Council and councillors

Brett Culpin, Community Infrastructure and Planning, Rutland County Council

20 minutes for presentation and questions

1)            RUTLAND LOCAL PLAN REVIEW ISSUES AND OPTIONS CONSULTATION – Brett Culpin, Community Infrastructure and Planning Obligations Officer, Rutland County Council

Mr Culpin gave a presentation on the review of the Local Plan and the key Issues and Options report; a copy of which was attached to the agenda for this meeting. 

Key areas highlighted included:

•         The existing documents comprising the Local Plan covered the period to 2026.

•         The main reasons for reviewing the Local Plan included: to extend the plan period to 2036 and provide a minimum 15-year time period as recommended by the government; to combine a number of existing documents into a single Local Plan and reflect any new issues that had arisen; to provide for any additional new housing, employment or other development that would be required over the extended plan period and to reflect the preparation of a number of neighbourhood plans in Rutland which the Council wanted to encourage communities to produce.

•         That the “Issues and Options” document would set out key issues and possible options and was the first stage in preparing the Local Plan review and would not include policies or proposals. 

•         That there would be a 9-week consultation period – 10 November 2015 to 12 January 2016.  Information would be available on the Council’s website and at public libraries in Rutland, consultation letters and/or emails would be sent to all Town and Parish Councils/Meetings and a community roadshow would be held at various areas in the county.

•         That under a government directed “call for sites” initiative there was also an early opportunity for developers, landowners, town and parish councils and others to put forward development sites for consideration.  This was a separate consultation with a closing date – 5 November 2015.  Sites put forward would be assessed as part of the Local Plan Review.  Further information was available on Rutland County Council’s website.

•         Key issues included: what role the Local Plan should take in coordinating Neighbourhood Plans; did the Settlement Hierarchy need to change; how much new housing and other development was needed; should the current distribution of development between the towns and villages be retained; should the current distribution of development between Oakham and Uppingham be retained; what were the most suitable directions for growth at Oakham and Uppingham; what additional infrastructure would be needed; were sites for employment, retail or other uses needed; were changes to minerals and waste planning policies needed; arising from an updated local waste needs assessment.

•         Following the consultation period the Council would consider all the comments received before preparing the next “Preferred Options” version of the Local Plan.  This would set out the proposed policies and sites to be allocated for development in the plan.  It was estimated that this would be published in August/September 2016.

The following points were noted:

•         That where land use allocation had not been taken up this could be rolled forward but the Council would need to understand why a site had not been developed; there was a need to make sure sites allocated came forward.

•         That the purpose of a Local Plan was to demonstrate the need for site allocation and the Council needed to be aware of neighbourhood plans and the timeframe for any reviews of adopted plans.

•         That schools, where now academies and the Local Authority had a duty to cooperate to meet need.

The Chair thanked Mr Culpin for his presentation.

For further information

•         Council’s website www.rutland.gov.uk/localplanreview

•         Email localplan@rutland.gov.uk 

•         Telephone 01572 722577