Given the monumental challenges we face this year, it would be easy to ignore the white paper Planning for the Future as just another thing to think about. But it would be dangerous to do so.

Commentators may be divided about the proposed reforms, but everyone seems to agree about two things: that the planning system must change and that, to quote the prime minister in his energetic foreword, “[this paper proposes] radical reform unlike anything we have seen since the Second World War”.

In 61 pages of poorly drafted and relentlessly repetitive text, the general thrust is deregulatory; much more about speed than about quality. Badged as simpler and more democratic, it’s unlikely to be either if it goes ahead. While Robert Jenrick, as Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, is ostensibly responsible for the white paper (and writes its second, somewhat less energetic foreword), it is often not ministers that come up with the ideas these days.

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