clearest manifestations of this is the high associated administrative costs for businesses arising from activities such as filling out forms or from overly onerous and disproportionate reporting requirements.”

To address these challenges, the Government says that it will overhaul our regulatory system so that it:

  • Supports growth.
  • Is targeted and proportionate.
  • Is transparent and predictable.
  • Adapts to keep pace with innovation.

The reforms will apply to all bodies exercising regulatory powers and functions, with the Government committing to cutting “administrative costs for business by 25% by the end of the Parliament”.

CIEEM is pleased to see Government recognise “that statutory consultees need to be resourced adequately, and on a sustainable basis“, however we are deeply cautious of the notion that a ‘lead regulator’ can make decisions on behalf of other regulatory bodies on matters that it may have no expertise in.

And we are perplexed by the desire to remove reference to a long-standing, industry best practice standard such as the Bat Conservation Trust’s Bat Mitigation Guidelines. We support BCT’s view that the removal of these guidelines is “alarming“, where they note that “These guidelines were developed through months of consultation with leading bat experts and government agencies. They provide a flexible, evidence-based framework to ensure developments are both practical and environmentally responsible. Good planning protects nature and enables development. Scrapping these guidelines would create confusion and increase delays, not reduce them.” And that “It is inconceivable that this guidance is just removed without any consultation or explanation.” According to ENDS, Natural England intends to publish updated bat guidance “soon“.

Below are the relevant steps that Government intends to take to reduce regulatory burden and increase growth in relation to environmental regulation and regulators.

Environmental and planning regulation

Remove complexity and tidy red tape across environmental permitting, by:

  • Streamlining Nationally Significant Infrastructure Projects (NSIPs): by easing environmental permit and licence requirements for low-risk activities within the planning process. This will ensure many developers do not need to seek consents orders so have the confidence to get building, while protections for the environment and local communities remain strong.
  • Launching a suite of new initiatives to support priority sectors: including the Environment Agency’s priority tracked service to allow developers to work with a dedicated team on their permits and track progress. These service improvements will result in quicker timeframes and more flexible decision-making in moving developers through the system. To support this, the Government recognises that statutory consultees need to be resourced adequately, and on a sustainable basis, while ensuring we are incentivising efficient and constructive engagement in applications, and in the planning system more generally. We intend to develop a model to support this sustainable funding, and we will set out further details in the coming weeks.
  • Consulting before Easter on reforms to permitting legislation that will enable regulators to be more agile in making sensible decisions on which low-risk activities should be exempt from environmental permits. Removing unnecessary requirements will encourage innovation and investment, and allow regulators to focus on high-impact, high-priority areas, including low-carbon infrastructure.
  • Consulting in June on a package of reforms to modernise permitting for industry and energy sectors. This will include: creating regulatory sandboxes for R&D trials to enable operators to innovate; streamlining outdated guidance to support investment; and enabling proportionate and risk-based regulation of new technologies in support of Net Zero and a circular economy.

Supporting better cooperation between environmental regulators by:

  • Appointing a single lead regulator for major projects. A lead environmental regulator will be appointed for all major projects in which multiple regulators have an interest, to make decisions on their behalf.

This will reduce layers of regulation and create a single front door for major projects. As an initial step, the Secretary of State for the Environment is willing to use his powers of direction to make this work and intends to instruct Natural England, the Environment Agency, the Forestry Commission and the Marine Management Organisation to work alongside the designated Lead Regulator, in collaboration with MHCLG, in carrying out their functions for these major projects in a timely manner.

This model will be tested through a series of projects, which could start with the Lower Thames Crossing subject to the planning process, as well as a new town-related housing project and future schemes like Heathrow expansion. We are asking industry to come forward with suggestions of additional projects which meet the steering criteria where they want to trial this new approach.

  • Convene the environmental regulators to commence work to upgrade their digital systems for planning advice, including exploring establishing a single planning portal for all environmental agencies.
  • Streamline delivery of major water projects. Defra will amend the Specified Infrastructure Projects Regulations (SIPR) to allow major water projects to be delivered more quickly and with better value to billpayers. This means major reservoir schemes, like the Abingdon Reservoir near Oxford and the Fens Reservoir near Cambridge, will benefit from using the successful licensed infrastructure provider model that delivered the Thames Tideway project.

