The adverse impact of over production of nutrients is something we have known about for a long time, unfortunately there has been little coordinated action to address the matter. As my grandmother would have said “A stitch in time saves nine”, I suspect there are some who feel that on this issue we long ago passed the point where nine stitches were going to do the job but to use another we worn phrase, better late than never.

In summary we can breath a sigh of relief and carry on as before with a system that allows contaminated land to be dealt with by planning conditions.

There is an excellent summary of the government’s response to the ‘intend to publish’ London Plan on the Pinsent Mason website

“The UK government has directed that significant amendments be made to the new London Plan, citing “deeply disappointing” progress on delivering much-needed housing stock. …”

On 12 March 2020 the Government published a policy document entitled ‘Planning for the Future‘ which sets out its plans for the delivery of housing and further reforms to the planning system.

The title of a very informative article in the September/October AGS Magazine. If you want to take advantage of the opportunities or avoid the risks of contaminated land then this article is worth a read.

It helps to underline the fact that for a successful project contaminated land has to be addressed as an integrated part of the project and not an after thought. The latter approach often leads to delays and additional costs.