Gypsy, Traveller and Travelling Showpeople Development Plan Document

Foreword

Our Gypsy and Traveller communities have been an integral part of Kent's cultural and economic identity for at least 500 years, and have helped to grow 'the garden of England'. As a child growing up in and around the county town, I remember fondly visits to the caravans of school friends from these traditions. At this time, agricultural and other seasonal work still supported a largely nomadic lifestyle, with transient settlements on roadside verges and out of the way rural locations a common sight.

In the intervening years, agricultural changes, urbanisation and an increasingly harsh legal landscape has brought about a more sedentary and settled way of life for many Gypsy and Traveller families. This transformation has not just had profound consequences for the communities affected, but also brought challenges for a planning system created for town and country planning. Having served on Maidstone's Planning Committee for many years, the limitations of our policy framework when it comes to Gypsy and Traveller applications have become increasingly apparent.

To address gaps in the prevailing planning policy landscape, Maidstone Borough Council has drafted this Gypsy, Traveller and Travelling Showpeople Development Plan Document. In addition to site allocations, this document incorporates a bespoke policy framework that enshrines principles of good design, residential amenity and sustainability, alongside effective planning safeguards for landscape and ecology.

Tony Harwood

Cabinet Member for Planning Policy and Management

Maidstone Borough Council

Planning for Maidstone's Gypsy, Traveller and Travelling Showpeople Communities

1. Maidstone Borough Council is preparing a plan to address the accommodation needs of the Gypsy, Traveller and Travelling Showpeople communities in the borough and is seeking your views to inform the content of the plan.
2. This 'Regulation 18c – Preferred Policies and Potential Sites' consultation is the third opportunity to formally give your views on the Plan but importantly, this is not the final Plan.
3. This stage sets the Council's preferred policies, revised to incorporate changes to national policy and the feedback received at Regulation 18b. It also includes the potential sites and draft detailed allocation policies. Evidence gathering and stakeholder engagement remains ongoing. As part of this ongoing work, we will continue to accept any potential new sites during the consultation period for consideration for allocation in the final plan.
4. This consultation provides an opportunity to influence the plan-preparation prior to consultation on the proposed submission Plan (Regulation 19).
5. This consultation is for everyone. Whatever your interest in or connection to the borough, we want to hear from you.

Scope of the Plan

6. This Plan will:

• identify accommodation needs for Gypsies and Travellers and Travelling Showpeople from 2023 to 2040;
• set out the spatial strategy and identify sites and broad locations for growth to meet accommodation needs;
• include strategic policies and non-strategic development management policies; and
• review Local Plan Review policies LPRSP10(C) – Gypsy and Traveller Site Allocations; LPRGT1(1) – LPRGT1(11) – detailed site allocations; and LPRHOU8 – Gypsy, Traveller and Travelling Showpeople accommodation.

7. This Plan accords with Government policy in Planning Policy for Traveller Sites (PPTS) and the National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF).
    
8. The Plan does not cover other forms of accommodation, including house boats or conventional 'bricks and mortar' houses. The Plan also does not set out details on obtaining a caravan site license nor on obtaining necessary sign off on health and safety matters such fire safety standards and gas storage as these are not planning matters.

The story so far

9. The first 'Scoping, Issues and Options (Regulation 18a)' consultation took place between February and April 2023. It focused on describing the background and context to the plan, signalling the challenges and identifying possible options and ways ahead for addressing the matters raised, including the proposed methodology for assessing potential sites. A total of 29 comments were received as part of this consultation. A Sustainability Scoping Report was also produced and the statutory consultees were invited to comment.
    
10. The second 'Preferred Approaches (Regulation 18b)' consultation took place between October and December 2024. It set the Council's direction of travel in terms of preferred policy approaches to matters such as the spatial strategy and ways of meeting identified needs, as well as approaches to design and layout – explaining why they were 'preferred' and included narrative on reasonable alternative approaches. In some instances policies were fairly well formed whilst others were more indicative in nature. Over 300 comments were received as part of this consultation and these were subsequently published on the Council's website.
     
11. The preferred approaches and reasonable alternatives were also tested through an interim Sustainability Appraisal which was also subject to consultation concurrent to the Regulation 18b DPD.
     
12. All the influencing factors at national, regional and local level that contributed to the preferred approaches DPD (including the Sustainability Appraisal outcomes) were summarised in two Topic Papers that were published alongside the consultation Plan. These Topic Papers are iterative and will again be updated and published alongside the proposed submission Plan (Regulation 19) in order to clearly demonstrate how those influencing factors and feedback from stakeholders continues to have informed and shape the Plan up to the point of submission.

Future Timeline

How to Comment

15. This document contains a series of questions to help people engage with the information being presented.
     
16. The questions are intended to help people more easily formulate their responses to the consultation. The question boxes are clearly identified as follows:

17. The quickest and easiest way to give your views is to go online:

maidstone.oc2.uk

18. Alternatively, you can contact the Strategic Planning Team to request a response form: