THIS AUGUST just gone may go down in UK logistics history as an auspicious month – when a government published actual planning policy with regard to Britain’s logistics sector.

The revised National Policy Planning Framework’s Section 7 is the first dedicated planning policy for the UK’s freight and logistics interests. It establishes new parameters for local authorities and defines the cases where decision-makers must give substantial weight to certain development benefits.

The importance of these changes for the logistics and transport industries cannot be overstated. A flexible, multi-faceted vision revolving around the central mission of growth is finally taking into account the subtle and silent role played by the firms that make it all happen; getting products from A to B and supplying the innovators, importers and exporters that are the cornerstone of the government’s ambitions. Only a joined-up approach like this can deliver the growth, development and stable economic ecosystem that the government wants to stimulate in areas up and down the country.

For instance, requiring local authorities to set out a clear economic strategy within their development plans will provide the kind of conditions businesses have long coveted to grow, hire and invest. And in making provision for “clusters, networks and sites for knowledge and data-driven, creative or high technology industries”, the government is laying the groundwork for the kind of complicated economic gear shift it often champions; a jolt to a forward-looking, reindustrialised country. Far away from the ivory towers of academia, and the gleaming laboratories of the Oxford-Cambridge corridor, the role logistics firms play in delivering this generational jumpstart nationwide is finally being recognised by policymakers.

New, expanded or upgraded facilities and infrastructure will support the growth of these industries. Local plans are expected to account for the complex tapestry of distribution networks, last-mile logistics, freight corridors and supply chain infrastructure.

This growth agenda will be underpinned by a further requirement on local authorities to proactively identify and remove planning barriers that hinder long-term investment. Decision-makers are to give “substantial weight” to the wider economic benefits of commercial and business development proposals, explicitly including freight and logistics, and planning decisions must factor in employment land shortfalls, existing allocations, and wider commercial market signals when considering applications.

The reforms have been widely, if cautiously, welcomed by industry bodies, relieved that logistics has at long last been given a seat at the planning table. Logistics UK Chief Executive Ben Fletcher reacted positively to the reforms but added they would continue to call for stronger recognition of logistics as critical national infrastructure and greater protection for existing logistics land.

The UK Warehousing Association (UKWA) cited current difficulties for securing consents and commended increased obligations on local authorities to provide appropriate sites going forward. A UKWA poll on the Freight & Logistics (E3) aspect of Section 7 received 657 responses, 51% of which strongly or partly supported it. There is certainly cautious optimism, but it is too early to say yet whether these latest reforms have moved the planning system on from the ‘age of sheds’ to the ‘age of strategic assets’.

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