The new regional governance arrangements for England are raising profound challenges for the integration of planning, sustainable-development, and economic-development strategies. The authors examine how tensions are emerging in respect of efforts to provide employment sites for large-scale inward investments, using the contrasting experiences of the South East and North East of England during the period 1997–2001. Some major ideological faultlines between national control over plan making and regional aspirations to devise distinctive approaches to planning for regional development are revealed.