The Water White Paper: A new vision for water – what changes are on the horizon for water infrastructure consenting?

By Jen Ashwell Douglas Haycock

9 Feb 2026 11 min read

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The Government’s Water White Paper (“the White Paper”) “A new vision for water”, published in January 2026, marks a decisive moment for the future of water resource planning and infrastructure delivery in England and Wales. Following two years of intense scrutiny of the sector—culminating in the Independent Water Commission chaired by Sir Jon Cunliffe—the White Paper sets out a broad programme of reform aimed at ensuring water security, improving environmental outcomes and accelerating infrastructure consenting.

This update summarises how the White Paper responds to key planning recommendations in the Cunliffe Review, which are summarised in our earlier blog.

1. Strengthening the role of water companies in planning

The Cunliffe Review emphasised the need for greater integration of water companies into the planning system. Recommendation 72 covered three core actions:

Cunliffe Review: Recommendation 72	White Paper Proposals
Water companies should be included in a “Requirement to Assist” with the development of local plans ensuring that the industry is prepared for future demands and thus reducing delay.	The UK Government is proposing to prescribe water and sewerage companies in the “requirement to assist” Regulations so they will be obliged to assist with plan making, where a plan-making authority reasonably requests it. There is also an intention to list these companies as consultation bodies for the plan-making system so they are able to be involved in strategic plan making.
The UK Government should consider whether water companies should be added as a statutory consultee to planning application, or whether a “requirement to notify” should be put in place.	This recommendation is noted as something that will be subject to further consideration as part of the proposed consultation on reform of statutory consultees.
The UK Government should conduct a review of the “right to connect” to consider where it is appropriate to provide circumstances where a water company can object to a request where there is insufficient network capacity. Introducing an ability to object could enhance the need to involve all parties at a strategic level through local plans.	Work is ongoing with MHCLG to review the right to connect and ensure it supports and enables the Government’s housing delivery objectives.

2. Reforming the NSIP Regime for water infrastructure

The Review identified that legal challenges against large, critical infrastructure projects can significantly slow down delivery and should be minimised. With the goal of ensuring that the planning process does not slow water industry infrastructure delivery, the Review outlined the following actions as Recommendation 73:

Cunliffe Review: Recommendation 73	White Paper Proposals
The Wastewater and Water Resources National Policy Statements (“NPS”) should be reviewed and updated in England.	There is a commitment to update the NPS, although no indication of timing. The Planning & Infrastructure Act 2025 (“PIA 2025”) prescribes a minimum 5 year period for updating NPSs. Please see our blog for more details.
A review of the NSIP thresholds should be undertaken to “speed up” the inclusion of strategically significant projects in the NSIP framework.	Whilst the industry may have been anticipating more widespread amendments to the NSIP definitions, including the lowering of the thresholds, the White Paper is silent. The PIA 2025 does, however, propose some amendments to the definitions, ensuring that more flexible procurement structures can be used (such as Direct Procurement for Customers – see our video series here for more details).
Consideration should be given to prescribing “Critical National Priority” status to the NPSs to ensure priority consideration during planning process.	The White Paper does not mention this topic. It should be noted that low-carbon energy infrastructure is currently prioritised as critical national priority infrastructure. Consideration as to whether to provide water infrastructure with the same status would need to be woven into a future update of the relevant NPSs.
The scope of legal challenge to NSIPs should be reduced as per the Planning & Infrastructure Bill proposals.	This has been provided for in section 13 of the PIA 2025, and will come into force on 18 February 2026.

3. Streamlining consenting processes

While the Cunliffe Review’s primary focus was governance and regulation, it also identified several areas where planning and consenting processes cause avoidable delay. It suggested that greater clarity in planning roles, early engagement between promoters and regulators, and streamlined NSIP pathways would be essential to delivering the necessary infrastructure.

