Communities Secretary Sajid Javid has announced today radical new proposals to crack down on the use of leaseholds in new-build homes. Leaseholds have previously been used for flats with shared communal areas however the number of houses sold as leaseholds has increased significantly in recent years. In many of these cases, there are clauses within the leaseholds that specify significant increases in ‘ground rent’ charges. A common example is for the ground rent to double every ten years. This has led to some leaseholders being left with homes that are almost impossible to sell. In other instances, the freehold has […]

  A year on from Brexit, A weak and wobbly Great Repeal Bill, New Leader of St Albans Council     National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF) Steve Quartermain, the Chief Planner of the DCLG has said that the Government will be looking to make the much discussed revisions to the National Planning Policy Framework this year. The department anticipate that a consultation will be launched no later than this summer, and that the department will be working on a revised NPPF towards the back end of this year. Savid Javid, Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, has said […]

After much speculation, the Government has now published details of its so-called Great Repeal Bill. It is safe to say that majority of people will have found it a great disappointment. The European Union (Withdrawal) Bill will repeal the 1972 European Communities Act, bringing an end to Britain’s membership of the European Union. European laws will no longer take precedence over UK laws and the jurisdiction of the European Court of Justice will be removed. So just how much control are we taking back? Untangling European law will be a messy affair. In reality, if and when the Bill becomes […]

  Waverley Borough Council’s Local Plan is under examination – early indications suggest the council will need to provide more homes. The examination in public (EiP) of Part 1 of the Waverley Local Plan, allocating strategic sites across the borough up to 2032, got off to a rocky start in Farnham last week. Such was local interest in the EiP that two additional rooms had to be provided at the council’s offices to accommodate the numbers. In April, in preparation for the EiP, the inspector had posed a series of questions to the council. These included questioning the allocation at […]