The well-being duty in Welsh planning decisions

This article is about Wales. Welsh planning decisions are taken within a statutory framework that has no English equivalent, and the well-being of future generations planning wales duty is the piece that most often surprises practitioners crossing the border. Public bodies in Wales, local planning authorities included, must carry out sustainable development in the way the Well-being of Future Generations (Wales) Act 2015 defines it, and that shapes both how policy is written and how an application is argued.

It is not a material consideration bolted onto an English style decision. It sits underneath the whole system.

The well-being goals and the sustainable development principle

The 2015 Act sets seven well-being goals covering prosperity, resilience, health, equality, cohesive communities, culture and the Welsh language, and global responsibility. Public bodies must set objectives and take reasonable steps to meet them.

The Act also defines the sustainable development principle, which requires a body to act in a manner seeking to ensure that present needs are met without compromising the ability of future generations to meet theirs. That principle is given content by five ways of working: looking to the long term, preventing problems occurring or getting worse, integrating objectives across bodies, collaborating with others, and involving people with an interest.

Those five are the operative part for planning. A decision that considers only the immediate effects of a proposal, without addressing prevention, integration, collaboration or involvement, has not applied the principle as the Act describes it.

How the duty reaches a planning decision

The duty sits on the authority as a public body rather than on the applicant, and the Planning (Wales) Act 2015 reinforces the point by tying the purpose of the planning system to sustainable development.

In practice it reaches applications through three routes. Development plan policies in Local Development Plans are written to deliver well-being objectives, so the plan itself carries the duty into decision making. Officer reports are expected to show how the recommendation relates to those objectives. And national policy requires the duty to be reflected in how proposals are assessed.

That produces a different kind of officer report from the English equivalent. Where an English report works through the development plan policies and then the material considerations, a Welsh report is more likely to frame the analysis against well-being objectives and the placemaking principles in national policy.

Placemaking as the organising idea

Planning Policy Wales places placemaking at the centre of the system and asks that proposals contribute to creating sustainable places. Future Wales, the national development framework, sits above the development plan and sets the national spatial strategy.

Placemaking in the Welsh sense covers more ground than design quality. It takes in the mix of uses, active travel provision, access to services, the Welsh language and culture, health, and the long term resilience of the place. A design and access statement that addresses appearance and layout and stops there answers only part of it.

The practical consequence is that a Welsh application benefits from a narrative running from placemaking principles through to the specifics of the scheme, rather than a policy compliance table. Officers use that narrative, and its absence is noticed.

Evidencing the duty in a planning statement

Applicants cannot discharge a duty that sits on the authority. What they can do is give the authority the material it needs, which is a more useful way to think about it than treating the duty as a hurdle.

What works in a Welsh planning statement:

• a section mapping the scheme's effects against the seven well-being goals, honestly, including the goals it does not advance
• evidence of involvement, which means who was consulted, what they said and what changed
• long term considerations addressed explicitly: climate resilience, adaptability of the buildings, lifespan of the materials
• prevention framed around the problems the scheme avoids rather than the benefits it claims
• integration with other public body objectives, such as health board or transport authority plans where relevant
• a Welsh language consideration where the scheme is of a scale or location where language is a planning issue

Keep it proportionate. On a householder application this is a paragraph. On a major residential scheme it is a section with evidence behind each point.

Statutory pre-application consultation

Wales has a requirement England does not, and it catches developers moving across the border.

For major development, statutory pre-application consultation is required before the application is submitted. The applicant must consult specified bodies, publicise the proposal locally, allow a set period for responses, and submit a pre-application consultation report with the application setting out what was said and how it was taken into account.

That is not a courtesy exercise. An application submitted without the report is liable to be invalid, and the timetable consequence is significant, because the consultation period has to run before submission rather than alongside determination. Build it into the programme at the outset.

It also dovetails with the involvement way of working under the 2015 Act, which means the same exercise serves two purposes if it is designed properly rather than treated as a notice to be posted.

National policy and the Technical Advice Notes

The policy hierarchy differs from England's and the documents have different names.

Two cautions on citation. Planning Policy Wales is issued in numbered editions and revised, so state the edition. And the Technical Advice Notes have been revised at different times, with the flooding note in particular subject to changes in the version in force, so verify which applies at the date of your submission rather than relying on a precedent document.

Where the proposal affects a listed building, the consent regime and the role of the Welsh heritage body differ as well, and that is covered in our note on listed building consent in Wales and the role of Cadw.

What applicants should actually submit

The practical answer is narrower than the statutory framework suggests.

1. A planning statement that engages with the Local Development Plan policies by number and with the placemaking principles in national policy.
2. A well-being section, proportionate to the scheme, mapping effects against the goals and the five ways of working.
3. The pre-application consultation report where the development is major, with the responses and the changes made.
4. A design and access statement that covers the placemaking dimensions rather than appearance alone.
5. Evidence of involvement that goes beyond a site notice, where the scheme is of a scale that merits it.
6. Welsh language considerations where the plan or the Technical Advice Note engages them.

An honest note on the limits of automated drafting here. PlanScope's report generation is grounded in the National Planning Policy Framework and English local plans, so a Welsh application needs the national policy framework, the Technical Advice Notes and the well-being duty checked and supplied by the reviewer rather than assumed from the draft. Scotland's framework differs again, and the contrast is drawn in our note on flood risk under NPF4 in Scotland and the avoidance principle.

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

Browse the 66 PlanScope report types to see which supporting documents a scheme of this kind usually carries.