Insights From The NSIP Implementation Plan - Next Steps Towards Streamlining Infrastructure Planning

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The UK government has published an implementation plan detailing the rollout of reforms to the Nationally Significant Infrastructure Projects regime following the Planning and Infrastructure Act 2025. The plan establishes a phased timeline through 2027 for introducing revised guidance, secondary legislation, and new Planning Inspectorate services, though the staggered implementation windows create uncertainty for projects currently in pre-application stages.

United Kingdom Government, Public Sector

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A recently published policy paper sets out how the government intends to implement key measures within the Planning and Infrastructure Act 2025. What can infrastructure developers expect, and when can they expect it?

Introduction

Acknowledging that streamlining the planning process for NSIPs will require further action beyond the Planning and Infrastructure Act 2025 (PIA 2025) alone, on 23 March 2026 MHCLG published a policy paper “Streamlining infrastructure planning: implementation plan” (the Implementation Plan). This identifies the key next steps required, based on the government’s September 2026 consultation on streamlining infrastructure planning. The Implementation Plan is a delivery document setting out when revised guidance, secondary legislation and new Planning Inspectorate (PINS) services will be rolled out.

The consultation response and guidance updates

According to the Implementation Plan, the government expects to publish its response to the September 2025 consultation in the coming weeks. It will set out the government's overarching vision for the reformed NSIP regime, including policy direction for major changes to pre-application, acceptance and examination, and initial conclusions on changes to PINS services and the fast-track process.

The Implementation Plan also commits to updating guidance on the pre-examination and examination stages to comply with the new requirement under section 50 of the Planning Act 2008 to issue best practice guidance about the steps applicants might take as they prepare DCO applications, as well as to reflect the increased importance of the Examining Authority's Initial Assessment of Principal Issues, provide new guidance for statutory bodies on their role in the examination process, support land access surveys and reflect changes to compulsory acquisition processes.

New guidance on the decision stage of the NSIP process will also be published, incorporating changes to judicial review of DCOs.

Secondary legislation will also be required to introduce further provisions and give full effect to the PIA 2025 measures, and the government may seek to make further changes to regulations unrelated to the PIA 2025 provisions subject to the consultation response.

What is coming, and when

The Implementation Plan lays out an optimistic delivery schedule across five windows.

Where changes do not require complex secondary legislation and are not reliant on the consultation response, the government will act as soon as possible. The new requirements for reviewing NPSs have already been commenced. Updated guidance on NPSs is stated to follow in spring 2026.

To provide certainty for applicants, the government will seek to publish critical aspects of new guidance relating to pre-application, the acceptance test, and content of a DCO application before it comes into effect. They will also commence certain provisions of the PIA 2025 and lay secondary legislation for NSIP regime changes. Importantly, this should include the guidance related to pre-application consultation. Spring/summer 2026 is targeted for this. Revised guidance should not be relied on until the Planning Act 2008 amendments and secondary legislation come into effect, and this will be made clear when the guidance is published.

From summer 2026 onwards, the government will carry out trials for the new approaches to pre-application services and streamlining examinations at PINS.

In summer 2027, the government plans to lay the relevant secondary legislation before Parliament and commence the further relevant PIA 2025 reforms.

The government plans for a new process for amending DCOs to be in place in 2027.

Transitional risk

For applicants submitting DCO applications for acceptance before the PIA 2025 provisions are commenced, PINS will advise that they continue to prepare applications in accordance with existing primary and secondary legislative requirements and guidance, and such applications will be tested against the current acceptance test.

For those planning to submit after the amendments commence, PINS will advise applicants to carefully consider their approach to pre-application consultation and engagement on a case-by-case basis.

Applications prepared against the current regime but submitted for acceptance after the relevant amendments commence will be assessed under the new regime, save for any transitional provisions. This creates a real risk for developers who are mid-preparation because the goalposts may shift before submission.

Conclusions

It remains to be seen what the content of the various documents committed to within the Implementation Plan will bring, but the government has set out a clear intent to progress with the implementation of the PIA 2025 by 2027. That said, the somewhat broad windows within which further guidance and secondary legislation will come forward still leave a degree of uncertainty for projects currently in the pre-application stage.

The content of this article is intended to provide a general guide to the subject matter. Specialist advice should be sought about your specific circumstances.

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