Cunliffe Review: Recommendation 74	White Paper Proposals
The Review suggested at Recommendation 74 that permitted development rights for water companies could be updated to support the delivery of water quality monitoring units, or small pumping stations. The suggestion has been to reduce the number of elements requiring planning permission to allow companies to focus on more complex project delivery.	The White Paper confirms that a review will take place for water companies in England to consideration how additional flexibility could assist small scale projects and help speed up delivery.It is likely that updating permitted development rights in isolation may only be part of the process for speeding up delivery of small scale infrastructure. A consideration of how these permitted development rights work alongside rights to operate in the highway, permit schemes, and temporary traffic regulation orders would also assist in the delivery of water infrastructure.
Cunliffe Review: Recommendation 75	White Paper Proposals
The Scope of the Regulators’ Alliance for Progressing Infrastructure Development (“RAPID”) should be expanded to include wastewater projects and strategically important projects that do not meet current size and complexity thresholds across England and Wales	The Government has committed to reviewing RAPID’s remit to enhance regulatory coordination, accelerate delivery and strengthen infrastructure resilience.
Cunliffe Review: Recommendation 76	White Paper Proposals
The National Infrastructure and Service Transformation Authority (“NISTA”) should consider how the water industry in England and Wales could move towards standardised practices and further recommend how this could be advanced. The Report highlighted how school and prison building standardisation has resulted in efficiency benefits.	The White Paper contains nothing concrete on this, but does suggest that engagement with NISTA is ongoing and the Government will explore how best to facilitate the adoption of standardised practices.
Cunliffe Review: Recommendation 8	White Paper Proposals
The UK and Welsh governments should review the current water legislative framework and amend it accordingly. The Review found that given current progress, the 2027 Good Ecological Status target will be missed. The regulation, implementation, governance and accountability under the Water Framework Directive (“WFD”) have significant shortcomings and has contributed to this failure. The Review recommended that a systems planning framework should replace River Basin Management Plans to address systemic issues. The Review went further and suggested that the WFD Regulations require reforming to make them more efficient and align them with public and environmental expectations	The White Paper has referenced an upcoming Water Bill which is intended to provide a “coherent reset” of the legislative framework of the WFD Regulations.

4. Structural improvements to a plan-led system

The Review provided a detailed assessment and recommendation of how the current system of plan-making in the water industry could be simplified and improved. Two core suggestions were that there should be National Water Strategies, as well as Regional System Planners. The proposals for a regional planning system for water are detailed and we will write a separate blog exploring those shortly.

Cunliffe Review: Recommendation 1	White Paper Proposals
The UK and Welsh government should each bring forward a new, long-term, cross-sectoral, and systems-focused National Water Strategy for England and Wales respectively.	Acknowledging that the current Strategic Policy Statements have resulted in “fragmented and short-term direction and decision making”, the White Paper proposes to reform the approach to the Strategic Policy Statements to expand it to cover long term priorities and targets for the wider water system.
Cunliffe Review: Recommendation 3	White Paper Proposals
A comprehensive systems planning framework should be introduced for England and Wales, with responsibility for integrated and holistic water system planning. In England, the systems planners should be regional – or ‘regional water authorities’. In Wales, the systems planner should be a national authority.	In response to the “missing middle” in the current system, the White Paper proposes a new planning framework which will see two core planning frameworks, one for water environment and one for supply. Regional plans will set out investment priorities to meet water and growth objectives. These frameworks will be supported by a regional water planning function which will support the delivery of national strategic objectives.The White Paper states that water companies have to publish and have regard to over 20 different plans and they will be looking to reduce this level of complexity.

The Welsh Government also published a Green Paper on shaping the future of water governance in Wales on 3 February 2026. The consultation closes on 7 April 2026 and responds to the Cunliffe Review and the Welsh Government’s initial response in October 2025. It acknowledges that the Welsh position is different to England, with a smaller sector, devolved priorities and a strong focus on well-being and sustainability, but that close liaison is required between the two. The Green Paper highlights that the English Water Bill will need to provide enabling powers to progress reform in Wales and set out transitional arrangements. Subject to the agreement of the new Government following the May 2026 Senedd election, the intention is for Welsh Government to publish a White Paper setting out proposals for new Welsh legislation, taking into account responses from the Green Paper. The aim is to establish a new economic regulator and system planner to be operational in the early 2030s with devolved powers to make decisions. A refreshed Water Strategy for Wales is also proposed to provide a long-term vision for water governance. The UK government and the Welsh Government will also draw up a shared transition plan that sets out the route to a new water system in Wales.

Looking ahead

The White Paper draws heavily on the Cunliffe Review’s recommendations, especially in strengthening water companies’ role in plan-making, reforming NSIP thresholds, and accelerating the consenting of nationally significant water resource projects. Many of the Review’s concerns around fragmentation, late engagement and regulatory inconsistency are directly addressed.

The White Paper states that a Transition Plan will be published later in 2026 to guide water companies and other sectors through the proposed reforms and provide a roadmap to work towards a future model.

We will be publishing further blogs on the specific proposals for the regional water planning framework and the Water Framework Directive but please do reach out to Jen Ashwell, Director, or Doug Haycock, Associate, if you have any queries in the meantime.