Give major business investments one consent and a six-month deadline

## Summary Large business investments in England would get one combined consent, covering planning, environmental permits and related licences, with a decision due within six months and fast-tracked legal challenges. Quicker and more predictable approvals should bring forward investment in factories, laboratories, logistics, data centres and energy, which would raise the capital stock and productivity sooner. ## Objective Large projects in England often need separate consents from local planning authorities, the Environment Agency, Natural England, the Health and Safety Executive and others. This can add years of delay, cost and uncertainty, and some projects are deterred or go abroad. The policy would work mainly through **business investment**, by cutting the time and risk cost of consenting. It would also have a secondary **productivity** channel, because new capital would arrive earlier. ## Measures 1. **Eligibility.** Projects in England with capital expenditure above £50m (cash, not indexed) in manufacturing, laboratories, logistics, data centres or energy generation and storage would qualify. Projects already in the Planning Act 2008 development consent order regime could opt in instead. Opting in would be voluntary. 2. **Single consent.** One application would cover planning permission, environmental permits, water abstraction and discharge licences, protected-species licences and hazardous-substances consent. 3. **Lead agency.** A new Major Investment Consents Unit within the Planning Inspectorate would run each application. Other regulators would become statutory consultees with a 10-week response deadline. 4. **Deadline and deemed approval.** A decision would be due within six months of a valid application. If the deadline is missed, consent would be treated as granted under published standard conditions. This would not apply where a habitats assessment or a COMAH/HSE safety assessment is legally required. Those cases would stay under the deadline but would not be deemed approved. 5. **Legal challenge.** Judicial reviews would go directly to the Planning Court, with a six-month target for judgment, a single permission stage and limited onward appeal. 6. **Fees.** Application fees would fund the unit in full. The assumed schedule is £150,000 for projects of £50m–£200m and £400,000 above £200m, giving an average of about £250,000. Fees would be uprated with CPI. ## Timing and phasing - **2027-28:** legislation, recruitment of about 350 staff, IT build and publication of standard conditions. - **April 2028:** the unit opens for applications. - **2028-29:** an assumed 140 applications as the pipeline builds. The first deadlines fall from October 2028. - **2029-30 onwards:** steady state of about 200 applications a year. - **2030-31 to 2032-33:** no further change. A statutory review would take place in 2031-32. ## Cost and financing Figures are in £bn, cash terms, and are additional to the March 2025 baseline. | | 2027-28 | 2028-29 | 2029-30 | 2030-31 | 2031-32 | 2032-33 | |---|---|---|---|---|---|---| | Gross running and set-up cost | 0.020 | 0.045 | 0.050 | 0.051 | 0.052 | 0.053 | | Fee yield | 0.000 | 0.035 | 0.050 | 0.051 | 0.052 | 0.053 | | Net cost | 0.020 | 0.010 | 0.000 | 0.000 | 0.000 | 0.000 | - **Steady state:** the stated £50m a year would be fully fee-funded and broadly consistent with 200 applications at about £250,000 each. Fees would score as negative DEL (departmental spending limits). - **Set-up and ramp-up:** this assumes a £30m shortfall over 2027-28 and 2028-29 before fees reach full yield. It would be financed by reprioritisation within MHCLG's existing departmental budget, so there would be no new borrowing and no new subsidy. ## Delivery **Legislation.** A Major Investment Consents Bill would amend: - the Town and Country Planning Act 1990 - the Environmental Permitting (England and Wales) Regulations 2016 - the Water Resources Act 1991 - the Planning Act 2008 Civil Procedure Rules changes would be needed for the Planning Court. Royal Assent would be needed by early 2028. **Responsibility.** MHCLG would lead, with the Planning Inspectorate delivering. Defra, the Environment Agency, Natural England, HSE and DESNZ would be consultees, and the Ministry of Justice would cover the courts. **Main risks:** - **Recruitment:** shortages of planners and ecologists could slow recruitment. - **Defensive refusals:** regulators might refuse or object early to avoid deemed approval. - **Unfinished applications:** applications could be incomplete, which would stop the clock running. - **Deemed-consent challenges:** legal challenges to deemed consents could test the six-month court target. - **Grid connection:** this sits outside the regime and could remain the binding constraint for data centres and energy projects. - **Low take-up:** take-up could fall short if fees are seen as high. This would create a funding gap. ## Relation to the baseline The March 2025 forecast included: - the December 2024 National Planning Policy Framework reforms, which the OBR judged would raise housebuilding and lift GDP by about 0.2% by 2029-30 - existing planning, permitting and court timescales for non-residential projects It made no specific allowance for later infrastructure consenting reforms, which were then in the Planning and Infrastructure Bill. It included nothing for a single business-investment consent, deemed approval or fast-track challenge. The analyst should therefore treat as additional: - the faster and more certain consenting of eligible non-residential investment in England - the fee-funded unit's direct cost and receipts shown above The analyst should net out any effects of the Planning and Infrastructure Act already reflected in later forecasts.

