Agenda item

To receive an update, and provide comments on,  the Haringey Draft Local Plan, which is currently out to public consultation.

The Panel received a report on the Draft Local Plan. The Local Plan was approved by public consultation by Cabinet on 16 September 2025 and public consultation was underway, closing on 19 December 2025. The paper set out the background to the Haringey New Local Plan and signposted the Panel to key documentation relating to the Draft Local Plan. The report was introduced by Cllr Sarah Williams, Cabinet Member for Housing and Planning and Bryce Tudball, Head of Spatial Planning. Rob Krzyszowski, Director, Planning & Bulding Standards was also present for this item. The following arose during the discussion of the report:

1. The Chair commended officers for the breadth and scope of the Draft Local Plan, acknowledging the large amount of work that must have gone in to producing the document. Officers set out that the Local Plan was the spatial expression of the Council’s vision and would set out how the organisation would seek to tackle the housing challenges it faced, along with tackling climate change and other challenges.
2. The Panel noted that it was a 15 year plan and sought assurances that it would be updated regularly, given the need for flexibility in light of changing priorities. In response, officers advised that Local Plans should be updated every five years. It was commented that the Plan was very detailed so it was hoped it would be more a case of refining it, rather than wholesale changes in future. Officers confirmed that it would be updated on a five-year rolling programme.
3. The Panel commented that the Plan was due to be adopted in 2027, by which time some of the schemes would already be in place. In response, officers acknowledged that this was the case but provided assurances that even though it was in draft format, the Plan still gave a clear signal to developers about what the Council expected in terms of future developments. Even though the full weight of the Plan couldn’t be given through the Planning process until it was adopted. Officers added that in terms of a longer term view, the Council was holding a call for sites that might become available for future development.
4. The Panel commented that the Plan talked a lot about equity and fairness, but queried why the fairness element was hyper-localised around neighbourhoods, given that people often lived and worked in different parts of the borough or even in different parts of London. In response, officers advised that the Plan could do both, it could deal with the hyper-local as well as the need to think beyond the borough and across the wider city. Officers elaborated that in the consultation received to date, there had been a lot of feedback around the importance that people attached to their neighbourhood, and so the service had tried to develop a Plan with neighbourhoods that people could relate to and recognise on the ground. Officers acknowledged that people often lived and worked in different parts of London.
5. The Panel welcomed references to 15 minute cities and having local urban centres, commenting on the necessity of having local services and amenities.
6. The Chair commented on the circular relevance of the plan and the extent to which the different elements intersected, given its importance to Placemaking. The Chair sought assurances around the extent to which there had been partnership working across different service areas and across the Cabinet Member portfolios for Housing and Placemaking. In response, the Panel were advised that like a lot of council activity it sat across more than one portfolio, but that it was ultimately a planning document. The draft Local Plan reflected placemaking priorities, but it also reflected priorities for tackling climate change, priorities around parks and green spaces and priorities around aging well. It was suggested that there were a range of strategies that ran through the document. The Cabinet Member for Placemaking and Local Economy emphasised the importance that Shaping Wood Green and Shaping Tottenham had on the development of the draft Local Plan.
7. The Panel queried whether it was appropriate to include the extension of the Victoria Line to Northumberland Park in the Plan. In response, officers advised that it was certainty appropriate to include the organisation’s infrastructure priorities, and that there was a live discussion ongoing about what those infrastructure priorities should be. Officers commented that these should be better reflected in final version of the Local Plan next year.
8. The Panel queried what the trade-offs might be in future or which of the priorities were seen as most important in the Plan, given it would be impossible to deliver on all of the aspirations without some trade-offs. In response, the Cabinet Member for Housing advised that it wasn’t a document about trade-offs, rather it set out the Council’s aspirations and how it saw the borough developing. The Local Plan was about what residents wanted to see, rather than what developers may want, and it was framed those terms. The Cabinet Member commented that there would have to be prioritisation on a site-by-site basis, as not all sites were the same and not all sites could deliver the same things. Officers added that by adopting a placemaking approach, the Council was acknowledging that each neighbourhood had its own priorities and characteristics. The Local Plan was currently out for consultation, so that residents could tell the Council what the priories for their local area should be.
9. The Chair welcomed the Local Plan’s focus on culture. In relation to social infrastructure, the Chair sought comments on the tension between pushing developers to build social infrastructure and the pressure on the local authority to maintain that infrastructure at some point, such as parks and green spaces. In response, officers advised that they were doing a lot of work behind the scenes around infrastructure delivery and that they were pulling together a digital infrastructure delivery plan over the next 12-18 months, which would look at the infrastructure needed in the borough and possible gaps in the future. Officers commented that they were looking to develop an interactive map tool on the website as part of this.
10. The Panel queried what the other areas were that officers thought may need most work on in the Plan in the coming 18 months. In response, officers advised that the aforementioned infrastructure piece was one and that there was a big stream of work going on the background. The second was around viability of development. Officers set out that the organisation had a requirement to make sure that the plan was deliverable and that the priorities as a whole and did not put future development at risk. The service would be undertaking a piece of work around viability and what was deliverable.
11. The Panel queried what the elements were in the plan that would ensure the delivery of affordable housing. In response, officers noted that they had sought to acknowledge in the Plan that not all affordable homes were equally affordable. The Plan set out a clear explanation of what was meant by genuinely affordable homes and what the Council expected in that regard. In terms of what was delivered on a site-by-site basis, that would be determined by the specifics of that development and the site. Officers provided assurances that there would be rigorous criteria to ensure that the borough would get as much genuinely affordable housing as it could. There was also a new London Plan in development with its own targets relating to affordable housing and the government had also introduced new targets in this area.
12. The Panel queried  an expected announcement by the government about council’s being unable to call-in schemes of over 150 units, and questioned how that might affect the Local Plan. In response, officers advised that, as it was an announcement they didn’t have all of the details, but that it was expected that that the changes would be around giving the Secretary Of State powers to call-in applications if the authority was minded to refuse them. It was commented that the changes seemed to be more aimed at problematic authorities who weren’t proactive in developing a Local Plan and who were not building enough homes. Officers commented that they did not believe that Haringey fell into this category. In terms of how it would affect the Local Plan, officers advised that the mooted changes wouldn’t affect the Plan at all, as the Local Plan set out the Council’s statement of planning policy and what it wanted to see in its borough. The Secretary of State couldn’t override it too much, and they still had to use the Local Plan as the basis of their decisions. Officers commented that the Local Plan would go through an independent inspection, appointed by the Secretary of State, prior to its adoption.

RESOLVED

That the report was noted.