Work has formally begun on a new Local Plan to guide development to 2046 and beyond, with Cabinet approving the timetable and a public scoping consultation.
David said: “This is the starting point for shaping the future of Shropshire. We are building a plan that reflects the needs and ambitions of our communities, while protecting what makes our county special.”
The new 30-month process is far faster than anything previously seen in Shropshire. Even so, the new plan won’t be adopted until March 2029. We haven’t been idle and have been gathering evidence while waiting for the Government to provide the legal framework to commence the plan. This was issued at the end of March 26 after several months of waiting.
“Our new Local Plan will need to be concise, robust and deliverable. There is very little room for delay, so it is essential we get this right.
“Getting an adopted Local Plan in place gives us greater control—ensuring development happens in the right places, at the right scale, and in line with local need.
“I would strongly encourage everyone to take part in the consultation.”
Scoping Consultation Open
The scoping consultation has now gone live on Shropshire Council’s website
The Scoping Consultation Runs from May 20th until The 5th of July 2026
At present, we are in the 4-month notice period as required by the government. The formal plan-making process begins in September. During this time, the consultation will run and invite the public to send in their comments about the plan-making process. The consultation asks many questions but doesn’t provide answers at this stage.
The results of the call for sites have been mapped, as provided by developers and land owners. The Site Promotion Map is a very raw and unvarnished map of the sites. Sites haven’t been assessed or evaluated. Many sites won’t pass that evaluation. So being on this map doesn’t mean these sites will go forward into the plan.
In Whittington Division, the sites put forward by developers and land owners are shown below, for both Whittington and West Felton:
I would urge people to participate in this important consultation and have their say on the future shape of Shropshire.
My statement to the May Cabinet meeting
At the May cabinet meeting, we initiated the plan-making process. Here is my statement to cabinet in moving the report:
Thank you, Leader.
This report sets out a number of documents associated with the first stage of the new local plan process – known as the ‘notification and scoping’ stage.
This includes the publication of:
- a new plan-making timetable (appendix 1),
- a notice to commence plan making (appendix 2),
- a consultation on a ‘Scoping’ document (appendix 4),
- and a draft Community Hierarchy (appendix 5).
The new plan-making arrangements are characterised by a more efficient 34-month preparation and adoption process, where the Council will develop an overall vision, objectives, and long-term spatial strategy for the sustainable development of Shropshire to 2046. This starts with a 4-month notice period, which includes a scoping consultation about the council’s approach to developing the new local plan.
It is more important than ever that Shropshire Council actively seeks to prepare and adopt a new Local Plan in an efficient timeframe. It’s critically important that the new plan is robust and sound, and delivers for the diverse needs of Shropshire. Doing so will enable planning decisions to be made against a locally agreed policy framework, reducing exposure to unplanned, speculative applications.
The Council is at the very start of the process to prepare a new Local Plan for Shropshire, which we will be doing using the Government’s new Plan-making system. Frustratingly, we have had to wait for some time for the secondary legislation to enable the new framework. Which finally landed at the end of March.
Plan-making will be faster than anything previously seen before, and there is little to no room for slippage. The new plan will need to be tightly focused and well aligned to the needs and aspirations of Shropshire. Whilst the new mandatory government housing target is a very stiff challenge, the new system does offer a big opportunity to provide a better framework for growth in Shropshire over the plan period and beyond.
The new Plan will, as a minimum, need to enable the delivery of Shropshire’s housing needs, as calculated using the national standard methodology, as well as providing land allocations and policies for other evidenced needs, such as for employment land. It also has the opportunity to provide new local planning policies to enable the sustainable delivery of proposed site allocations, although it should not duplicate policies already provided by the National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF).
The new plan will also allow us to give spatial expression to a number of related Council strategies and objectives, including the emerging Corporate Plan and the ‘New Direction for Shropshire’ paper published in 2025.
The purpose of the scoping document is to seek stakeholder views at the outset of the plan-making process. This includes, but is not limited to, local residents, parish and town councils, infrastructure providers, statutory agencies, local businesses, developers and agents.
As we are at the very start of this process, the scoping document purposely does not define either a future spatial strategy or future site allocations; these issues will be addressed in future consultation stages once we have gathered initial thoughts and collected additional evidence. Nevertheless, the scoping stage is an important first step in the Local Plan preparation process and one where the views of stakeholders can meaningfully shape the future direction of the Local Plan.
This Cabinet report also seeks approval for the publication and consultation of a draft ‘Community Hierarchy’, which is the first step in a process of defining a spatial strategy for the distribution of growth in the Local Plan. Alongside this, the Council will also publish information from the ‘call for sites’ exercise carried out in late 2025, where landowners and developers provided land options for consideration. Whilst we are not specifically seeking views on these options at this time, we recognise the public interest in these options and are therefore making them available to view.
It should be noted that sites shared are raw, unvarnished sites, as provided to the council, and will be subject to evaluation during the plan-making process. The call for sites remains open, and we would encourage more sites to come forward so that the best sites can be considered.
Following the conclusion of the notification and scoping stage, and subject to passing an initial self-assessment readiness ‘Gateway’ check, the Council will formally commence plan making in September 2026 in line with the agreed plan-making timetable.
Happy to move the report and recommendations 3.1 through to 3.7
