Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:

To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, what assessment he has made of the effect on the garden community proposals for North Essex of the letter from Planning Inspector, Mr Roger Clews, dated 8 June 2018 addressed to Braintree District Council, Colchester Borough Council and Tendring District Council on the examination in public of the respective Councils' Local Plan proposals.

We welcome the planning inspector’s report on section 1 of joint local plan submitted by Colchester Borough and Tendring and Braintree District Councils for examination in public earlier this year. The proposals to create three new garden communities with new homes for up to 43,000 homes in North Essex are, by their nature, ambitious and long-term. The Planning Inspectorate has an important role to play in assessing those proposals and identifying areas that need further consideration. The inspector’s letter of 8 June 2018 sets out a number of such areas. It will be for the local authorities to decide on how to proceed.