An interim position statement may be published when:

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• The Local Plan is out of date.
• A full Housing Land Supply Statement has not yet been completed or published for the current monitoring year.
• The council is awaiting confirmation of housing delivery numbers (e.g. completions, permissions).
• There is uncertainty due to appeals or legal challenges that affect the 5-Year Housing Land Supply.

It is a way for the council to indicate its estimated position, e.g. stating that it believes it has 3.2 years’ worth of deliverable housing land, pending final verification.

Status of Interim Statements

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• Not binding — unlike a formally published 5-Year Housing Land Supply Statement.
• Subject to change — as new data or appeal decisions are incorporated.
• May be used by officers to inform development management decisions, especially for tilted balance cases.

Relevance to Tilted Balance

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If the council publishes an interim statement indicating it cannot demonstrate a full 5-year supply, this can trigger Paragraph 11(d) of the NPPF, meaning the tilted balance applies:

Planning permission should be granted unless the adverse impacts would significantly and demonstrably outweigh the benefits.

In such cases, the council must still apply planning judgment and local policies — but with less control due to the shortfall.

Yes, but it’s fragmented, inconsistent, and largely reactive rather than strategic.

🏛️ 1. There is no single national spatial strategy for England

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Unlike Scotland and Wales, England does not have a formal national spatial plan or development strategy.

That means:

• There is no top-down plan saying where major growth should occur
• Decisions are delegated to local councils (districts and unitaries)
• The government sets targets, but not structure

📈 2. Targets are nationally set – but unevenly applied

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The government uses the Standard Method to calculate Local Housing Need, which creates a baseline housing target per local authority.

BUT:

• These numbers are not binding unless adopted in a Local Plan
• Councils can challenge or “cap” them based on constraints
• South East districts often get hit hardest due to high house prices, while Northern areas face weaker delivery incentives

🧱 3. There is no national land-use logic

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Despite population and economic growth being highly concentrated in the South East, there is no coordinated national strategy for:

• Relieving housing pressure
• Relocating public investment
• Connecting jobs to housing

Compare this to:

• France (with its regional urban clusters)
• Germany (strong federal-state planning)
• Netherlands (compact, nationally guided growth zones)

England? It’s piecemeal.

📉 4. No national investment strategy to match housing delivery

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Even though local councils are told to deliver more homes, there’s no automatic funding for schools, GPs, roads, or public transport.

So you get:

• Homes approved without sufficient infrastructure
• Communities growing faster than services
• Backlash and resistance

📍 Summary Table

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National Control	Exists?	Notes
National Spatial Strategy	❌ No	England is the only UK nation without one
Housing Need Formula	✅ Yes	Standard Method sets minimums per district
Binding Housing Targets	❌ No	Targets aren’t enforced unless in Local Plan
Infrastructure Funding	❌ No	No automatic match to population growth
Land Use Redistribution	❌ No	No plan to rebalance growth across the country

🧠 Final Thought

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There is national control over the numbers, but not over the consequences or coordination. That’s why districts like EHDC are under pressure from targets they didn’t shape — without the tools or funding to deliver them properly.

The Annual Monitoring Report (AMR) is a document that each local planning authority — including East Hampshire District Council (EHDC) — must publish at least once per year. Its purpose is to track the council’s performance in delivering planning objectives and housing targets.

Think of it as EHDC’s “planning report card”, offering transparency about whether it is meeting the commitments set out in its Local Plan.

The Annual Monitoring Report (AMR) is a yearly publication required by all local councils. It tracks housing delivery, Local Plan progress, and whether the council is meeting national planning targets. One of its most influential roles is confirming whether the council has a five-year housing land supply — a key measure used to determine how much control it retains over planning decisions.

In this article, we explain how the AMR works — and how windfall housing approvals (homes approved outside planned allocations) are sometimes used to improve headline figures. While this can help councils meet short-term targets, it can also mask deeper planning problems, such as overdevelopment in rural communities, underinvestment in infrastructure, or failure to deliver allocated sites.

🧾 What Does the AMR Include?

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The AMR typically reports on:

• 📦 Progress on the Local Plan: Has the council delivered what it promised?
• 🏡 Housing completions: How many homes have been built each year?
• 📉 5-Year Housing Land Supply (5YHLS): Does the council have enough land to meet demand over the next five years?
• 🧮 Housing Delivery Test (HDT) performance

The Housing Delivery Test (HDT) is a national measure of how many homes a council has actually delivered, compared to how many it was expected to deliver over the past three years. If delivery falls below key thresholds (e.g. 85%, 75%), it can trigger penalties such as action plans or tilted balance.

