Design South East holds a round table discussion on design quality

Design South East has held a round table discussion at Farrells in London on the relationship between achieiving design quality in new housing and the speed of delivery.  Peter's contribution to the discussion centred on how constant changes to national planning and housing policy have undermined the confidence of developers, local authorities and local communities in the planning system, and have increased the risks involved in planning for the long term.  In addition, the Government's encouragement of developers to renegotiate affordable housing provision on grounds of 'viability' has led to delay and to increasing confrontation between developers and local authorities and the communities they represent.  Value engineering at the end of the design process then often leads to a reduction of design quality, with under-resourced local authorities struggling to uphold quality standards.  Peter argued for greater stability and certainty as the basis for building a new consensus about quality in place making.