The government is expanding its PlanAssist artificial-intelligence planning tool to 15 English councils after early testing cut the time spent on selected planning tasks by 58%, alongside new rules giving professional planning officers greater responsibility for straightforward applications.
The package gives Housing Secretary Angela Rayner something planning reform often lacks: measurable operational results. The government says testing of PlanAssist helped reduce processing times for routine householder applications from eight weeks to four, while 420 planners have now been recruited through government-backed programmes, exceeding the 2024 manifesto commitment of 300.
For construction, the useful part is the combination. The government is adding staff, changing who decides routine applications and testing software intended to remove administrative work from qualified planners. None of those measures alone fixes England's planning system, but together they address three recurring problems: capacity, process and the time planners spend assembling information before making a decision.
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PlanAssist moves from three councils to 15
PlanAssist was developed with Google DeepMind, Google Cloud, Faculty and local authorities. It brings planning applications, local policies and site constraints into one workspace and produces an initial evidence-backed assessment for an officer to review.
The first trial covered Camden, Barnet and Dorset. MHCLG confirmed on 30 October that testing will now expand to another 12 councils, taking the programme to 15 authorities for a 12-month period.
The additional councils are Ashford, Lambeth, Newcastle, Nottingham, Bristol, Cumberland, North Lincolnshire, Rochdale, Redbridge, South Gloucestershire, Stoke-on-Trent and Westminster. The government intends to make PlanAssist available to every council in England by the end of 2027, subject to the expanded testing programme.
Planning officers remain responsible for reviewing applications and making decisions. The software is being used to collect and organise information that officers would otherwise have to retrieve across applications, policy documents and site-constraint records.
That is a sensible use of AI in a planning department. A householder extension does not need an autonomous algorithm deciding whether development is acceptable; it does need qualified planners spending less time searching documents and more time applying planning judgement.
New delegation rules start on 31 October
The technology rollout lands alongside a more immediate change to planning governance. From 31 October 2026, the National Scheme of Delegation requires specified categories of planning applications to be determined by officers instead of automatically reaching planning committees.
The statutory scheme comes from the Planning and Infrastructure Act 2025 and the Town and Country Planning (Discharge of Local Planning Authority Functions) (England) Regulations 2026. Government guidance says applications in Schedule 1 must be delegated to officers, while Schedule 2 cases are presumed to be delegated unless the nominated officer and nominated committee member agree that referral criteria are met.
For homeowners, small businesses and smaller construction jobs, this removes a layer of governance from applications that do not need committee scrutiny. Councillors remain involved where applications raise significant planning, economic, social or environmental issues under the statutory gateway.
The change also stops local constitutions from using some of the automatic triggers that previously pushed applications towards committee, including call-in arrangements or referral simply because a fixed number of objections had been received.
Rayner now has delivery figures behind the reform
LCM has previously argued that Rayner's strongest case for UK construction comes where policy is backed by a delivery mechanism. The latest planning package fits that test better than another announcement about speeding up the system.
There are now 420 government-backed planner recruits, a tested AI system reporting a 58% reduction in time spent on selected tasks, a 15-council expansion programme and statutory delegation rules with a fixed commencement date. Rayner has also said the government intends to recruit 1,400 people across the planning system by the end of the Parliament.
That additional capacity is relevant beyond domestic extensions. Householder applications account for nearly 70% of planning applications each year, so reducing the administrative load attached to that volume could release qualified officers for major housing, commercial and infrastructure schemes.
The direction also follows the government's wider move towards digital planning records. LCM's review of Budget 2026 noted the requirement for councils to digitise and publish key planning documents as open data by the end of 2027. Better structured data should make systems such as PlanAssist easier to use across different authorities and reduce reliance on information buried in PDFs and historic files.
Councils want the delegation rules reviewed sooner
The committee reforms have drawn objections from local government. The Local Government Association supports attempts to make planning more efficient but has argued that restricting councillor call-in powers could weaken local democratic accountability.
The regulations require the government to review the National Scheme of Delegation by 31 October 2028. The LGA has asked for that review to happen in 2027 so any effects on local decision-making can be assessed earlier.
That is a reasonable test to build into the reform. Faster decisions are useful to applicants and construction businesses, but speed is only an improvement if the decisions remain legally sound and the cases that genuinely need committee scrutiny still reach it.
For now, the government has moved further than another planning-reform promise. On 31 October the delegation rules take legal effect, PlanAssist begins its larger 15-council test and 420 additional planners are already in the system. The next measurable point will be whether the four-week processing performance seen in early testing survives a year of use across councils with very different caseloads and planning pressures.
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