Q&A with Catriona Riddell on strategic planning matters

5 minute read

For the latest in Sigma Strategic Land's Q&A series with experienced and insightful industry professionals, we are thrilled to sit down with Catriona Riddell, Chartered Town Planner and Director at Catriona Riddell Associates to discuss strategic planning matters.

Catriona is a very experienced Chartered Town Planner who is extremely passionate about the enormous potential that effective strategic planning can play in the planning reform package and beyond. Catriona provides support to local authorities and their partners on a wide range of spatial planning issues but specialises in strategic planning, working with local authorities and their partners to develop and deliver different approaches to strategic frameworks and growth plans. She recently authored a report on behalf of the County Council Network [Zooming Out: The Benefits of Strategic Planning - County Councils Network] to help inform the response to the Government’s planning reforms around what could replace the Duty to Cooperate.

Previous roles include Head of Strategic Planning at Surrey County Council and Director of Planning at the South East England Regional Assembly. Catriona is the Strategic Planning Specialist for the Planning Officers’ Society (POS), Vice-Chair of the Town and Country Planning Association (TCPA), a member of the RTPI’s England Policy Panel and a regular columnist for Planning Magazine. Catriona is also Director of Catriona Riddell Associates Ltd, a planning consultancy based in Thames Ditton in Surrey.

1. In light of the Queen’s speech on 11^th May foreshadowing the Planning Bill, are you pleased with the direction of travel for Planning indicated by the Government, so far as the details are known at this stage?

There is, unfortunately, so little detail known at the moment that it is difficult to see how all the different proposals will fit together into a coherent and deliverable planning system. Add into the mix the push back from the Conservative Grassroots, who are particularly concerned about the threats to local democracy and the imposition of housing targets and who knows where this will all land.

Personally, I would love to work within a system that is less complex, more transparent and easier to engage with – all worthy aspirations – but I’m not convinced the Government are looking at it as a single system as the proposals all seem to be a bit fragmented. I’m also very concerned about the radio silence on what will eventually replace the disastrous Duty to Cooperate, with very little in the White Paper and no mention of it in the Queen’s Speech or supporting documents. A more effective approach to strategic planning has the potential to solve so many of the current problems without throwing everything up in the air but there doesn’t seem to be a proper understanding within Government of what good strategic planning looks like and what the essential ingredients are.

2. Strategic Planning is often thought to be a more co-ordinated, structured approach to planning set over fairly long timescales and at larger scales of delivery. It often involves greater collaboration and partnership to deliver not only housebuilding but other key outcomes such as infrastructure that is not achievable on the smaller sites. How do you view strategic planning and the role it has today?

I spent a lot of time thinking about why strategic planning is so important when I was working with the County Council’s Network (CCN) – see next question [Zooming Out: The Benefits of Strategic Planning - County Councils Network] - to consider what a good approach might look like in response to last year’s Planning White Paper. Our conclusions are set out in the report but the three main purposes, I believe, of an effective approach to strategic planning are:

• To integrate long term economic, environment and infrastructure priorities around a shared vision across a large area which can then be articulated spatially. A good strategic plan should provide a long term investment framework for supporting growth – it is not a big local plan. But it is also about facilitating long term growth in a way that addresses some of the real challenges we face like Climate Change, improving health and well-being and – yes- ensuring that everyone has access to a decent home.
• To act as the essential pivot between national and local levels, ensuring that national priorities are capable of being delivered but also that these can reflect different contexts and circumstances locally.
• To provide a larger spatial canvas for delivering long term growth that offer real options to ensure development is directed to the best locations for delivering a sustainable outcome. This is particularly important where transformation of an area is planned over a long term and strong investor confidence is needed. For the local authorities I work with, I make sure they look at the spatial geography on a boundary-blind basis so they are not influenced by artificial lines on a map.

3. Back in March 2021, you gave a thought-provoking talk on your work with the County Councils Network (CCN) in respect to ‘Planning Reform and the role of Strategic Planning’ which Sigma Strategic Land covered on with a LinkedIn post. With a decade of growing evidence, do you think there is now a clear and visible path through to creating the recommended single accountable growth body which can identify key spatial strategies? How would this mesh in with the planning reform package, if at all?

Getting the decision-making right is key to everything. We know from decades of experience that having a single decision-making body is key to being able to address some of the most challenging issues in planning – overall housing numbers and distribution, delivery of strategic (and national) infrastructure, new communities, Green Belt!  Our solution was the establishment of Strategic Planning Advisory Bodies which could operate within a wider growth board structure (or potentially a combined authority structure) and would have very clearly defined roles (set out in legislation) for testing different spatial options and advising Government on things like housing numbers, strategically important growth or renewal areas (including new communities) and strategic infrastructure. Vitally, they would also have the key role of determining where local Green Belt reviews are needed to accommodate growth; setting the ‘general extent’ of Green Belt was a critical role of strategic planning authorities before 2011 and is one that is very much needed now.    

