Category: FALP2014

Minor Alterations 2015

The GLA is making Minor Alterations to the London Plan (MALP) during 2015. These mainly deal with relaxation of limits on parking space in outer London suburbs and with the space standards for housing.

Details are here on the GLA web site.

Just Space put in objections during the consultation period, essentially pressing for a firmer and stronger line on minimum housing standards and resisting the provision of higher levels of car parking in new residential developments where public transport is poor: the priority instead should be to raise the quality and accessibility of public transport. The Just Space submission is here: MALP Housing and Parking Standards – Just Space Response

There will be an Examination in Public. Housing Standards will be considered on Wednesday 21st October and Parking Standards on Thursday 22nd October. Details of the procedures and the Inspector’s proposals for the “Matters” he will consider and the Participants invited to speak are all at http://www.london.gov.uk/priorities/planning/london-plan/examination-in-public/inspectors-draft-matters-programme

Just Space has now submitted responses to the questions posed by the planning Inspector in his “list of Matters” (referred to and linked above). Both on parking and on the weakening of housing standards —especially scrapping “Lifetime homes” and weakening disability access— Just Space organisations are submitting very critical evidence. Downloads here:
Just Space MALP statement parking
Just Space MALP statement Housing Standards

If any Just Space organisations wish to make use of the Just Space seat at either part of the EiP they should contact Richard Lee well in advance of the event.

18/09/2015
Revised London Plan is now out

There have been press stories today from Cannes reporting that the Mayor of London has announced (at MIPIM) an ambitious new London Plan. In fact what has happened is that the Further Alterations to the London Plan (#FALP14) which were debated in last year’s public hearings – EiP – have finally been integrated with previous versions and published. This is now the operative London Plan and can be downloaded from the City Hall web site http://www.london.gov.uk/priorities/planning/london-plan/further-alterations-to-the-london-plan

Work is starting on a complete review of the London Plan (and Just Space plans a conference in the summer on what it should contain). Meanwhile a further set of minor alterations is expected to be published for consultation immediately after the UK general election in May 2015.

Checked Michael Edwards 21 07 2015

10/03/2015
Alarm at loss of London industrial space

Feb 2015 Jenny Jones who chairs the Economy Committee of the London Assembly has issued a strong critique of the Mayor’s policies (or failure to stick to policies) on protecting industrial buildings and land from the developers who would convert almost anything to housing. In her report she draws on Just Space work, on published academic work from UCL and Cass Cities. Her report can be downloaded at https://www.london.gov.uk/media/assembly-member-press-releases/green-party/2015/02/mayor-plans-for-london-manufacturing-to-disappear-within-fifty (dead link. Soarching reveals this page about the report https://www.london.gov.uk/who-we-are/what-london-assembly-does/news-jenny-jones/publication-jenny-jones-past-staff-protecting-workspace but the report itself has disappeared. We have written to complain.

Meanwhile the GLA has allocated £100,000 for a study of industrial land, with this brief, (dead link) to report in May/June. URS consultants and Peter Brett & partners (formerly Roger Tym) (and perhaps others) have been shortlisted and a decision will be made soon (note added feb 19.)

Checked and notes added Michael Edwards 21 07 2025

18/02/2015
About FALP
This page mostly written in spring 2014 with additions up to September 2014.

The London Plan is the Mayor of London’s over-arching strategic planning policy and covers all Inner and Outer London boroughs. Each borough’s local policy must conform with it.

See the key issues here as foreseen in spring 2014

Public hearings (“Examination in Public” – EiP) on the mayor’s latest set of proposed changes started on 1 September and ran through most of the month. The planning inspector will now report back in a few months’ time. Details, topics and documents are on this page of this site. A large number of community and activist groups submitted evidence and ideas and many of these took part in the sessions of the EiP. All the sessions are open to the public, without booking.

From one page on the GLA web site http://www.london.gov.uk/priorities/planning/london-plan you can download:
- The plan itself “Further Alterations to the London Plan” in which proposed changes to the 2011 Plan are shown in blue.
- An erratum slip for it.
- An Integrated Impact Assessment IIA.
- A Habitat Regulations Assessment HRA.
- The SHLAA Strategic Land Availability Assessment.
- The SHMA Strategic Housing Market Assessment.
- [later] slide presentation from the launch event.
- dates of consultations events and EiP timetable and issues.
Consultation on a new version of the London Plan started 15 January 2014 and ended on Thursday 10 April 2014. Detailed material – chapter by chapter – is on this group of pages under the 2014 menu.

