8 C O N T E X T 1 3 7 : N O V E M B E R 2 0 1 4 LEGAL BRIEFING Changes to the listed building consent regime The Enterprise and Regulatory Reform Act 2013 has made a number of significant changes to the listed building consent regime with the aim of introducing greater flexibility. The Enterprise and Regulatory Reform Act 2013 (the relevant parts of which came into force on 6 April 2014) has made a number of significant changes to the existing regime for listed building consent, namely: the exclusion of structures or objects from listing, certificates of immunity from listing, heritage partnership agreements, listed building consent orders and certificates of lawfulness of proposed works. These measures should significantly reduce the number of individual applications for listed building consent in relation to minor or routine works to listed buildings. The act also replaces the need to obtain conservation area consent for the demolition of unlisted buildings in a conservation area with a requirement to obtain planning permission. Existing regime Section 7(1) of the Planning (Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas) Act 1990 prohibits any person from executing or causing to execute ‘any works for the demolition of a listed building or for its alteration or extension in a manner which would affect its character as a building of special architectural or historic interest’ without obtaining listed building consent from the local planning authority or secretary of state under section 8. There was previously no way for a person proposing to make minor works to a listed building to legally determine whether those works would, in fact, affect the special character of the building without making an application for full listed building consent. Understandably, conservation officers are unwilling to give any kind of informal assurances in the absence of a formal application. Furthermore, there was no equivalent in the listed building consent regime to ‘permitted development rights’ under the planning regime or ‘class consent’ under the scheduled ancient monument regime, which grant advance blanket consent to development or works which, while they may affect the special character of a building, are still relatively minor or uncontroversial. Exclusion of specified objects or structures from listing Schedule 17 of the act amends the 1990 act to provide for a new listing of a building to specifically state that an object or structure is excluded from the listing. It also allows for existing listings to be updated, to exclude specific objects or structures. This should be a very welcome provision. It will allow developers and conservation officers to specify at the outset which parts of the listed building are intrinsic to its special interest, and to avoid some of the frequent debate over whether a particular object or structure is part of the listed building or within its curtilage when subsequent works are proposed. Certificates of immunity from listing The 1990 act is further amended by Schedule 17 to introduce a right for any person to apply to the secretary of state for a certificate stating that the secretary of state does not intend to list a specified building for at least five years.The act extended the right so that an application for a certificate may now be made at any time. Heritage partnership agreements Section 60 of the act inserts a new section 26A into the 1990 act which enables a local planning authority to enter into an agreement with any owner (or a tenant for a term of seven years or more) of a listed building.This effectively grants advance listed building consent for works specified in the agreement, subject to conditions also contained within the agreement. Section 26A sets out a very wide range of other provisions that a heritage partnership agreement may contain, including setting out works which would not affect the character of the listed building (and, therefore, not require listed building consent at all), provision for the maintenance and preservation of the listed building, for public access or the provision of facilities, information or services to the public, for the restriction of access or use of the listed building, and provision for payments towards the costs of works by the local planning authority, English Heritage or the secretary of state. A number of other bodies can be party to a heritage partnership agreement in addition to the local planning authority and the owner of the listed building: another local planning authority, the secretary of state, English Heritage, a person with another legal interest in the building, an occupier of the building, any person involved in the management of the listed building and any person The text of this article has been amended from the printed version of Context 137 in respect of the timing of the right to apply for a certificate of immunity from listing.The act extended this right so that an application for a certificate may now be made at any time.
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