What is the South East Plan?
The South East Plan is the region's new Regional Spatial Strategy.
Prepared by the South East England Regional Assembly (SEERA), it will set out a long-term strategy for future development and show how we should meet growing demands for homes, jobs and transport while protecting the environment, ensuring the region continues to be an attractive place to live, visit and work.
Content of the plan
Although attention tends to focus on future levels of new development, the South East Plan is about a lot more than just housing numbers. It will also create a basis for:
- the development of the economy, transport and communications
- conserving natural resources
- managing changes in the countryside.
As a new Regional Spatial Strategy, the South East Plan should also link with other key areas like health and education and be well integrated with other important regional plans (such as the Regional Economic Strategy and the Regional Housing Strategy).
The South East Plan is a set of documents. Along with the core document containing the regional policies and sub-regional strategies, it includes an implementation plan and a monitoring framework.
The implementation plan shows how the policies and proposals in the South East Plan will be delivered and who by. The monitoring framework sets out how SEERA proposes to monitor the Plan's progress and whether it is achieving its objectives.
Background
The areas covered by the plan are the county and unitary council areas in Berkshire, Buckinghamshire, East Sussex, Hampshire, Isle of Wight, Kent, Oxfordshire, Surrey and West Sussex. View a map of the region.
SEERA submitted the draft plan to government on 31 March 2006. It presents key proposals for how the region should develop over the next 20 years, aiming to balance economic, social and environmental needs to help deliver communities that are sustainable. It includes core regional policies and more detailed sub-regional strategies where a distinct approach is needed to tackle key issues that cross local authority boundaries.
Under the planning system, the more detailed local plans that councils must prepare for development in their own areas will have to conform to the final version of the South East Plan. Once the final version of the South East Plan has been published by government in spring 2008, it will have major implications for the future quality of life in East Sussex.
Further information
Further detailed information is available on the SEERA website – South East Plan pages.
Details of each stage of the process are available on our Current position and timetable page.
