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Is Neighbourhood Planning at a Fork in the Road?

Written by Julian Jackson.

Has the interest of local communities in neighbourhood planning started to wane? Understandably, Neighbourhood Plan making has been more difficult over the last 12 months with all the restrictions brought on by the pandemic. However, will Plan preparation activity pick up again once the full freedoms of personal association are restored? Perhaps more fundamentally will producing a Neighbourhood Plan typically be a one-off task and not one that endures over the long term?

The latest research by Planning Aid England volunteers in the North West reveals the tide may be turning away from neighbourhood planning. Work was started on only 2 new Plans in the year, by far the lowest figure since the annual survey of activity was first done in 2017. This may mean that most of those communities who want to produce a Plan have already embarked upon that journey. However, there are also strong indications that many of those that started the process may never complete the task. Certainly, a significant number of Qualifying Bodies in the North West have found Plan making hard going.

A particular focus of the research this time was the quarter (53) of all the Plans in the Region started over 4 years ago that appeared not to have been progressed to a statutory stage beyond initial designation. The results reveal that 6 of these Plans had now reached a later statutory stage and that some other Neighbourhood Plan groups had carried out other post-designation tasks, although in some cases not recently. However, establishing exactly what the ‘live’ status is of many of these ‘slow-moving’ Plans has proved to be difficult.

The research concluded that work on 11 of the 53 Plans had definitely been abandoned but also in a further 15 cases no Plan preparation progress was found, so in all probability work on these has ceased as well. Progress on a further 6 Plans was recorded as temporarily ‘paused’, typically this was because of COVID-19 issues.

As to reasons for this slow and faltering progress a combination of factors is probably at play. A RTPI webinar held on 7 October 2020 examined possible causes:

  • Are some neighbourhood planning groups trying to produce a Plan for the wrong reasons or started off with false expectations?
  • Is the whole process just too hard for the non-planners that typically make up Plan steering groups?
  • Is maintaining community volunteer involvement over the sustained period it takes to produce a Plan a commitment some groups can’t maintain?

The webinar can be viewed on the RTPI YouTube channel https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=23YwtCOzCDQ

There is no doubt from the research that Neighbourhood Plan making is often harder for Forums compared to Parish/Town Councils. A total of 32 Plans in the North West have been started by Forums, 16% of all the Qualifying Bodies. Forums typically experience a steep initial learning curve in fully appreciating even the basic aspects of town and country planning, whereas this is common knowledge to Parish/Town Councils given their inclusion in parts of the planning process, such as being consulted on planning applications. Since 2012, following the enabling legislation, 197 Neighbourhood Plans have been started in the North West; 77 of these have so far been completed ie ‘made’; a ‘success’ rate of 39%. The number of made Plans will undoubtedly increase in the next few years as the later starters get to the finish line. However, to date the success rate of Forum-produced Plans is just 18%.

Forums are typically located in more deprived communities than Town/Parish Councils. Looking at all the Neighbourhood Areas in the Region in relation to the Index of Multiple Deprivation rankings reveals that a far lower proportion of Qualifying Bodies have completed the task in the more deprived communities. In the two most deprived quartiles the proportion of made Plans averages out at 26%, whereas it is 57% in the two least deprived quartiles.

Another aspect of Forums is that they have a limited ‘life’ of 5 years. After then they need to be re-designated to formally continue to exercise their planning powers. Several Forums in the Region have had to become re-designated before being able to complete making a Plan. Several others over 5 years old have not sought re-designation since finishing work on a Plan, so those Forums have officially ceased to exist and have no powers to carry out a Plan review.

Town and Parish Councils can take as long as they like to prepare a Plan although early evidence work may become out of date and need to be re-done to properly inform the eventually emerging Plan. Many of the groups that have been slow but not given up work on their Plan are Town/Parish Councils. It is far easier for these Bodies to resume work as they have a perpetuating existence through the election of councillors. When a Forum has lost membership and fallen below the required number of 21 at the time of first designation, finding replacement members for re-designation can be a significant challenge.

Local planning authorities are required to help Neighbourhood Plan groups and over the four years that the research has been carried out that degree of assistance has measurably improved, but only a little. There are still wide variations across the North West in the levels of council support offered. There is little doubt that deficiencies in this regard have contributed to the lack of progress on some Plans and may account for why some local authority areas have no Neighbourhood Plans at all.