Twitter: use #FALP14 and/or #LondonPlan
short URL for this JustSpace page is http://wp.me/P3WY0O-y
meetings for community groups about the Alterations: go to events

Three other important base documents are
- the latest London Office Policy Review LOPR http://www.london.gov.uk/priorities/planning/research-reports/technical-and-research-reports/london-office-policy-reviews (a summary by Ed Jones (UCL) available here)
- and a special study of retailing http://www.london.gov.uk/priorities/planning/publications/consumer-expenditure-and-comparison-goods-retail-floorspace-need
- plus the 2013 London Town Centre Health Check https://www.london.gov.uk/priorities/planning/publications/2013-london-town-centre-check
A (formally) separate consultation is under way on the Mayor’s Draft London Housing Strategy, closing on 17 February. Details and download at http://www.london.gov.uk/priorities/housing-land/consultations/draft-london-housing-strategy

Just Space documents and discussions are here in a topic-based group of pages.

10 Feb: a working group of voluntary and community organisations (including Just Space) has produced a draft response to the Draft London Housing Strategy: Joint VCS response on London Housing Strategy 20140210

Response to the Draft London Housing Strategy from Tom Copley AM http://tomcopley.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/02/Response-to-the-Draft-London-Housing-Strategy.pdf

Debates, discussions, comments by others

Please let us have links to useful material which we can list here.

John Lett of the GLA London Plan team gave a talk on the new plan at LSE, with particular emphasis on office and retail markets (drawing on the two studies linked above). His slides are a 13MB download, linked from just under his name on this page: http://bit.ly/19WWz5h Jennifer Peters gave a short slideshow on 20 Feb summarising the FALP 201400220 Short FALP

Also at GLA on 20 Feb: a summary of the Strategic Housing Land Availability Assessment SHLAA 20140220 SHLAA findings and of the Strategic Housing Market Assessment SHMA 20140220 SHMA findings

Tom Chance blog, beginning to explore scope for densification in London (18-01-14) with some comments http://tom.acrewoods.net/2014/01/17/making-parts-of-london-more-dense/

Blog of Nicky Gavron (leader of Labour Assembly members on planning) blogs a first reaction to the plan: not enough housing proposed and anyway mayor delivers hardly anything: http://www.nickygavron.co.uk/ (15-01-14)

Assembly Member Darren Johnson evaluates the Housing Strategy in the Guardian http://www.theguardian.com/housing-network/2014/jan/29/london-housing-strategy-mayor-boris-johnson?CMP=twt_gu

Peter Eversden, London Forum, writes a 2-page commentary on the new plan, 14 February.

Demography behind the FALP: 2 important presentations by GLA staff (one from the Intelligence group and the other from Housing) were given at an LSE seminar in July 2013 and can be downloaded here: http://lselondonmigration.org/2013/10/07/londons-household-projections-and-their-implications-for-planning-a-roundtable-discussion/

19 March 2014: in response to a query from Robin Brown (JUst Space) the GLA advises that the Supplementary Planning Guidance (SPG) documents promised to support the Plan are expected to be published as follows:
Planning Statement – April
Dust SPG – April
Sustainable Design and Construction SPG – April
Character and Context SPG – May
Draft Social Infrastructure SPG – May
Draft Accessible London SPG – May
Town Centres SPG – early summer
In terms of neighbourhood planning – this will be part of a Lifetime Neighbourhood SPG, however work on this won’t be starting till after the EiP on the further alterations to the London Plan has finished.

Just Space work on the London Plan up to and including the version published finally in 2011 is, for the moment, all on the web site justspace2010

The debates about the last lot of Amendments to the London Plan in 2012/3 (known as REMA) are, for the moment, covered in our wikispaces site {temporarily offline ]
23/01/2015
Public hearings on new Plan under way

The Examination in Public of the Mayor’s proposed changes to the London Plan opened on 1 September 2014 at City Hall and run through most of September.

The structure, topics and programme for the hearings are summarised here, with links to the Statements which Just Space, other community groups and other individuals and organisations have made on each topic.

