Neighbourhood planning

Neighbourhood Development Plans

The Localism Act 2011 introduced a range of new rights and powers. One of these rights was neighbourhood planning.

Neighbourhood Development Plans (or Neighbourhood Plans) give local communities the opportunity to develop a shared vision for their area. Each plan should be 'positively prepared’ and ‘add real value’ at local level.

Neighbourhood Plans have statutory weight and status. Once adopted ('made'), they become part of the development plan for the designated area and will be used to help determine planning applications, where relevant. 

Across Babergh, we have 44 neighbourhood plan areas. Many of those plans have been adopted, some are now being reviewed, and others are making progress. Please use the links further below to find out more about each plan.

What is best for your community?

To help decide what is right for your community, we suggest you start by reading our Guide to Community-led Planning Tools (July 2022). An updated version of this is in preparation.

Information previously published by Locality can now be found on the MHCLG Neighbourhood planning toolkits webpage

The Planning Practice Guidance website also provides information on all the key neighbourhood plan stages.

People and Place

We were pleased to have been involved with the government-funded Neighbourhood Priority Statement project. To find out more about our approach, please visit our People and Place webpage.

Apply to designate a neighbourhood area

Before a parish can create a neighbourhood plan, they must first apply to designate their plan area. We encourage you to discuss this with us in the first instance. 

Apply to designate a neighbourhood area

Parish Plans and Village Design Statements

Parish Plans and Village Design Statements differ from neighbourhood plans in that they don't have statutory weight or status. Typically, they set out a broad vision for the area and are often used as a basis for preparing neighbourhood plans.

Village Design Statements provide a statement of the character and local identity of an area and may be used to assess planning applications.

There are a number of parish in Babergh with published Parish Plans and Village Design Statements.