On 16 March 2026, Harborough District Council voted by just 17 to 15 to submit its Local Plan to the Planning Inspectorate for independent examination.
The Inspectorate is not a rubber stamp. Its job is to test whether the plan is legally sound - against four strict national criteria. If it fails those tests, the Inspector can require fundamental changes or find the plan unsound entirely.
We believe this plan fails on all four counts. And we have the evidence to prove it.
The National Planning Policy Framework requires every Local Plan to be positively prepared, justified, effective, and consistent with national policy. Here is how the Harborough plan fares on each.
Is it positively prepared? The Council has added 1,657 homes above its objectively assessed housing need - a 16% buffer it is not required to apply, because it has consistently exceeded its delivery targets by 150%.
This unnecessary surplus is the sole justification for allocating the Gartree Road site. Remove the unjustified buffer and the case for the development largely collapses.
Is it justified? The entire spatial strategy rests on the 2018 Leicester and Leicestershire Strategic Growth Plan, which was built around the A46 Expressway. That road was cancelled by Midlands Connect in 2020. The plan has never been updated to reflect this.
The strategic foundation is obsolete. Furthermore, a detailed alternative spatial strategy proposed by the Willoughby Waterleys Residents' Association - focusing on west Leicester with direct M1/M69 access - was submitted over six years ago and has never been formally assessed. That is a direct breach of NPPF requirements.
Is it effective? The Council's own viability consultant classifies the Gartree Road site as "marginally viable." Independent analysis identifies billions in additional costs not included in that assessment - the Building Safety Levy, increased service connection charges, and transport infrastructure costs that have not yet been identified, quantified or costed.
The Local Transport Authority has stated in writing that the plan fails the NPPF soundness tests on transport. Roads, schools, GP services, and flood defences all remain unfunded and unplanned.
Is it consistent with national policy? The site contains and adjoins the Stretton Magna Scheduled Monument, the Grade II* listed Church of St Giles, and the Grade II* listed Stretton Hall. The Heritage Impact Assessment required before allocation remains incomplete. Significant portions of the site fall within Flood Zones 2 and 3 - and Great Glen flooded severely in January 2025. There is no credible, funded flood mitigation strategy anywhere in the Infrastructure Delivery Plan.
Those are not STNT's words. They are the words of Leicestershire County Council's own Head of Planning, used to describe the Harborough Local Plan at a formal Cabinet meeting in March 2025 - on the record, in public.
The Local Transport Authority has said the same thing in writing. This plan has serious, documented weaknesses. The Inspector will see them. Our job is to make sure they are heard.
The Planning Inspectorate examination is a formal, quasi-judicial process. Harborough District Council will arrive with professional planning barristers. The site promoters and developers will do the same. To give you a sense of the scale involved hiring a barrister to attend a 3 hour meeting can cost between £5000 and £10000.
A full examination runs to weeks of preparation and multiple hearing days.
To match that level of representation, STNT needs to fund:
— A specialist planning barrister to lead our case at the live hearings
— An independent transport and highways expert report
— An independent viability expert report
— An independent flood risk expert report
— A heritage expert report, given the Scheduled Monument and listed buildings within the SDA boundary
— A planning consultant to manage and coordinate the case
- to instruct the barrister and begin preparation.
-to fund the complete legal team through the hearings.
All contributions go to the legal fund and essential campaign costs. STNT is entirely volunteer-run with no paid staff.
Here is what each donation level funds:
Legal case preparation and research
Contribution towards legal preparation and expert witness research
A significant contribution towards an expert witness report
Around a quarter of a complete expert witness report (each report costs £4,000–£5,000)
A complete expert witness report — transport, viability, flooding, or heritage — in its entirety
A significant contribution towards planning barrister costs.
Two complete expert witness reports plus a significant contribution to barrister costs
This sustained support as a monthly subscription. As a Friend of STNT you will receive additional brief update from our Chairman on how the situation is progressing.
Prefer to give by bank transfer? Or have an idea for a fundraising event? Contact us here.
Or you can donate via our GoFundMe page.
We have spent over a year building this case. We have studied the Council's own documents, the transport evidence, the viability reports, and the heritage assessments.
The weaknesses in this plan are real, they are documented, and they are serious.
What we are asking for now is simple: the resources to put that case in front of the Inspector professionally.
Without a barrister, without expert reports and without planning professionals, we walk into the most important stage of this fight at a fundamental disadvantage.
With them, we have a genuine chance of stopping this plan - or forcing changes so significant that the development becomes unrecognisable from what is currently proposed.
This is the moment. The hearings will not wait for us to be ready.
If you are able to support us - at whatever level - please do so now.
And if you know anyone else who cares about this, please share this page with them.
Thank you for everything you have done, and for what you are about to do.
Dr Henri Winand
Chair, StopTheNewTown.org
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