The annual number of made Plans in the Region appears to have peaked, although 2020 was not a typical year with the COVID-19 restrictions preventing 5 Plan referendum votes from taking place. In a normal year, all of those Plans are likely to have received majority community support in the vote and gone on to be made. Adding those 5 Plans to the 9 that were formally made gives a total of 14 for the year, the lowest number of completed Plans since 2016.

It is interesting to also consider sub-regional variations in Plan making take-up. With no new designations in the last 12 months there are signs that most if not all the Town and Parish Councils that intend to prepare a Neighbourhood Plan in the two districts with most Plans already – Cheshire East (with 54 Plans) and Cheshire West and Chester (36) – have already embarked on that journey. But that only covers half the parishes in Cheshire East and a third of those in Cheshire West and Chester.

Eden in Cumbria is the only other local authority area with over a dozen (14) Plans started and given that the Upper Eden Plan (the first in England to be made) covers 17 parishes, the potential Neighbourhood Plan coverage is this district is extensive. However, only one other Plan in Eden has been made whilst 9 others have not progressed to a statutory stage after designation in at least four years. This points to an early widespread enthusiasm for making Plans not being maintained, again the reasons for this are not clear from the research.

Perhaps the most fundamental indication of whether neighbourhood planning will endure is to see how many Bodies have commenced a Plan review. Although only 7 Plans in the North West are over 5 years old (the typical duration triggering a review) another 13 will fall into that category by the end of 2021. To date the annual monitoring work has not identified any Plan reviews that are underway. This begs the question what proportion of Plans will be reviewed? Was the initial experience such a big task that few groups would want to repeat the exercise? Only time will tell.

So, it remains to be seen whether neighbourhood planning will take the road to an enduring future where the majority of Plans are kept up to date through periodic reviews. Or whether statutory plan making by local communities proves to be short lived as most Qualifying Bodies choose to turn away from that path. November 2021 will mark ten years from when the Localism Act came into law. If the coming year were to be a ‘normal’ one, then maybe the future of neighbourhood planning would become clearer however with the likelihood of personal restrictions continuing in some form for at least the next few months it may well take a while longer for a true picture to emerge.  One ray of light may be that with many folk re-discovering their immediate surroundings during lockdown local walks and a new-found sense of community, a desire to plan for neighbourhoods may be rekindled.

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Neighbourhood Planning and COVID-19

Written by Edward Taylor, PlanSpace.uk

For many Neighbourhood Planning groups, the Covid-19 virus will have led to a slowing down in activity. Lockdown has made it difficult for forums and Parish and Town Councils to meet up and face to face engagement has had to be curtailed.  One new group in Liverpool had 3 events planned for the end of March, all of which had to be cancelled and another group decided not to send out leaflets door to door because residents were concerned about the health risks involved.

Local Planning Authorities are often less able to respond and the Government has announced that there will be no Neighbourhood Planning Referendums before May 2021, a decision that does not look like being reversed. 

This all presents a challenge and makes it much harder to keep momentum which can be important. 

For any Neighbourhood Plan to progress there must be engagement and the people driving them have to be able to meet up to take decisions. One possibility of course is to hold meetings and engagements online. More and more people are getting used to using platforms like Zoom or Google Hangouts or Microsoft Teams which allow people to not only see one another but also to share what is on their screens and chat and record and review the meeting later. These platforms offer a way for people to get involved in debate around the various issues in an emerging Plan. 

Another popular platform is CommonPlace. Many councils are currently using this to allow people to have their say about walking and cycling in their neighbourhoods. So far in Merseyside for example 4 authorities: Knowsley, Liverpool, Sefton and Wirral have taken up the offer. Liverpool’s CommonPlace page is found at https://liveablestreetsliverpool.commonplace.is/  The way it works is that you register and log onto the site and then using a map not unlike Google Maps you identify a place you wish to comment on and then plant a flag and submit your comment. You can also ‘like’ other people’s comments. The platform is currently being offered to Councils for free so it may be possible for Neighbourhood Planning groups to access it as well. 

