After a significant pause in the examination of the Stroud District Local Plan Review, the planning inspectorate has written to the Council to confirm their view that withdrawal of the plan from Examination is now the most appropriate way forward. The letter can be found here: id-018-stroud-dlp-letter-from-inspectors-07-february-2025.pdf

The inspectors confirmed that they do not envisage being able to find the plan sound and “it would not be in the best interests of the Council or the businesses and communities of Stroud District to agree to further delays in the Examination”.

Their concerns are summarised as follows;

• Lack of detailed and specific information regarding how the J12 and J14 M5 improvement schemes will be funded and when they would be delivered.
• Only 63% of the District’s housing need can be met without impacting on J12 or J14. Modelling work to establish this figure hasn’t been shared with National Highways so at present this remains an untested assertion as far as the inspectors are concerned.
• Regarding Sharpness new settlement, uncertainties exist around whether alternative transport modes are viable (with all options, cost appeared to outweigh potential revenue) and deliverable. This calls into question whether this allocation could be delivered in line with the strategy and relevant Plan policies.

The inspectors summed up by saying that “Given the issues that we have identified regarding the SRN [(strategic road network)] and the lack of any identified funding, we have little confidence that the schemes can be delivered during the early part of the plan period in line with requirements. It therefore follows that a significant proportion of the Plan’s allocated sites do not have a realistic or reasonable prospect of being delivered during the plan period. This consequently also puts into question the overall spatial strategy of the Plan”.

Whilst they acknowledged than additional work could potentially be done to assist, they stated that further pauses to the examination process may cause other issues including existing evidence becoming out of date, requiring more delays for updates. “We are therefore not convinced that further significant delay to the Examination would be effective.”

Stroud are unlikely to have a five-year housing land supply for the foreseeable future, as their housing requirements will go up significantly in line with the revised standard method published by the Government before Christmas.