The Core Strategy is unsound as it has not been justified through an effective Strategic Housing Land Availability Assessment (SHLAA). The Council published a list of sites considered through the SHLAA approximately one week before the deadline for submissions towards the Proposed Submission Core Strategy on Monday 2nd November 2009. However, no supporting text or explanation of the sites listed by the SHLAA was provided. The Core Strategy has therefore been prepared without any provision for interested parties to properly review and comment on the contents, recommendations and conclusions made within the SHLAA. The Council has produced a Core Strategy Development Plan Document in an inappropriate, ineffective and unjustified manner. Central government encourages consultation at the earliest possible stage in the plan making process.

The Core Strategy Proposed Submission Document should be made available for a further six week period and notices should be published to inform all interested parties that the SHLAA has been now been completed and forms a key part of the Evidence Base to the Core Strategy.

Supporting document supplied Council ref AE23