Ensure our planning system supports growth. Ministry of Housing, Communities & Local Government (MHCLG) will be reforming the system of statutory consultees. This will:

  • make clear that statutory consultees should be focused on growth;
  • signal a spring consultation on the impact of removing some statutory consultees and reducing the permissions they need to be consulted on;
  • make clear that local planning authorities should only consult statutory consultees where really necessary;
  • set up a new performance framework to monitor performance, including an MHCLG-HMT ministerially-led review point; and
  • signal that government intends to allow statutory consultees to recover costs for advice.

Environmental regulation

Ahead of the publication of the Corry Review into environmental regulation, Government says that it is already “clear that our regulatory system for the environment is not fit for purpose in driving nature recovery or economic growth, lacking a strong link to our Environment Act targets and imposing unnecessary, increasing costs on businesses.”

The government says it will use the review to “bring forward packages of reform, including, if necessary, legislation to improve the effectiveness of environmental regulation.”

The reforms will be designed to ensure that “regulators’ statutory purposes are focused on their core missions and enable them to take proportionate risk-based decisions that support the delivery of national priorities.”

The government says it will “rapidly review and rewrite the existing catalogue of environmental compliance guidance so that it is fit for purpose, removing any duplication, ambiguity and inconsistency. Guidance should help businesses navigate regulatory requirements, not add additional complexity. This will include Natural England revising their standing advice to Local Planning Authorities on bats and removing the reference to the Bat Conservation Trust.”

Government says that Defra is also making plans to move quickly to:

  • Publish new strategic policy statements for all regulators to mandate regulators to use constrained discretion to deliver desired outcomes within the law.
  • Allow trusted nature conservation and environmental partners and other trusted organisations greater autonomy through memoranda of understanding and wider deployment of class licenses; enabling them to move fast on restoring nature without applying to multiple regulators for permissions.
  • Explore launching a Nature Market Accelerator to bring much needed coherence to nature markets and accelerate investment.

Key regulator pledges

Government has also made pledges for the below organisations to deliver on.

Natural England:

  1. Increase usage of self-regulation by moving regulatory responsibilities onto trusted landowners, large organisations, and trade bodies, including through accelerating Organisational and Project Licensing and the Bat Earned Recognition Programme, with assurance achieved through more monitoring of outcomes.
  2. Deliver a more flexible service to customers, proactive engagement with major housebuilding programmes through enhanced pre-application advice and greater use of strategic solutions.
  3. Maximise strategic approach through reform, where the current legislative framework could be streamlined – for example on nutrient pollution, and newt and bat licensing – including delivering Local Nature Recovery Strategies, and the Nature Restoration Fund, which will save developers time and money, whilst protecting the environment.
  4. Reduce the cost of delivering regulatory requirements by embedding changes to increase NE’s risk appetite and optimise opportunity for environmental gain, through updating guidance and increasing the use of Ministerial directions.
  5. Work with government to develop a workforce plan on how to improve skills capability, including addressing environmental skills necessary to implement reforms with decision makers. For example, through an enhanced training offer for Local Authorities with the Planning Advisory Service.

Environment Agency:

  1. Accelerate responses to planning applications, bringing performance back within the 21 day target by September 2025, supported by:
    i. Investment in the development of modernised, fit for purpose digital systems and enhancing digital services;
    ii. Dedicated support for infrastructure related to priority sites contributing to housing and clean energy priorities through its recently established National Infrastructure Team
  2. Make its permitting service more efficient and transparent for investors by:
    i. Introducing priority tracked services for more complex applications, starting with a trial for major infrastructure projects and growth sites;
    ii. Providing additional support through the Hydrogen and Carbon Capture Utilisation and Storage Programme to ensure permitting does not delay roll-out;
  3. Commence the process of finding an AI partner to collaborate with on streamlining digital services.
  4. Improve its regulatory transparency and consistency to help businesses they regulate understand EA decision making and reduce uncertainty. It will enable communities to better understand their local environment and take appropriate action. Starting in the Spring, Compliance Assessment Reports (CAR) for water quality Environmental Permitting Regulations (EPR) permits will be published online, providing access to records when EA visit operators to check they are complying with their permit. A rolling programme bringing CAR forms for further sectors will follow.
  5. Ensure growth projects consider environmental limits and solutions from the outset by providing technical advice on environmental capacity for growth in industrial clusters to support our approach to spatial planning, commencing with Humberside, Teesside and Merseyside.
  6. Partner with the Office for Investment to attract investment in priority sectors, identifying key investment opportunities for priority sectors with the EA providing early advice to support planning and environmental permitting.