Housing Land Supply Position Statement

Five Year Housing Land Supply Statement

Section 1 of the Colchester Local Plan 2017–2033 was adopted on 1 February 2021. Section 2 was adopted in July 2022.

The complete Local Plan now carries full statutory weight as the Development Plan.

Housing requirements

Section 1 includes the strategic policies for housing, employment, infrastructure, place shaping, and the allocation of a Garden Community.

Policy SP4 sets the annual housing requirement for Colchester at 920 homes.
This results in a minimum requirement of 18,400 new homes across the plan period to 2033.

The Tendring Colchester Borders Garden Community is allocated in Section 1.
All other site allocations are made in Section 2. Within Section 2, we have allocated enough sites to meet the housing requirements set out in Section 1. All allocated sites are considered deliverable and developable.

Why we are not publishing a 2024 statement

Under paragraph 76 of the National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF), local authorities do not need to update their five-year housing land supply annually if:

the adopted Local Plan is less than five years old, and
the Local Plan identified at least a five-year supply of specific deliverable sites at the point of examination.

Because both conditions apply in Colchester, we will not be publishing a Housing Land Supply Position Statement for 2024.

Previous Five Year Housing Land Supply Statements

The information is correct in respect of the time period it covers, but due to the nature of housing supply and delivery it is considered to be a ‘live document’.

This means that it is subject to change as and when new information is received which changes the housing supply and/or housing delivery position.