See homepage for news of recent developments.

See reports from the advisory committee and here for minutes of meetings.

In the referendum on 30th May, a majority of 83.5% voted in favour of Rushcliffe Borough Council using "the Neighbourhood Plan for Keyworth to help it decide planning applications in the neighbourhood area". Click here for further details. The Borough Council has accordingly made the Plan part of the Development Plan for Rushcliffe Borough. Click here for a copy of the plan and here for a copy of the Borough Council's decision statement.

(May 2018)

There appears to be some confusion regarding the forthcoming referendum on the Neighbourhood Plan (see below). I have been contacted by a number of people who are under the impression that it is just about housing and, if they vote 'No', it will mean no additional housing in Keyworth. This is not the case. The housing is coming whether we want it or not. The Neighbourhood Plan, amongst other things, sets out, after much consultation, the type and location of housing that the people of Keyworth would like to see.

A vote against the plan would mean no local input into future housing. As I have said before, the plan may not be perfect, but it is certainly better than no plan at all. Keyworth Parish Council urges people to vote in favour of the plan on the 30th May.

Cllr Tony Grice, Parish Council Chair

(March 2018)

On 30th May, residents will have their chance to vote in a referendum on the future development of Keyworth.

The Keyworth Neighbourhood Plan has been developed by the Parish Council after considerable consultation with local people, businesses, voluntary groups and developers. Following amendments and approval by Rushcliffe Borough Council and an independent examiner, Keyworth Parish Council approved the plan on 9th April at an extraordinary Parish Council meeting. The plan sets out how we want Keyworth to grow and improve over the next ten years, and we urge residents to vote in favour of it. You may not think it perfect, but it is better to have a plan than not. With no plan in place, developers may seek planning permission without any reference to local opinion.

Whilst it is not possible to accommodate every wish, the plan seeks to inform planning decisions, and we will seek funding from the new housing to be built in the village to pay for improvements, so everyone can benefit. There are eight key objectives, which aim to guide how development should happen and ensure protection of existing assets and valued areas of the village:

1. ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT: Protect existing businesses, encourage high-skilled entrepreneurs.
2. COMMUNITY FACILITIES: Retain and improve existing services and facilities, building our role as a rural 'hub'.
3. LEISURE AND RECREATION: Improve the number of recreation and leisure facilities and their quality; improve access to the countryside for all.
4. SHOPS AND RETAIL: Retain, improve and promote local shops – and encourage new retail development.
5. TRANSPORT AND ACCESS: Encourage new walking and cycling routes, plus road improvements to key junctions.
6. HOUSING: 450 to 480 homes to help meet Rushcliffe's housing targets up to 2028 – while creating a sensitively designed and sustainable community.
7. ENVIRONMENT: Protect and enhance the environment and biodiversity, support community-led schemes and new development that relates well to the landscape.
8. HERITAGE AND CONSERVATION AREA: Protect our Conservation Area and heritage through good design which reinforces Keyworth's character.

Click here to see the plan, or visit the Parish Council Office if you prefer to read a hard copy. Please vote on May 30th.

Tony Grice, Council Chairman

Rushcliffe Borough Council received the independent examiner's report for the Keyworth Neighbourhood Plan in February and, in accordance with Neighbourhood Plan Regulations, a decision statement has been produced by the Borough Council, stating that it accepts all of the examiner's recommended modifications and that, once modified, the plan should proceed to referendum on Wednesday, 30 May 2018. Click here to find the examiner's report, decision statement and Neighbourhood Plan referendum draft; and here to see the illustration document highlighting modifications, which appears on the Borough Council website. The Parish Council will be discussing the proposed modifications at an extraordinary meeting in the Centenary Lounge on Monday, 9th April starting at 7.00pm. Please watch this space for further news in due course.

(December 2017)

Consultation on the submission draft of the Keyworth Neighbourhood Plan ended on Tuesday 17 October 2017. Mr Patrick Whitehead of Intelligent Plans and Examinations (IPE) Ltd has now been appointed by Rushcliffe Borough Council to examine whether the plan meets the 'Basic Conditions' and has issued a letter to the Parish and Borough Councils on procedural matters for the examination. Click here to see the relevant letter and subsequent correspondence, and here to find other relevant items on the Borough Council website.

