Neighbourhood plans: when they outrank the local plan

A made neighbourhood plan is part of the development plan, with the same statutory status as the local plan. So the question of neighbourhood plan weight in planning is not whether it counts. It counts fully. The question is what happens where its policies conflict with an adopted local plan, and the answer sits in section 38(5) of the Planning and Compulsory Purchase Act 2004: the conflict is resolved in favour of the policy in the plan that was adopted, approved or made most recently.

How a made neighbourhood plan enters the development plan

The Localism Act 2011 created neighbourhood planning, and the procedure sits in Schedule 4B to the Town and Country Planning Act 1990. A qualifying body, normally a parish or town council or a designated neighbourhood forum, prepares a plan for a designated area. The plan goes to independent examination, then to a referendum of the electorate in that area, and the local planning authority makes it if the referendum passes.

Once made, section 38(3) of the 2004 Act brings it into the development plan for the area. Section 38(6) then requires applications to be determined in accordance with the development plan unless material considerations indicate otherwise, and the neighbourhood plan is now part of what that means.

That status catches out agents who treat a neighbourhood plan as a consultation document or a supplementary planning document. A local design guide adopted as an SPD carries weight as a material consideration but does not sit in the development plan, which is a meaningfully different thing from a policy in a made neighbourhood plan, and the difference shows up in how householder design guide SPDs are argued against by comparison.

Section 38(5) and resolving conflict between plans

Where two development plan documents conflict, section 38(5) resolves it in favour of the one adopted, approved or published most recently. Recency, not hierarchy.

So a neighbourhood plan made in 2024 prevails over a conflicting policy in a local plan adopted in 2018. And a local plan adopted in 2026 prevails over a conflicting policy in a neighbourhood plan made in 2021. Parish councils are often surprised by the second half of that, and applicants are often surprised by the first.

Two cautions before relying on it.

The provision only operates where there is a genuine conflict between policies. Most apparent conflicts are not conflicts at all: a neighbourhood plan policy adding local design detail sits alongside a local plan policy on design rather than against it, and both apply. Officers reach for section 38(5) far less often than agents cite it.

And plan-making reform under the Levelling-up and Regeneration Act 2023 changes parts of this framework, including the relationship between national development management policies and the development plan. Check whether the relevant provisions are in force at the point you are writing, because the position has been moving.

The basic conditions that limit what a plan can do

A neighbourhood plan has to meet the basic conditions in Schedule 4B before it can proceed to referendum. The examiner tests them, and they define the outer limits of what any neighbourhood plan can lawfully contain.

The plan must have regard to national policy and advice, contribute to the achievement of sustainable development, and be in general conformity with the strategic policies of the development plan for the area.

That third condition is the one that matters most in practice. A neighbourhood plan cannot allocate less housing than the strategic policies require, cannot draw a settlement boundary that frustrates a strategic allocation, and cannot set a policy that undermines the local plan's spatial strategy. Plans that try are modified at examination.

What a neighbourhood plan can do is shape how development happens: allocate additional sites, set design codes and materials palettes, designate Local Green Space, protect community facilities, set local parking or space standards where they are consistent with strategic policy, and identify important views.

The policies that bite in practice

Four types of neighbourhood plan policy come up repeatedly in decisions.

Design codes and character policies. These are the most useful and the most enforceable, because they are specific: eaves heights, roof pitches, boundary treatments, plot widths, window proportions. An officer can apply them without judgement, which makes them harder to argue away than a general local plan design policy.

Local Green Space designation. This is a strong protection, because national policy treats designated Local Green Space in a way consistent with Green Belt protection. The designation has to meet the tests, meaning the space is in reasonably close proximity to the community, demonstrably special to it, and local in character rather than an extensive tract of land. Where it has been properly designated, it is very difficult to build on.

Settlement boundaries and infill policies. These are the ones most likely to be tested, because they interact with housing land supply arguments.

Housing mix and local occupancy policies. Small site allocations, requirements for a proportion of smaller homes, and in some rural areas principal residence policies, which have survived examination in several coastal and National Park areas.

Illustrative example

An illustrative case: a plan made in 2023 designating a paddock as Local Green Space and setting a design policy requiring natural slate on all new dwellings within the village envelope. An application for four houses on the paddock is refused, and the Local Green Space designation is the reason that holds. A separate application on an allocated site proposes a concrete interlocking tile. The applicant argues that the local plan, adopted in 2019, requires only that materials respect local character. There is no conflict to resolve under section 38(5), because the neighbourhood plan policy adds detail rather than contradicting anything, so both apply and the slate requirement stands.

Checking whether a plan is made, emerging or ageing

Before writing a word of policy analysis, establish the plan's status and date.

1. Check the council's neighbourhood planning pages for the designated area, the plan's stage and the date it was made.
2. Check the national planning data platform, which publishes neighbourhood plan areas and boundaries as open data, and confirm your site actually falls inside the area.
3. Download the made version, not the submission or referendum version, and check for any modifications made at examination.
4. Check whether a review or replacement plan is in preparation, because an emerging replacement changes the weight argument.
5. Check the date of the most recently adopted local plan, since that is what section 38(5) compares against.

Weight for an emerging plan follows the usual three considerations: the stage the plan has reached, the extent of unresolved objections to the relevant policies, and the degree of consistency with national policy. A plan that has passed examination and awaits referendum carries considerable weight. One at pre-submission consultation carries little.

Made plans do not expire. Their weight can reduce as they age, particularly where the evidence base behind a policy has been overtaken, but there is no automatic lapse and a policy in an eight-year-old made plan remains part of the development plan until it is replaced.

National policy also contains a provision protecting areas with a recently made neighbourhood plan from the tilted balance in certain housing land supply circumstances, subject to conditions about the age of the plan, its housing provision and the authority's supply and delivery record. Those conditions have been reworded between editions of the Framework, so take the current test from the current edition rather than from an older appeal decision.

Writing a policy compliance section that covers both plans

The structure that works in a planning statement is a single policy table with a column for each plan, followed by narrative on the two or three policies that are actually in issue.

List the local plan policies and the neighbourhood plan policies side by side against each topic: principle of development, design, heritage, amenity, transport, drainage, ecology. Say against each whether the proposal complies, and where it does not, say so and make the case under section 38(6) that material considerations outweigh the conflict.

Do not fudge a conflict. Officers read neighbourhood plans closely, because parish councils write to them about it, and a statement that quietly omits the one policy the scheme breaches loses credibility for everything else in it.

Where a genuine conflict between the two plans exists, set out the dates, apply section 38(5) explicitly, and say which policy therefore prevails. Where there is no conflict and both apply, say that too, because it prevents an objector claiming that the neighbourhood plan has been ignored.

Two practical points. Neighbourhood plan conflicts frequently push an application to committee, since parish objections are a common trigger, so understanding how committee and delegated decisions divide up in that authority affects your timetable. And where a neighbourhood plan sets local requirements for evidence, such as a design statement or a landscape appraisal for sites on the settlement edge, scope that work against the full list of report types before submission rather than after the parish response arrives.

This is general guidance, not legal advice; check the position with your local planning authority or a qualified professional before relying on it.

Enter your postcode on PlanScope to see which reports your site is likely to need before you write the policy section.

PlanScope provides AI-assisted draft reports for planning applications. Reports should be reviewed before submission. We do not guarantee planning approval.