You could be forgiven that the draft Deregulation Bill (the one that is about removing so-called red tape for businesses) has little significance for neighbourhood planning. Not so.
Tucked away in a little corner (page 31 para 187) is a “repeal of duty to prepare sustainable community strategy“. In essence, this is about modifying the Local Government Act 2000 to delete section 4 so that local authorities (such as Wiltshire Council) are no longer required to prepare sustainable community strategies.
This makes no sense, on the one hand
we are encouraged, rightly, to prepare neighbourhood plans and on the other the authority which is supposed to be supporting the neighbourhood planning process no longer has to prepare a strategy of which the neighbourhood plan is a key element.
A case of muddled thinking and rather conflicting.