Users of Twitter should look for #FALP14

Page checked by Michael Edwards 19 07 2025

18/08/2014
EiP Matters, Statements, programme

(Autumn 2014) This page combines the draft Programme with the Matters proposed for discussion in each session and links to the Statements which participants have submitted on each, including those from all the groups affiliated with Just Space. Beware because the Programme could change so it may be wise to check on the official papers (by clicking on the blue links in this paragraph). All timings except the start of each day are approximate because discussions can over-run.

Session 1 Monday Sept 1 2014 1400 to 1800h: The GLA’s duty to cooperate with other authorities Statements on this Matter.

Session 2 (actually 4 half days) Housing need and supply
Tuesday 2 September 0930-1300h and 1400h-1800 2a
Wednesday 3 September 0930-1300h and 1400h-1800 2b
Statements on this Matter. [ including 304_JustSpace_Session2 Housing ]

Session 3 Thursday 4 Sept 0930-1300h Affordable housing
Statements on this matter. [ including 304_JustSpace_Session3 Affordability ]

Session 4 Thursday 4 Sept 1400-1800h Other housing issues: elderly & other groups, density Statements on this matter.
[ including 304_JustSpace_Session4 Housing other matters [

Session 5 Monday 8 Sept 1400h-1800h Minerals and waste
Statements on this matter.

Session 6 Tuesday 9 Sept 0930-1300 & 1400-1800h Employment
Statements on this matter. [ including 195_JustSpaceEP_Session6 Employment ]

Session 7 Thursday 11 Sept 0930-1300h Retailing, town centres
Statements on this matter. [ including 195_JustSpaceEP_Session7 Centres ]

Session 8 Thursday 11 Sept 1400-1800h Transport
Statements on this matter. [ including 304_JustSpace_Session8 Transport ]

Session 9 Friday 12 Sept 0930-1300 & 1400-1800h Climate change, flood risk, water management Statements on this matter.

Session 10 Monday 15 Sept 1400-1800h Implementation
Statements on this matter. [ including 304_JustSpace_Session10 Implementation ]

Session 11 Tuesday 16 Sept 0930-1300 & 1400-1800h London’s living spaces and places Statements on this matter. [ including 304_justSpace_Session11 Places ]

Session 12 Thursday 18 Sept 0930-1300 & 1400-1800h Opportunity areas
Statements on this matter. [ including 304_JustSpace_Session12 Opportunity Areas ]

Monday 29 and Tuesday 30 Sept: reserve days.

18/08/2014
Next steps for Just Space Economy and Planning

After the enormous collective effort of our 40 page response to the Mayor’s proposed Further Alterations to the London Plan (FALP), Just Space Economy and Planning group is, well, regrouping, with two evening seminars and a half-day event planned over the next few months.

JSEP ponders the FALP, gathering evidence and examples with which to respond to the proposed alterations to the London Plan

Fear not! We’ll be getting back to the FALP soon enough, in order to marshal a diverse range of representations on economic issues for the Examination in Public in September. To get involved, contact Myfanwy Taylor (myfanwy.taylor.09 AT ucl.ac.uk). To catch up on JSEP’s work on the FALP, you can read our collective response here (2nd response), and the note of the discussion which informed it here.

But before then…

On Friday 20 June, we’ll be trying to look beyond the minutae of the FALP to develop our thinking on more environmentally sustainable and socially inclusive economic development strategies for London. The London Enterprise Panel (LEP) is currently working on a new Economic Development Plan for London (and have commissioned London First for the task) but its hard to get involved as the meetings are held in private and there’s no community representation. Nearly six months on, JSEP’s request to meet with the LEP still remains unanswered.

We’re also working to organise a long overdue discussion with trades unions, cooperatives and other groups that represent people who work in London, whose voices tend not to be heard in debates about economic issues in planning.

Finally, watch this space for further details about a half-day event to explore how a future London Plan might support a more socially and environmentally sustainable economy We’ll be addressing the questions Boris ducked in the FALP, reinvigorating public debate about how planning policy can support the kind of London economy we want.

Checked by Michael Edwards 17 07 2025

09/06/2014
Strong criticism in community responses to plan

Community groups across London are releasing the comments they submitted on 10 April to City Hall on the Mayor’s draft Further Alterations to the London Plan FALP. #FALP14

A common thread in the responses is that the plan will be a waste of paper because it doesn’t begin to meet the housing implications of growth while it welcomes the growth itself. A linked problem is the way the plan fans the flames of land and property speculation which in turn impoverishes the majority of Londoners while enriching a minority and sprinkling skyscrapers along the river and in arbitrary spots elsewhere.