(September 2017)

Keyworth Parish Council has submitted its draft Neighbourhood Plan to Rushcliffe Borough Council. The Keyworth Neighbourhood Plan contains local objectives and planning policies which the Borough Council will use when considering planning applications within the parish. The Borough Council is now required to publicise the draft plan for six weeks and invite representations to be made during this period. The consultation will run from Tuesday, 5 September 2017 until 5pm on Tuesday 17 October 2017. Further details relating to the consultation can be found at: https://www.rushcliffe.gov.uk/planningpolicy/neighbourhoodplanning/. Following the consultation, the draft plan and all representations received will then be considered by an independent examiner. This has to happen before the plan can be approved.

(June 2017)

Residents may recall that in the autumn of 2016 a number of complaints were made to the Monitoring Officer at Rushcliffe Borough Council (RBC) about some Council members. These complaints were in relation to their involvement with meetings, discussions and decisions concerning the Keyworth Neighbourhood Plan.

In late April 2017 the Monitoring Officer replied to all those directly involved confirming that no investigation was to be undertaken by the police and that he was rejecting the complaints. It follows that no sanctions were to be imposed upon the individual Council members involved (under the Localism Act 2011) or upon the Council in relation to compliance with the Parish Council's code of conduct.

It was clear from the response from the Monitoring Officer that:

• The proximity of land interests held by the Councillors against whom specific complaints concerning Disclosable Pecuniary Interests (DPIs) were made, did not require their non-involvement in Neighbourhood Plan decisions and that regarding this and other alleged code breaches the same Councillors had sought and acted upon advice given by the previous Monitoring Officer before participating in decisions of the Parish Council in respect of the Neighbourhood Plan which gave rise to complaints.
• The decisions of the Council regarding the Neighbourhood Plan were not invalid and that the ongoing processes of the Neighbourhood Plan process carried out by RBC (the local planning authority), the required Independent Examination and local referendum provide adequate and democratic safeguards for the interests of residents.

The Parish Council Neighbourhood Plan Advisory Committee remains in place as the plan progresses at RBC through its next stages and will meet, as required, publish its minutes, dealing with matters that are appropriate to its terms of reference.

Cllr Nic Seller

Chair, Neighbourhood Plan Advisory Committee

(December 2016)

The revised submission draft of the Keyworth Neighbourhood Plan was a major item on the agenda for the meeting of the Parish Council on 12th December. The meeting was attended by twenty-eight members of the public, several of whom were invited to make comments and ask questions. Click here to see the advisory committee chairman's report. Following intense questioning and lively debate, the Parish Council voted by an overwhelming majority to accept the plan as revised by the Neighbourhood Plan advisory committee. The plan will now be forwarded to Rushcliffe Borough Council to be considered in its deliberations to create the Local Plan Part 2 including the Green Belt Review. This will probably take place in the first few months of 2017. The Borough Council is entitled to further revise the plan before it is placed before the community for approval or rejection via a referendum. Further information will be posted on the Parish Council website as this process and any associated consultation takes place.

Whilst the Neighbourhood Plan advisory committee has completed the task set by the Parish Council, its former chairman, Cllr Nic Seller, will try to deal with any relevant comments or questions that are submitted to him by letter or email up to and including Monday 16th January although, due to the Christmas and New Year holidays, replies over this period may be delayed a little.

Nic Seller, on behalf of Keyworth Parish Council, 13th December 2016

(November 2016)

At the Parish Council meeting on 7th November, Cllr Nic Seller, chairman of the Neighbourhood Plan advisory committee, reported on the committee's progress since it was set up at the Full Council meeting meeting on 26th September. Click here to see Cllr Seller's report in full.

A revised submission draft (subject, at the time of writing, to a number of editorial corrections) will be considered at the meeting on 12th December. Click here for details. Please watch this space for news of further developments.

