Good news – work resumes on Newent’s NDP. After the double whammy of Covid 19 restrictions and the retirement of our professional adviser, the Newent NDP Steering Group is back in action.
We welcome Liane James from Gloucester Rural Community Council (GRCC) as our new adviser who replaces Kate Baugh under whose guidance we embarked on this journey to make our local NDP.
We were due to look at the analysis of the questionnaires collected in October at our first major public Consultation and to undertake a Business and Employment Survey when lockdown hit us in March.
Coming to grips with Zoom technology, we met for a trial meeting with Liane, and we are delighted to be fully up and running again since July 2020. Some of our activities may continue to be restricted from time to time and we have been finding new ways of working, including publicising our themed surveys via social media.
Planning for the Future – The Government’s proposals
The white paper that was published on 6th August 2020 has far reaching proposals that, if implemented, would turn our present planning system upside down. You can view them here.
We are concerned that the level of local democratic involvement will be drastically reduced to the first stage of the proposed new system which will create three designated zones into which every area will be allocated. These zones are for Growth, Renewal and Protection. After that, developers will have much more freedom to build what they want.
The Newent Neighbourhood Development Plan’s Steering Group made a detailed response to these proposals.