Ministry of Works and Planning, which was commissioned to draft ideas on how to achieve Better Britain from an urban planning perspective. The British government also announced that the report's decentralisation and relocation of population and industry initiatives would be followed. Plans and legislation Post-war rebuilding initiatives saw new plans drafted for London, which for the first time addressed the issue of decentralisation. Firstly, the County of London Plan of 1943 recognised that displacement of population and employment was necessary if the city was to be rebuilt at a desirable density. Moreover, the Greater London Plan of 1944 went further by suggesting that over one million people would need to be displaced into a mixture of satellite suburbs, existing rural towns, and new towns. In 1945, the New Towns Committee was formed to consider the "establishment, development, organisation, and administration" of new towns. Within eight months of its formation, the committee had completed a highly comprehensive study into these issues, resulting in positive recommendations for the construction of new towns. Accordingly, the New Towns Act 1946 was passed which, coupled with the Town and Country Planning Act 1947, created a "machinery for positive town construction". These Acts resulted in a total of 28 New Towns being constructed in Britain over the following half-century. New Towns in Britain It was in 1946 that the work of the "New Townsmen" finally paid off with the passing of the New Towns Act 1946. Swayed by the need for post-war reconstruction, more housing, and a call to halt any further expansion of London's girth, authorities saw that there was no alternative to the New Town solution. In total, 27 New Towns were built after 1946. These were: Stevenage, Crawley, Hemel Hempstead, Harlow, Hatfield, Basildon, Bracknell, and Milton Keynes outside London; Newton Aycliffe, Peterlee, and Washington in the North East; Skelmersdale and Runcorn in the North West; Corby, Telford, and Redditch in the Midlands; Cwmbran and Newtown in Wales; and in Scotland, East Kilbride, Glenrothes, Cumbernauld, Livingston, and Irvine. Towns that were expanded under the New Towns Act include Peterborough, Northampton, Warrington, Ipswich, and Preston-Leyland-Chorley. The New Towns Act 1946 enabled the creation of New Town Development Corporations, whose responsibilities included the management, design and development of New Towns. Stevenage was the first New Town to be designated in 1946. The Stevenage Development Corporation Board existed between 1946 and 1980, when it was dissolved and