Future Proof Conveyancing

The planning landscape is shifting at pace - and for conveyancers, the risks are no longer confined to the red line on a title plan. That’s the clear warning from DevAssist founder Paul Addison and OnPoint Data co‑founder Jeremy Dorkins in the latest *Today’s Conveyancer Podcast*, where both argue that future development risk is now a core part of modern due diligence. Addison’s background in land acquisition gives him a blunt vantage point. As he puts it, “there’s a 46% chance… something could be happening just outside those boundaries” - something capable of affecting views, amenity or value. And with the Labour government’s accelerated push for housing, those odds are only rising. The National Planning Policy Framework has been “injected with steroids”, Addison says, with the re‑introduced five‑year housing supply requirement triggering a surge in opportunistic applications. Councils unable to demonstrate supply face the **tilted balance**, where “benefit outweighs harm” and large schemes on greenfield land become difficult to resist. Yet most buyers, and many conveyancers, remain unaware of the deeper planning pipeline: SHELAA allocations, emerging policies and long‑term strategic land. As Dorkins notes, raw planning data in standard reports “is just a statement in time”. It doesn’t reveal what’s coming. And when what’s coming arrives, the first knock is on the solicitor’s door. Addison references live negligence cases and the *Bird & Bird* appeal, where the court made it “abundantly clear” that solicitors must report on planning data or searches. For firms, the message is simple: offering future‑development insight isn’t an add‑on, it’s a safeguard. As Dorkins puts it, “if something untoward does happen… the first point of call will be the conveyancing solicitor.”  In a market where clients assume their lawyer “does all that anyway”, future‑proofing is fast becoming part of the job.  The Today's Conveyancer podcast can be found on your preferred podcast provider and also at www.todaysconveyancer.co.uk. Subscribe and listen in for all the latest conveyancing industry news and views.  Thank you to our podcast sponsors LEAP Legal Software and InfoTrack