Devolution? Not When It Comes to Planning: The East Riding Reality Check

It is becoming increasingly difficult to understand what the Government actually means when it talks about devolution.

​On one hand, Westminster speaks fluently about taking power away from Whitehall and handing it to the regions. Yet, when it comes to planning in the East Riding, we are witnessing the exact opposite. Local powers are being steadily stripped from democratically elected councillors and concentrated upward into the hands of regional mayors and unelected officers.

​For residents across towns from Bridlington to Beverley, this marks a worrying democratic retreat.

​The Squeeze on Local Democracy

​The contradictions are piling up fast. At the local level, changes to planning schemes of delegation have meant that routine, smaller planning applications are increasingly determined by council officers rather than the people you vote for.

​Now, the government has pushed ahead with plans giving regional mayors new powers to "call in" major planning applications and effectively overrule local councils. These sweeping proposals target developments of more than 150 homes, large commercial projects, and any structures standing over 30 metres high.

​For communities who expect a direct voice in how their neighbourhoods change, it feels like the goalposts are shifting.

​"It beggars belief that a Prime Minister who constantly talks about devolution is simultaneously taking decision-making away from the people who are closest to their communities."

— Cllr Denis Healy, Leader of the Liberal Democrat Group on East Riding of Yorkshire Council

​Swept Aside by Mayoral "Call-Ins"

​East Riding councillors live and breathe their local areas. They understand the strain on local roads, the capacity of village schools, and the everyday infrastructure challenges that come with new housing schemes.

​Yet, under the new framework, those insights risk being bypassed entirely by regional figures sitting miles away from the communities affected.

​"Local councillors are elected by the people who live in these communities. They understand the roads, the schools, the infrastructure and the impact that development can have on existing neighbourhoods,"

​"Of course we need more homes and we need economic growth. But that does not mean that local democracy should be swept aside whenever a development becomes politically inconvenient." Cllr Denis Healy 

​Far from empowering the North, the East Riding Liberal Democrats argue this creates a dangerous double-squeeze: decisions pushed down to officers at one end, and pulled up to regional mayors at the other.

​A National Warning on Housing

​The concern isn’t isolated to East Yorkshire. Across the country, Liberal Democrats are pushing back against what they see as a chaotic, top-down approach to national housing targets that ignores local realities.

​"Taking powers away from communities and local councillors is taking powers away from local people. This plan is a direct attack on communities across the country," said Gideon Amos MP, the Liberal Democrats’ national housing and planning spokesperson.

​"Instead of silencing residents and handing mayors a blank cheque, the government should be empowering local councils with the resources to deliver genuinely affordable homes alongside the infrastructure to support them."

​Trust Local Communities

​True devolution means trusting the people on the ground. When decisions about concrete, bricks, and green spaces are made further and further away from those who live with the consequences, trust in the planning system erodes.

​As Cllr Healy concludes:

​"The Government needs to decide whether it really believes in devolution, or whether 'devolution' simply means moving power from Westminster to another tier of politicians while local communities lose their voice."