Cutting red tape on heritage buildings could help unlock 670,000 homes, MPs tell government

Fast-tracking planning applications to transform historic buildings into housing could help unlock 670,000 homes, a cross-party group of MPs has told the government.

In a newly published report, the Culture, Media and Sport (CMS) select committee said an “overly rigid” planning system was allowing too many listed sites to fall into disrepair instead of allowing them to be reused as housing.

The 68-page report followed an 18-month long inquiry which heard evidence from architects, local authorities, trade bodies and heritage groups including Historic England, SAVE Britain’s Heritage and the City of London.

It found listed buildings including churches, factories and monuments across the UK are under increasing strain from cost pressures, workforce shortages and a planning system that is “complex and inconsistent”.

The select committee has called for a new ‘heritage-to-housing’ scheme which learns from approaches used overseas by adopting a clear re-use first policy on new housing developments.

The report highlighted Italy’s €1 house model, where historic buildings were sold cheaply on condition of restoration, as a potential way to meet housing needs while preserving heritage sites.

The committee also said the existing listed building consent system for planning applications on protected sites was often found to be “punitive rather than preventative”, allowing listed buildings to decline rather than approving necessary maintenance or reuse works.

The report called for local and national Listed Building Consent Orders, a rarely used fast-track system for applications on protected sites introduced in 2013, to become a “standard and accessible route” for the approval of low-risk and routine heritage work.

It also urged the government to provide more funding for conservation officers and heritage specialists in local authorities, skills in the heritage repair workforce and owners of historic sites to enable repairs.

The committee’s chair, Conservative MP Caroline Dinenage MP, said the report had found that the most effective way to protect a historic building was for it to be “occupied, used, lived in and loved”.

But Dinenage said the government’s approach to reusing historic buildings “reveals a deep complacency, is devoid of ambition, and shows a complete lack of imagination”.

“Old buildings and other pieces of our past play a vital economic, social and cultural role in our communities, but the sight of leaking roofs, crumbling brickwork and vacant premises illustrates how the current policy approach to heritage is failing miserably to support either its protection or potential,” Dinenage said.

She added: “Other countries with a similarly rich heritage have shown what can be achieved by thinking outside the box. ‘Reuse first’ should be the guiding principle, with a heritage to housing scheme offering a clear win-win by preserving our historic buildings and helping to meet the pressing need for new homes.”

SAVE Britain’s Heritage director Henrietta Billings said the report, which followed similar recommendations from the Environmental Audit Committee last year, was a sign that a “consensus is growing” on the reuse of historic buildings.

The CMS report also comes five months after the publication of research by Grosvenor, the Duke of Westminster’s property company, which warned that an overly complex planning system was holding back repairs and decarbonisation works on listed buildings.

The Grosvenor report found councils spend around 4,000 working days each year processing listed building consent applications for low-risk measures such as insulation and heat pumps, with only a third being decided within the required eight-week timeframe.