The Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities has allocated £1.59m to a scheme to help councils recruit and develop more planners after architects reported a threefold increase in projects being cancelled because of delays in the planning process.

Last month’s RIBA Future Trends survey found 22% of practices reporting that projects had been abandoned in the previous three months because of delays in processing planning applications. The latest Future Trends survey – published on Thursday – describes planning delays as a “top concern” among architects.

DLUHC’s just-confirmed funding boost will go to the Local Government Association’s newly-launched Pathways to Planning Programme, which will place talented graduates in councils and support around 30 people with placements and bursaries while they study towards a planning masters.

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