Consultation Statement
1. Introduction
The Neighbourhood Planning (General) Regulations 2012 (Localism Act 2011) require a Consultation Statement to set out the consultations undertaken to inform the development of a Neighbourhood Plan. In accordance with these Regulations and Wiltshire Council’s guidance on consultation, the preparation of the Downton Neighbourhood Plan has involved consultation with residents, businesses and other organisations with an interest in the parish on how they see the Downton developing over the next x years (within the ‘constraints’ of the Wiltshire Core strategy). A Consultation Strategy was written outlining the purposes of consultation and the underlying principles of the Plan so that quality of output will be increased and wasted time and effort reduced (See Appendix 1)
In accordance with the Community Engagement Statement and Regulation 14 of theNeighbourhood Planning (General) regulations 2012, this Consultation Statement supports the Submission Neighbourhood Plan. It contains the following:
- Details of people and organisations consulted about the proposed Neighbourhood Plan from the initial meeting in November 2013 to final…..
- Details of how they were consulted with any letters, questionnaires and discussion guides included in the Appendices
- A summary of the main issues and concerns raised through the consultation process (full survey results are included in the Appendices)
- Descriptions of how these issues and concerns have been considered and addressed in theproposed Neighbourhood Plan.
The aim of the consultation in Downton was to ensure that engagement has been as widespread as possible, with all levels, sectors and stakeholders of the Parish.We hope thisis demonstrated by this Statement.
2. The Plan Preparation Process
The Plan preparation process was initiated by Downton Parish Council in July 2013 by setting up a Neighbourhood Plan Committee. The first tasks of this Committee were to
- seek advice from WC on the process and to attend relevant meetings,
- to make a recommendation for the designated area of the Plan,
- To consider and approve the content of the Application Statement for Downton to be included in the Wiltshire Council Neighbourhood Area application
- set up an inaugural planning workshop
Initial Planning workshop
This was open to the whole village and took place on November 6th2013 in Downton Primary School. People were notified of the meeting via email invitations, the schools communications systems and posters put up throughout the village. (for minutes see Appendix 2)
The purpose of this workshop was, firstly, to inform the village about Neighbourhood Plans, their legal status and why the Parish Council considered it important to have one. Sarah Hughes the Liaison Officer from WC outlined the Neighbourhood Plan development process. Furthermore attendees were told that, although sponsored by the Parish Council, the process must be undertaken by members of the Community (after the setting up of the Neighbourhood Plan Steering Group, Councillors would only be present in an advisory capacity) and therefore the second aim of the workshop was to determine the appetite of the village to develop a neighbourhood plan. After the presentations, attendees were split into discussion groups to brainstorm the key planning issues of the area. Each group was led by a Parish Council councillor who reported back their findings to the meeting. A summary of the key points can be found in the Appendix 2.
Approximately X people attended the workshops and it was felt that sufficient interest was shown to progress the development of a Neighbourhood Plan in Downton. Therefore all attendees plus others also expressing an interest but unable to attend the workshop, were invited to a further meeting in early January 2014, again chaired by the Parish Council, to set up the Neighbourhood Plan Steering Group. This meeting was also publicised on the Parish Council website, by posters in the Parish, via distribution within school and community lists and advertised in local magazines.
Downton Neighbourhood Plan Steering Group
At this second meeting a Chairman was appointed and the terms of reference agreed.
From that point on the Steering Group has met monthly throughout the development process on the first Tuesday in the White Horse Inn and will continue to do so until the referendum. Approximately 20-25 people are regular attendees at these meetings. Minutes are kept and these are available on the Neighbourhood Plan Website at
The process will comprise 3 main stages:
1Collection of baseline evidence and consultation with the village and interested stakeholders.
This started with publicity at the Cuckoo Fair (early May 2014) and was followed by varied communications (verbal, electronic and paper) with village organisations, businesses and individuals, and 2 surveys (on-line qualitative survey, followed by a paper quantitative survey) – See Section 3 for full details. In addition information was taken from
- The 2010 Parish Survey
A survey undertaken on behalf of the Parish Council to all residents in response to a government policy initiative. See Appendix 3for results - New Housing Development Consultation in July 2013
As part of the exhibition on the plans of the new housing development, visitors were asked to respond by completing a survey. See Appendix 4 - The Village Design Statement (2005)
In 2005 The Downton Society (an active group of Downton residents interested in encouraging high standards in all aspects of the village and its environment – see for further information) produced this document which gives direction for planners on the design of homes in both new and existing development. See Appendix 5 - Traffic surveys
The Downton society have carried out various traffic surveys, the results of which have been used in, firstly, getting the HGV weight limit through the village reduced and, latterly, in demonstrating that the ban is frequently flouted (See Appendix 6) - Housing Needs Survey December 2013
A Wiltshire Council initiative – a survey delivered to all households to identify affordable housing needs within the village. (See appendix 7 for results). This survey is referred to later in this document.
