New Local Plan

Preparing a new Local Plan

The Council needs to ensure its Local Plan remains up to date so it can positively manage built development and protect areas from inappropriate development. Harborough District Council has begun the preparation of the new Local Plan, which will replace the Harborough Local Plan 2011-2031, however some policies may be saved. 

The Local Plan is the long-term plan for Harborough District, and sets a 15 plus years strategy for the amount, location and design of new built development (such as homes, schools, employment, retail etc.) whilst helping to protect the countryside, important green spaces and our built and natural heritage from inappropriate development.

The current Local Plan was adopted in April 2019 and is still considered to be up to date. However, it takes a number of years to prepare and adopt a new Local Plan so the Council has started preparing a new one to ensure it remains up to date in the future. The Harborough Local Plan 2011-2031 contains policies requiring it to be updated in certain circumstances.  One of these is linked to the publication of the Leicester City Local Plan which was published in January 2023. This means we must update the Local Plan within set timescales. 

Further information about local plans, how they are prepared and the process we are required to follow are outlined in this short video by the Planning Inspectorate (opens the YouTube website).

 

FAQs and Supporting evidence 

Further information on the new Local Plan and supporting evidence is available on the links below:

 

Issues and Options Public Consultation

The Issues and Options public consultation is the first stage of public consultation of the new Local Plan and seeks views on a range of planning issues and potential options for the future development of the District.

The Issues and Options consultation document is available to read here.

The Issues and Options consultation document, associated background documents and evidence have been prepared in the context of the relevant National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF) at the time of their preparation. In most cases this is the September 2023 version of the NPPF.

A user friendly summary guide of the consultation document is available here. 

The Consultation will be open for comment from 16 January to 27 February 2024.

Comments can be submitted via our dedicated online consultation page. 

To submit comments, you will need to register with your name and email address, you can do this by clicking here.

For further information on consultations, please visit our How to get involved page. 

 

Public drop-in events

Planning for the future is a complex process. Therefore, as part of our commitment to involve local residents, businesses and organisations in the preparation of new planning policy documents, Council Officers will host five public drop-in events across the district.

The public drop-in events are designed to provide interested parties with more information on the Issues and Options consultation document, how to respond and an understanding of what happens next.  Venues, dates and times are as follows:

  • 24 January, 10.30am to 8pm: Market Harborough – Council Chamber, 2nd Floor The Symington Building, Adam & Eve Street, LE16 7AG.
  • 31 January, 3.30pm to 7.30pm: Scraptoft – Community Hub (Lounge), Malsbury Ave, LE7 9FQ.
  • 6 February, 3.30pm to 7.30pm: Lutterworth – The Wycliffe Rooms (Community Hall), George Str, Masonic Hall, LE17 4ED.
  • 7 February, 3.30pm to 7.30pm: Broughton Astley – Broughton Astley Village Hall (Boughton Hall), Station Rd, LE9 6PT.
  • 13 February, 3.30pm to 7.30pm: Kibworth – The Old Grammar School (Main Hall), School Rd, LE8 0JE.

The display boards used at our public drop-in events are available to view in the Summary Guide.

 

Next steps

Your consultation responses and further work will inform the next version of the Local Plan, which will contain more detail.  The next version will also be subject to further public consultation in early 2025.

Further information on the timetable for the preparation of the New Local Plan can be found in the Local Development Scheme.