The Housing Delivery Test and the presumption in favour

The Housing Delivery Test presumption bites at 75 per cent. Below that figure, the presumption in favour of sustainable development applies to applications for housing development in that local planning authority's area, which is the consequence every applicant and every objector actually cares about. Above it, the consequences are an action plan at below 95 per cent and a 20 per cent buffer on the five year housing land supply at below 85 per cent, and neither changes the decision-making balance directly.

How the measurement works

The test is a backward looking arithmetic exercise, published annually by government. It compares the number of net additional homes delivered in an authority's area over the previous three years with the number of homes required over the same three years, and expresses the result as a percentage.

Two features of the method matter in argument. Delivery is measured from net additional dwellings, which includes conversions, changes of use and some communal accommodation on a ratio, so the figure is not the same as completions on allocated sites. And the requirement side uses the lower of the authority's adopted housing requirement or local housing need for the relevant years, with transitional arrangements where a plan is recently adopted.

The result is a single number per authority. It carries no policy weight on its own and everything flows from which band it falls into.

What happens at each performance level

The bands are cumulative. An authority at 70 per cent owes an action plan, carries the 20 per cent buffer and is subject to the presumption.

The 85 per cent band is the one most often misunderstood. The buffer applies to the supply calculation rather than to the decision, so an authority can be carrying a 20 per cent buffer, still demonstrate a five year supply, and face no presumption at all.

Action plans and the buffer

An action plan is due within six months of the publication of a result below 95 per cent. It should identify the reasons for under delivery and set out what the authority intends to do, and it is published by the authority rather than approved by anyone.

Read it. Action plans are candid documents, written by officers who want to explain why delivery is outside their control, and they frequently contain admissions that are useful in a planning statement: allocated sites with viability problems, infrastructure that has not come forward, a stalled local plan review. An authority that has written down that its allocations are not deliverable has limited room to argue the opposite at appeal six months later.

The buffer works on the supply side. A five year requirement is calculated, the buffer is added, and the deliverable supply is measured against the total. Whether specific sites are deliverable, which turns on the definition in the Framework's glossary, is where most supply disputes are actually fought.

The presumption in favour, and what the tilted balance does

Where the presumption applies to a decision on housing development, permission should be granted unless the adverse impacts of doing so would outweigh the benefits when assessed against the policies in the Framework taken as a whole, and the test the Framework sets is whether those adverse impacts would outweigh the benefits significantly and demonstrably.

That phrasing does the work. It does not make policy irrelevant. Development plan policies remain the starting point under section 38(6) of the Planning and Compulsory Purchase Act 2004, and the statutory duties on listed buildings and conservation areas under the Planning (Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas) Act 1990 are unaffected by the tilted balance, as are the Framework's own protections for designated areas such as Green Belt and habitats sites.

What changes is the burden. In an ordinary case the applicant demonstrates that the proposal accords with the plan. Where the tilted balance applies, the authority has to show that the harm clears a raised threshold.

A caution on citation. The Framework was re-issued on 17 August 2026 with policy-coded chapters in place of the paragraph numbering used in the December 2023 and December 2024 editions. If you are quoting the presumption, quote the current edition and state which edition you are using, because a reader holding an older copy will be looking for a paragraph number that no longer exists.

How inspectors have approached it

Appeal decisions are indicative of approach rather than precedent, and the pattern across housing appeals where the tilted balance has been engaged is reasonably consistent.

Inspectors identify the benefits with some precision: the number of homes, the affordable element, construction employment, and the contribution to a shortfall they quantify. They then identify the harms and attach weight to each. Landscape and character harm in an undesignated area is frequently found to be outweighed. Harm to a designated heritage asset, highway safety harm and harm to protected habitats are much less often outweighed, because each engages a statutory duty or a separate policy test that sits outside the balance.

The practical consequence is that a tilted balance case is won on benefits that are evidenced and harms that are narrow. An affordable housing offer that is quantified and secured carries more weight than an aspiration, which is why an Affordable Housing Statement setting out tenure mix, numbers and the delivery mechanism is worth more than a paragraph of commitment.

The evidence an applicant should assemble

Six documents, all public, and all of them to obtain before you write anything.

1. The latest published Housing Delivery Test result for the authority, with the underlying delivery and requirement figures.
2. The authority's current five year housing land supply position statement, with the site by site trajectory.
3. The latest Annual Monitoring Report or Authority Monitoring Report.
4. The action plan, if one is due or published.
5. Recent appeal decisions in the same authority where supply or the tilted balance was in issue.
6. The adopted plan's housing requirement and its base date, because a plan adopted more than five years ago may fall to be measured against local housing need instead.

Where the figures are contested, the dispute is normally about deliverability of named sites rather than about the arithmetic. Build your case site by site, with planning history and current status for each, and the authority's own monitoring will often do half the work.

Where the measure is under review

As at October 2026, the Housing Delivery Test remains the published mechanism, and the policy consequences described above remain those set by the Framework. Both the measure and the wider plan-making system have been the subject of consultation and reform, and the Levelling-up and Regeneration Act 2023 provides for National Development Management Policies and a new plan-making process, with dates of effect that need checking against the current position rather than assumed.

That matters for transitional cases. The weight to be given to an emerging plan, and the status of a plan part way through examination, change as the reforms take effect, and our note on plan-making reform and what happens to emerging plans sets out the transitional questions. The timeline at PlanScope's planning law updates page is a place to follow reform news, though the position should always be verified against the current government publication.

Putting it into a planning statement

Lead with the figure and the band, then the consequence, then the application of the balance to your scheme. A Planning Statement that opens with three pages of supply history before saying what it means has lost the officer.

The structure that works: the authority's result and the band it falls in, the five year supply position and the buffer, whether the presumption is engaged and why, the identified benefits with figures attached, the identified harms and the weight you say each deserves, then the conclusion on the balance. Keep the statutory duties separate from the balance rather than folding them in, because that is how an inspector will handle them.

And check the result before you file. Housing Delivery Test publication has not always been annual in practice, and an out of date figure in a planning statement undermines everything after it.

If you are putting together the evidence base for a housing scheme and want to see which supporting documents the site is likely to need, enter the postcode on PlanScope and work through the constraints first.

This is general guidance, not legal advice, so check the position with your local planning authority or a qualified professional before relying on it. PlanScope provides AI-assisted draft reports for planning applications. Reports should be reviewed before submission. We do not guarantee planning approval.