The Engagement Group, one of 3 sub groups set up in early 2014 by the Steering Group, undertook the Neighbourhood Plan publicity and questionnaire management. Their remit was to engage the village by both informing them of the Neighbourhood Plan and getting views of future development in the village and also to developa bespoke website. The written engagement strategy is available in Appendix 8. The other 2 groups were the Vision Group – purpose to produce a high level vision for the village to be to be put tothe village for agreement – and the Research/ Technical information group. The purpose of the latter was to find existing research reports or carry out research as needed to supply baseline data for example Wiltshire Counciltraffic surveys and undertaking a survey of local businesses.
This phase concluded in February 2015.
2Writing the Pre Submission Neighbourhood Plan
This document set out the vision, objectives, policies and proposals for the Plan area and an assessment of the Downton Neighbourhood Plan Consultation Statement ready for a six week public consultation period during May 2015. Following this public consultation, it is anticipated that revisions will be made to create the ‘Submission Neighbourhood Plan’.
3Submission Neighbourhood Plan. This document will be sent to Wiltshire Council, accompanied by a revised this Consultation Statement for approval. If approved by Wiltshire Council, the Neighbourhood Plan will then be subject to an independent Examination. Any recommendations made by the Examiner will be considered by the Parish and Wiltshire Councils and the Plan again amended before being approved for a local referendum. If supported by a majority vote at the referendum, the Neighbourhood Plan will be adopted by Wiltshire Council as planning policy for Downton parish.
Following the set-up of the Steering Group, the Parish Council committee was disbanded with relevant Councillors becoming members of the Steering Group.
Designation of Neighbourhood Plan area
The Parish Council made an application for the Designation of the Neighbourhood Plan area with consultation closing on 11 June 2014. The suggested area had been placed in the Post Office, Library and Co-op and will go on website for the 6 weeks beforehand. No replies disagreeing with the boundary were received.
The application contained:
- A map which identified the area to which the area application related; (In appendix)
- A statement explaining why this area was considered appropriate (in appendix)
Designation of the Plan area was approved by Wiltshire Council.
Sources of learning and advice
Sarah Hughes was our Link Officer at Wiltshire council. Three members of the Steering Group including the Chairman met with her in at an early stage of the process and she attended the Steering Group in January 2015 where she was very helpful and knowledgeable in answering questions.
Downton Councillors had a meeting with councillors from Idmiston who are further along in the process to get the benefit of their experience.
Other meetings attended included:
- Workshop with architect on planning issues 12 June 2014
- Presentation on Revised Settlement Boundaries (July 2014)
- Associated learning from Parish Council business meetings
3. Early Community Engagement
Background
The Engagement group referred to in Section 2 of this statement took responsibility for leading the stages of community engagement with accountability to the Neighbourhood Plan Steering Group. However members of the Steering group and other interested parties were frequently involved in the engagement activities. Vital to the planning of our approach was the development of an Engagement Strategy (Appendix 8). The principles of the strategy were as follows:
People of Downton Parish will have been engaged and consulted throughout the development of the plan
The plan will be based on meaningful engagement which has reached as much of the local community as possible.
The forms of engagement will be suitable to different audiences, using ways of interacting with people that are appropriate to ensure understanding and informed involvement.
There will be documented evidence of the involvement activities
All engagement activities will be undertaken with honesty and integrity and with an open mind.
The strategy clarifies the aims of engagement and the methods to be used; provides an outline time line and states the commitments of the Engagement group. It also lists the identified stakeholders, both internal and external, and includes a table of tasks and task owners.
Initially community engagement focussed on explaining to as many stakeholders as reasonably possible what a Neighbourhood Plan is and how it can represent the views of the Parish to inform the County Council in consideration of planning applications. Once this was felt to have been achieved it was important to gather and record evidence of the views and opinions of the residents of the Parish. The main vehicle for this stage was the qualitative questionnaire described later. The next stage was to use these results to draw up proposals and then to measure the extent to which the Parish residents supported these proposals. To do this the vehicle used was a quantitative questionnaire, also described later. The feedback from analysis of this second survey formed the basis of the proposals in the Plan. The last stages of engagement focussed on consulting residents prior to plan submission, demonstrating how feedback had been taken into account in the final draft and then encouraging residents to vote in the referendum organised by Wiltshire County Council.
The following provides information, evidence and description of the methods and activities used to engage the residents of Downton Parish.
Website and newsletter
In April 2014 we set up a website the address of which was publicised in leaflets and posters (downtonfuture.org.uk). This was launched on May 2nd 2014. The information on the website was basic but informed interested parties of the purpose of a Neighbourhood Plan and the membership of the Steering Group. There was also a ‘contact us’ address which members of the Engagement group responded to on a rota basis.Resignation of the website designer necessitated the commissioning of a new designer and the website address having to change slightly (downtonfuture.org). This was available from October 2014 with re-launch publicity in January 2015. The new website was also publicised on the December 2014 household survey. After sufficient use the new website now comes up as the dominant site on a Google search.
