It was announced in the Queen’s Speech in May that the Coalition is to introduce a Bill which would devolve greater powers to councils and neighbourhoods and give local communities control over housing and planning decisions.

The bill is expected to be published in late November 2010. This major piece of legislation is likely to affect housing, planning and local government legislation dating back, in some cases, decades.

The coalition states that the main benefits of the Bill will include the following:

• Empowerment for local people
• Free-up local government from central and regional control
• Give communities a share in local growth

The Bill sets out significant new powers and freedoms from local councils and communities, and will include reforms to the planning system. In October’s Spending Review the government identified the current planning system as an important area in need of structural reform.

The main elements of the Bill are:

• Abolish Regional Spatial Strategies.
• Return decision-making powers on housing and planning to local councils.
• Abolish the Infrastructure Planning Commission and replace it with an efficient and democratically accountable system that provides a fast-track process for major infrastructure projects.
• New powers to help save local facilities and services threatened with closure, and give communities the right to bid to take over local state-run services.
• Abolish the Standards Board regime.
• Give councils a general power of competence.
• Require public bodies to publish online the job titles of every member of staff and the salaries and expenses of senior officials.
• Give residents the power to instigate local referendums on any local issue and the power to veto excessive council tax increases.
• Greater financial autonomy to local government and community groups.
• Create Local Enterprise Partnerships (to replace Regional Development Agencies) – joint local authority-business bodies brought forward by local authorities to promote local economic development.
• Form plans to deliver a genuine and lasting Olympic legacy.
• Outright abolition of Home Improvement Packs.
• Create new trusts that would make it simpler for communities to provide homes for local people.
• Review Housing Revenue Account.

The Bill applies to England and Wales.