The new Ford focus

"We've had a fantastic response. There are a lot of high-quality people. I'm thrilled." English Partnerships chairman Margaret Ford is talking about the agency's search for a chief executive to replace David Higgins, who departed to head the Olympic Delivery Authority last month. Ford sounds dead chuffed - and perhaps even surprised - to have discovered that the office alongside her own has become one of the most coveted in regeneration.

The eagerness to win the chief exec's job has much to do with Ford herself and the reinvention of EP that she has led over the past four years. Now into her second, and final, three-year term of office, Ford worked with Higgins for two-and-a-half years. Together they have recast EP as the director of the government's big production number, the sustainable communities plan.

Ford says the sustainable communities plan has presented her with the greatest career opportunity of her life: "When I first met [communities minister] David Miliband, he asked me what it was like to be heading up EP.

Maragret Ford. Credit: Eva Vermandel

I said it was an absolute labour of love. I've waited all my life for a coherent statement of what regeneration is all about. The plan has provided that statement, in terms of scale and what a sustainable community feels like - and it has been backed by resource. The government has put its money where its mouth is."

Standing in the way of creating the happily ever after of sustainable communities are many seemingly intractable problems, planning delay being only one of them. Ford makes manifest the business adage that every challenge is really an opportunity. Between rapid-fire bursts of can-do talk, she says of this interview: "I'll come across like Pollyanna."

Ford may have plenty of Pollyanna's bright enthusiasm but she recognises the magnitude of the challenges that EP is taking on, and feels passionately about them, saying: "It is more straightforward to create mixed-income communities such as Oakgrove millennium community than it is to retrofit a failed estate like Woodside in Telford. It breaks my heart to see some of the estates where people have to live. I feel so strongly that will be the most rewarding work for EP."

An equally tough challenge is tackling the problems in providing the infrastructure needed to accompany planned housing growth, yet it is one that Ford and EP are taking on in earnest. EP is set to focus its efforts on ingenuity and innovation in infrastructure, and Ford says she'll be looking to talk to investment banks and big contractors about this subject at MIPIM: "We'll be trying to develop a range of mechanisms to unblock the delivery of infrastructure."

That infrastructure is likely to be funded by the government's planning gain supplement, and Ford has determined views on how that and other elements of government policy will help in achieving the holy grail of housing growth in sustainable communities. 

Q & A

I’ve waited all my life for a coherent statement of what regeneration is all about

What is your take on the proposed planning gain supplement?

The consultation document on the PGS is a genuine, thoughtful attempt to get this right and it deserves a thoughtful response.

The siren voices that say it is just another version of the failed development land tax are not giving a mature response. There have been suggestions that it will slow supply of housing - I don't see that. I've had five years of developers complaining about the inequity of Section 106.

It is clear that Section 106 has deficiencies and the main problem is that you can't operate at a strategic level. The strength of the PGS is that it safeguards the affordable housing and says there's another slice that has to go into infrastructure. We've got to get this issue out of the "too difficult" drawer and crack it.

But while many developers don't like the PGS, they do like the planning tariff that EP has initiated and brought through for Milton Keynes. What do you make of that?

The tariff wouldn't be necessary if we had the PGS, but in the absence of the PGS it was sensible to proceed with it. The principles of the tariff are entirely in tune with the PGS. The tariff is an aggregated Section 106 - isn't that what the PGS is? Eighteen months ago [before the tariff was formulated] people said they didn't like the tariff, but thinking moves on.

What are the chances of delivering the greater number of homes that the country needs?

Rather than looking at the raw numbers, you need to look at where we need the housing and what type of housing that should be.

We need to be more precise in our definitions. But if you take at face value the view that housebuilders can increase supply, as I do, we have to make it possible for housebuilders to develop high-quality homes in sustainable communities in the right places.

The old caricature of the volume housebuilder building boxes just isn’t right any more

Some housebuilders say they could deliver more homes, but that they are being prevented from doing so by obstacles, notably the planning system. What can be done to help?

The new planning delivery agreements will help. We've tried to identify where the blockages are and be as innovative as possible. Our hallmark has been to innovate around seemingly intractable problems. At Milton Keynes we have done that with the tariff. In Hattersley, in Greater Manchester, we are acting as guarantor to make sure stock transfer can go ahead. We are working with the Advisory Team on Large Applications to unlock homes that have been stuck in the system for years and that is starting to show startling results - it is working on projects with the potential to unlock 30,000 homes. All this is not rocket science, but it requires creativity. In helping with cashflow, brokering deals, we are doing everything we can of a pragmatic nature to try to unlock things. We're troubleshooters.

That is very different from EP's traditional role.

Has your relationship with the housebuilding industry changed, too?

It is very different. Five years ago, we had a commercial relationship with housebuilders but we didn't do a lot of business with the very big players. David [Higgins] and I have worked to attract all sorts of housebuilders to work with us. It is in our interests to work with the big housebuilders that have the big balance sheets and with the smaller nimble players. I meet with the Major Home Builders group on a quarterly basis and I see it as my job to advocate, with government, changes that can be made. Our dialogue is better formed. It is much better than it was five years ago.

What does EP want from housebuilders now?

We're looking for people who understand that we want high-quality homes in sustainable, mixed-income communities.

We also want housebuilders to be very successful and to be able to innovate. The old caricature of the volume housebuilder building boxes just isn't right any more. The quality of product the industry is coming up with is very different from that of 15 years ago.

Where does the sustainable communities plan go from here?

I think we are making progress. Look at the Milton Keynes prospectus: we have a 20-year business plan that for the first time sheds clear light on what is meant by infrastructure, what the players will deliver and what it will cost - that is why it has been supported by developers. The challenge now is to make sure that other government departments are aligned with the plan for the next 20 years - and the last contribution will be from people playing their part through the PGS.