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Planning Policy Committee - Wednesday 17th September 2025 6.00 pm
September 17, 2025 View on council websiteSummary
The West Northamptonshire Council Planning Policy Committee met to discuss and approve the release of the draft West Northamptonshire Infrastructure and Developer Contributions Supplementary Planning Document (WNIDCSPD) for public consultation. The committee also agreed to use the indexation arrangements outlined in the document for all section 106 agreements1 in the interim. Finally, they delegated authority to the Head of Planning Policy and Specialist Services to make minor changes to the document before its release.
Draft West Northamptonshire Infrastructure and Developer Contributions Supplementary Planning Document
The committee approved the release of the draft West Northamptonshire Infrastructure and Developer Contributions Supplementary Planning Document 2 (WNIDCSPD) for a six-week public consultation. They also agreed that the indexation arrangements outlined in the document would be used in the interim for all section 106 agreements. Finally, they delegated authority to the Head of Planning Policy and Specialist Services to make minor editorial and presentational changes to the draft before it is released for public consultation.
The WNIDCSPD will provide updated guidance on how developer contributions will be calculated and negotiated when determining planning applications. These contributions cover a range of areas, including affordable housing and open spaces. Councillor Thomas Manning, Cabinet Member for Planning and Communities, stated that the document aims to provide certainty to both planning applicants and the communities where development will occur, ensuring that mitigation costs are borne by developers rather than taxpayers.
The new SPD will replace three existing SPDs from the former local authority areas of Daventry District, Northampton Borough and South Northamptonshire District, and will act as a single source of guidance for planning applicants. According to the agenda frontsheet, the council currently relies on these three separate documents to assess the level of developer contributions required.
The report highlights that the National Planning Policy Framework3 (NPPF) sets out three tests that developer contributions must meet:
- Necessary to make the development acceptable in planning terms
- Directly related to the development
- Fairly and reasonably related in scale and kind to the development
Previous Meeting Minutes
The minutes of the previous meeting, held on 23 July 2025, were approved and signed by Councillor Thomas Manning, Chair.
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Section 106 agreements are legal agreements between local authorities and developers, used to mitigate the impact of new developments on the community and infrastructure. ↩
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A Supplementary Planning Document (SPD) provides further details on how policies in a Local Plan should be implemented. ↩
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The National Planning Policy Framework is a document produced by the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government. It sets out the government’s planning policies for England and how these should be applied. ↩
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