(September 2016)

After four years of preparation by the Keyworth Neighbourhood Plan Steering Group, the Keyworth Neighbourhood Development Plan Submission Draft was presented to Keyworth Parish Council for approval at the extraordinary meeting on 14th September. The Parish Council declined to support the Submission Draft and voted to set up a Council sub-committee to look at the housing strategy and reconsider the potential housing development sites. Any future information regarding the Plan will come from the new sub-committee, the members of which will be decided at the next Full Council meeting, when terms of reference will also be approved.

Linda Abbey, Tony Grice, Liz Chmara, John Cottee and Keith Barton (Members of Keyworth Neighbourhood Plan Steering Group).

Click here for previous Neighbourhood Plan items.

(March 2016)

Meetings with Developers: Members of the Steering Group put points and queries, from residents' comments in the formal consultation period last year, to the representatives of each of the sites earmarked for new housing development and for safeguarding in the Draft Plan, to make the community's expectations clear.

Release of Green Belt for Development: As there appears to be no possibility of release of Green Belt Land ahead of Rushcliffe Borough Council's Review, the Neighbourhood Plan will go forward with the Housing Policy as an appendix of recommendations. This will enable us to complete soon. The release of land and allocation of sites would then be done on completion of the Rushcliffe Local Plan Part 2.

Timescale: We hope the Plan will be completed and approved in the next couple of months and passed to Rushcliffe Borough Council, to independent examination in the autumn and then to referendum in early 2017.

Linda Abbey, Chairman of the Keyworth Neighbourhood Plan Steering Group.

Click here for previous Neighbourhood Plan items.

(November 2015)

Click here for the latest news from the Neighbourhood Plan Steering Group.

(July 2015)

The Neighbourhood Plan Steering Group is pleased to share with you the details of the public contributions from the Regulation 14 Consultation, completed earlier in the year. The Steering Group thanks all those residents who provided responses. Summaries of views in graph form and key issues raised for each policy are listed. To view, please click here.

Click here to continue reading.

(June 2015)

The Neighbourhood Plan Steering Group has just been informed that we are not allowed to recommend any sites for housing development in the plan no matter what evidence or public support we have for any such sites. (You will remember that, some time ago, the Parish Council was told that we would have to plan for 450 new houses in Keyworth). This is because any sites recommended would be on green belt land. Any housing development would, however, have to be on the green belt because that is the only sort of land available on which to build 450 houses! The Parish Council was encouraged to develop a Neighbourhood Plan and, to that end, a lot of time and money has been spent developing it. We are in a Catch 22 situation where, having been encouraged to develop a plan using green belt land, we are, in actual fact, forbidden to recommend the building of houses on green belt land! We are seeking an urgent meeting with Kenneth Clarke, our MP, to raise this ridiculous situation with him, and to ask him to take it up with the government on our behalf.

Tony Grice (chairman, Keyworth Parish Council)

(May 2015)

Important notice regarding the Keyworth Neighbourhood Plan

It has been brought to the attention of the Neighbourhood Plan Steering Group that the Department of Communities & Local Government (DCLG) has declined to make any decision on the release of green belt land for development within a Neighbourhood Plan where the allocation of sites would be ahead of the Local Authority's green belt review. In so doing, it has ignored the recommendation of the Select Committee. We knew that any building development for Keyworth would have to be on green belt and we have made numerous approaches over the past two years, together with Rushcliffe Borough Council, to the DCLG to clarify the position. Our problem is that Rushcliffe Borough Council has yet to carry out its green belt review as part of its Local Plan Part 2. At this point, therefore, we are legally unable to allocate sites, but only recommend them. The sites can be considered fully when the findings of the Rushcliffe Local Plan Part 2 are known.

The process of developing the Keyworth Neighbourhood Plan will continue, but the difference is that it will take longer than previously thought. It could be over two years before any decision can be made on the release of green belt land around Keyworth. We are as sorry and frustrated about this as we know you will be too. See below for previous Neighbourhood Plan items.