Responsibilities for planning and delivering growth (and accountabilities for funding streams) are so fragmented these days, not just in the Oxford Cambridge Arc as recently highlighted by the Government, but across England generally and especially where there is more than one tier of local government. So, a partnership model is needed but decision-making must be on a majority voting basis to ensure that a) decisions can be made in the interests of the greater good and b) any decision-making body can survive long term and therefore can be resilient to changing membership e.g. through local government reform, political leadership changes or organisational changes in other partners.

Current models of joint governance on offer are not fit for purpose.  Joint plans are done through Section 28 of the 2004 Planning and Compulsory Purchase Act and Section 29 allows for joint committees. However, none of the Joint Strategic Plans (JSPs) currently being prepared use S29 as it is very inflexible. It requires an Order of the Secretary of State and therefore needs some legislative time to both establish a new joint committee but also to dissolve an existing one.  It also can’t include both a county and a unitary authority so rules out a huge number of areas, especially the smaller city regions like Derby, Nottingham, Leicester, Brighton.  So every time a decision is needed on a JSP, it has to go through the individual decision-making routes of the partners involved.  This also means that, in two-tier area, county councils have no formal decision-making role as they are not a Local Planning Authority. Decisions therefore also have to be unanimous, which is why the Greater Exeter JSP and Greater Manchester joint plans fell apart – one partner walked away.  Although Spatial Development Strategies are managed under one single governance structure (the combined authority), they still require unanimous support from all partners which is a very high bar to cross.  It will be interesting with this in mind, to see how the Liverpool City Region get on with its SDS – it might well manage to get it through the system with 100% support but will it tackle the real challenges and deliver the transformation needed?  

Perhaps the model that is needed, therefore, is along the lines of the Oxford-Cambridge Arc where the Government will be the ultimate decision-maker but decisions are informed by the advice and evidence prepared by our proposed Strategic Planning Advisory Bodies?

4. One of the key concepts within your ‘Planning Reform’ paper was the idea of an Integrated Strategic Framework (ISF). Can you please explain how this would work particularly in respect to setting out spatial planning policies?

Integrated Strategic Frameworks would bring together the long term priorities of partners around a shared vision for sustainable growth and would have a clear spatial strategy to interpret how this plays out on the ground.  The expectation is that these would not aim to provide a detailed spatial map or site allocations but would set out where the shared priorities are, or as I call them, strategic opportunity areas, such as urban extensions, new communities, major renewal areas, strategic infrastructure. The frameworks would also set out what strategic level interventions are needed to deliver the priorities, including where things like Green Belt boundaries need to be reviewed but also where national-level interventions are needed, for example from government agencies like Highways England or Network Rail. One of the problems we are currently faced with is that local views on long term growth and how this will be delivered are not always aligned with the views (and investment priorities) of government agencies.  In our proposals, the frameworks would be signed-off by Government and would therefore effectively form a contract between local and central government, including government agencies. This also means that there would be much more alignment of funding pots and less time spent arguing at local plan examinations!

5. Do you see zonal planning which is expected to come through the Planning Bill as a form of strategic planning and will this be effective by itself?

I’m not convinced that what the Government is proposing is zoning, which to me is a tool for development management and therefore requires a much more defined approach with many more zones involved.  What the Government has talked about so far - renewal, growth and protection areas - sounds much more like what we used to do in structure and regional plans i.e. high level spatial designations.  Until we see what the Government actually means by its approach, we simply won’t know what implications it will have for the planning system as a whole.

6. You have previously described the Duty to Co-operate (DtC) as “hobbling plan-making”. With Sevenoaks District Council having their Local Plan fail on these grounds and subsequently resulting in legal challenges, together with Tonbridge and Malling Borough Council asking for ministerial intervention on the same issue, it appears that there are significant difficulties in meeting this requirement. Why do you think the Duty to Cooperate has been such an obstacle for Local Planning Authorities to overcome? Do you think that in its absence is where true strategic planning can be found?

The Duty to Cooperate was a last-minute thought when local councillors pointed out to Eric Pickles that something was needed to replace regional planning.  It was introduced in the ‘spirit of Localism’ with the belief that local councils would be able to make difficult decisions about how they wanted their local communities to grow, without any ‘higher authority’ imposing it and that, as part of this philosophy, neighbouring areas would be happy to work voluntarily together to meet development needs, with no real incentives.  It was, therefore, process-driven and, even where authorities have met the legal duty, it has arguably not always delivered good strategic planning outcomes.