The proposal would create an optional single consent for business investments above £50m in five sectors in England. A fee-funded unit opening in April 2028 would decide each application within six months, with deemed approval if the deadline is missed and a fast-track route for judicial review. Consenting speed is not a tax parameter, so it is entered as a profiled add-factor on total gross fixed capital formation (IF), which passes one-for-one into business investment (IBUS): a small dip in 2028, a bring-forward hump peaking at ≈£3.2bn a year in 2030, and ≈£1.5bn a year by end-2032, of which ≈£1bn is lasting additional investment. This is cross-checked against the cost-of-capital route and paired with a small rise in trend productivity per hour (TRPRODH) as capital arrives earlier. The unit's direct cost would net to zero after fees and MHCLG reprioritisation, so the fiscal effect comes from capital allowances and from receipts on extra activity; overlap with the Planning and Infrastructure Act 2025 for energy projects is netted out.

### Interpretation The proposal would give large business investments in England the option of one combined consent. Eligible projects would be those with capital expenditure above £50m in manufacturing, laboratories, logistics, data centres, or energy generation and storage. The single consent would cover planning permission, environmental permits, water licences, protected-species licences and hazardous-substances consent. A new Major Investment Consents Unit in the Planning Inspectorate would have to decide each valid application within six months. If it missed the deadline, consent would be deemed granted under published standard conditions, except where a habitats or COMAH/HSE safety assessment is legally required. Judicial reviews would go straight to the Planning Court on a six-month target. Legislation and set-up would run through 2027-28. The unit would open in April 2028, with first deadlines from October 2028, and would reach a steady state of about 200 applications a year from 2029-30. The March 2025 baseline contains today's non-residential consenting timescales and the December 2024 housing-focused planning reforms, but nothing for a single business consent, deemed approval or fast-track challenge. The faster, more certain consenting of eligible projects is therefore treated as incremental, apart from an overlap with the Planning and Infrastructure Act 2025 that is netted out. Consenting speed is not a tax parameter, so it does not move the tax-adjustment factor (TAF) in the investment block. In the published March 2025 code, total gross fixed capital formation (IF) and real GDP (GDPM) are both set outside the model. Business investment (IBUS) is derived as IF less government, dwellings and transfer-cost investment. The policy is therefore entered as a profiled add-factor on IF that passes one-for-one into IBUS, in three phases: - a small dip of ≈£0.3bn a year in 2028, as developers hold back applications for the new regime; - a bring-forward hump peaking at ≈£3.2bn a year (≈0.9% of business investment) in 2030; - a gain of ≈£1.5bn a year (≈0.4%) by the end of 2032, of which ≈£1bn reflects lasting additional investment. The size is cross-checked against the user cost of capital (COC) and desired capital stock (KSTAR) relationship. A second, smaller shock to trend productivity per hour (TRPRODH), building to ≈0.06% by 2032, captures the extra capital arriving earlier. The fee-funded unit would net to zero once MHCLG absorbs the £30m set-up shortfall, so public sector current expenditure (PSCE) is left unchanged. Two scope choices matter. First, energy projects opting in from the development consent order regime already benefit from the 2025 Act's consultation and judicial-review changes, so the energy-segment gain is roughly halved. Second, grid connection sits outside the regime and is assumed to remain the binding constraint for many data-centre and energy projects. ### How it works through the OBR model 1. **The policy enters as extra total investment, which flows straight into business investment.