A Decade of Delay, Now a Mad Rush to the Finishing Line!
At a Glance
- Ten-year delay leaves Rochford without an adopted Local Plan
- Key evidence missing during public consultation
- Increased risk of speculative development
- Urgent leadership and strategy required
Ten years after work began in 2015, Rochford District Council still has no adopted Local Plan. Current timings show final submission winter 2026/27; adoption, at best in 2028.
This plan sets out our vision and policies for future development of our district, for housing, jobs, infrastructure and green spaces, guiding planning decisions, ensuring sustainable growth and meeting communities’ needs for the next 15/20 years.
District Left Exposed
Without an up-to-date plan and without a demonstrable 5-year housing land supply, our district is completely exposed to speculative, developer-led applications. With this comes great risk of uncoordinated urban sprawl, loss of the green belt and open spaces between our villages, destroying their separate identities forever.
The government has set a hard deadline: Regulation 19 (final publication) must be reached by December 2026. To achieve that date, Regulation 18, probably the most crucial phase for residents, the full public, stakeholder and statutory consultation on the draft plan and its entire evidence base is scheduled in February 2026.
Yet our council has repeatedly missed deadlines for the essential evidence base required. Unbelievably, only four of the ten remaining technical studies will be ready for the draft plan for Regulation 18:
Methodology & Site Allocations
Local Plan Transport Assessment
Infrastructure Delivery Plan
1st Stage Whole Plan Viability
Public Asked to Judge Blind
Six critical assessments will not be available until after Regulation 18 has finished:
Flood Risk Assessment (Levels 1 & 2)
Water Cycle Study
Green Belt Review
Local Wildlife Site Review
Detailed Heritage Assessment
Strategic Playing Pitch & Built Facilities Strategies
This means we will be asked to give our views on a plan that will define our district’s future for the next 20 years, with more than half of the most important information we need to see missing.
I’ve questioned Cllr. Belton, leader of our council about this, and she accepts that in an ideal world every piece of information would be available before Regulation 18. My reply was, “it’s not an ideal world, but it’s a world that was almost entirely created by the various council administrations between 2015-2025. We now live with the consequences.”
The remaining evidence is promised for “spring/summer 2026”. This means our council will have only a few months to digest, challenge, cross-reference and weave thousands of pages of complex technical data into a coherent deliverable plan which will set the future of our district and communities for generations to come, the Regulation 19 document.
Last-Minute Announcement
Adding more pressure, at the December Planning Policy Committee meeting, less than 3 months before the Regulation 18 public consultation is due, an announcement was made that land that formed the EOI for the New Town last year, Sector D, has been brought back into consideration. With the potential for 8000+ homes shared between Southend and Rochford.
Also at this meeting we heard Cllr. Belton, the leader of our council, propose her council submits a plan with housing numbers below the government target. Everyone will agree housing numbers should be based on local need, however when Castle Point Council did exactly this, our council was consulted on their plan and responded saying a plan with a lower number was not legally compliant or sound. So why is Cllr. Belton so late in the day now pushing for something her own council has said is not legally compliant? Are we descending into chaos at the 11th hour?
A further complication is our deputy leader, Cllr. Mason, promising during the early stages of the plan development that he would arrange a petition for residents to request a referendum on the Local Plan before it is adopted. This promise must be accommodated too.
Strategy Needed Right Now!
Here’s the rub; even if our Local Plan passes examination, adoption is unlikely before 2028, just as Local Government Reorganisation throws everything up in the air again.
Meanwhile, speculative unsustainable developments are constantly filling the pipeline. We have approaching 8,000 homes already at pre-app or application stage. We require our council leaders to have a strategy to manage the risk of today, and not be blindsided by the focus on the Local Plan. By the time our Local Plan is finally adopted the damage will largely be done.
Rochford District Council acknowledges the situation is precarious, and strong, decisive leadership is needed urgently to take control back from developers and deliver a visionary place-making outcome in both the short and long term.
We must trust our leaders to deliver this. Let’s hope when it matters most they can show the strategic thinking that was perhaps missing at the start of this sorry saga because we will be living with the outcome forever.
by Richard Pryor
Concerned Resident, Hockley
thehockleygreenbelter@gmail.com