Dudley Borough Local Plan Scoping Consultation Document

4. Proposed consultation and community engagement strategy for the new Local Plan

How will we consult and engage on the new Local Plan?

The Council’s existing Statement of Community Involvement (SCI) will be replaced by a new consultation and community engagement strategy. The existing SCI sets out how the Council will consult and engage with stakeholders on planning policy and other planning processes under the old local plan system. It is therefore outdated, and under the new plan system SCIs are no longer a statutory requirement.

A new consultation and engagement process for the new Local Plan will therefore be prepared in accordance with the new plan making system, and we would like to take account of your views as part of this consultation. Given that the new plan making system is based on a fixed 30-month preparation and adoption timetable, the approach to consultation and engagement will need to be focused and effective to align with the plan preparation deadlines.

The key principles of the strategy reflect the legislative requirements and local initiatives, including:

• Notifying relevant general and specific consultation bodies (as set out in the Regulations). Notifying persons and organisations that have requested to be kept informed of the plan consultations.
• Undertaking the required consultation stages as follows:

• Publishing summaries of the consultation responses at each relevant stage of the process.
• Making documents available online.
• Reflecting requirements for the digitisation of local plans by taking a digital first approach, helping to aid accessibility of reading online documents and making local plan documents easier to navigate.

How does the drive towards digital planning impact the consultation and engagement strategy?

In view of the Government drive towards digital planning, we intend to make the local plan documents primarily available online at the Council’s Planning Policy webpage We will encourage the submission of consultation responses online via the consultation portal. The Council will employ methods to facilitate digital access via the local libraries.

It is recognised that some stakeholders may wish to submit their responses via email or post, which we will facilitate, however the preference will be for online responses.

We intend to primarily use digital means of communication wherever possible, however we would welcome views on what options should be made available by the Council. Our digital forms of publicising and communication will include:

• Updates via the Council’s Planning Policy webpage: here
• Notifications issued via email/letter to those on the Local Plan consultation database. You can register for inclusion on our consultation database at: here
• Facilitating publicity of the consultation by the media through digital press releases
• Use of social media to raise awareness including sponsored social media
• Ebulletins to all residents/businesses registered on the Council’s database

Our non-digital forms of publicising and communication may include:

• Displaying posters or leaflets in key public buildings.
• Arrange community drop in events and/or attend existing public events and meetings.
• Hard copy local press advertisements
• Local Radio advertisement campaign

To support stakeholders wishing to respond to our consultations, we will:

• Prepare guidance summarising the purpose of the consultation providing details of how to respond and in what time period
• Provide a consultation form in an appropriate format where online consultation responses are unable to be completed.

Summarising Responses to Engagement

Following the conclusion of each consultation undertaken to inform each stage of the new Dudley Borough Local Plan preparation, we will give due consideration to the responses received, prepare a summary of the consultation responses and then publish the summary of responses.

Responses to the scoping consultation will inform the ongoing development of next stage of the new Dudley Borough Local Plan. In addition, responses to the Local Plan consultations will be submitted to the Inspector to inform the examination of the Local Plan.

If you would like to be kept informed about the new Dudley Borough Local Plan, please ensure you sign up the consultation database at: here

Please note if you were previously on the Council’s Dudley Local Plan consultation database, you will still need to sign up to the new database as the previous one will no longer be in use in line with GDPR requirements.