** IF is exogenous in the published code, and IBUS is IF minus government, dwellings and transfer-cost investment. Any add-factor on IF representing private non-residential projects therefore shows up pound-for-pound in IBUS. The starting point is the eligible pipeline: ≈200 applications a year at an average of ≈£220m each, ≈£44bn of capital spending consented each year. The fee schedule implies ≈40% of projects are above £200m. Of that £44bn, ≈£21bn is assumed to be built and to count as fixed investment. This strips out speculative battery and data-centre applications that never proceed, and land and transfer costs. A consent is a gate rather than an engine, so the question is how much the regime changes the timing and number of projects passing through it, not the size of the pipeline itself. 2. **Faster decisions mainly pull investment forward, creating a temporary hump in 2029–2031.** In manufacturing, laboratories and logistics, planning and permits are usually the binding constraint. Projects there are assumed to start ≈7 months earlier on average, once defensive refusals, incomplete applications and challenges to deemed consents are allowed for. Data-centre and energy projects gain only ≈3 months, because grid connection dates often bite later. The weighted acceleration of ≈4.3 months on a ≈£21bn annual flow pulls ≈£7.5bn of spending forward, phased at ≈£2.0bn in 2029, ≈£3.0bn in 2030, ≈£1.8bn in 2031 and ≈£0.7bn in 2032. Before that, ≈£0.3bn of 2028 spending slips as developers wait for the unit to open in April 2028 rather than apply under the old regime. If every project arrives a few months sooner, there is a one-off period in which old-regime and new-regime projects overlap. After that, the flow of spending returns close to its baseline level. 3. **Lower delay and refusal risk act like a cut in the cost of capital, adding a smaller, lasting rise in investment.** In the investment block, desired capital is KSTAR = exp(log(MSGVA) − 0.4·log(COC) + 2.43), where market-sector gross value added (MSGVA) is output and COC is the tax-adjusted cost of capital. Removing several months of holding costs and part of the refusal and judicial-review risk is judged equivalent to cutting the effective COC on eligible projects by ≈7%. That raises their desired capital by ≈2.8% (0.4 × 7%), or ≈£0.6bn a year of extra spending on a £21bn flow. A bottom-up view of projects that would otherwise be deterred or go abroad gives a similar figure: ≈£1.15bn a year gross, or ≈£0.75bn after assuming 35% is displaced from other UK locations or from other uses of scarce construction and grid capacity. Adding the permanent effect of accelerating a growing pipeline (≈£0.3bn) gives a lasting gain of ≈£1bn a year by 2032. Firms invest when expected returns clear a hurdle that includes the cost of waiting and the risk of never getting permission. Lowering that hurdle tips some marginal projects into going ahead. 4. **The extra spending builds up the capital stock, although the brought-forward part gradually washes out.** The market-sector capital stock (KMSXH) accumulates as last quarter's stock less depreciation plus new business investment (IBUSX, which excludes a one-off 2005 transfer). The real depreciation ratio (RDELTA) is 2.2% a quarter. Cumulative extra investment of ≈£9.8bn in cash terms (≈£8.5bn in 2022 prices) leaves the stock ≈£7bn, or ≈0.26%, higher by the end of 2032. The part due purely to bringing projects forward slowly depreciates back towards baseline, because the baseline would eventually have built the same assets. The part due to additional projects persists, which is why the long-run gain is smaller than the peak. 5. **Output (GDPM) rises first through demand, with roughly 30% of the extra spending leaking into imports.** The model's investment import weight (MIF) is 0.234 of IF. Server-heavy data centres and imported plant push the effective import content for this mix to ≈30%. A peak extra flow of ≈£3.2bn a year therefore adds ≈£2.2bn to domestic demand, ≈0.065% of GDP. A small second round through incomes takes the peak GDP effect to ≈0.08% in 2030. The published code holds GDPM exogenous and lets the change in inventories (DINV) balance the expenditure identity. The GDP path is therefore set to match these expenditure-side changes rather than left to the inventory residual. 6. **Over time the larger capital stock raises potential output through market-sector productivity.** The output elasticity of capital is taken as ≈0.25, below the textbook 0.3, because some data-centre and storage capital adds little measured value added. The market sector is ≈85% of the economy. On that basis a 0.26% larger capital stock lifts potential GDP by ≈0.055%. A little embodied-technology gain from newer plant takes it to ≈0.06% by 2032, entered as the TRPRODH shock. More machines per worker means each hour of work produces more, so this channel shows up in productivity and wages rather than in jobs. 7. **Household income and spending follow with a lag.** Private-sector average earnings (PSAVEI) respond to market-sector productivity, with a coefficient of 0.264 on MSGVA growth relative to market-sector employment (EMS). Construction and supply-chain hiring also adds to wages and salaries (WFP). Both lift real household disposable income (RHHDI). The consumption equation has a short-run elasticity to RHHDI of only ≈0.10 but a long-run elasticity of ≈0.44. Consumption (CONS) therefore rises by ≈0.02% in 2029 and ≈0.04% from 2030. That is smaller than the GDP gain because the gain is investment-led and part of the extra profit goes to overseas owners. Households adjust spending gradually to income gains they expect to last, which is why consumption trails investment. 8. **The labour market tightens briefly, then the effect fades.** EMS responds to lagged output growth with a coefficient of ≈0.17 and adjusts slowly towards its long-run ratio to output. Faster output growth normally brings a tighter jobs market, a relationship often called Okun's law. The ≈0.06% positive output gap at the hump lowers the unemployment rate (LFSUR) by ≈0.03 percentage points in 2030, or ≈11,000 people. By 2032 the gain in output is mostly supply-driven and comes through productivity, so the unemployment effect shrinks to ≈0.01 points. 9. **Prices and gilt yields barely move.** A tighter labour market typically lifts wages and prices, the Phillips channel. The brief positive output gap pushes up wages and market-sector unit labour costs (ULCMS) slightly, raising the consumer expenditure deflator (PCE) by ≈0.02% at the peak. As productivity catches up with demand, the effect fades to ≈0.01% by 2032. Effects this small would not move Bank Rate (R), which is held on its baseline path. Borrowing falls only marginally, so the 20-year gilt yield (RL) is unchanged to within a basis point. ### Key assumptions - **Eligible pipeline:** ≈200 applications a year from 2029-30 (≈140 in 2028-29), with average capital spending of ≈£220m. That gives ≈£44bn consented a year: ≈£11bn in manufacturing, laboratories and logistics, ≈£20bn in data centres and ≈£13bn in energy generation and storage. The fee schedule implies ≈40% of projects exceed £200m. - **Realisation and investment share:** 70% of consented manufacturing, laboratory and logistics spending is assumed to be built, 50% of data-centre spending and 45% of energy spending. Of that, 90% counts as fixed investment, giving ≈£21bn a year. - **Acceleration of start dates:** ≈7 months for manufacturing, laboratories and logistics and ≈3 months for grid-constrained data-centre and energy projects. The weighted average is ≈4.3 months after allowing for defensive refusals, stopped clocks and challenges to deemed consent. - **Additionality and displacement:** 8%, 5% and 3% more projects proceed in the three segments, with 35% displaced. That gives ≈£0.75bn a year net, plus ≈£0.3bn a year from accelerating a pipeline growing at ≈4% in cash terms. - **Transition dip:** ≈£0.3bn of investment is deferred in 2028 as projects wait for the unit to open; spending then follows the delivery profile of first decisions from October 2028. - **Planning and Infrastructure Act 2025 netting:** energy-segment acceleration and additionality are roughly halved. Development consent order projects already benefit from the Act's judicial-review and consultation reforms and its environmental delivery plans. No other effects of the Act are counted. - **Import content of the extra investment:** ≈30%, above the model's 23.4% weight on IF, because of imported servers and plant. - **Capital stock and output elasticity:** depreciation (RDELTA) of 2.2% a quarter as coded; an output elasticity of capital of ≈0.25; the market sector at ≈85% of GDP. - **Cost-of-capital cross-check:** the delay and risk saving is judged equivalent to a ≈7% cut in the effective user cost of capital on eligible projects, applied through the model's −0.4 elasticity of KSTAR. - **Capital allowances:** full expensing for plant and