The Mayor has been shifting the emphasis of his housing policy away from those in the greatest need – and indeed from most average Londoners – for years. In his last round of alterations to the London Plan he followed government instructions to scrap ‘social-rented’ housing and use the new concept that rents up to 80% of local market levels shall be deemed – and named – “affordable”. He even took power to forbid Boroughs from setting lower rent levels within their areas. The London Assembly was so incensed that—quite exceptionally—it voted to reject that Plan. Unfortunately, however, a 2/3 majority would have been needed for the Plan to fall. The changes proposed in this 2014 set of Alterations further shift the emphasis of policy away from London’s real needs.

Other comments on the plan include calls for much more decisive action on air quality and climate change, stronger defence of jobs in industrial zones and suburban centres and much more effective democracy in which local councils meet their people’s needs rather than—as so often—just siding with developers and displacing low- and middle-income communities.

Submissions made to City Hall are available here, as they come in.

Checked 17 07 2025 Michael Edwards

11/04/2014
Consultation responses April 2014

Further Alterations to the London Plan (FALP)

22 May 2014: the GLA has put ALL the April consultations responses, of which there are over 300, online: http://www.london.gov.uk/priorities/planning/london-plan/examination-in-public/responses-to-consultation

The following ones are ALSO available here:

Just Space collective response

FALP Just Space submission Comprehensive critique

FALP JSEP response Economy in more detail

Community group and similar responses

FALP LTF response London Tenants Federation

FALP London Forum short issues and FALP London Forum response

FALP WCC Submission Wards Corner, Tottenham, Haringey

FALP response of Selby Trust Tottenham, Haringey

FALP Response from Tottenham Traders Partnership, Haringey

FALP Response Our Tottenham, Haringey

Wells House Road response to London Plan 080404 Old Oak Common

FALP response of Island Triangle RA OOC Old Oak Common

FALP Friends of Wormwood Scrubs Old Oak Common

Save Ealing Centre response to FALP Housing targets FINAL

FALP response of West Ealing NF Neighbourhood Forum

FALP response of Ealing Fields RA

FALP Response Hayes Community Development Forum para 1.10D

FALP and Air Quality Hayes Community Development Forum-1

FALP response LGTU Gypsies and Travelers

FALP comments Waterloo CDG

FALP 35% campaign response and associated web page FALP 35% campaign Elephant and Castle on “viability” and social housing

FALP Brethren’s Gospels Trust

FALP response LSX on Air Quality

FALP response of Ladywell Society (Lewisham)

FALP Lon Thames Gateway Forum on protection of industrial land

FALP response of PECKHAM VISION

FALP Response Latin Elephant

FALP response of East End Trades Guild

FALP response of Regents Network on canals, Blue Ribbon Network

FALP response of Sustrans (Transport)

FALP sustain submission Food, farming, GrowLondon

FALP Jessica Ferm submission Affordable workspace

FALP Laura Vaughan submission Suburban economies

FALP Michael Edwards submission Employment sectors

FALP response of Pat Turnbull Hackney

Other responses

Campaign to Protect Rural England CPRE London

FALP London Waterways Commission

09/04/2014
8 Implementation
This page relates to chapter 8 – implementation, monitoring & review in FALP

To download the Further Alterations to the London Plan as a whole, or download supporting evidence and related documents, go to our Greater London page. Or you can download this chapter on its own here.

Short summary of the changes: FALP Ch 8 summary 2pp

Workshop on MDCs and implementation: key recommendations:

Note that Chapter 8 on Implementation has many changes which are potentially helpful as ‘hooks’ to hang your issues on, e.g. see the Key Performance Indicators.
- Targets (homes & jobs) are already missed. FALP changes do not reflect evidence around previous versions of Enterprise Zones ( e.g. which simply relocated jobs rather than created new jobs).
- MDCs are strategic matters/proposals, so their aims, areas, scope, governance etc. should be published in the London Plan and should involve genuine/meaningful consultation.
- Transparency with community representation on Enterprise Zones/MDCs. Alternative financing/housing model likely to overstimulate over heated land market (e.g. borrowing to finance development now on the basis of future hopes for financial return).
Report of the workshop 140315 JS delivery models workshop
16/03/2014