• 🏘️ Affordable housing delivery
• 🧭 Windfall trends and development outside planned allocations
• 🌿 Environmental and infrastructure indicators
• 📆 Whether the Local Plan still meets national policy requirements or needs updating

🗓️ When Does EHDC Publish the AMR?

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• EHDC typically publishes its AMR between May and July each year, covering the previous financial year (e.g. 1 April 2023 to 31 March 2024).
• The most recent version as of early 2025 is the 2022/23 AMR, released in summer 2023.

📌 What Is the Legal Duty?

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Under Regulation 34 of the Town and Country Planning (Local Planning) (England) Regulations 2012, councils must:

• Publish a monitoring report at least annually,
• Make it publicly available, and
• Keep it relevant to Local Plan performance.

⚠️ Why It Matters

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• The AMR helps determine whether EHDC has maintained a 5YHLS and met its housing targets.
• If shortfalls are revealed, the tilted balance is triggered, weakening local control over speculative development.
• The Housing Delivery Test (HDT) uses AMR figures to assess whether local planning authorities are delivering enough homes. Failing the HDT can:
  • Trigger an action plan,
  • Require an early Local Plan review, or
  • Engage the presumption in favour of development (tilted balance).

🚨 Pressure to “Patch the Numbers” Before the AMR Cut-off

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Because AMRs rely on data captured as of 31 March each year, there is a risk that councils under pressure to meet housing targets might approve borderline or windfall applications in Q1 (Jan–Mar) to artificially boost completions before publication.

This creates a risk that:

• Windfall approvals are rushed or strategic rather than properly assessed.
• Councils may cut corners on cumulative impact, environmental risk, or consultation.
• Settlements like Medstead — which already absorbed disproportionate growth — may be further burdened to “make up the numbers.”

🧾 Windfall allowances hide structural failure

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NPPF Paragraph 71 allows councils to count windfall sites in their housing supply — but without any spatial limit.

👉 Result:

• Councils can use windfalls to fill the numbers,
• Even if growth is unplanned, disconnected from infrastructure, and overloads specific settlements (like Medstead).

This makes it look like delivery is working, while masking the failure to deliver plan-led, equitable growth

🚨 When the AMR Becomes a Trigger to Cut Corners

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Although the AMR is designed to promote transparency, it can also create perverse incentives when councils are under pressure to meet housing delivery targets. Because each AMR captures housing data up to 31 March, local authorities may feel compelled to approve marginal or windfall developments in the final months of the year — even in unsustainable locations — simply to boost their numbers before publication.

In reality, this pressure can begin well before the AMR deadline. If internal tracking or draft housing completions reports indicate that delivery may fall short, councils like EHDC may accelerate approvals in Q3 or earlier, particularly for windfall or tilted balance schemes that can be counted toward annual totals.

This is especially risky when:

• The council anticipates failing the Housing Delivery Test (HDT),
• The Five-Year Housing Land Supply (5YHLS) position is already weak,
• Or the tilted balance has been triggered and used to justify approvals.

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🎙️ In the LPC meeting on 20 March 2025, EHDC’s Development Manager confirmed that the 2016 Ashwoods (Medstead) development was approved during a period when the council lacked a five-year housing land supply and was relying on an Interim Housing Position Statement. It was a windfall development, not part of a planned allocation.

📉 Every year, EHDC must report on housing delivery. When it appears that targets may fall short, windfall approvals can play a role in closing the gap. While this helps meet district-wide numbers, it also risks obscuring underlying planning weaknesses — with communities like Medstead absorbing the real-world impacts of unplanned growth.

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In such moments, settlements like Medstead — which have already absorbed high levels of growth — may be exposed to rushed or speculative approvals without cumulative safeguards, long-term infrastructure planning, or meaningful local scrutiny. The AMR, intended as a tool for accountability, can unintentionally incentivise short-termism and overdevelopment, particularly in rural communities that lack formal delivery caps.

• The Council’s Leadership Cabinet, which is responsible for setting and resourcing strategic priorities.

• The Planning Policy Team, for managing the process (though often under resourcing constraints).

• Full Council, if they failed to adopt or fund a timely review when warned.

⚖️ Why Accountability Matters?

Loss of Local Control

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Increased Risk to Infrastructure and Communities
Without an up-to-date plan, housing growth may happen in places without the necessary roads, schools, or GP capacity — and the council cannot effectively coordinate delivery.

Legal and Financial Exposure

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An outdated plan may increase the risk of:

• Planning decisions being overturned at appeal.

