The local plan deadline has moved to March: what it means if your land is in a draft plan

On 23 October 2026 the housing and planning minister, Matthew Pennycook, told Southend-on-Sea City Council to publish its draft local plan with site BG1 still in it. His letter says the council’s leader had told him that cross-party agreement meant taking the site out. He wrote: “Examination remains the appropriate forum for testing individual site allocations and the supporting evidence base in a transparent and impartial manner.”

The same day he gave councils whose last public consultation on a plan ends by 31 December until 31 March 2027 to submit it under the old system. He also told them not to expect another extension.

If your land is allocated in a draft plan that is at or near that stage, both letters matter. The government is pushing plans towards examination: the minister says the plan-led approach “is, and must remain, the cornerstone of our planning system”. That should help a site already in a draft.

It does not make the road short. At the Planning Inspectorate’s recent median pace, a plan submitted on 31 March 2027 would be adopted around the end of 2028. Neither letter is a guarantee.

What the extension changes

A council that finishes its last public consultation on a plan by 31 December now has until 31 March 2027 to send the plan to the Planning Inspectorate, unless the minister has already fixed its date. That consultation is known as Regulation 19, and anyone can make representations during it. They have to reach the council by the closing date the council publishes. Anyone whose representations seek a change to the plan can ask to be heard at the examination, and the Inspector must give them that chance. A landowner who only supports an allocation has no right to be heard at the hearings, and the Inspectorate says such landowners will not usually be invited.

For a landowner, that consultation is the moment to act. If the plan describes your site in a way you want changed, such as its boundary or the number of homes, say so then.

The extra time is the council’s, and the letter says councils “should make every effort to submit their plans as soon as possible”. The minister’s letter says many councils “will still need to carry out a range of administrative and governance tasks prior to submission”, and that some are at risk of missing 31 December “by a fine margin”. Cheltenham, Gloucester and Tewkesbury said on 23 October that they can now submit their joint plan by 31 March 2027, provided their final consultation ends by the end of December 2026.

The extension does not shorten anything. Other things being equal, a plan that reaches the Inspectorate three months later is examined three months later, and everything after it moves with it.

What it leaves alone

The plan itself does not change. The extension moves a date, not the draft. The test does not change either: an Inspector examines whether the plan has been prepared in line with the legal requirements and whether it is sound.

The rules for examination stay the same. Plans in the old system are examined against the December 2024 version of the National Planning Policy Framework, unless transitional arrangements send them to an earlier one.

An allocation is not a permission. It says where the council intends development to go. Under section 57 of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990, “planning permission is required for the carrying out of any development of land”, so an application still has to be made and decided.

From Regulation 19 to adoption

After the consultation closes. The council considers the responses and takes any decisions it needs before it submits. The Planning and Compulsory Purchase Act 2004 says the council must have complied with the regulations and “must not” submit a plan unless “they think the document is ready for independent examination”. The Planning Inspectorate asks for a pre-examination checklist and “will then aim to respond in writing within 10 working days”.

Examination. The Secretary of State appoints an Inspector. The Inspectorate’s guidance says: “In most cases the examination will include hearing sessions which are held in public.” The median time from submission to the Inspector’s report was 19.4 months for strategic plans in 2025/26, down from 31.5 months the year before. For non-strategic plans it was 15.1 months.

The report. “In most cases the report will recommend some changes that are necessary to allow the plan to be adopted”, known as main modifications. The Inspectorate’s annual report says that sometimes this meant “recommending removing policies or introducing new ones, amending the wording of a policy or changing a housing requirement”. In 2025/26 it issued 28 reports and found all 28 plans sound, and four councils withdrew plans.

Adoption. The council “may adopt” the plan, with any main modifications, by resolution. On the Inspectorate’s published list, the 30 plans containing strategic policies adopted between January 2025 and July 2026 were adopted a median of about a month after being found sound. Anyone aggrieved then has six weeks to apply to the High Court for leave to challenge the plan.

Put together, a plan submitted on 31 March 2027 and examined at the 2025/26 median pace for strategic plans would reach a report in November 2028, with adoption about a month later. That is an illustration, not a forecast. On the same list the quickest of those 30 plans took 10 months from submission to adoption and the slowest 81. The list leaves out plans still in examination, so it favours the quicker ones.

No further extension

The letter says: “There should be no expectation of further extensions beyond the end of March. This is the last opportunity for areas seeking to progress plans to submission in the legacy system.”

A council that misses the date starts again in the new system. The government’s guidance says a council “cannot carry out a regulation 18 statutory consultation under the existing system and move directly to publishing your Gateway 1 self-assessment under the new system”. It expects a new-system plan “within 30 months from publishing your Gateway 1 self-assessment”. The guidance, last updated in March and so before the extension, sets 30 April 2027 as the latest date to start the 30-month process. Starting then and using all 30 months would end in October 2029. It does not say what applies to a council that relies on the extension and misses it. The old draft does not become the new plan.

What the Southend letter tells a landowner

In Southend a council’s proposal to take a site out did not remove it from the draft that goes to consultation and examination. The minister said he was “not convinced that there is a planning or evidential basis for reducing the housing requirement in the draft Plan and in particular removing site BG1”, and that doing so “could also risk the Plan being found unsound at examination”. For a site that stands up on the evidence, that sends the test of the site to an Inspector, who recommends whether it stays.

The signal has limits.

• It is one letter to one council. Southend’s last plan with strategic policies was adopted in December 2007, its Housing Delivery Test score was 20% in 2025 and its housing land supply was 1.3 years in the council’s April 2025 statement, with the 20% buffer. Other councils will have other facts.
• The council is taking advice. Its cabinet member for planning said on 23 October that the council was “taking legal advice”.
• It does not decide adoption. Direction 4 tells the council to “Progress the Plan up to the end of the examination process”. None of the five numbered directions requires the council to adopt, and they stay in force “until withdrawn by the Secretary of State”. Adoption is a council resolution unless the Secretary of State uses his default powers.
• Tested can mean changed. The Inspector can recommend changes to a plan, and in most cases does.

In July the minister also wrote to the Inspectorate about how inspectors should weigh deliverability and viability when they examine plans. Where “a robust evidence base exists and there is a reasonable basis for concluding that allocations are capable of delivery over the plan period as a whole”, he expects those concerns “to be approached pragmatically”. The same letter says nothing in it “alters the statutory local plan preparation or examination requirements”, nor does it “diminish the importance of proportionate evidence supporting plan allocations and policies”.

What to do now

• Find the council’s timetable. Its Local Development Scheme sets out the dates for the Regulation 19 consultation and for submission. The minister has asked councils that will not submit by 31 December to send revised schemes to his department by the end of November.
• Read how the draft treats your site. Check the boundary, the number of homes and any conditions against the earlier draft.
• Check for a ministerial letter. gov.uk publishes the minister’s letters to councils about their plans. A council with a letter that sets its own submission date appears to be outside the extension unless the minister amends it.
• Have the evidence ready. An Inspector tests a plan on evidence, so the papers on access, flood risk, ecology, heritage and deliverability for your site matter.

Our free Land Potential Check gives a first read of the constraints on a piece of land, drawn from national planning data.