machinery (≈50% of spend) and the 3% structures and buildings allowance (≈40%). Corporation tax is 25%, and half of claims are usable in the year of spend. - **Tax content of extra activity:** ≈30% for investment-led demand and ≈37% for supply-side gains. - **Monetary-policy reaction:** Bank Rate (R) is held on its baseline path; the 20-year gilt yield (RL) is unchanged, with moves of under 1bp. - **Direct costs and fees:** the proposal's figures, with take-up at 90% of the assumed 200 applications and half of unit costs fixed. In addition, ≈£9m a year of consultee and Planning Court costs would not be covered by fees. - **Baseline levels:** the March 2025 EFO rolled forward to 2032 at ≈1.7% real growth and ≈2% CPI. Nominal GDP is ≈£3.4tn in 2030 and ≈£3.8tn in 2032. Business investment is ≈£335bn in 2030 and ≈£360bn in 2032. Public sector net debt (PSND) is ≈96% of GDP, ≈£3.65tn, in 2032. The marginal gilt rate is ≈4%. The coefficients taken from the OBR model itself are comparatively firm: the import weights, the capital-stock accumulation and depreciation rate, the cost-of-capital elasticity of desired capital, and the consumption and employment equations. Most of the uncertainty lies in inputs from outside the model: the size and realisation rate of the eligible pipeline, the months of acceleration actually achieved, and the share of projects that are genuinely additional rather than displaced. The results are most sensitive to the acceleration assumption. If the regime saved 8 months on average rather than 4.3, for example because grid connection reform removed the bottleneck for data centres, the brought-forward hump would roughly double to ≈£14bn and peak GDP would be ≈0.13%. If defensive refusals, incomplete applications and legal challenge to deemed consent eroded most of the time saving, the hump could be half the central case or less. Additionality drives the lasting effect: halving it would cut the 2032 GDP gain to ≈0.04% and the supply-side receipts feedback by about a third. The legal durability of deemed approval is a further judgement outside the model. If courts found deemed consent incompatible with the requirement to reach a reasoned conclusion on environmental effects, take-up and the time saving would both fall, pushing all the macro and fiscal gains down. On the fiscal side, the capital-allowance cost depends on how many developers are in taxable profit. The receipts feedbacks depend on the tax content of investment-led activity. Each could shift the net borrowing effect by a few hundred million pounds over the horizon without changing its sign. The assumed monetary-policy reaction matters little, because the macro effects are too small to move Bank Rate. ### Headline results Output (GDPM) is unchanged in 2027, while the unit is still being set up. It is ≈0.01% lower at the end of 2028, when developers holding back applications for the new regime delay some site starts. It then rises to ≈0.07% at the end of 2029 and peaks at ≈0.08% in 2030, as brought-forward projects overlap with those already consented, before easing to ≈0.07% in 2031 and ≈0.06% in 2032. Business investment (IBUS) has the sharpest profile: ≈0.1% lower at the end of 2028, ≈0.85–0.9% higher in 2029–2030, ≈0.6% higher in 2031 and ≈0.4% higher by the end of 2032. By then the remaining gain reflects projects that would not otherwise have gone ahead in the UK, and the earlier delivery of a growing pipeline. Consumption (CONS) rises by a steady ≈0.04% from 2030. The unemployment rate (LFSUR) dips by ≈0.03 percentage points at the 2030 peak and by ≈0.01 points by 2032. The consumer expenditure deflator (PCE) is at most ≈0.02% higher, and the 20-year gilt yield (RL) is unchanged. The demand effect comes early and the supply effect late. The investment hump fades as the one-off timing gain is used up, while the capital-deepening effect on potential output builds gradually to ≈0.06% and would persist beyond 2032. By the end of the horizon, GDP is close to its new, slightly higher potential rather than above it. In scale, the effect is about a third of the ≈0.2% GDP gain the OBR attached to the December 2024 housing planning reforms. That reflects the smaller number of projects and the voluntary opt-in. It also reflects that grid connection, rather than consent, would remain the bottleneck for the most capital-intensive segments.