• Costly Judicial Reviews.

• Loss of control over CIL/S106 infrastructure negotiation.

Impact on Public Trust

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Residents may lose confidence in the council’s ability to manage development fairly and transparently — especially when speculative schemes are approved without strong local backing.

Step	Regulation	What Happens	Legal Note

1. Early Evidence Gathering

None (pre-Reg 18)

The council starts gathering data: housing need, environment, transport, etc. May also issue a “Call for Sites”.

Informal stage. No legal duty to consult yet.

2. Issues & Options / Draft Plan

Regulation 18

Council must publicly consult on a draft plan and ask: “What do you think?”

🔹 Legal duty to consult any person who may be affected (Reg 18).

3. Pre-Submission Plan

Regulation 19

Council publishes the plan it wants to adopt. You can now object on legal and soundness grounds (e.g. not justified, not effective, not compliant with NPPF).

🔹 Critical stage: your last chance to influence what gets adopted.

4. Submission to Inspector

Regulation 22

Council submits the Reg 19 plan + evidence + consultation responses to the Planning Inspectorate.

Council loses control of the process at this point.

5. Public Examination

Not a “regulation” stage, but legally required

An independent Planning Inspector holds a public examination to test if the plan is “sound” and “legally compliant”. You may be invited to a hearing if you objected at Reg 19.

🔹 Required by law. Inspector checks legality and compliance with national policy.

6. Inspector’s Report

Regulation 25

Inspector issues a report: either (a) sound, (b) sound with changes, or (c) unsound.

🔹 Council can only adopt the plan if it complies with this report.

7. Adoption

Regulation 26

Council votes to adopt the plan. It now has full legal force and guides all planning decisions.

🔹 Must publish the plan and adoption notice within set time.

8. Legal Challenge Period

N/A (but allowed under Planning Act)

Anyone can challenge the adopted plan within 6 weeks if it’s legally flawed.

Judicial Review in High Court.

🔍 1. Pre-Regulation Work – Evidence & Site Calls

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What’s happening?
Before anything official begins, the council gathers background evidence:

• How many homes are needed?
• Which schools or roads are at capacity?
• Which sites might be suitable for development?

They may also run a “call for sites” — asking landowners to submit land they want considered for development.

🟡 You can:

• Submit land (if you’re a landowner),
• Start watching for early signs of big development zones.

📝 2. Regulation 18 – Draft Plan & Early Consultation

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What’s happening?
This is the first formal public consultation.
The council publishes a draft version of the plan or “issues and options” — they might offer different scenarios or layouts and ask the public what they think.

📜 What does “Regulation 18” mean?
It’s the legal requirement that the council must consult “any person or organisation it thinks will be affected.” This gives the public a first formal voice in the process.

🟢 You can:

• Respond with general views on where homes, roads, and green spaces should go.
• Highlight local evidence: flooding, schools, transport, nature, etc.

📣 3. Regulation 19 – Final Plan & Legal Objections

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What’s happening?
The council publishes the plan it wants to adopt — the Pre-Submission Plan.
This is not a “what do you think” stage — this is a “tell us what’s wrong” stage.

📜 What does “Regulation 19” mean?
The council must publish the final version for a minimum of 6 weeks and allow the public to raise formal legal or policy-based objections. These go straight to the Planning Inspector.

🔴 You must:

• Say if you believe the plan is unsound (not justified, not effective, or conflicts with national policy),
• Or not legally compliant (e.g. flawed consultation, missing evidence, or no proper Sustainability Appraisal).

🛠️ This is the last chance to get changes made before it becomes law.

📤 4. Regulation 22 – Submission to the Planning Inspectorate

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What’s happening?
The council sends the plan — plus all your Reg 19 objections — to an independent Planning Inspector.

🧾 No new objections can be submitted now.

🔎 You may:

• Be invited to attend a hearing if your Reg 19 objection raised key issues.

⚖️ 5. Public Examination

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What’s happening?
The Planning Inspector tests the plan’s legality and “soundness”.
There are public hearings — but they are technical, not like public debates.

🎯 They check:

• Is the plan positively prepared?
• Is it based on evidence?
• Can it actually be delivered?
• Does it comply with national policy (like the NPPF)?

📚 The Inspector may also suggest “main modifications” — required changes before it can be approved.

🧾 6. Regulation 25 – Inspector’s Report

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What’s happening?
The Inspector issues their findings — either:

• ✅ Sound as is,
• ✏️ Sound with modifications, or
• ❌ Not sound (very rare).