The website includes background details about the purpose of aNeighbourhood Plan, the members of the team, survey results, minutes of all public meetings, a gallery of photos and a link to enable easy contact with the team by members of the public. It is regularly updated and interested residents are encouraged to use the site to update their knowledge. This encouragement takes the form of making the website address available on all publicity posters and surveys; sending out regular emails to those who have provided their email addresses and inclusion of the website address in articles in the local press and in the quarterly local newsletter delivered free to all addresses in the Parish.
Open day and other open events
A number of open day events have been held, some specifically associated with the household surveys as described above but in all cases designed to raise awareness, provide information and encourage involvement and discussion.
Downton holds an annual Cuckoo Fair on the Saturday of the early May bank holiday weekend. This is a hugely popular event attracting up to 20,000 people. Although the majority of these are from outside of the Parish, it is attended in significant numbers by residents. After visiting the Parish Council and raising awareness it was agreed that our first open day would take the form of a tent/stand at the Cuckoo fair providing information and asking people to place stickers against the proposals that they would support. Active participation was encouraged by members of the team going into the street engaging visitors in conversation and handing out A6 card flyers with the website address and ‘contact us’ details. Over 100 local residents agreed to come into the tent to take part and the results of the ‘sticker count’ can be seen in Appendix 9.
On the 17th July 2014, arranged to coincide and share a venue with the consultation event arranged by a local developer, a further open event was held, again providing A6 information cards and encouraging involvement by providing refreshments and discussion. Of over 65 attendees, almost every visitor to the event throughout the afternoon and early evening was engaged with information about the proposedNeighbourhood Plan.
On the 8th August, a stand was held at the local Community Market. This market is held weekly and is widely attended. Again A6 cards were handed out and discussion initiated. By this time it was becoming clear that when we asked the question ‘have you heard of the Neighbourhood Plan’ people were generally responding positively and expressing interest.
Also at the beginning of August, a ‘pop up’ stand was set up in an area of the village where it was expected that parents would pass on their way to taking children to school. This was specifically to encourage people from where interest had been under-represented and engagement had been limited. In the event, it became clear that, despite the sunny weather, most children did not walk to school and few pedestrians passed the stand.
On Saturday the 13th September an open event was held, with an information stand, outside the local Cooperative store to engage people undertaking their local shopping. The event had been planned for 10am to 4pm but, because of active interest from passers-by, started from the moment we arrived to set up and continued until nearly 5pm. The following week, on the 20th September, a Neighbourhood Plan display board and open access tent formed part of a local church led event known as the ‘Goose Fair’ where, again, a constant stream of visitors were encouraged to ask questions, give their views and understand the purpose of a Neighbourhood Plan. These two events were advertised on the initial household survey meaning that every household had the potential to be aware of the events from the leaflets delivered through their doors.
The open event launching the second household survey is described in more detail below and took place on the 22nd November 2014. In addition, the announcement of the prize draw winners was held in one of the local pubs on the first Saturday after the 2015 New Year and had been advertised as open to all.
At each of these events people were encourage to provide their email address or contact details if they wanted to be regularly updated or were willing to be involved in the making of the plan. This has resulted in a list of approximately 65 names of people who have been involved on an ongoing basis and have acted as a focus group, providing feedback and comments in an ad hoc way.
Household surveys
Surveys did not constitute the only means of engaging and consulting residents but they did form the catalyst for many of the activities. A chronological list of the events and actions taken to engage residents of Downton Parish can be seen at Appendix 10
In August 2014 a leaflet was delivered to every household in the Parish, asking residents to complete an online survey designed to ascertain their views on what they like about Downton, what they don’t want to lose and how they feel about additional housing. (see Appendix 11) The questionnaire was very simple and took a qualitative approach mostly allowing free text responses and had a closing date of the 26th September. The purpose of the questionnaire was to widen understanding of a Neighbourhood Plan and to obtain a general understanding of village residents’ views to provide a basis for a more detailed quantitative survey. The leaflet itself was introduced with a stark choice pointing out the different levels of influence that could be obtained with and without aNeighbourhood Plan. It included a stylised map of the centre of the village showing the main potential development sites as found in the Strategic Housing Land Availability Assessment (SHLAA). This map raised some controversy but there is no doubt that it raised awareness and proved to be a useful talking point. Although the leaflet focussed on completion of the survey online, the opportunity for completion of a paper copy was given and this was taken up by a few residents. In addition to the leaflets, two open days were offered to allow residents the opportunity for discussion and a personal approach.