Gateway 1: publication of self-assessment summary
Introduction
The Gateway 1 self-assessment has been prepared in accordance with the requirements of the Town and Country Planning (Local Planning) (England) Regulations 2026 and the Local Plan guidance (Gateway 1 for local plan: what you need to do).
Gateway 1 is the first of 3 mandatory gateways that support the preparation of a plan within 30 months. It is intended to help increase the transparency of the preparation of the new Waverley Local Plan for our stakeholders and local communities.
Gateway 1 involves self-assessing the council’s progress and readiness to start the 30-month plan preparation process and publishing a summary of this self-assessment. The publication of this self-assessment formally marks start of the 30-month period.
Some areas of plan-making, including the development of the vision, spatial options and monitoring framework, will evolve as the evidence gathering and community engagement progresses. For this reason, a few of the elements of the assessment are recorded as amber.
How we got ready to prepare a new Local Plan
The formal preparation on a new Local Plan for the Waverley borough area started on 23 October 2026. This follows a four-month notification period that commenced with publication of our formal Notice of Intention to commence Local Plan preparation and Local Plan timetable on 11 June 2026. The Scoping Consultation was then carried out between 15 June and 27 July 2026.
The start of the 30-month plan preparation period officially commences on the date that our Gateway 1 self-assessment is published (23 October 2026). Government policy says we should adopt the new plan within 30 months of this date. This is to help ensure we have an up-to-date Local Plan that responds to the needs of the area and our communities.
This page explains what we have done to get ready to meet the 30-month timeframe. It also has links to further information and where you can get updates.
Notice of Intention
We published a timetable for preparing the Plan
The Local Plan timetable for preparing the Waverley Local Plan was published on 11 June 2026. The timetable includes the steps that we must undertake to prepare the Waverley Local Plan and shows how we intend to work towards adopting the new Local Plan within the Government’s 30-month timeframe. It gives residents, businesses, infrastructure providers and other stakeholders a clear overview of the process and when they will be able to get involved.
The timetable includes the key stages where local communities and stakeholders will be invited to comment, including the Proposed Plan Contents and Evidence and the Proposed Plan consultation stages. These formal consultation stages enable everyone to comment on the policy directions, site allocations, the supporting evidence and the overall approach to growth and development across Waverley.
To ensure we deliver our plan within 30 months, we:
- have utilised the feedback and responses we received through the stakeholder visioning workshops held in June 2025 and the Issues and Options consultation that took place between October and December 2025.
- have progressed the evidence base to understand the issues facing the borough.
- will promote the use of digital technology to encourage wider engagement and help us analyse the responses from consultations.
We are confident we will be able to adopt our plan within 30 months. However, we are aware that parts of programme may need to respond to national policy changes, new evidence and engagement feedback. Furthermore, Local Government Reorganisation within Surrey may impact upon the progress of the Local Plan. The timetable will therefore be kept under review and updated if necessary to reflect any changes.
Local Plan timetable
Stakeholder Visioning Workshops
Waverley Local Plan Issues and Options response summary
We established project management and governance arrangements
Preparing a Local Plan involves many people across the Council and from other organisations. Thinking early about how the work is planned, managed and signed off helps us monitor our progress and keep the work on track. It also helps us anticipate and manage any risks to the Local Plan timetable.
We have developed a project plan to help us prepare the plan in accordance with our Local Plan timetable and will meet with key decision makers to monitor progress. A Project Initiation Document (PID) has been prepared and sets out the management framework and approach for delivering the Waverley Local Plan. It provides:
- a summary of the Local Plan scope
- a summary timeline for preparing the Local Plan
- a summary of the Governance arrangements
- details of staff resource and management
- details on the key evidence that will be used to inform the Local Plan
- the approach to stakeholder engagement
- a budget overview and cost estimates for the Local Plan’s production
- the key risks and mitigation.
The preparation of the Local Plan will be undertaken in accordance with the Council’s constitution. Accordingly, operational or procedural milestones such as timetable updates and gateway submissions are delegated to the Director of Planning while progress on the Local Plan is reported to the Local Plan Executive Working Group for information, and advice or direction depending on the matter being reported. These meetings are held approximately every 6 weeks or more frequently if appropriate. The publication of the timetable, notice of intention and the scoping consultation document was approved by the Executive on 2 June 2026. However, Local Plan documents where policies and allocations are proposed for public consultation requires the decision of Full Council decision.