(April 2015)

Responses from the community consultation are being professionally evaluated and, as soon as this has been completed, amendments will be considered by the Steering Group in conjunction with the independent planners' findings. When this has been completed, further information will be made public. Click here for previous items concerning the Neighbourhood Plan.

(January 2015)

The seven-week public consultation period on the Keyworth Draft Neighbourhood Plan came to a close on 24th January. Thanks to all who participated. Click here for an update from Cllr Linda Abbey, chairman of the Neighbourhood Plan Steering Group, or see below for background details.

(December 2014)

Seven weeks from 6th December

Lots of interest at launch event

Click here to see the Draft Keyworth Neighbourhood Development Plan and questionnaire, plus sundry background documents.

The Neighbourhood Plan Steering Group would like to thank the seventy or more residents who put their Christmas shopping on hold, and came along on a very cold morning to show their interest in the Draft Neighbourhood Development Plan – the culmination of over two years' work to date - at the launch event on 6th December (click here for photographs), and also the residents who attended the drop-in session on 15th December. There was lots of interest in the display boards, and members of the Steering Group were on hand to answer questions.

Policy display boards, on display in the Village Hall foyer until 16th December, will then be at Keyworth Library until 12th January; then on the ground floor foyer of Keyworth Primary Care Centre until 26th January. Consultation is over a period of seven weeks, from 6th December, so please make sure you have your say! If you're a Keyworth resident, you should have received a questionnaire through your letterbox on or around 10th December, along with a summary booklet* but, if you prefer to complete the questionnaire on-line, click here.

*N.B. Unfortunately, there has been a processing error affecting the wording of the summary booklet (the section re Shops & Retail); please click here for the correct wording or here to see the correctly worded document in its entirety.

N.B. We cannot undertake to respond to comments on the Neighbourhood Plan individually, but please rest assured that all comments will be taken into account.

(November 2014)

At an extraordinary meeting on 12th November, the Parish Council approved polices for the draft Neighbourhood Plan to go out for public consultation; these included provision for 480 residential dwellings as follows:

• 200 (including a minimum 80 for the elderly) on land off Nicker Hill.
• 80 (retirement village or similar) on land off Platt Lane.
• 200 on land north of Bunny Lane.

The next step is public consultation over a period of seven weeks starting 6th December - click here for further details, and please watch this space for more information in due course.

(October 2014)

There will be an extraordinary Full Council meeting on Wednesday, 12th November (7.00pm in the Centenary Lounge) to discuss the steering group's recommendations in respect of the Neighbourhood Plan. Members of the public are welcome to attend, but will not be invited to participate in the meeting; however, assuming the Council approves the recommendations, there will be a six-week public consultation period during which residents will be able to make their views known.

(June 2014)

The Neighbourhood Plan steering group is making good progress in relation to the Neighbourhood Plan with help from independent planning consultants, BPUD. Click here for an update on the current position and the next steps.

(April 2014)

Some forty residents accepted our invitation (with the April Keyworth News) to the Annual Parish meeting on 28th April, and inspected displays submitted by prospective developers, outlining proposals for sites being considered as part of the Neighbourhood Plan process. The displays were then moved to the Village Hall foyer for the next three weeks, and attracted considerable attention. Thank you to everyone who submitted comments, all of which have been forwarded on the Neighbourhood Plan steering group. Click here to see the relevant display documents if you haven't seen them already.

• Neighbourhood planning is a new right for communities introduced through the Localism Act 2011.
• For the first time, local people will have a major statutory say in helping to shape development in the areas in which they live.
• Much more information can be found on the Communities & Local Government website.

