For example, we’ve been trying to talk to planners at one local authority about an application for a listed building which, as always with such properties, needs to be discussed carefully and in detail.

The team is so short-staffed though, that they have not been able to suggest a date for a meeting because demands on their time are so intense.

However, I am pleased to see a growing number of authorities, which were previously loathed to embrace development on any significant scale, taking a different approach. Stratford-upon-Avon District Council is changing its mindset, helped by the creation last autumn of the dynamic and focussed group, Stratford Vision. I believe they, and other authorities, have come to realise that good development doesn’t make money for just a few people, as some appeared to think during the property boom.

Good development creates jobs throughout the construction industry, and along its supply chains. It also creates jobs for architects, advisers, many other consultants - and even planners.

I believe passionately that we need to see innovative proposals coming forward, so we can once again see cranes on the skyline, and urban sites being regenerated.

The country has a massive shortage of good-quality homes, but housebuilders can’t get the access to finance they need to proceed with proposals - which in many cases have been on hold for three years and more. I know developers in the Birmingham area who are proceeding with schemes on single-digit margins, which simply isn’t sustainable even into the medium-term.

There I think lies the biggest hurdle facing David Cameron, Eric Pickles and the other disciples of localism.

Talking of a new mindset, making planning documents thinner and more digestible, and giving headline-grabbing speeches about local communities deciding their own future is fine - but if finance isn’t readily available for developers or purchasers, then very little gets built.

For me, and my colleagues in the planning industry, the Government is still not doing enough to stimulate development, and shows no sign of recognising that access to finance remains the crucial issue.

However, let us hope that 2012 is the year when all councils realise that they need to work in partnership with developers, and providers of finance, and advisers, to seek innovative solutions which will create the homes - and the jobs - which the country so desperately needs.