Local Government Reorganisation will mean that Waverley Borough Council will cease to exist from 1 April 2027 (Vesting Day). From this point the new unitary authority of West Surrey will take responsibility for the Local Plan as the local planning authority. The governance arrangements for West Surrey have not yet been established.
We planned how we’ll consult on the Plan
Public consultation is essential for the Local Plan to represent the needs of our communities. It needs to be accessible to allow people to have their say so they can influence the way the area develops. By planning this early, we can ensure people are aware in advance and can get involved from the start.
We have undertaken a Scoping Consultation where we invited feedback from communities and stakeholders on what the Local Plan should contain and on the content of the Draft Engagement Strategy. The Draft Engagement Strategy set out potential approaches to how we will engage and consult on the plan at key stages.
The feedback received through our Scoping Consultation highlighted that a range of communication and engagement approaches are required to meet the needs of different groups, including:
- a mix of digital engagement and in-person events
- varied event times including evening and weekends to increase involvement
- using existing groups as routes to engage people
- early engagement with statutory and infrastructure bodies
- materials that are accessible, clear and concise
- demonstrating how feedback has influenced the Local Plan.
The feedback received also recognised that some voices are less often heard in planning consultations. We will therefore seek to engage underrepresented groups such as young people, future households and ethnic minority communities. This may include working with schools, colleges, community groups, housing providers, and other local partners.
We have drawn on the principles of the Statement of Community Involvement, which was adopted in July 2024, and the feedback we received during the Scoping Consultation to prepare the Engagement Strategy. It sets out how we will seek to consult, communicate and involve stakeholders and communities during the preparation of the Local Plan. The Engagement Strategy will be reviewed as the plan progresses and may need to be updated once the new unitary authority of West Surrey is established on 1 April 2027.
We began scoping the content of the Plan
Scoping includes considering how well the existing plan is working and gathering baseline information about the area. This helps to identify our future needs and ambitions. Starting this early means we can begin preparing the new plan with a clear vision, which makes it quicker and easier to consult on the plan and make decisions about it.
We consulted on what the Local Plan should contain through engagement work which included stakeholder visioning workshops held in June 2025 and an Issues and Options consultation held between October and December 2025. The feedback received through this engagement helped identify the key issues and priorities facing the Borough and informed the preparation of the Scoping Consultation, which took place between 15 June and 27 July 2026.
We are processing and analysing all comments received in response to the Scoping Consultation. These responses will inform plan preparation as we move towards our Proposed Local Plan Content consultation. A summary of the responses received will be published prior to the Proposed Plan Contents and Evidence Consultation.
Following the stakeholder visioning workshops, we consulted on a draft Vision as part of the Issues and Options consultation. We have considered how to monitor progress towards our Vision and are seeking to identify measurable outcomes. The vision will continue to evolve as evidence gathering and engagement progresses.
To support the preparation of the Local Plan we have commenced key evidence studies, including:
- Land Availability Assessment
- Housing and Economic Development Needs Assessment
- Traveller Accommodation Assessment
- Green Belt Assessment and Landscape Review
- Water Cycle Study
- Strategic Flood Risk Assessment.
We have started to understand the development requirements for our area and have begun to consider where new developments could be located. Work will continue towards developing high-level spatial options and locally specific policy approaches, which will informed by the evidence base and ongoing engagement.
We are undertaking a Call for Sites, which will run between 26 August and 7 October 2026, to give landowners, developers and site promoters an opportunity to submit sites that may have future development potential. Previous Call for Sites ran in both 2024 and 2025.
We began a Strategic Environmental Assessment
We’re legally required to identify, describe and evaluate likely significant effects on the environment of:
- implementing the Local Plan
- reasonable alternatives, taking into account the plan’s objectives and scope.
This process will consider how community, national and international environmental protection objectives and any other environmental challenges are taken into account in the plan. It will help us to predict significant environmental effects and develop ways of preventing, reducing and offsetting these.
It is important we start this work early and are transparent about how we’re doing the assessment when engaging stakeholders and communities.
A Sustainability Appraisal incorporating Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA) Scoping Report has been undertaken. This report identifies current conditions and likely future trends of the borough. This information leads to a number of objectives which create a framework that will be used to test the policies and site options in the Local Plan as it emerges.
How to stay up to date
The latest information and updates regarding the new Waverley Local Plan can be found at: New Local Plan.
To register for consultations or be notified of the plan-making stages, please access our online system at: Register for consultations. If you wish to be notified for specific stages, but not all stages of the plan-making process, please make this clear when you register and email planningpolicy@waverley.gov.uk.
Readiness Checker for Gateway 1