planning hierarchy, facilitates faster decision-making, promotes a closer involvement of the
citizen in the planning process, and enhances integration with other local strategies and plans.
In the Planning Green Paper, the former hierarchy of regional, county, and local guidance and
plans is characterized as complex and confusing: too often, plans were produced to different
time-scales and contained inconsistent policies. It was thought that the multi-level structure of
plans had become a major barrier to responsive and effective planning. Strategic issues were
addressed either by the county structure plan or the unitary development plan. Since many of
them cut across county boundaries, issues are increasingly dealt with at either regional level
or across sub regions. Since the Planning and Compulsory Purchase Act 2004, the regional
level now makes use of the statutorily enforced Regional Spatial Strategy, which replaces the
regional guidance. One of the reasons for focusing on regional planning is that the
Government plans to improve democracy through the decentralization of decision-making.
For this reason there is a need to reform the arrangements for the preparation of Regional
Planning Guidance (RPG). Criticism of the former RPG was that is was too ‘top-down’,
lacked a regional focus, spent too much time reiterating national policies, was too narrowly
land-use orientated, took too long to produce, and did not command the confidence or
commitment of regional stakeholders. The envisaged end result is regional guidance
providing an effective basis for deciding regional or sub-regional issues that are difficult to
resolve if left to individual authorities. With greater regional ownership must come greater
regional responsibility, both in facing up to the difficult issues and implementing the strategy
for dealing with them.
At the local level, the development plan system is being replaced by a ‘folder’ approach to
policy making. This portfolio of documents is referred to as the local development framework
(LDF). It will contain the authority’s policies and require the Secretary of State’s approval. In
order to pay more attention to citizen participation in the planning process, the Local
Government White Paper presumes more integration of policy at local level. The new local
development documents and local traffic and transport plans must conform to the Regional
Spatial Strategy. In parallel with the Green Paper, proposals for change have been put forward
for more efficiency in development control, for land expropriation and compensation
regulations, planning obligations, and the organization of governance: this last with the aim of
strengthening the regional level. The regional government level will be strengthened so as to
stimulate strategic policy preparation. To this end, the accent at the regional level must shift
from land-use planning to spatial strategy. We elaborate on the changing role of the English
region in the next section.
7.3 The changing role of the English region
The English region differs from that in the other two countries discussed here. It does not
have a democratically chosen government and the average size is far greater (NUTS 1 vs.
NUTS 2). The population of a region varies between 2.5 and 8 million inhabitants (2001
Census). The English regions have long been neglected. Government Offices for the Regions
(GORs) - created in 1994 - filled the gap. They now bring together the activities and interests
of ten different central Government Departments in the nine English regions (London
included). Previously, these Departments each had their own regional representation and even
used different regional boundaries. Tomaney and Mitchell (1999) conclude that “the GORs
fail to meet their currently limited declared objectives because of the many lines of
accountability and funding, which makes it difficult to co-ordinate activity effectively.”
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