The government has published legislation designed to enact its promise to extend all planning permissions otherwise due to expire during lockdown.

The measure is contained within the Business & Planning Bill, which also sets out a new “deemed consent” route designed to speed up the process of approving changes to construction site working hours.

The legislation enacts the government’s promised extension of planning permissions by way of inserting new clauses in to the 1990 Town and Country Planning Act. The government’s aim, following repeated calls by both local authority planners and the development industry, is to back-date the measure to the start of lockdown. Hence, if the new rules are passed by Parliament, they will extend until April 1 next year all permissions that were otherwise due to

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