🗳️ 7. Regulation 26 – Plan Adoption

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What’s happening?
The council votes to formally adopt the plan.
Once adopted, the plan becomes the law — developers must follow it, and so must the council (unless national policy overrides it).

🗂️ The council must publish:

• The adopted plan,
• A notice of adoption, and
• Any final sustainability documents.

⏳ 8. 6-Week Legal Challenge Window

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After adoption, anyone can launch a Judicial Review if they believe the plan is legally flawed (e.g. flawed process, failed consultation, unlawful policies).

🧑‍⚖️ Challenges go to the High Court, and only succeed if a clear legal error is proven.

There are no legal, financial, or procedural barriers preventing East Hampshire District Council (EHDC) from implementing a stronger Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) screening policy — none. The full cost of EIA preparation falls entirely on developers, not the council. National policy (NPPF) not only allows but encourages local authorities to tailor EIA thresholds and requirements to reflect their area’s specific environmental and infrastructure pressures. EHDC holds full legal discretion to do so. The only missing ingredient is political will: a genuine, resident-focused leadership that chooses to act. Strengthening EIA screening is a no-brainer — it costs EHDC nothing and delivers enormous public benefit. Any refusal to pursue this reform cannot be justified on planning grounds; it can only be seen as an abdication of responsibility.

Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) isn’t just a bureaucratic box-ticking exercise — it’s a critical safeguard, designed to protect local communities, public services, and the environment from developments that might cause serious harm. And like any serious risk management process, it unfolds in structured steps.

To make it easy to understand, imagine the planning system as a healthcare system. Just as doctors don’t rush into surgery without checking a patient’s history, local councils shouldn’t approve large-scale developments without understanding their real-world impact — especially when multiple schemes may combine to produce cumulative harm.

🏥 The EIA Process – Explained Through a Health Analogy

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Stage	Planning Term / Actor	What It Does	Medical Analogy	Who Pays / Decides?
0	National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF)	Sets the national rules for how and when EIA should be applied. Councils are encouraged to interpret and strengthen this based on local needs.	Like NHS clinical guidelines — national standards, but applied by local doctors.	National policy – EHDC decides how it’s implemented locally
1	EHDC (Local Planning Authority)	Determines if EIA is needed, what it must include, and whether cumulative risks should be examined. Has full legal discretion to require stronger screening.	Like your GP and local hospital board — deciding how best to apply the rules to protect patients.	EHDC decides — developer pays for all assessment, not the council
2	EIA Screening	Decides whether a full EIA is required. Must include a check for cumulative impact with other approved or planned developments.	Like triage — do current symptoms or known risk factors (including past conditions) justify tests?	Developer (small admin fee)
3	EIA Scoping	If an EIA is needed, scoping defines what topics must be studied and how deeply — including any combined/cumulative risks.	Like a doctor deciding whether to test the heart, lungs, liver — and whether existing health problems must be factored in.	Developer
4	EIA (Full Environmental Impact Assessment)	The developer commissions expert reports, surveys, and models on traffic, flooding, biodiversity, health services, etc. Findings go into an Environmental Statement.	Like a full medical workup before major surgery — detailed and evidence-based.	Developer
5	EIA Findings & Mitigation	The results shape planning conditions, developer contributions (e.g. roads, GPs, biodiversity offsetting), or project redesign. May include long-term monitoring.	Like a treatment plan — surgery allowed, but with follow-up, rehab, or medication.	Developer (via conditions, Section 106, etc.)

🧱 Why Cumulative Impact Is So Critical — and So Often Ignored

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Here’s where many councils, including EHDC, fall short: they treat each development in isolation, ignoring the fact that multiple smaller schemes can combine to cause major damage. That’s the essence of cumulative impact — and it’s already a required part of both the Screening and Scoping stages under national planning guidance.

It’s like assuming a single prescription is harmless — without checking whether the patient is already taking five others. One scheme might not overload a road or surgery, but five new estates across a village cluster absolutely can.

EHDC has both the legal right and the moral duty to insist on proper cumulative impact assessment — especially in overdeveloped areas like Four Marks, Medstead, Alton, and Whitehill. Yet time and again, it fails to use its powers.

🧾 Final Word

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EIA, when done properly, is a vital planning tool. It’s not about blocking development — it’s about making sure growth happens responsibly, with the real-world effects understood, mitigated, and monitored.

• Developers pay for the entire process
• The NPPF allows and expects councils to strengthen safeguards locally
• EHDC has complete discretion to apply these checks based on local needs
• The only thing missing is the will to use the powers already available