Some sort of web presence would normally be recommended in more normal times and an effective web strategy combining social media with a website can provide many effective ways for people to engage with an emerging Neighbourhood Plan.  There are of course limits to online engagement. Firstly people may not even know you have a website and you may have trouble finding out people’s e-mail addresses assuming they’re even happy to hand them over. And of course there are people who do not engage much or at all online.

In any circumstances, an online presence needs to work alongside an offline engagement and even if under lockdown the balance has to shift, an offline presence is still important. With reasonable precautions leafleting houses should be safe enough but in the absence of face to face meetings the leaflets will have to do a lot more. They can’t just tell people to look online, they also need to give people other ways of having their say such as via questionnaires and surveys.

Another process which is tricky to replicate online is co-design which is where the design of an area or a site or building is done though cooperation within a particular community with design professionals typically taking more of an advisor or facilitator role. Co-design often involves groups of people crowding around plans and being encouraged to be hands on and drawing their ideas directly onto plans. There is huge potential for co-design processes such Planning for Real or Design Charettes in neighbourhood planning which perhaps needs more recognition but undertaking it under lockdown presents a significant challenge.

There may well be many other challenges. We would be interested in knowing your thoughts. How has Covid-19 affected your Neighbourhood Plan process and how have you adapted? Contact us to share your experience.

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Planning Practice Guidance Updates

Paragraph Additional content published 13 May 2020
Paragraph 107
Reference ID: 41-107-20200513

What changes have been introduced to neighbourhood planning in response to the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic?
The government has been clear that all members of society are required to adhere to guidance to help combat the spread of coronavirus (COVID-19). The guidance has implications for neighbourhood planning including: the referendum process; decision-making; oral representations for examinations; and public consultation. This planning guidance supersedes any relevant aspects of current guidance on neighbourhood planning, including in paragraphs 007, 056, 057, 061 and 081 until further notice.

Referendums: All neighbourhood planning referendums that have been recently cancelled, or are scheduled to take place, between 16 March 2020 and 5 May 2021 are postponed in line with the Local Government and Police and Crime Commissioner (Coronavirus) (Postponement of Elections and Referendums) (England and Wales) Regulations 2020 until 6 May 2021.

Decision-making: Where the local planning authority has issued a decision statement (as set out under Regulation 18 of the Neighbourhood Planning (General) Regulations 2012) detailing its intention to send a neighbourhood plan to referendum, that plan can be given significant weight in decision-making, so far as the plan is material to the application.

Examinations: The general rule remains that examinations should be
conducted by written representations. If an examiner considers that oral representations are necessary, these should not take place in person. Wherever possible, oral representations may still take place using video conferencing or other suitable technologies.

Public consultation: The Neighbourhood Planning (General) Regulations 2012 require neighbourhood planning groups and local planning authorities to undertake publicity in a manner that is likely to bring it to the attention of people who live, work or carry on business in the neighbourhood area at particular stages of the process. It is not
mandatory that engagement is undertaken using face-to-face methods.
However, to demonstrate that all groups in the community have been
sufficiently engaged, such as with those without internet access, more
targeted methods may be needed including by telephone or in writing.
Local planning authorities may be able to advise neighbourhood planning groups on suitable methods and how to reach certain groups in the community.

There are also requirements in the Neighbourhood Planning (General) Regulations 2012 that require at some stages of the process for neighbourhood planning groups and local planning authorities to publicise the neighbourhood planning proposal and publish details of where and when documents can be inspected. It is not mandatory for copies of documents to be made available at a physical location. They may be held available online. Local planning authorities may be able to advise neighbourhood planning groups on suitable methods that will provide communities with access to physical copies of documents.

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Latest Neighbourhood Plan Making Progress in the North West

The results of the latest survey

Once again, a team of Planning Aid volunteers has been monitoring the progress of Neighbourhood Plan making in our Region. Since 2012 when the powers were first made available to local communities nearly 200 (195) Neighbourhood Plans have now been started in the North West. That is 11 more than a year ago and an increase of 27 over two years, so there are signs that the uptake rate of this task is slowing down.

There remain large variations across the North West in Neighbourhood Plan making activity. Just under half of all the Plans started are in the Cheshire sub-region with the most all in Cheshire East (54) followed by Cheshire West and Chester(36). Only 16 Plans have been started in the Liverpool City Region, 19 in Greater Manchester, 29 in Cumbria and 37 in Lancashire. Each sub-region has seen new designations over the past year except for Cumbria where there were none and some slowing progress of those started.

