New planning rules tell English councils to back broadband builds
The government published a new National Planning Policy Framework for England on 17 August. One chapter of it decides how your council has to treat the next mast, cabinet or fibre exchange somebody proposes near your home. As ISPreview reports, planners are now told to give substantial weight to the benefits of maintaining or improving network coverage, capacity, reliability and resilience, gigabit broadband and standalone 5G included.
Substantial weight is planning language, not a guarantee. It approves nothing on its own. What it does is start the benefit side of the scales heavier before anything else goes on them. The same chapter also sets out what a council may no longer do: insist on a minimum distance between telecoms kit and other buildings, question whether an upgrade is needed at all, apply its own health standards in place of the international radiation guidelines, or try to keep rival operators apart.
Plenty of it still reads the resident’s way. Operators are told to use the masts, buildings and structures already carrying this kit, or to upgrade what is there, unless there is no reasonable opportunity to. Anything new has to be sited and designed to keep its visual impact down. An application has to turn up with evidence that existing structures were looked at first, and with the outcome of consultation, particularly where a mast would go near a school or college. Visual impact is still something you can object on. What has changed is what the council has to weigh it against.
Behind the change are two government targets running late. ISPreview puts standalone 5G in all populated areas by 2030 and gigabit-capable broadband at around 99% of the country by 2032, against roughly 91% today. Mobile UK, the operators’ trade body, called the wording a necessary step forward that gives planners a clear mandate and should cut delays.
Guidance to decision-makers is not equipment in the ground, though. ISPreview makes the point that councils still have to weigh public opinion, visual impact and safety, and that planning departments short of staff are arguably the bigger brake on anything getting built. Mobile UK is also still asking for changes it has not been given, permitted development rights among them, so the argument about what can go up without a proper application carries on.
Nothing on your bill moves today, and nobody can honestly tell you your street is served sooner for this. The framework covers England, and the other nations run their own planning systems. If you are waiting on a faster line, the availability checker is the only thing that answers it, and our guide on when full fibre reaches your street covers what actually governs the timing.