Unity is strength, so the saying goes. Local government reorganisation may be the exception.
On 16th July, the Government confirmed four new unitary councils for Hertfordshire, subject to parliamentary approval, taking over county, district and borough functions from 1st April 2028. One of them, South West Hertfordshire, brings together Hertsmere, Three Rivers and Watford.
This was not simply central imposition. The model of four unitaries was submitted locally by six councils including Hertsmere, whose Cabinet selected it as its preferred option in November. The alternative of two, backed by the county council and St Albans, was rejected.
Whether it wanted it is another question. All three authorities approach planning from markedly different starting points.
Watford
Mayor Peter Taylor, returned comfortably in May, leads a pragmatic administration that is explicit about the need for growth: several tall buildings approved in the town centre, investment actively courted. His critics did not coin "Taylor Towers" kindly and expect that criticism to find a larger audience once Watford's members sit alongside colleagues from two far more constrained districts.
Hertsmere
Designated on 15 June under section 62A, one of nine that day, because too many of its major decisions are being overturned at appeal. This is about decision quality, not housing delivery. The council still determines applications, but applicants can now go straight to the Planning Inspectorate instead. The catch: there is no right of appeal against a section 62A decision.
The underlying tension is real. December 2024's Green Belt policy requires released land to meet the "golden rules", and developers have brought forward schemes designed to satisfy them. For members who consider any Green Belt release unacceptable in principle, the golden rules resolve very little and the resulting refusal rate is exactly what the designation criteria capture.
Three Rivers
Often bracketed with Hertsmere, but a different instrument aimed at a different problem: plan making, not development management. A holding direction under section 21A stopped adoption of the Regulation 19 plan, which met only 56 per cent of the need identified by the standard method. An intervention letter in March issued nine directions, including seven sites previously discounted, pushing the plan beyond 11,200 homes against the 7,000 approved by Full Council in January.
The council's counterargument is not weak: 76 per cent Green Belt, fewer than 700 homes deliverable on previously developed land and 93 per cent of required development landing in the Green Belt. Every party group leader signed the objection and now this dispute is inherited by the new authority.
So how does local government reorganisation fit into all this?
It doesn't settle any of the above. It relocates it.
Plan making takes the immediate hit. South West Hertfordshire inherits three plans in three conditions and will eventually need one plan and one Green Belt review assessing Bushey, Croxley Green and Radlett on a consistent methodology. That is substantial work and the temptation until 2028 is to wait for it, with twenty months of decisions still to be taken by members who know their councils are being abolished. Five-year supply positions quietly deteriorate; appeal inspectors fill the vacuum. Interventions of the kind above exist precisely to stop that, so expect the pressure to continue regardless of who holds the pen.
Then the politics, which are genuinely uncertain. Roughly 300,000 residents, three complexions: a Liberal Democrat mayoralty in Watford, Liberal Democrats without a majority in Three Rivers, and the Conservatives as the largest party in Hertsmere but who don't form the leadership. The shadow authority elections, likely in May 2027, will decide which planning culture sets the tone for a decade. It is the most consequential thing here for anyone holding land.
The merger internalises a fight rather than ending it. The case for reorganisation is that one council in charge means quicker decisions and faster housebuilding. That works when the parts agree. Watford builds upwards because it is urban and has nowhere else to go. Hertsmere and Three Rivers have spent years defending precisely the position the Government is dismantling. The argument doesn't disappear. It moves into one chamber, to be settled by whoever wins in 2027 rather than by three separate electorates.
For developers, the practicalities are clear enough. Neither intervention lapses in 2028. Both survive the transition. The golden rules apply whatever the letterhead says.
Unity here is not obviously strength. But it is coming. The useful question isn't whether the union is happy. It's which of these three approaches ends up defining South West Hertfordshire.
