Today's entry compares the original and current programme of
National Policy Statements.
Before what is likely to be a busy day on Wednesday, this is the
fourth in a series of blog entries as we move towards the abolition
of the Infrastructure Planning Commission (IPC) on 1 April. It
suggests that the originally intended suite of National Policy
Statements should be continued with.
National Policy Statements (NPSs) are one of the cornerstones of
the Planning Act regime. Although they are not intended to be
expressions of new policy, for the first time they contain a
convenient statement of the need for infrastructure and the impacts
that should be mitigated by project promoters and assessed by the
IPC or its successor the Planning Inspectorate when applications
are made. The crucial test of whether to grant an application
requires weighing the need against the mitigated impacts, and
permission is to be refused if the latter outweigh the former (plus
any other
