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A new National Planning Policy Framework was published on 17 August 2026. It is 130 pages, it is the first full rewrite since 2012, and — this is the part that changes what you do this week — its decision-making policies took effect on publication.
Not on adoption of a new local plan. Not after a transition. They are material considerations in every determination and every appeal from the day it was published.
For a small or medium housebuilder, five changes matter.
One: the medium development category exists
The Framework creates a new tier: housing development of 10 to 49 dwellings inclusive, on a site not exceeding 2.5 hectares.
Medium sites remain legally major development, but they now get specific carve-outs under a “proportionate approach”:
- Validation lists must distinguish major, medium and other development, and medium sites should not face information requirements designed for larger schemes where those are disproportionate.
- Pre-application engagement proportionate to the scale of the scheme.
- Access to permission in principle.
- National model planning obligations should be used where relevant, unless there are strong reasons for using something different. Same presumption for national model conditions.
- Flexibility on market housing mix where the plan’s affordable requirement is met.
What medium sites did not get, despite commentary suggesting otherwise: no Building Safety Levy exemption, no cash payment in lieu of affordable housing, no national minimum social rent percentage, and no extension of the Small Sites Metric for biodiversity net gain. All four were floated; none were delivered.
Two: a real site-size allocation duty
Plans must now allocate at least 10% of housing on sites of one hectare or under, plus a further 10% on sites between one and 2.5 hectares, unless there are strong reasons why not.
That is a meaningful upgrade on the old single 10%-under-1ha rule, and it is the policy hook SMEs have wanted for years. Small and medium sites are where SME housebuilders operate, and the supply of allocated ones has been the binding constraint.
The action is not on your applications, it is on your local plan representations. Every Regulation 18 and Regulation 19 consultation you can reach should carry this duty in your response, with evidence of how the emerging plan performs against it. This is the single highest-leverage thing on the list, and almost nobody will do it.
Three: grey belt, and softer golden rules
Grey belt is now embedded in both plan-making and decision-making, with a more granular Green Belt assessment methodology that looks at smaller parcels individually rather than assessing whole swathes. Release can be supported through the evidenced-unmet-need route where there is a land supply shortfall or a Housing Delivery Test result below 75%.
The commercially significant change: the proposed flat 50% affordable housing requirement on grey belt has been dropped. It is replaced with 15 percentage points above the local plan policy requirement, capped at 50%.
On a plan requiring 30% affordable, that is 45% rather than 50% — which on a marginal site is the difference between a scheme that works and one that does not. If you have appraised a grey belt opportunity on the 50% assumption in the last year, re-run it.
Four: viability moves to plan-making
Requirements are to be set in local plans and reflected in land values from the outset, with viability resolved at plan-making rather than renegotiated at application. New planning practice guidance limits the use of viability assessments at application stage.
This cuts both ways and it is worth being honest about which way it cuts for you.
In your favour: more certainty at bid stage. You can price section 106 from adopted policy rather than guessing what you might negotiate down to, and your competitor cannot outbid you on land by assuming a viability reduction they have not secured.
Against you: if you have overpaid for land, the route out has narrowed considerably. A viability case at application is a much weaker instrument than it was.
The practical discipline: price obligations from the adopted plan at land-bid stage, not from an optimistic viability case. That is a change in how you bid, not just how you argue.
Five: the transitional risk on older local plans
Development plan policies adopted before 17 August 2026 may lose weight where they are materially inconsistent with the new national decision-making policies. Policies examined against the new Framework do not suffer that reduction.
That is an argument available to you today, on live applications and appeals. Where an adopted local plan policy conflicts with the new national position, the weight argument exists now, and the applications most likely to benefit are the ones where a dated policy is the only thing standing in the way.
Re-read your live refusals and pending applications against the new Framework before you do anything else.
The things worth knowing but not acting on immediately
Station-area development. Stronger policy around well-connected rail and tram stations, with minimum densities reported at around 35 dwellings per hectare where there are four or more trains an hour and around 45 where there are six or more — plus the ability to alter Green Belt boundaries in suitable station areas without demonstrating exceptional circumstances. If you have a site near a station, this is a genuine upgrade.
Density generally. Development should increase the density of the surrounding area unless clearly justified otherwise.
Accessibility. Plans to require no less than 40% of homes on major developments to meet M4(2). Design that in rather than discovering it at reserved matters.
Structure. Policies are now split between plan-making and decision-making, and a permanent presumption in favour of sustainable development replaces the old tilted-balance mechanism, with narrower grounds for disapplication on design or density conflicts.
What this does not fix
The 1.5 million homes target is off track — around 392,000 net additional dwellings in England between July 2024 and June 2026, roughly 26% of the target, at a rate that would take another five and a half years to reach it.
And the constraint has moved. Barbour ABI recorded planning applications down 56% in a single month, and RICS found 67% of respondents citing financial constraints as their main obstacle. More schemes are getting permission than are getting built. Planning reform helps the front end of a pipeline whose problem is currently at the back end.
Which is worth remembering when reading any planning announcement this year: consent is necessary and it is no longer sufficient.
Four things to do this month: re-run live applications against the new decision-making policies; re-appraise any grey belt site on the softened golden rules; get the 10%+10% duty into every local plan representation you can reach; and start pricing obligations from adopted policy at land bid stage.
If you want that done properly across a pipeline rather than site by site, that is exactly the kind of front-end work we take on.