Agenda item - Dorset Council Local Plan Consultation

To consider a report of the Cabinet Member for Planning and Emergency Planning.

(a) That officers be authorised to prepare for the Dorset Council Local Plan options consultation; and approve the commencement of the consultation in mid-August 2025, to run for a period of eight weeks.

(b) That officers be authorised to prepare for the Minerals and Waste Local Plan consultation and approve the commencement of the consultation in mid-August for a period of eight weeks.

(c) That authority be delegated to the Service Manager for Spatial Planning, in consultation with the Portfolio Holder for Planning and Emergency Planning, to agree the consultation material prior to the start of the consultation.

Reason for the decision

It was important that the Local Plan was prepared in a positive manner that actively explored realistic opportunities for meeting growth needs within Dorset. Following the correct process would enable a robust Local Plan to be prepared.

The consultation material would include a strategy for meeting housing, employment and other needs. It would need to explore the reasonable deliverable development opportunities for meeting these needs.

Once the consultation was complete, the site opportunities would be reviewed and where no insurmountable deliverability issues including significant negative impacts had been identified, the sites were likely to be taken forward for allocation. The final set of site opportunities for the next stage of plan making would need to be deliverable.

The Cabinet member for Planning and Emergency Planning advised Cabinet that it was a statutory requirement to have an up-to-date Local Plan, to meet the growth needs of the community. Consultation for a draft local plan took place in January 2021. However, since this consultation there had been significant changes to national policy and an amended standard approach to calculating housing needs. As a result of these changes there was a need to conduct a further consultation. A new Minerals and Waste Plan was also necessary, and a separate consultation process on this would run alongside the local plan consultation.

The Cabinet member took the opportunity to highlight the four strategic priorities that were relevant to the local plan and the uplift in housing numbers from central government meant that a further consultation on new development sites was necessary.

The Cabinet member confirmed that it was important to demonstrate throughout the creation of the local plan that the Council has consulted and considered all development site options. He proposed the recommendations as set out in the report.

The recommendation was seconded by Cllr N Ireland, who advised that the Local Plan EAP members would have an opportunity to road test the consultation before launched.

In response to questions around the housing numbers set by central government, the Cabinet member for Planning and Emergency Planning advised that the Council needed to carry out the consultation, research and due diligence by presenting a plan to the examiner, that would show that the Council had tested all the development sites and set out the number of houses that the Council could actually deliver within the plan.

Responding to questions around the consultation timeline, the Cabinet member advised that the Council could be flexible with the first consultation period and responses received past 13 October 2025 will be included, however the second consultation end date, in August 2026 was a more rigorous period. There would also be an all-Councillor Briefing held on a date in August 2025.

Decision