Only 27 of the designated groups are Forums and a significant number of these have made little or no progress. Three Forums have been re-designated because they had been in existence for over 5 years, but five others have also been in place for at least that long and yet have not sought re-designation, so they effectively cease to exist. Just five Forums were set up as Business ones.

On the positive side just over a third (34%) of all the Plans started have been completed and formally ‘made’. About two-thirds of these made Plans are in the two Cheshire unitary authorities where nearly half of all the Plans started here have reached the final stage. Elsewhere the ‘made’ proportion of started Plans ranges from 15% (in Greater Manchester) to 27% in Lancashire.

Successful Plan making performance is highest in the more affluent areas. A total of 40% of started Plans have been completed in the top two quartiles of areas with least deprivation. Whereas for Plans in areas falling within the two quartiles most deprived, the ‘made’ rate average is just 24%.

How can we account for these variations in Plan making performance?

Certain local planning authorities promote and support neighbourhood planning more than others. The support offered by authorities was measure against 10 criteria as evidence from their published website information. A total of six councils offer at least 7 of the 10 support features. These include the three authorities with the most Plans – the two Cheshire unitary authorities and Eden Council in Cumbria. However, Carlisle, Sefton and Knowsley Councils also score at least 7 and have far fewer Plans; Knowsley Council designated its first in 2019, at Halewood.

Generally, the level of support local authorities offer is edging up each year since this monitoring started over three years ago. However, this measurable support clearly does not account for all the variation in Plan uptake and success rates. Councils’ attitude to neighbourhood planning will vary but this is very difficult to measure.

A tangible factor that can be assessed is the performance of Forums. Unfortunately, the most supportive local authorities and certainly those with the most Plans have no Forums so it is not possible to directly equate Forum success rates with consistent levels of support. However, of the 27 Forums which have started off only 5 have achieved a made Plan and as we have seen many others appear to have given up the task completely. 

Undoubtedly the task of Plan making is much harder for Forums compared to Parish/Town Councils. The latter have an established organisational structure, staffing support (a clerk), a longstanding working relationship with their local planning authority, often prior experience of plan making (e.g. Parish Plans) and the capacity to raise revenue. Forums by contrast need to create themselves from scratch, often have little or no financial resource and typically comprise members unfamiliar with the planning system. At one time Forums were automatically eligible for extra government grant support but are now only eligible for one additional Technical Support package – to help them become designated.

Of more general concern is that the monitoring shows more and more groups, whether they be Parish Councils or Forums, struggling to complete the task of producing a Plan. The latest findings show that 53 Plans which were started in 2016 or earlier have not proceeded to a formal stage beyond initial designation. The equivalent figure from a year ago was 44. 

Why are many Neighbourhood Plan groups making slow or no progress?

The short answer is we don’t know and there is little research from elsewhere in the country to shed light on this. Producing a Neighbourhood Plan is no easy task. Very few groups can successfully go through the whole process without professional assistance but inevitably grant funding and other support available (from all sources, including Planning Aid) is limited. Some groups are fortunate to include professional planners within their ranks and/or have substantial financial resources of their own to pay for extra help.

The other reasons why some groups struggle is probably a combination of factors. Some groups may enter the process with unreasonable expectations and become disillusioned at the scale of the task. The people directly involved may start with the best of intentions, be well organised and led but these persons will often have many calls on their time and/or move away from the area to follow employment or other overriding commitments.

To fully expose the range of difficulties some groups face further research is needed.

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Why do a Neighbourhood Plan?

People decide to do Neighbourhood Plans for a variety of reasons. In the North West, I have worked with groups that were concerned with ensuring that new housing on allocated sites was well designed, respected local character of the area and integrated well with the wider area. Some groups have been motivated by a desire to protect and enhance local historic character or natural environment or are keen to see affordable housing and community facilities in their area. Other reasons include improving walking and cycling or enhancing green space to make places more liveable. Neighbourhood plans can address all these issues and opportunities and others to varying degrees by providing the evidence based policies that planning departments are obliged to use when determining planning applications.

