LGA demands planning permission for all phone boxes

Local Government Association (LGA), which represents 370 councils in England and Wales, has urged the government to scrap the permitted development right which enables phone companies to install telephone boxes without planning permission, as the new “boxes” are nothing but advertisement panels making use of an old law to circumvent planning control. This as BT has begun replacing 750 of their traditional phone boxes in London with a 3 metre high two-sided advertisement tower, the InLink.

Half of the households still in hotels

On Thursday, a televised Grenfell Tower national memorial service will be held in St Paul’s Cathedral.
Six months after the Grenfell Tower fire, only 45 of the 208 households have moved into new permanent homes. Of the remaining, more than 100 are still living in hotels.