About the CIL

The Mayoral CIL charging schedule was introduced on 1 April 2012.

The Mayoral CIL 2 charging Schedule was introduced 1 April 2019

The Royal Borough of Greenwich CIL charging schedule was introduced on 6 April 2015 and adopted on 25 March 2015.

The Royal Borough of Greenwich Regulation 123 list sets out the type of infrastructure that the Council CIL will fund.

The Royal Greenwich CIL Charging Schedule was examined in February 2015. View the examiner's final report.

Where CIL applies

CIL applies to any development that creates a new dwelling or 100 square metres or more of new floor space.

All planning applications involving the construction of new floor space need to provide the following with their application:

You should submit these forms as part of your planning application.

How CIL is calculated

CIL is calculated at the time planning permission is granted - at this point, a liability notice will be issued confirming how much CIL is payable.

Before development starts, the person who pays CIL must serve both of the following:

The Council will then issue a demand notice for the CIL payment in accordance with its instalments policy. If a commencement notice isn't received, surcharges apply and full payment is due immediately.

Charges for Mayoral CIL

£35 per square metre of gross internal area (GIA), for developments where planning permission first permits development prior to 1 April 2019.

£25 per square metre of gross internal area (GIA), for developments where planning permission first permits development on or after 1 April 2019.

£35 per square metre of net additional floor area.

Charges for Royal Greenwich CIL

View the Royal Borough of Greenwich CIL charging schedule

Annual CIL rate summary

In accordance with Regulation 121C of the Community Infrastructure Levy (CIL) Regulations 2010 (as amended), the Royal Borough of Greenwich as a CIL charging authority, which took effect on 06 April 2015, is issuing this Annual CIL Rate Summary effective from 1 January 2024 until 31 December 2024.

This annual CIL rate summary, published in December 2023, contains the rates for CIL liable development across the borough for the calendar year 2024. The rates for 2021, 2022 and 2023 are also included for reference.

View the annual CIL rate summary

Permitted development

In some cases, a permitted development may be of a scale to trigger the liability to CIL. In these cases, it is the responsibility of the developer to serve a notice of chargeable development on the Royal Borough of Greenwich before starting development.

The Council will then calculate and apply the CIL charge as though planning permission had been issued.

Download the notice of chargeable development form

Exemptions from CIL

The following types of development are exempt and can get relief from CIL:

To claim relief on self-build new homes or residential extensions or annexes, you need to complete one of the following forms:

The Royal Borough of Greenwich has taken the decision to withdraw exceptional circumstances relief.

View the statement on this decision

Exceptional Circumstances Relief will no longer be available as of 28 September 2022.

 

CIL and Section 106 receipts and expenditure reports

The Community Infrastructure Levy (CIL) regulations require all local planning authorities that issue a CIL liability notice or enter into section 106 planning obligations during a reporting year to publish an infrastructure funding statement (IFS) at least annually (Community Infrastructure Regulations 2010 (as amended, Regulation 121a)). This report represents the statement for financial year 2019/20 and has to be published on the Council’s website by 31 December 2020 and by 31 December each year thereafter.

There are a number of factors that can affect the amount of CIL the borough collects:

  • Number of commencements: an applicant is required to submit a Commencement Notice to the Council before starting works. This Commencement Notice is the trigger for a Demand Notice being issued to the applicant, which must then be paid within a certain timeframe based on the Council’s instalments policy. The amount collected in a given year is dependent on the number of commencements. The Council have commenced a review of all outstanding liabilities to identify applicants that may have commenced without informing the Council. Surcharges can be imposed on those applicants that do not provide a valid Commencement Notice.
     
  • Charging rate: The CIL rates set by local authorities are based on a local viability assessment and then subject to a Planning Inspector led Examination in Public. The current adopted rates are what the Council was able to secure agreement at the time the CIL policy was progressed, and in comparison to other London Boroughs are quite low. The Greenwich CIL policy was adopted in 2015 and a review of the charging schedule is scheduled to commence by Autumn 2021, to run alongside the early stages of the local plan review. When deciding the levy rates, an authority must strike an appropriate balance between additional investment to support development and the potential effect on the viability of developments.
     
  • Relief: Where a development provides affordable housing or is for charitable purposes, the developer can claim social housing relief / charitable relief from the CIL liability. Since 2015 nearly £12m in social housing relief has been granted in Greenwich, reflecting the levels of social housing that the borough has secured.
     
  • Section 106: Some of the borough’s largest development schemes were approved prior to the adoption of the Greenwich CIL charging schedule. For these schemes developer contributions have been secured through S106, rather than CIL. The Kidbrooke scheme for example was approved before the adoption of a CIL charge. The majority of the developer contributions for this scheme have been secured through Section 106, with CIL only being secured where permissions are subsequently varied, and then only from any uplift in floorspace.

Woolwich Crossrail Station Fit Out

In 2013 the Council entered in to an agreement with the Mayor of London to contribute £15m to the fit out costs of the Woolwich Crossrail Station through a combination of S106 contributions from schemes within 1 mile of the Woolwich Station (referred to as “Crossrail roof tax”) and from 50% of the borough’s Community Infrastructure Levy (CIL) receipts. To date the borough has collected and transferred £6.3m to TfL in accordance with this agreement. The intention (based on forecasts at the time) what that the £15m would be met by end of 2022/23. In some cases schemes that it was expected would contribute to this have not progressed as expected. It was agreed that the borough's Strategic CIL (i.e. the other 50% not already committed to this agreement) would be held to underwrite the outstanding funding commitment, in the event that the contribution mechanism set out in the agreement did not meet the £15m target by 2022/23.

Community Infrastructure Levy and S106 financial reports

In addition, it is recommended that local authorities also publish the raw data that informed the infrastructure funding statement. The raw data is made up of:

  • developer agreements
  • developer agreement contributions
  • developer agreement transactions

View the developer contributions data