Where Councils have a Community Infrastructure Levy, (CIL) which is a charge on development, Parish Councils and Neighbourhood Forums that have produced a Neighbourhood Plan are able to have a greater say in where that money is spent and this incentive is a perfectly legitimate reason for doing a Neighbourhood Plan. Not all councils have CIL but may have one day so having a Neighbourhood Plan in place can be a good idea.

As well as being able to produce the Neighbourhood Plan, Parish Councils and Neighbourhood Forums have to be consulted on planning applications in their area and any comments they make have to be referred to in any relevant reports. This can help communities get a clear idea of what is happening in their area and give them a say on proposals. When producing a Neighbourhood Plan, groups can commission quality evidence such as Urban Design Analysis, Character Assessment, Housing Needs Assessment, Site Analysis and Site Assessment which can inform comments on planning applications.

Neighbourhood Planning can also work well alongside other initiatives that communities can do such as lobbying, funding bids, running events or setting up Community Land Trusts, Community Interest Companies or Development Trusts. But Neighbourhood Planning can be more than just another element. Neighbourhood Planning attracts grant and other support to help produce the Plan by funding engagement, strategy development including a Vision and Objectives to give direction to the Plan and quality evidence to give clarity about a variety of issues such as housing need, design and character and these can help develop and evidence a wide variety of other complementary initiatives.

The Vision and Objectives, if based on quality engagement so that they represent local concern and aspirations can provide clear direction to prompt, coordinate and support other complementary initiatives. For example, the Plan may have an objective to improve security and the Neighbourhood Plan could have policies ensuring that new development has high quality street lighting as well as other features that ensure safety such as habitable rooms overlooking public space and active frontages along streets. But the objective of improved security could also be met by the complementary action of improving existing street lighting which the group could lobby councillors and officers for. This way the objectives provide a simple way of coordinating the planning policies in the Neighbourhood Plan with complementary non-planning actions.

Engagement can have benefits for the community as well. Often issues such as education and housing cut across different groups and good quality engagement on these issues can help bring people together to tackle them. Not all engagement has to be filling in surveys, useful though this can be and there are lots of creative ways of to engage with people based around events, sport, music, food, play and so on which can bring people together.

We would be interested in hearing about your experiences with anything mentioned above, whether it is spending CIL, complementing the Neighbourhood Plan with other initiatives, community engagement, commenting on planning applications, using evidence or whatever.


Edward Taylor, PlanSpace.uk

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A VIEW FROM THE INSIDE – An anonymous blog from planning practitioners who say how it really is

An Anonymous View from the Inside of Neighbourhood Planning

What is the Future for Neighbourhood Planning?

It’s coming up to 10 years since the notion of ‘Localism’ was taken up by the Conservative Party and used to justify a series of initiatives to devolve powers to local communities. Cynics might say it was really pursued as a way of saving money by reducing costly ‘big government’ in times of austerity and instead encouraging more, free of charge, voluntary effort. Localism comes in many guises. The Localism Act of 2011 comprises over 240 paragraphs, only 6 refer to Neighbourhood Planning; however these few provisions have led to an enormous amount of voluntary effort in Plan making across England.

Across the country over 2600 communities have embarked on the task of producing a Neighbourhood Plan and more than 800 of these have passed the referendum stage. The equivalent figures for the North West Region are over 180 plans started and more than 50 reaching the referendum stage so far. However, the pace of plans coming forward has slowed and there is much anecdotal, but no hard, evidence that many Neighbourhood Plan Groups have been struggling to complete the task or have given up altogether. Information collected by Planning Aid England volunteers in our Region (see Planning Aid England Research via the Resources tab) shows that 44 North West Plans started four or more years ago have not reached the next statutory stage of preparation.

There have also been numerous reported planning decision cases from across England where planning permission has been granted seemingly in contradiction of Neighbourhood Plan policies. The degree to which such decisions directly cut across Neighbourhood Plan provisions no doubt varies in practice with other factors (‘material considerations’) weighing in the balance, not least of which will have been the adjudged scale of the local housing supply.

