Britain must speed up to survive the AI era Opinion The AI era will reward the small number of countries that can adapt and build quickly enough and it will punish those that can’t, says Sam Richards “Well, in our country,” said Alice, still panting a little, “you’d generally get to somewhere else – if you ran very fast for a long time, as we’ve [...]
‘Great shame’: Berkeley challenges blocked Peckham development Property Berkeley has launched a bid to push through its 850-home development at a “run down” Peckham shopping centre, slamming the council for its “spectacular failure” to meet housing targets. The FTSE 250 housebuilder has applied for a judicial review of the planning inspectorate’s decision to block the plans, which it says wrongly put heritage concerns [...]
Fuse boss attacks planning rules as a ‘self-imposed bottleneck for growth’ Energy Alan Chang believes Britain’s energy crisis is largely self-inflicted. The founder of Fuse Energy, the $5bn (£3.72bn) energy supplier and infrastructure developer, argues that the UK already has the ingredients needed to drive investment in the sector. What it lacks, he says, is a planning system capable of turning that potential into projects. “There is [...]
Jeremy Hunt is right to ask Can We Be Rich Again? June 9, 2026 With the CBI’s latest economic forecasts warning of a dramatic spike in unemployment and a prolonged period of anaemic GDP growth, it’s a good time to reflect on the question posed by former chancellor Jeremy Hunt in his latest book, Can We Be Rich Again? The book is the latest in a series of works [...]
Soho killjoys are the worst kind of Londoners June 4, 2026 The Soho Society has declared a Nimby campaign against all new licensing applications. If they don’t want to live in the party centre of London they should leave, says James Ford What is the collective noun for a bunch of party poopers? A kennel of killjoys? A complaint of curmudgeons, perhaps? Well, if left to [...]
£450m City block approved after developers lop three storeys of plan May 29, 2026 Revised plans for a new £450m tower in the City have been rubber-stamped by the Square Mile’s planning committee after developers chose to lop three stories off the building’s design in response to fierce local criticism. The City of London Corporation greenlit an adjusted proposal for the 1 Silk Street mega-scheme on Thursday, saying it [...]
Labour has not delivered on planning reform, manufacturers say May 26, 2026 UK manufacturers have hit out at the country’s archaic planning system, claiming the Labour government has not delivered on stated aims to back builders over blockers. A new report from industry body Make UK found that almost half of manufacturers (46 per cent) believe the current planning system is still hampering the UK’s economic potential, [...]
Is housebuilding in London impossible? May 25, 2026 After its 900-home development in Peckham was blocked, housebuilder Berkeley said it can “no longer invest” in London. Felix Armstrong asks whether development in the capital really has hit a brick wall At the Aylesham Centre in Peckham, south London, shoppers are met with graffitied walls, peeling paint and shuttered retail units. The site began [...]
‘Downright offensive’: Southwark council slammed for blocking 900 homes May 19, 2026 Southwark council has been blasted for celebrating the blocking of an 867-home development on the site of a Peckham shopping centre. The local authority hailed a “great day for Peckham” after housebuilder Berkeley failed to overturn a ruling against the development, which would have delivered retail, leisure and commercial space alongside the hundreds of homes. [...]
Councils turn to AI to boost housebuilding May 18, 2026 Local councils across the country are turning to artificial intelligence to speed up the planning process, as Labour’s 1.5m housebuilding target clashes with a slowing construction sector. A number of local authorities – including several in the capital – have either piloted or implemented AI planning tools, but housing leaders have warned that the government [...]