### Costing the policy - **Gross static cost (mechanical spending increase):** +£0.26bn. These are the Major Investment Consents Unit's running and set-up costs as set out in the proposal, ≈£15m in 2027 rising to ≈£53m a year by 2032 in calendar-year terms. Every figure in this list is signed as a contribution to public sector net borrowing (PSNB): positive adds to borrowing, negative reduces it. - **Fee income (application fees scored as negative DEL):** −£0.23bn. Fees averaging ≈£250,000 on ≈200 projects a year would cover the unit's steady-state cost from 2029-30, but would fall short during the 2028-29 ramp-up. - **MHCLG reprioritisation (set-up shortfall absorbed):** −£0.03bn. The ≈£30m set-up shortfall would be met within MHCLG's existing budget, so the direct lines net to zero. This assumes the reprioritised spending has no measurable macro effect. - **Barnett consequentials (nil: net England DEL unchanged):** £0.0bn. MHCLG's net departmental limit would not change, so there would be no consequentials for Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. If the Treasury instead topped up a shortfall, ≈19% extra would flow to the devolved governments. - **Behavioural: lower take-up and fee shortfall:** +£0.01bn. Assuming 90% of the 200 applications materialise, with half the unit's costs fixed, leaves a fee gap of ≈£2–3m a year. - **Unfunded consultee and Planning Court costs:** +£0.04bn. Meeting a 10-week response deadline would need extra staff at the Environment Agency, Natural England and HSE, and the fast-track route would add Planning Court time. Together these cost ≈£9m a year from 2029, which the unit's fees would not cover. - **Capital allowance cost on extra investment (full expensing):** +£0.78bn. Full expensing lets firms deduct plant and machinery spending immediately. The ≈£9.8bn of extra and brought-forward investment therefore cuts corporation tax receipts by ≈6–8p per pound in the year it is spent, front-loading a cost that would partly reverse after 2032. - **Demand feedback (IT / NIC / VAT on extra activity):** −£1.55bn. The investment hump raises nominal GDP by up to ≈£2.7bn a year in 2030. At an investment-led tax content of ≈30%, that yields income tax and NICs on construction and supply-chain pay, VAT on spending out of those incomes, and corporation tax on suppliers' profits. The figure is net of a small loss in 2028, when spending dips. - **Supply-side receipts feedback (higher potential output):** −£1.48bn. The larger capital stock lifts potential GDP by ≈0.06% by 2032, worth ≈£2bn of nominal output a year. At the average tax content of ≈37%, including business rates on new factories, warehouses and data centres, that adds ≈£0.7bn to receipts in the final year. - **Debt-interest saving (lower debt):** −£0.15bn. Debt ends up ≈£2.35bn lower by 2032, and at a marginal gilt rate of ≈4% that trims interest costs. Gilt yields themselves are unchanged. - **Net cumulative PSNB change:** −£2.35bn. This is the sum of the rows above. Borrowing would be ≈£0.75bn a year lower by 2032, ≈0.02% of GDP, almost entirely because of receipts on higher activity rather than the direct fiscal lines, which net to zero by design. ### Debt path Public sector net debt (PSND) would be marginally higher at the end of 2028, by ≈£0.04bn, because the transition dip lowers receipts. It would then fall below baseline: by ≈£0.27bn by the end of 2029, ≈£0.9bn by 2030, ≈£1.6bn by 2031 and ≈£2.35bn by the end of 2032. The 2032 baseline is ≈£3.65tn, or ≈96% of nominal GDP of ≈£3.8tn. The lower numerator alone cuts the debt-to-GDP ratio by ≈0.06 percentage points (£2.35bn ÷ £3.8tn). The denominator works in the same direction. Nominal GDP is ≈0.07% higher in 2032 (≈0.06% real plus ≈0.01% on prices), which lowers the ratio by a further ≈0.07 points (0.96 × 0.07). That gives a fall of ≈0.13 points in total, and of ≈0.12–0.13 points from 2030 onwards. On the OBR's standard conventions, the measure would be fiscally self-financing. Its direct cost is fee-funded and absorbed within MHCLG, and the receipts on extra activity more than cover the front-loaded capital-allowance cost, leaving a small dividend of ≈£0.75bn a year by 2032. That dividend depends on the investment response and is well within normal forecast error, so it is best read as no structural hole rather than as reliable new headroom.

