SOLIHULL’S local plan has been withdrawn following a heated debate.
At the Full Council meeting on October 8 Councillors agreed to scrap the current plans and go back to the drawing board to create a plan which will determine how the borough is developed over the years.
The debate came after the Planning Inspectorate concluded the borough’s plan for how the land will be developed should be withdrawn as the plans due to a shortfall of land supply.
The adoption of Solihull’s local plan has been delayed since 2022 as the council and planning inspectorate have been at loggerheads over housing numbers and land supply.
When the vote was taken councillors agreed the draft local plan should be withdrawn and work on a new local plan to begin with ‘immediate effect’.
Over the years the local plan has been faced with numerous challenges over the years.
It has faced High Court challenges and changing policies enforced by the Government.
Most recently in December the former secretary of state for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities said when issuing the current National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF) that Councils did not, and do not, need to redraw their Green Belt boundaries or sacrifice protected landscapes to meet housing numbers.
However ten months on the new Labour government has proposed changes seek to overturn that policy, and to make planning authorities release land from Green Belt to meet housing targets.
As well as having to allocate space to fulfill the number of houses Solihull has been allocated the Council also faces the challenge of having to help out neighbouring authorities which are unable to meet their numbers due to lack of land.
