The Government annouced yesterday that it is making available more funding for Neighbourhood Plans.
Below is an extract from the press release on the Planning Portal:
‘The Government has announced further funding to help communities get involved in the new neighbourhood planning regime.
From January next year local planning authorities will be able to claim grants of up to £50,000 to help up to 10 communities get going with their neighbourhood plans.
From April 2013 this will be extended further with £100,000 available to kick start up to 20 plans in the area. Authorities will then receive a further £25,000 for every neighbourhood plan that gets through a successful examination.
More than 300 communities are already using the new powers introduced in the Localism Act to work up plans for neighbourhood areas that decide, for example, the location of new homes or what green spaces communities to protect.
Planning minister Nick Boles said: “Communities across the country are showing real enthusiasm for neighbourhood planning. The new financial support we are making available to councils will enable them to open up neighbourhood planning so that even more communities can turn paper plans into the realities of prospering neighbourhoods that are growing and developing in the ways they want to see.”
From 2 January local planning authorities will be able to claim up to a maximum of £50,000 (up from £20,000) for area designations this financial year up to a maximum of 10. There is an overall limit of £1.5 million on designation payments
From 1 April 2013 local planning authorities will be able to claim for up to 20 designations (£100,000) in the financial year 2013 to 2014. The overall limit for designation payments in 2013 to 2014 has been set at £5 million.
In a separate but related development, Boles has clarified the status of so-called emerging neighbourhood plans in respect of local plans. This came during oral questions in the Commons on 17 December.
He told MPs: “ It is important for people to understand that the weight given to an emerging neighbourhood plan is in no way contingent on the status of the local plan, and that there is nothing to prevent them from making progress as rapidly as possible.”
The funding announcement is available from the DCLG pages on Gov.uk‘