• The Keyworth Parish Profile sets out what residents told Rushcliffe Borough Council about Keyworth in consultations.
• The Core Strategy in Rushcliffe Borough Council's Local Development Framework sets out the vision and strategy for growth and development in Rushcliffe up to 2026. It covers the broad locations of development and includes strategic policies for housing, business, retail and transport.
• The Core Strategy proposes that at least 450 new homes should be built around Keyworth by 2026.
• This would, in all probability, mean development on some part of the green belt.
• The Strategic Housing Land Availability Assessment (SHLAA) for Rushcliffe is an assessment of a number of sites to consider whether they could be suitable for housing development.
• Nine sites have been identified in or around Keyworth, and some of these sites are likely to be the ones where the new homes will be built; click here for map.
• Under the Neighbourhood Planning (General) Regulations 2012, which came into force in April, it became necessary for the Parish Council to apply to the Borough Council for formal designation of the neighbourhood area in which possible sites for development could be identified. A Borough Council consultation folllowed during the period 18th July to 29th August.
• It was resolved at a Borough Council Meeting on 4th December, in accordance with section 61G of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990, to approve the application to designate the Parish of Keyworth as a Neighbourhood Area.

• Rejecting the proposals for new homes is not an option, but a Neighbourhood Plan will enable the community to have a say on where new homes, shops and businesses should be built, and what the new buildings should look like.
• It should be borne in mind, however, that, if the Neighbourhood Plan is rejected by the community, there will be no opportunity to put forward an alternative plan, and the proposed housing growth would go ahead without regard for the community's views.
• Accordingly, we need to get it right first time, and we need residents to let us know what they think sooner rather than later.

• The Parish Council has set up a steering group, chaired by Cllr Linda Abbey, also chairman of the Council's Planning committee, to manage the process of assessing possible sites for the new homes, and consulting the community at large.
• Other members of the steering group are: Cllrs Keith Barton, Peter Harding, Liz Chmara (Council vice-chairman) and Tony Grice (Council chairman); also, Borough/County Cllr John Cottee.
• The steering group has been receiving help and advice from an independent planning consultant, planners from Planning Aid, the Rural Communities Action Network, and a Notts County Council Consultation officer.

• The recommendations of the steering group will ultimately require approval by Full Council.
• No decisions, or indeed recommendations, will be made until after the consultation process is concluded, and, when the Neighbourhood Plan is complete, residents will be able to vote on it in a local referendum.
• For reasons outlined above, however, it was important that residents didn't leave it until the referendum to make their views known, hence the need for consultation beforehand.

• Visioning workshops (for Parish and Borough Councillors, local businesses and other groups) organised by the Borough Council in June and July 2011.
• Community consultation event at the 2011 Keyworth Show.
• Workshops for pupils at village schools.
• Items in Parish Council newsletter (Keyworth News).
• Residents invited (flyers distributed with Keyworth News) to participate in a consultation exercise at the Annual Parish meeting on 30th April 2012 - some fifty residents attended, along with Parish, Borough and County Councillors.
• Talks with school governors re likely impact of proposed housing on schools.
• Consultation with U3A, May 2012.

• Consultation at BGS, 11th July 2012.
• Council also looking to consult staff from village schools, health service, Police, local small businesses, youth providers, young parents.
• Touch screen kiosk in the Village Hall on the day of the 2012 Keyworth Show, and then at Keyworth Health Centre until 31st August.
• Display at 2012 Keyworth Show.

• Questionnaire for residents available on website and from Council office from 30th April until 31st August 2012.

• Map also on display at the Council office; comments forms available on website and at office from 27th May until 31st August 2012.
• Focus on Neighbourhood Plan at Annual Parish meeting (advertised in Keyworth News and on separate flyers) on 29th April 2013.
• Town planning graduate engaged to collate and analyse feedback; results presented to steering group 30th January.
• Prospective developers invited to submit their ideas for the potential sites by 1st Mar 2013, presented in accordance with strict criteria so as to ensure 'level playing field'. Subsequent face to face discussions with prospective developers.
• Information and advice sought from the main statutory bodies (County Council Highways, Natural England, Seven Trent Water, neighbouring parishes) on potential sites.
• Prospective developers invited to submit displays outlining their ideas, to be on show at the Annual Parish meeting on 28th April 2014; Residents attending the meeting (advertised in Keyworth News and on separate flyers) invited to submit comments.
• Displays subsequently on show at the Village Hall with display documents on the website; residents invited to submit comments prior to 16th May 2014.
• See homepage for news of recent developments.