Keir Starmer has vowed to defeat the “blockers” he says are preventing the UK from completing projects like nuclear plants and windfarms.
The prime minister will unveil changes to planning rules which currently allow campaigners to launch up to three legal challenges against major infrastructure projects.
Ministers say that ends up delaying building work for years, clogging up the courts and adding hundreds of millions of pounds to the final cost while hampering the government’s attempts to boost economic growth.
New rules will mean that just one legal challenge will be allowed for “cynical cases lodged purely to cause delay”.
Among the examples of projects which have been held up in this way, according to the government, are the Sizewell C nuclear plant, the A47 national highway project and new windfarms in East Anglia.
Starmer said: “For too long, blockers have had the upper hand in legal challenges – using our court processes to frustrate growth.
“We’re putting an end to this challenge culture by taking on the NIMBYs and a broken system that has slowed down our progress as a nation.
“This is the government’s plan for change in action – taking the brakes off Britain by reforming the planning system so it is pro-growth and pro-infrastructure.”
Current laws will be amended to ensure that where a High Court judge rules that a legal challenge to a major project is “totally without merit”, the Court of Appeal cannot be asked to reconsider the case. Appeals will still be allowed in other cases.
The changes follow a review of legal challenges against major building projects by Lord Banner KC.
He said: “I saw broad consensus from claimants to scheme promoters that a quicker system of justice would be in their interests, provided that cases can still be tried fairly.”
“I am therefore pleased to see the government acting on the back of my review. In particular, reducing the number of permission attempts to one for truly hopeless cases should weed out the worst offenders, without risking inadvertent delays because judges choose to err on the side of caution.”
“I look forward to seeing these changes help to deliver a step change in the pace of infrastructure delivery in the months and years ahead.”
Shadow levelling up secretary Kevin Hollinrake said: “While we welcome the government taking forward Conservative initiatives to streamline the planning system, Labour’s blocking of our efforts to cut EU legacy red tape, such as nutrient neutrality, so they can align more closely with the European Union will hold Britain back.
“Labour ministers have also sat on their hands on implementing the measures introduced by the Conservatives to cut bureaucracy and provide greater certainty to local residents and developers and abolishing and replacing hundreds of local councils and asking all their employees, including planning officers, to reapply for their jobs is hardly a recipe for accelerating decision-making.
“The Conservative Party is under new leadership and we will come forward with real plans, not empty announcements, to get Britain building.”