The Queens speech set out the goals of this parliament, its policies and pledges to improve Planning and the Environment in the UK, some of the key commitments are set out here.

Housing

According to the Queen's Speech this government will support home ownership, with discounted houses of at least 30% available to first time buyers. This First Homes Policy will find funding from housing developers planning gain contributions.

A White Paper is expected to set out how the new homes target will be reached as well as how to make the planning process clearer, more accessible and certain. It has been set out that at least 1,000,000 new homes will be built over the term of the next parliament with the Conservative manifesto giving continued support to reaching 300,000 by mid 2020s.

The Government is expected to legislate that developers of new build homes must belong to a New Homes Ombudsmen to regulate building safety in line with a new Building Safety Bill. This will create and enhance regulatory regimes for building safety and construction products with new clearer framework giving national oversight of construction products.

Infrastructure

The Government has continuing commitment to reach zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050 committing £100 billion to invest in infrastructure. The National Infrastructure Strategy is likely to be published alongside the first budget in March of this year.

The briefing published with the Queen's Speech commits the government to spending £4 billion on flood defences and £9.2 billion on energy efficient homes, schools and hospitals. £10 billion in the Single Housing Infrastructure fund will support new homes by providing roads, schools and GP surgeries.

A new Future Homes Standard will be introduced by 2025 ensuring new homes have low carbon heating and are as energy efficient as possible.

Environmental bill

The Government has pledged to re-introduce the Environmental Bill which was set aside upon dissolution in November. This bill will create a new independent Office for Environmental Protection.

Targets that are set will be legally binding and include reducing fine particle matter in the atmosphere to improve our air quality. The Government will minimise waste, promote resource efficiency and promote a circular economy.

Biodiversity net gain will be introduced as mandatory and will be required to be a condition of grant of planning permission, applications will have to include net gain plans which must guarantee net gain for 30 years. This will be covered in greater detail in a later article.

The Queen's Speech is available here:

The background briefing note giving greater detail on the Queens speech is available here:

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