Tom Symonds
Political correspondent
Chas Geiger
Political reporter
Sir Keir Starmer has announced plans to block campaigners from making repeated legal challenges to planning decisions for major infrastructure projects in England and Wales as part of the drive for economic growth.
No 10 says the proposals will prevent “cynical” and “hopeless” appeals blocking new nuclear power stations, roads, railway lines and wind farms.
Sir Keir vowed to end a “challenge culture by taking on the Nimbys [Not in My Back Yard]” who, he said, stood in the way of growth.
Campaign group Friends of the Earth accused Labour of attempting to “scapegoat” people with “valid concerns about a project’s impact”.
The Conservatives welcomed the initiative, but said the government must also scrap environmental regulations which they say increase the cost of major projects.
According to the government, more than half of decisions on nationally significant infrastructure projects are taken to court – causing an average delay of 18 months and adding millions to costs.
Opponents of major schemes currently have three opportunities to secure permission for a judicial review: writing to the High Court, then in an oral hearing and finally by appealing to the Court of Appeal.
Under the government’s proposals, the written stage would be scrapped – meaning campaigners would have to persuade a judge in person to order a judicial review.
In addition, any challenge deemed “totally without merit” by a High Court judge would not be eligible go over their head to the Court of Appeal.
Scotland has its own legal and judicial review system, while there are also separate rules in Northern Ireland.
The government has made economic growth its top priority, and building major transport and power projects is a key part of that.
Downing Street says wind farms in East Anglia, Sizewell C nuclear power station in Suffolk, and improvements to the A47 in Norfolk have each been held up for two years or more by legal challenges which were eventually dismissed as hopeless or having no logical basis.
Ministers said overhauling the rules, in the upcoming Planning and Infrastructure Bill, would send a strong signal to global firms looking to do business – that the UK was a “great place to invest”.
Speaking at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, on Wednesday, Chancellor Rachel Reeves signalled her intention to back expansions to Heathrow and Gatwick airports to help boost growth, despite environmental concerns shared by several senior Labour figures.
“When there are decisions around infrastructure investment, the answer can’t always be ‘no’, and with this government the answer is ‘yes’,” she told the BBC.
The Treasury is looking at whether to approve a third runway at Heathrow and a second one at Gatwick.
Sir Keir said it was time to fix “a broken system that has slowed down our progress as a nation”.
“For too long, blockers have had the upper hand in legal challenges – using our court processes to frustrate growth,” he said.
Niall Toru, senior lawyer at Friends of the Earth, described the proposals as a “deeply concerning” bid to “favour developers at a cost to people and the environment”.
“Friends of the Earth only brings cases we think are strong and necessary to protect people and nature from unlawful harm, and considering our string of recent legal wins, so do the courts.
“If ministers don’t want to be challenged in the courts they should act within the law, because already cases aren’t allowed to proceed unless they have merit.”
Labour has promised to make 150 major infrastructure project decisions by the next election.
Officials pointed to cases including the approval of Sizewell C, where campaigners spent 16 months seeking permission for a judicial review despite their case being described as “unarguable” at every stage.
However, only some of the grounds in the Sizewell C case were deemed “totally without merit”, meaning the remaining grounds could still have been reconsidered by the Court of Appeal.
Alison Downes from campaign group Stop Sizewell C said the scheme had been delayed by funding issues, not legal challenges.
She added: “Sizewell C remains a deeply flawed project as local people are only too aware, and crucial decisions that have been at the root of legal challenges – such as the water supply and sea defences – remain unresolved.”
The government’s proposals follow a review by planning lawyer Lord Banner, who recommended streamlining the judicial review process so claimants had “fewer bites of the cherry” when seeking permission to bring a case.
Welcoming the proposed changes, Lord Banner said “reducing the number of permission attempts to one for truly hopeless cases should weed out the worst offenders”.
