<a href="https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/boardroom-suggestion" target="_blank" rel="noopener">This meme</a>  features a guy being thrown out of a window of a boardroom meeting when he suggests a simple solution following suggestions that miss the point. This meme is the natural counter-weight to the anti-Cheems mindset. There is a tendency to suggest in unfavourable environments “what if we just came up with an entirely new planning regime?!”, when more gradual but politically feasible changes are likely to have more chance of making an actual positive impact. A good example is the ongoing debate about consultation. On the one hand, someone would say wouldn’t be wonderful if we just removed it? On the other hand, the political resistance and the alleged benefit of identifying problems sooner gets raised.

I guess the point here is that a model for planning reform which is just “this is good, and this is bad” without considering secondary effects and political viability ends up eating a lot of time without doing much. For example, if I had a large majority in a new government, I might be more ambitious on reforming consultation. If I didn’t, and was worried about long-term backlash, I might suggest ‘why don’t you get rid of Category 3 persons’, make changes to statutory guidance to stop excessive consultation, and – at a stretch – remove the requirement for a PEIR. Not thinking through political constraints, different actors and power-brokers (e.g., PINS, the civil service) means you run the risk that your ideas will be lost like a fart in the wind.