### Overall pattern Directly, the proposal would change household incomes very little. Developers would save ≈£0.3bn a year in consultancy, legal, duplication and holding costs, net of ≈£50m of fees. About 45% of that saving would go to overseas owners, such as hyperscale data-centre operators and foreign infrastructure funds. That leaves ≈£0.17bn a year reaching UK households, ≈£6 a household on average: ≈£0.1bn through pensions and shareholdings and ≈£0.06bn through wages over time. In cash the gain rises steeply with income, from ≈£1 a year in the poorest tenth to ≈£20 in the richest. As a share of income it is flat at ≈0.01% except in the top tenth, so the cash pattern is mildly regressive. The larger distributional effects are one-off changes in asset values. Land suitable for large sites would gain ≈£0.8bn in hope value, ≈£0.5bn of it going to ≈1,200 landowning households (≈£400,000 each). Meanwhile ≈12,000 households living close to additional sites would lose ≈£4,000 each in home value. Borrowing would also be ≈£0.75bn a year lower by 2032, ≈£26 a household. Counting that, the average household would be a small net gainer, although the gains would be tiny for most and large for a few. ### Who gains - **Owners of land suitable for large industrial, data-centre and energy sites:** ≈£400,000 per household, one-off; a gain in wealth, not income. Faster and more certain consent would raise the expected value of ≈1,000 pipeline sites near grid and transport connections by ≈4%. Around 1,200 farming and estate households own the household share of that land; the rest of the gain goes to institutional owners, land promoters and developers. - **Employees in manufacturing, construction, logistics and energy:** ≈£9 a person a year, ≈0.03% of net income. Part of the business cost saving is assumed to pass into wages over time, in the same way a share of corporation tax is usually assumed to fall on workers. Job and wage gains near new projects are second-round effects and are not counted here. - **Households with private pensions or direct shareholdings:** ≈£6 a household a year, ≈0.01% of income. UK shareholders and pension funds would receive ≈35% of the developers' saving through higher returns, and holdings are concentrated in the top two income deciles. ### Who loses - **Households living within 1km of additional large industrial sites:** ≈£4,000 per household, one-off; a loss of wealth, not income. Additional projects, and deemed consents under standard rather than site-specific conditions, would bring more warehouses, data centres and battery sites close to ≈12,000 homes. That would trim ≈1% from their value and add noise, traffic and visual impact that the cash figure does not capture. ### Paying for it and bond markets - **Future taxpayers:** ≈£26 a household a year, ≈0.06% of income. Borrowing would be ≈£0.75bn a year lower in 2032, and ≈£0.75bn ÷ ≈29 million households ≈ £26 a household. This is an ongoing annual amount, not a one-off or a total over the horizon. Under the fiscal rules the saving would eventually be banked as lower taxes or less spending restraint; if returned through broad-based taxes, higher-income households would gain most in cash. A deficit-financed giveaway has hidden losers among future taxpayers; this measure would instead leave them slightly better off. - **Future taxpayers (lower debt):** ≈£81 per household, one-off. Debt would be ≈£2.35bn lower by the end of 2032, and ≈£2.35bn ÷ ≈29 million households ≈ £81 a household that future taxpayers would not need to service or repay. - **Mortgage borrowers:** £0 a year. The 20-year gilt yield (RL) moves by less than 1bp in the macro table and Bank Rate is unchanged, so the effect on new and refixed mortgage rates is negligible. ### Across the income distribution Across equivalised income deciles, the direct cash gain rises from ≈£1 a year in the poorest two tenths to ≈£9 in the ninth and ≈£20 in the richest. That is because returns to shares and pensions are heavily concentrated at the top, while wage gains are spread roughly in proportion to earnings. As a share of income the figures are ≈0.01% for deciles 1 to 9 and ≈0.02% for the top decile. The cash incidence is therefore mildly regressive but immaterial for almost every household. The averages hide the two groups that matter most. One is the small number of landowning, often rural, households who would capture large one-off land-value gains; they sit mostly in the upper half of the income distribution and far higher in the wealth distribution. The other is the households near new sites, spread across the income distribution, who would bear amenity and home-value losses. Workers in places likely to host the extra investment would also see larger second-round gains in jobs and wages than the averages show. These include the North East, the East Midlands and the area around Oxford and Cambridge. ### Caveats The figures rest on judgement about who captures the developers' cost saving. Both the split (45% overseas owners, 35% UK shareholders and pension savers, 20% workers) and the size of the saving are assumptions. The land-value and home-value effects rely on hope-value and house-price evidence rather than official distributional statistics. These are static first-round effects. They exclude the second-round macro effects shown above, which would add modestly to wages across the distribution: the ≈0.06% rise in GDP, the brief ≈0.03 point fall in unemployment and the small consumption gain. Averages also mask large variation within groups, particularly among landowners and households near sites. The decile allocation draws on the ONS Effects of Taxes and Benefits on Household Income for income levels, the Wealth and Assets Survey and HMRC dividend statistics for share and pension ownership, and Family Resources Survey earnings by sector.