Planning Inspectorate Info

Robert Young has been appointed Programme Officer for the Inspectorate and published details of the forthcoming Inspectorate Examinations on 17th March 2026. 

Firstly, if you submitted a response to the Local Plan at the Regulation 19 Consultation stage and ticked the box to say you wished to participate in the Examinations but didn’t receive the update email from Robert, it is important you email him urgently robert.young@southglos.gov.uk to get yourself on the mailing list as we are aware of at least one person who got missed.

The email contained 3 documents being : Guidance notes explaining the process, a list of 558 Questions on 24 Matters the Inspectorate want to address and a Timetable of dates for 5 weeks of public hearings.

The Guidance notes are important and need to be reviewed as they explain the process and the permissible scope of any statements you may wish to make.  Statements need to address the Inspectorate’s questions and issues with other responses received following the previous consultations; it is not permissible to repeat previous statements or introduce new evidence at this stage.  You may be eligible to participate and may choose to appear in person or present a written hearing statement.  If you wish to appear in person, then you must advice Robert by no later than 5pm on 10th April 2026.  Written statements must be submitted by 5pm on 28th April 2026.  These are hard deadlines.  Public hearings commence on 19th May 2026.

SOGS-SG have engaged our planning consultant, Context Planning, to respond on behalf of the group in line with their previous approach of defending the Green Belt.  In order to achieve the most benefit from the £7,000 budget we currently have available, it is likely the responses will take the form of written statements rather than in person representation at a hearing as they would charge around £2,000 per day to attend whereas £7,000 will buy us around 40 hours of office based time.  As the process progresses we will get a better feel for how much time will actually be required and if any budget is still available or if we have managed to raise further funds, then we can look again at getting in person representations at key hearing sessions.  – The more money we can raise, the more Context Planning can do for us. If anyone is prepared to represent us in person for free and deliver statements prepared by Context Planning, then that may be of help.

Here is a link to the Planning Inspectorate's web site

 

In the meanwhile if you are able to contribute to our fighting fund please visit our gofundme page  

Every little helps!