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With planning officers facing rising workloads due to system bottlenecks, pressure from the Government to deliver housing targets, and a decline in planning recruitment, the need for digital transformation is rapidly growing. This blog explores how purpose-built AI could help relieve these pressures by automating time-consuming processes and improving efficiency when the planning system needs it most.
LPAs are under a significant amount of pressure to meet the Labour Government's goal of 1.5 million new homes by 2029, averaging a production of more than 300,000 new homes per year (3). A BBC Verify house tracker found that roughly 200,000 new homes had been built during their first year in Parliament, which was down 8% from the previous year (4). However, this was not the same for planning requests, which were up 49% outside of London earlier this year. No doubt, this is putting enormous pressure on LPAs to process applications quickly, with demand continuing to rise.
With roughly 600,000 planning applications submitted in the UK each year, planning officers are required to manually validate and approve numerous technical documents and drawings for each individual project. The statutory planning timeline for major developments in the UK should be 13 weeks, however, only 20% of decisions fell into this timeframe last year (5), indicating the risk of delay under the current system.
This image depicts the typical lifecycle of a planning application (6). It’s a lengthy process with multiple stages where applications can stall. In particular, the validation stage can act as a blockage due to the room for error for applicants. A planning officer must validate an application before it is ready for assessment, with each council having a specific set of requirements. A lot of councils are receiving a large number of invalidated applications. For example, Tewkesbury Council invalidated approximately 45% of all submitted planning applications last year (7). Reasons for this are mainlydown to applicant errors, including oversights like missing plans, unlabelled drawings, and incorrectly signed and dated forms (8). What starts as a simple mistake can quickly turn into hours of manual work for officers.
Another issue LPAs are facing is the lack of sufficient planners available to them, with 82% of councils citing struggles with hiring planners (9). 33 related organisations have taken direct action against this by addressing a letter to Housing Minister Matthew Pennycook in a desperate attempt to reinforce the hiring and education of planning apprentices (10).
Change needs to happen. Manual validation processes create bottlenecks that technology can solve. What officers need are tools that integrate into existing workflows and automate repetitive tasks.
AI holds clear potential to streamline the validation of planning applications. By automatically flagging common errors in forms or inconsistencies in drawings, such tools could help officers focus on higher-value work rather than chasing missing information. If implemented with care, this kind of automation could reduce validation delays and significantly shorten the amount of time it takes for an application to move from submission to assessment. However, the integration of AI into LPA systems requires much more than a quick fix. It needs the highest expertise in planning data and a deep understanding of officer needs and workflows, ensuring that officers remain completely in control.
Earlier this year, we hosted a collaborative workshop with Idox Plc (11), where we invited planning officers from five local authorities to discuss the everyday challenges they face within their current systems and how digital innovation could tackle this (12). The discussion focused on AI built specifically for officers, and what this would look like. It was an impactful, real-life example of how intelligent planning software can ease pressures through digitalisation of key processes, including validation automation, consultation simplification and overall productivity enhancement - all whilst keeping officers in the driving seat.
Recent examples of AI being introduced into local government include Extract, a tool unveiled by the Prime Minister earlier this year, which proposes to speed-up planning permissions by scanning hundreds of files, working to boost Starmer’s Plan for Change (1). Built by Google's Gemini, Extract is proposed to quickly convert old and complicated planning documents into comprehensible digital data, a process that typically takes officers up to 2 hours (13). This is set to be rolled out to councils mid-next year.
Another example can be seen in the Government’s new Minute tool, which uses a transcription engine and a large language model to produce comprehensive summaries of meetings for public servants, saving them time from note-taking, transcribing and encapsulating crucial meetings, interviews and appointments (2). This is currently being trialed with 22 local authorities.
Whilst the Government is making steps towards AI procurement in local government, it is critical that these tools are tailored to all local authorities, and not just designed as a “one-size-fits-all solution” (14). In response to a recent Government report which set out a 6-point plan for long-term digital reform, the LGA supported the premise of championing such transformation, but highlighted the differences in council composition (15). Councils vary in their digital infrastructure and technical capacity, and the right solution needs to work seamlessly with the systems councils already use. There is a call for a new AI initiative that encapsulates national strategy whilst being accessible for all local authority workflows.
To add real value to the planning process, AI integration needs to be grounded in a deep understanding of the pressures and complexities officers navigate each day, ensuring the technology supports their judgement rather than displacing it. It’s not about substituting human decision-making, but about building tools that respect officer expertise, reflect and transfer easily into their current workflows, and leave them firmly in control. A purpose-built AI tool that encapsulates these requirements could seriously streamline the planning pipeline, supporting the Government's housing targets while easing pressure on planning teams.
AI in planning must be tailor-made, not retrofitted. The right technology (integrated into existing workflows and designed with officer input) can maintain professional judgment while reducing administrative burden. Implementation must be gradual, carefully governed, and rooted in genuine collaboration with planning teams. Done thoughtfully, AI becomes a tool that supports planners.
Join the conversation! If you’re a planning officer, involved in local planning or interested in digital innovation, we’d love to hear your thoughts. Get in touch at hello@planda.co.uk
