The EAC’s inquiry will gather opinions on how the housing planning reforms may affect nature and climate. Credit: UK Parliament.

The Environmental Audit Committee (EAC) has initiated an inquiry titled ‘Environmental sustainability and housing growth’, aimed at scrutinising the environmental implications of the UK Government’s planning reforms to meet housebuilding targets.

The new Government has pledged to construct 1.5 million homes in England over the coming five years, proposing changes to the National Planning Policy Framework to release more land for the purpose of development.

Responses to the summer consultation on these proposed reforms have raised concerns about their ability to uphold existing environmental protections.

The EAC’s inquiry will gather opinions on how the planning reforms might affect nature and climate.

The Committee’s broad terms of reference include examining the potential for the reforms to support environmental enhancement, encourage active travel, reduce embodied carbon levels, and facilitate local nature recovery networks, all while pursuing housing growth.

An evidence session is scheduled to begin exploring the environmental considerations already factored into the government’s reform plans.

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The EAC’s role is to assess the contribution of government departments and public bodies to environmental protection and sustainable development, auditing their performance against set targets.

Environmental Audit Committee chair and Member of Parliament Toby Perkins said: “Britain has a housing crisis, a climate crisis and a nature crisis. All three must be tackled in tandem and addressing one must not be at the expense of another. The Government’s ambitious target to build 1.5 million homes in the next five years – 300,000 a year – is significant and we must ensure that climate and nature protections underpin any such reforms to our planning system.

“Conscious that changes to the National Planning Policy Framework have already been proposed, the Committee is prioritising this area as our first inquiry. We will be examining whether environmental protections are being sufficiently considered in the reforms, and if not, what the Committee can recommend to Government to ensure that they are.”