Conference programme
The details of the conference programme and the book of abstracts will be available in February 2025.
Keynote Speakers
Simon Gilbert (Head of Planning at Cardiff Council)
Title: City Development: Reflections from Cardiff’s Head of Planning
Date: Tuesday 4 March 2025
In this keynote, Simon Gilbert, Head of Planning at Cardiff Council, will draw on his extensive experience to offer a comprehensive perspective on Cardiff's development journey. Beginning with an introduction to the city's unique context, he will reflect on its urban development trajectory: past achievements, present challenges, and future aspirations. He will also situate Cardiff's experience within the broader framework of planning as a profession in Wales and the UK, highlighting evolving trends and practices.
A candid discussion on risks and challenges will be complemented by insights into opportunities for improvement, fostering innovation in city development. Concluding with reflections on the importance of collaborative and forward-thinking approaches, Simon’s remarks will set the stage for a vibrant conference, engaging participants in a dynamic dialogue on planning, law, and property rights.
Professor Antonia Layard (Professor of Law at the University of Oxford)
Title: For Public Space
Time: Thursday 6 March 2025
Public “space is always under construction. It is never finished; never closed”. Drawing on Doreen Massey’s For Space, this talk considers how we think about public space, particularly from a legal and geographical perspective. It takes a broad approach to definition: including public squares and highways, bars and footpaths.
Understanding public space as both a designation and an activity illustrates a tension: public space is free to enter but expensive to maintain. The costs are justified but who should pay? To provide public space – whether grey, green or blue – we need to understand and articulate why public space matters, how it should be provided as well as, crucially, how it should be maintained. These are active, relational, ongoing decisions.
To inform decision-making on public space, we need to be clear about why it matters. Justifications include democratic participation, social inclusion, cultural identity and economic vitality as well as health and ecological sustainability. More confident in our reasoning, we can understand and justify legal frameworks and rules, imposing obligations on some landowners, limiting their ability to do as they may wish with the land by protecting footpaths, access land, local wildlife sites, commons or village greens.
We can see how the normative values in public space might (or might not) conflict with the normative premises of property (depending on how we define property). We can also understand how bars, clubs and cafés provide space to be in public (even if some spaces appeal to some groups more than others) and why networks of mobility are critical to accessing public space.
Panel discussion
Date: Friday 7 March 2025
Like many countries, Wales has an acute shortage of affordable housing. This contributes to homelessness and the poor mental health of those unable to access secure accommodation. In order to address this, the Welsh government has introduced a target of delivering 20,000 low carbon homes for rent in the social sector for the current government term.
To meet this target will require a combination of conversion of existing housing into affordable housing, developer contributions made by private developers (as a form of land value capture), new development by not-for-profit housing associations, as well as the direct delivery of affordable housing by state agencies.
However, market, policy and regulatory conditions do not impact these different entities in the same way, creating a complex array of incentives and pressures. There is therefore a need to understand this complexity and think of imaginative ways to bring together a fragmented delivery sector to ensure that government, market and third sector entities are pulling together. The panel aims to explore how affordable housing is delivered in Wales and to examine how some of the deep challenges may be overcome.
Panellists
Emma Williams - Director of Housing and Regeneration, Welsh Government
Emma Willians leads the Housing and Regeneration department within Welsh Government to deliver on Ministerial priorities ensuring that everyone in Wales has a high quality, affordable and suitable place to call home.
Prior to this Emma was Deputy Director within Housing and Regeneration, where she had responsibility for policies aimed at ensuring every citizen in Wales has access to a secure, quality home and support to live independently.
Helen White – CEO of Taff Housing
Taff Housing develops places with people, not profit, in mind, building homes and communities where people can thrive. Taff owns and manages over 1,500 homes across Cardiff, giving over 4,000 people somewhere to call home.
Helen joined Taff in August 2019. Having started her housing career working in tenant participation, Helen remains passionate about making sure the needs of tenants and communities are central to how services are designed and delivered.
Matt Dicks - National director of Chartered Institute of Housing Cymru
Matt Dicks is the national director of CIH Cymru and leads the team in Wales. Matt took his current role armed with a breadth of knowledge of the Welsh policy landscape following 17 years of working as a senior communicator at the heart of Welsh civic and political life.
He joined the National Assembly for Wales (now Welsh parliament) as its head of news. He transformed the Welsh Parliament’s media operation into the modern multi-platform, multi-media function you see today.
Mark Harris - Planning and Policy Advisor for Wales at the Home Builders Federation
Mark Harris is Planning and Policy Advisor for Wales at the Home Builders Federation. Mark joined in 2014 having spent most of his career working in Wales as a planner in both the public, private sector and a housebuilder. Mark’s role includes representing HBF members across Wales, working closely with Welsh Government to help influence housing policies and regularly sits on a range of Welsh Government working groups.
Also responsible for reviewing local development plans and preparing written representations, appearance at Examination Hearings and on-going engagement with Local Planning Authorities on evidence base supporting their plans.