Who are the people and the organisations that have had the most influence over planning during the past couple of years?
One could make a case for Jack Airey and Policy Exchange. Airey, who joined Localis having graduated in geography, became Head of Housing at Policy Exchange before being appointed Downing Street’s special adviser on housing and planning. In the spirit of Dominic Cummings’ shake-up of government apparatus, the attraction of Airey could have been his Policy Exchange paper called ‘Rethinking the Planning System for the 21st Century’, some of which found it’s way into the albeit now seemingly-jettisoned ‘Planning for the Future’ White Paper.
One could also make a case for Nicholas Boys-Smith and Create Streets. Boys-Smith, a history graduate, desk officer in the Conservative Research Department and banker, founded Create Streets in 2013; was a co-chair of the Build Better, Build Beautiful Commission; and was appointed by the previous Secretary of State as chair of an ‘Office for Place’.
Conspicuously neither are planners...
Could a case be made for present planning policy being influenced by Think Tanks to a degree not seen since the simplified planning promoted by right-leaning Think Tanks like the Centre for Policy Studies in the 1980s? Either way, it is a reminder of the influence of Think Tanks on the planning policy agenda, which makes it a topic worthy of conversation on a town planning-based podcast.
Why and how do Think Tanks do what they do? Where do policy ideas come from? And how do bright ideas get turned into actual policy?
Sam Stafford puts these questions to Samuel Hughes (@SCP_Hughes), Research Fellow at the University of Oxford and Senior Follow at Policy Exchange; Anya Martin (@AnyaMartin8), Director at PricedOut and a researcher in the social housing sector; and Matthew Lesh (@matthewlesh), Head of Public Policy at the IEA.
Some accompanying reading.
'Rethinking the Planning System for the 21st Century' by Jack Airey
https://policyexchange.org.uk/publication/rethinking-the-planning-system-for-the-21st-century/
‘Beware of ‘Policy Intern Brain’ – the source of so many bad ideas’ by Anya Martin
https://capx.co/beware-of-policy-intern-brain-the-source-of-so-many-bad-ideas/
‘Build me up, level up: popular homebuilding while boosting local communities’ by Matthew Lesh
https://www.adamsmith.org/research/build-me-up-level-up
‘Strong Suburbs’ by Samuel Hughes and Ben Southwood
https://policyexchange.org.uk/publication/strong-suburbs/
‘Living Tradition’ by Samuel Hughes
https://www.createstreets.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/08/Living-Tradition.pdf
‘Learning from History’ by Ben Southwood
https://www.createstreets.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/12/Tottenham-Paper-1.9.pdf
‘The Green Noose: An analysis of Green Belts and proposals for reform’ by Tom Papworth
‘A place in the sun’ by Anya Martin
https://www.worksinprogress.co/issue/a-place-in-the-sun/
‘Housing Politics in the United Kingdom’ by Brian Lund
https://policy.bristoluniversitypress.co.uk/housing-politics-in-the-united-kingdom
Some accompanying listening.
Wah Wah (Think Tank) by Happy Mondays
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FyERDM7cbSo
Some accompanying viewing.
How policy is formulated in Westminster (Part 2 - Please see episode 55 for Part 1)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iZXpeH28MpM
50 Shades T-Shirts!
If you have listened to Episode 45 of the 50 Shades of Planning Podcast you will have heard Clive Betts say that...
'In the Netherlands planning is seen as part of the solution. In the UK, too often, planning is seen as part of the problem'.
Sam said in reply that that would look good on a t-shirt and it does. Further details can be found here: http://samuelstafford.blogspot.com/2021/07/50-shades-of-planning-t-shirts.html
50 Shades of Planning
50 Shades of Planning is Sam Stafford’s attempt to explore the foibles of the English planning system and it's aim is to cover the breadth of the sector both in terms of topics of conversation and in terms of guests with different experiences and perspectives.
50 Shades episodes include 'Hitting The High Notes', which are a series of conversations with leading planning and property figures. The conversations take in the six milestone planning permissions or projects within a contributor’s career and for every project guests are invited to choose a piece of music that they were listening to at that time. Think Desert Island Discs, but for planners.
50 Shades episode also include the 'All Around the World' series, which is being led by friend of the podcast, Paul Smith.
Paul put it to Sam that debates about the planning system in England tend, for the most part, to focus solely on the planning system in England. Planners here very seldom look to other countries for inspiration and ideas. Paul wanted to remedy that and so in this series he chats with planning professionals and academics from a number of countries to find out what works well there, what works less well, and what can be learnt.
Sam is on Bluesky and Instagram, and his blogs can be found here (from where you can also sign up for his newsletter).
The 50 Shades platforms are expressions of Sam's personal opinions, which may or may not represent the opinions of his past, present or future employers.
50 Shades of Planning is by planners and for planners and so if you would like to use the podcast or the YouTube channel for sharing anything you think that the sector needs to be talking about then do please feel free to get in touch with Sam via [email protected].
Why Fifty Shades? Well, town and country planning is very much not a black and white endeavour. There are at least fifty shades in between....