Given all this, it is perhaps not surprising that the Ministry (of Housing, Communities and Local Government) have been pondering how to maintain the Neighbourhood Plan making momentum and ways of bolstering their status. As part of this process they have been running a series of invitation only events around the country over the summer where leading people involved in Neighbourhood Planning have been asked for their views and suggestions relating to:

  • The impacts of neighbourhood planning 
  • Issues experienced and ways to increase uptake in areas where neighbourhood planning hasn’t ‘taken off’
  • How neighbourhood plans can be strengthened 

As we’ve seen the impact of neighbourhood planning in terms of Plans being produced is considerable but to borrow the title of a Smiths song – what difference does it make? The underlying Government agenda has always been that Neighbourhood Plans are another way to boost the supply of housing. However, some leading commentators, such as consultants Lichfields, have reported that the overall increase in housing land supply attributable to Neighbourhood Plans is comparatively small.

Some would argue that neighbourhood planning is all about the small things and many Plans provide the policy support needed to achieve all manner of minor improvements and practical on-ground project implementation. However, perhaps a more pertinent question to ask is will neighbourhood planning have a lasting impact? Many groups find the task of preparing a Plan a huge, exhausting process such that the prospect of preparing a plan review is too much to contemplate. So, we might well find many Plans are a one off, never to be updated.

Neighbourhood Forums of course have an additional challenge as time goes by. Being designated for only five years, some have had to pursue re-designation so they can finish preparing their Plan. How many will bother to do so if they have completed the task? 

Forums have a tough job right from the off and now receive little extra support from the government funding programme. At least parish councils have councillors familiar with the planning process, a paid member of staff (clerk) and a statutory right to raise funds through their precept, plus above all they have an enduring existence. Should Forums get a fast track to becoming parish councils? How many would want to? The title might put some off, but they could call themselves ‘neighbourhood’ or ‘community councils’.

The take-up of neighbourhood planning varies greatly from place to place around the country with metropolitan areas generally seeing less activity. Part of the reason for this is the need to establish Forums in the non-parished towns and cities. However, another reason is some metropolitan councils seem to have a complete downer on allowing any organisation other themselves plan the locality and have gone to extreme lengths to frustrate neighbourhood planning groups such that many have given up. The Ministry know who the councils are but fail to act.

At least larger and less deprived councils ought to be better resourced staff-wise to devote some time to supporting fledging groups. Many smaller district councils have barely enough planners to produce the Local Plan and all that goes with it, leaving little or no scope for Neighbourhood Plan assistance.

The government boasts that many millions of pounds are available to support the neighbourhood planning effort across England. However only about half of that is available as direct grant support. Nearly all the remainder supports one major consultancy to provide ‘Technical Support’ packages. Is this the best way to use the financial resource? Should cash strapped local planning authorities get a share of this funding to support groups?

What other assistance is out there? When the support programme was first run from 2012 to 2015 several organisations pitched in. Not least of which was Planning Aid England where the RTPI used government funding to employ planning advisors in every English Region, the North West had two such enablers and a fine job they did. However, when the government contract came up for renewal the RTPI declined to bid to be a leading player. As a result, the RTPI had the unenviable task of terminating employment contracts. It has no appetite to put itself in that position again.

Do Neighbourhood Plans need to be strengthened? They are already a fully-fledged part of the statutory Development Plan. Sometimes it appears planning officers fail to fully reflect the relevance and provisions of a Neighbourhood Plan when writing their reports on planning applications. Sometimes Planning Inspectors similarly overlook the Neighbourhood Plan, perhaps some can’t see beyond the ‘must have more housing’ mantra? Maybe national policy and guidance should be further tightened up to try to avoid such oversights by stipulating application/appeal reports must explicitly consider relevance of the Neighbourhood Plan.

The Ministry’s civil servants have no doubt found the timing of their events roadshow a little awkward. Arranged in advance of a new Prime Minister being ‘elected’ and their Departmental ministerial team changes. So, they found themselves asking the questions without knowing the likely future direction from their political masters. We’ll have to see what comes of this navel gazing…

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What are some common barriers to successfully completing a Neighbourhood Plan?

By Dr John Sturzaker MRTPI,
Discipline Lead for Planning, University of Liverpool
Email: john.sturzaker@liverpool.ac.uk

As a founder member of the North West Neighbourhood Planning Network I am very supportive of Neighbourhood Planning – I think it’s a great idea and I’m keen to see more Neighbourhood Plans across the North West. However, it’s important that groups go into the process with their eyes open – producing a Neighbourhood Plan is a lot of work, and whilst that work can be worthwhile, there are some barriers which can crop up. Following the research we at the University of Liverpool did for Planning Aid England to assess the level of Neighbourhood Planning activity across the North West, I have been carrying out interviews with a number of members of Neighbourhood Forums and Neighbourhood Planning support workers to try and understand what these barriers are.

