Earlier this year, West Northamptonshire Council published its Draft Plan (Regultion 18) as part of the emerging West Northamptonshire Local Plan (WNLP) for consultation with a focus of additional housing and employment growth towards Northampton. At the Council’s Planning Agents & Developers’ Forum held on 15th October 2024, it was reported that the LDS (January 2024) timetable for the WNLP would be revised and the Pre-Submission Plan (Regultion 19) planned for January 2025 would now be postponed. A further Draft Plan (Regulation 18) consultation is needed to consider any uplift from revised Local Housing Need (LHN) figures (as part of the proposed changes to the Standard Methodology), which increase from 2,124 dwellings per annum to 2,584 dwellings per annum. WNC Planning Policy Offers stated that the Draft Plan might need to accommodate an additional c. 10,000 homes due to changes to the LHN and that the plan period will need to be extended possibly by at least another two years.
North Northamptonshire are behind West Northamptonshire in terms of their timescales and the recent slippage means it is uncertain when there will be a consultation on a Draft Strategic Plan, although an updated LDS is due to be reported to the Council’s Planning Communities EAP on 13th November 2024. There currently isn’t any opportunity for new sites to be submitted to the Council for consideration – although the Council do say there will be opportunities in the future. North Northamptonshire’s revised Local Housing Need (LHN) figures also increase from 1,856 dwellings per annum to 2,064 dwellings per annum.
Five-Year Land Supply
Both West Northamptonshire and North Northamptonshire continue to be able to currently demonstrate stable five-year housing land supply positions, with no clear and obvious route to the tilted balance under the presumption in favour of sustainable of development, at the present time.
Both Authorities, however, will not want to rest on their laurels, as there will likely be increasing short-term housing land supply pressures without timely progression of both committed allocations in adopted Plans and the identification of additional growth as part of the new Local Plans, which could possibly drive a continuation of speculative applications in some parts of the County.
At the current time, the Authorities monitor on the basis of the former Districts – this will end in April 2026, five years after creation of the Unitary Authorities, at which point they will need to report on a Unitary Authority basis.