Provisional Hazardous Substances (Planning) Common Framework inquiry launched

1 December 2020

The hazardous substances framework governs the siting of establishments containing hazardous substances in order to prevent major accidents and limit the impact on life and the environment when they do take place. It achieves these aims through setting limits on the amount of dangerous substances that can be stored on a site and providing the planning framework required for the use of such materials to be approved.

The inquiry will form the scrutiny part of the process for establishing the common framework and the processes governing it. It will also examine how effective it will be in supporting a combined approach across governments in the UK and provides mechanisms for resolving any disputes that arise.

Terms of reference

The Housing, Communities and Local Government Committee wants to hear your views. It welcomes submissions from anyone with answers to the questions in the terms of reference. More information about how to submit evidence is available on the inquiry page.

The Committee invites evidence on the detail of the provisional framework. In particular, submitters might like to consider the following questions:

Is the government right to conclude that regulatory consistency across the four nations is not necessary?
On the consequences of policy divergence, is the government right to conclude, as it does in the framework, that "relaxed hazardous substances standards would not bring a significant enough benefit to operators to influence which administration they set up business in to the point where this would distort the internal market".
In the proposed framework, the UK government commits to consulting devolved administrations before ratifying amendments to either relevant international convention. Is a non-legislative commitment to consult sufficient?
Is the process for dispute resolution satisfactory?

Further information

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