NDP Referendum

Thank you all for supporting the Parish NDP.  91% of the votes cast supported the NDP. Over 400 parishioners voted, a turnout of 29%. The highest turnout of the night -  Stroud who were also voting for their NDP had a turnout of just 21% so not bad Eastington.

The next stage is the formal adoption by Stroud District Council in October described by David Hagg, the CEO, as a formality. The parish NDP has the same legal status as the Stroud District Council  Local Plan.

Over the last few months  SDC has been concerned that at planning appeals the inspector has “overruled” the Local plan in favour of “sustainability”.  At the same time as the parish NDP has gone through its various stages we have expressed concern that SDC planning officers have chosen to ignore the NDP and indeed have also ignored the SDC Local Plan.

Stephen Davies, our District Councillor, has expressed our concerns that if we are to go through so much to get a plan it must indeed be followed. That message has now been understood sadly a little late for the Meadow Mill application. David Hagg has asked Neil Carmichael, our MP, to raise the concerns of the Council that inspectors have been setting aside policies in the Local Plan and granting planning permission via the Secretary of State. We have asked Neil to take up our cause with SDC on the same issue.

The Parish will now need to work differently with SDC on planning applications and we need to agree how we are going to work to avoid tensions of interpretation around the respective plans. It would not be helpful for Officers to be recommending applications that the Parish opposed based on the NDP. It is essential we resolve these differences in advance and we learn to work closely on planning applications early on in the process.

Yes we are in the vanguard of NDPs in the district but soon there will be many more. Each Councillor will need to support their respective NDP and as some of those Councillors with an NDP will be on the DCC (planning committee) this becomes ever more important.

There is a real need to understand in detail the NDP and the Local Plan and how the policies contained within these documents inform how we respond the Planning Applications that come forward. If we are to support an application then we need to be clear why and on the basis of which policies. If we are to oppose an application we need to apply the same logic.

The change that the NDP creates is a challenge to our parish. We will be judged on how we respond to that challenge. The Parish Council in the future will be opposing  unpopular planning applications based on our NDP,  equally the Council may have to support just as unpopular applications for the same reason.

The frameworks that all applications are to work within are now clearly understood. Later this month there is a joint meeting with Planning Officers and members of the NDP project team to begin the work of developing a new working relationship. A very constructive response to recent concerns.

Daniel James