Sustainability Appraisal
The Local Plan: Joint Core Strategy, being prepared by East Hampshire District Council and the South Downs National Park Authority, sets out what kind of development we should have and where it should be to meet community needs in the District. The strategy covers the period up to 2026.
We also need to check that the Joint Core Strategy supports sustainable development.
What is a Sustainability Appraisal?
Sustainable development is defined by the government as:
- Living within environmental limits
- Ensuring a strong healthy and just society
- Achieving a sustainable economy
- Promoting good governance
- Using sound science responsibly
To help make sure our plans for the future keep these aims, the Joint Core Strategy is subject to a Sustainability Appraisal (SA), which includes the requirements of the EU Directive on Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA).
Our current position
Part of the process involves consultation with statutory authorities and others on the scope of the Sustainability Appraisal.
A Scoping Report was published in May 2007 and amended and approved in October 2007 taking into account comments received. It sets out 27 sustainability objectives against which to assess the policies and proposals within the Joint Core Strategy.
One role of the Core Strategy is to look at broad areas where development will take place in East Hampshire to 2026.
An initial Sustainability Appraisal was made of the different development options set out in the Issues and Options Topic Paper 7 ‘Where should new development go?’ and Topic Paper 8 ‘The Whitehill/Bordon Opportunity’ (February 2008).
It was not a full Sustainability Appraisal, just an initial summary of the likely effects of the options.
At the next stage of the process, the Preferred Policies version of the Joint Core Strategy was accompanied by a full Sustainability Appraisal explaining how it helped to identify preferred policies (November 2009).
The Pre-submission version of the Joint Core Strategy will be published on 3 February 2012. A Sustainability Appraisal Report on this document will also be published and comments on its contents should be made by 5pm on 16 March 2012 (see related page - Joint Core Strategy pre-submission draft).
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