However, with the decision-making responsibility came all the risks –political and financial risks – with no one else to blame. On top of that, the numbers of new homes and therefore the planning challenges increased significantly under the post-2011 NPPF system, with many Green Belt (and traditionally Conservative) areas, especially in the South East, suddenly being faced with preparing plans that had to deliver 3 or even 4 times more new homes than ever before. As a result, we have ended up with 10 years of local planning stale-mate in many areas and, in many areas, a sea change in local politics, with an increasing number of residents associations and independent councillors who have been elected as defenders of the Green Belt or on an anti-development ticket. 

7. Looking to the past can often help shape the future. How can the lessons of regional planning be best learnt in order to strengthen the role of strategic planning going forward?

There are a lot of lessons – good and bad – which we must learn if we are going to have a system that works effectively.  For me the four main lessons are:

• We need to get the decision-making right: we need one single responsible body, albeit comprised of different partners with a role to play in facilitating place-based growth. Although the Regional Assemblies had about 70% local authorities, the 30% economic, environment and social stakeholders played a valuable role in influencing the final output.
• Strategic planning is usually best managed at a sub-regional scale but can work alongside regional frameworks which are considered necessary to deliver national priorities around transport and economy, as long as priorities are aligned. It is the Goldilocks Principle – large enough spatial scale to be able to give effect to national policies and priorities but small enough to reflect different local circumstances and context.
• An integrated place-based approach to facilitating growth is essential: This is where regional planning was moving to in 2010 when it was abolished - new integrated Regional Strategies were to replace existing regional spatial, transport and economic strategies. We must move away from a focus on just development – strategic planning must be about delivering good outcomes for the economy, the environment, places and people.
• It is much better to manage strategic planning outside the statutory development plan system: This was the main mistake made in the 2004 system as it moved regional planning from a high level policy framework (RPGs) to a more complex and rigid approach which had to tick all the boxes of a statutory system. It was therefore not flexible and was not responsive to an ever changing context, especially in relation to the economy (as we found out following the 2008 economic crash).  This is why we have proposed that Integrated Strategic Frameworks are treated as policy (preferably national policy) and not as part of the development plan, although they would obviously be delivered (in part) through the development plan system.

8. How important is speed in the planning process and do you think that strategic planning can assist with this element?

If we have long term strategic planning frameworks that are vision-led and outcome focused, a lot of the contentious issues would be resolved before they are delivered through local plans.  This would result in a much quicker system but would also mean that local plans would not have to be constantly being reviewed. However, if we don’t get the decision-making right, we will have a much longer process – imagine a joint strategic plan involving 5 separate local planning authorities all having their own decision-making structures. There is no way they could be prepared in 30 months, as suggested in the White Paper, as it could take 6 months to get the plan through each partner’s committee cycle every time a key decision is needed!     

9. Sigma Strategic Land (SSL) joins other strategic promotion and development businesses in seeking a comprehensive Green Belt review. This must be one of the strongest and most appealing parts of strategic planning. How do you see a strategic Green Belt review being structured and ultimately enacted?

I believe Green Belt is one of the most successful planning policies and has delivered some essential outcomes over the last 50-60 years.  I also think the specific purposes of Green Belt remain valid today. However, it is a strategic policy and for the last 10 years has been treated as a local policy with every individual authority doing their own reviews.  So I don’t believe it is a flawed policy but I do think it needs to be managed (and reviewed) at the strategic scale and applied properly, especially around the big cities. 

10. Strategic Planning has the potential to de-risk sites with its longer timescales that can often weather structural and organisational change, along with different political cycles. Given the potential that strategic planning has to deliver more sustainable growth with its holistic vision for a city, area or region, how would this sit alongside non-strategic planning? Is there a scale that strategic planning is weaker in its operation?

See my answer to Q7. For me, strategic planning is best operated at a sub-regional scale, using the statutory local planning system to deliver the shared priorities on the ground.  Although the CCN approach endorsed a non-statutory approach, one of the benefits of having a joint strategic plan prepared through the statutory planning system is that you should not need a local plan sitting beneath that; we need to use the development plan tool box much more flexibly so focus on areas where change needs to be managed (e.g. through Area Action Plans) as opposed to having a blanket approach to local plans where a joint plan has been prepared. This becomes even more sensible the more permissive the system becomes. 

11. Sigma Strategic Land very much appreciates your time and commitment in participating in this Q&A. Finally, how do you see the role of strategic planning developing over the next few years and do you expect this to be a more prominent and visible vehicle than it is at present?

I really hope that the Government listens to what everyone is saying about the need for a new, much more effective strategic planning system because it has the potential to solve so many of the current problems.  But this will depend on a proper understanding within Government of what strategic planning is and how far they are willing to reintroduce a much more robust and resilient approach to decision-making. Of course, we also need a whole new generation of strategic planners and that will be a challenge in itself. Thank you for letting me share my thoughts. 

Thank you for your time and thought-provoking answers, Catriona.

This is the second in the series of our Q&As with experienced and insightful industry professionals. Please lookout for more very soon!

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