The first is that it is often harder to get going with the work of producing a Neighbourhood Plan in urban areas than it is in rural areas. There is usually no Parish or Town Council, which often have paid employees and will certainly have elected members who may have been volunteering on the Council for a number of years. Without this, a fair amount of work is needed just to get a Neighbourhood Forum in place and begin the process of producing a Plan.

The second is that, wherever you are, producing a Neighbourhood Plan is usually a long process – two or three years is not unusual. So you need stamina, and you are much more likely to succeed if you have a group of keen and willing people. If just one or two people are trying to push things through, the process can be tiring.

The third is that the level of support you can expect from your local authority will vary quite significantly. Some local authorities have been worse hit than others by “austerity” and the very significant average cuts to local authority budgets, so in some cases planning departments have seen their staff numbers drastically reduced. But the variability we found in support seems to go beyond this, with some local authority councillors seemingly opposed, in principle, to Neighbourhood Planning. We are currently doing more research to try and find out why this is.

These points are not designed to put anyone off Neighbourhood Planning – we at the University of Liverpool want to do everything we can to support communities, indeed our students work with a local community to support them in producing their Neighbourhood Plan every year. It’s my hope that through the North West Neighbourhood Planning Network we can build and share knowledge about Neighbourhood Planning to try and overcome these barriers.

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Why a North West Neighbourhood Planning Network?

There has been a lot of speculation about Neighbourhood Planning ever since it was introduced by the Localism Act in 2012: who would take up the opportunity? what kind of Plans would be produced? how easy will people find the process? and what support can be provided to make it easier?
 
Generally those who have managed to produce Neighbourhood Plans have found the experience a positive one but there also groups who have found the process difficult. In all cases, however, there are reasons to believe that the whole process could be made easier, more effective and more rewarding. One way in which the whole experience can be improved in this way is by bringing neighbourhood planners together so that they can share their experiences, learn from one another and work together.
 
That was the reasoning behind the North West Neighbourhood Planning Network. While Neighbourhood Planning represents a great opportunity to address issues at a neighbourhood level, there is currently a lack of any coordination between neighbourhood planning groups and potential neighbourhood planning groups in the region. In addition, there are concerns about the lack of Neighbourhood Planning in certain parts of North West – especially non-parished areas such as Liverpool and Manchester.
 
There is are great potential benefits of greater coordination such as:
 
  • Sharing information and experience,
  • Moral support,
  • Signposting towards help such as funding sources, guidance etc
  • Advocacy on behalf of Neighbourhood Planners and feedback to those involved in Neighbourhood planning such as Local Planning Authorities, Locality, Groundwork and Ministry of Housing Community and Local Government about their actions and programmes etc,
  • Evidence of and greater understanding of needs and issues facing Neighbourhood Planners in the region
  • Tailored support for Neighbourhood Planners in region
 
We hope that this network will be able to bring together those with an interest in Neighbourhood Planning in the region whether you are a Neighbourhood Planning Group, a potential Neighbourhood Planning Group or are involved in Neighbourhood Planning in some other capacity for example as a consultant or academic or just a member of the public interested in the subject.
 
The Network hopes to achieve this by being very open to new members, no fee required, so that as many people can join as possible. The network will use the website, e-mail bulletins and social media to keep members up to date about what it is doing and to help spread the word about the network. We will use surveys and discussions on social media to get as clear an idea as possible of what the issues are affecting Neighbourhood Planners in the area and what the Network can do about it for example by advocating on behalf of members or organising training or addressing issues through resources on our website including Frequently Asked Questions and through our blog and e-mails.
 
Ultimately, like any network, the success of the NWNPN will depend on the involvement of its members so if you haven’t already done so, head over to our home page and sign up, it’s free, to receive our e-mail bulletins and let us know what you would like to see and what you would like the Network to address. Don’t worry! we won’t clog up your inbox, you can expect a bulletin around once every 2 months while there will be opportunity for discussions over on our social media channels.
 
With that said, we look forward to hearing from you.

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