An amendment to the Planning and Infrastructure Bill has been announced by Government to remove all statutory consultees from the Nationally Significant Infrastructure Projects (NSIPs) pre-application process. See Planning reforms to slash a year off infrastructure delivery - GOV.UK.
The Wildlife Trusts believe this is bad news for both nature recovery, communities and for infrastructure delivery. Pre-application is intended to be the crucial stage when, informed by consultation with experts, potential problems with major infrastructure projects are revealed and solutions found. This is also the stage where nature protection and restoration can be built into the early stages of a project – avoiding harm to precious nature sites, protecting community greenspaces and reducing costly project-stopping trouble later on.