ET Planning

We work in partnership with architects, property owners, developers, and private investors to provide expert advice and strategy to realise your vision for development through the complete planning process.

With a passion for serving independent land owners and businesses, the company was founded by Emily Temple in 2017 following 12 years of experience in the public and private sector; at Test Valley and Wokingham Borough Councils, and a national multi-disciplinary consultancy.

Our friendly and approachable team includes fully qualified chartered planners with a combined professional experience of over 75 years, and who have previously worked for a large number of Local Planning Authorities including Wokingham, Bracknell, London Borough of Ealing, Hertsmere, Wycombe, South Buckinghamshire, Chiltern, Test Valley, Hart, Chichester, Portsmouth and Shropshire, as well as various Private Consultancies. We offer a personalised service to help you navigate through the complex planning system, and can support you with strategic planning advice, site appraisals, planning applications, planning appeals and, when you’re in trouble, resolve enforcement disputes. We negotiate with Local Planning Authorities on your behalf as your planning agent and find solutions that result in successful outcomes.

We can prepare and co-ordinate the submission of planning applications and can act as planning agent when negotiating with the Local Planning Authority. Making particular use of the experience of our staff who have previously worked in Local Authority, we can guide you through the whole process for developments of all scales, from house extensions to hundreds of new dwellings. This service also encompasses Certificate of Lawfulness and Prior Approval submissions where relevant to your particular development proposal.

The Community Infrastructure Levy (CIL) Regulations are extremely complicated, and very rigid in the way they’re applied. Local Authorities don’t always get things right, and any mistake can cost anything from a thousand, to tens or hundreds of thousands in CIL Levy charges. That, is understandably very stressful and causes liable parties a lot of worry. Understanding how the Council has gone wrong, and particularly how and when to challenge them can be critical in saving you from unreasonable or inappropriate charges.

Here at ET Planning we’ve got experience successfully submitting Regulation 114 CIL Appeals to challenge the chargeable amounts in Liability Notices, as well as successfully reducing Demand Notice Surcharges at Regulation 117 Appeals. We can also provide advice on how to mitigate excessive charges, or provide strategies to minimise the amount of CIL you pay. If you get us involved early enough in the process, we can also provide advice on the best strategy going into the beginning of the planning process, to properly keep the CIL charges to the appropriate minimums – and explain what legitimate processes exist that can help avoid CIL Liabilities all together.

We help navigate house builders, developers, institutions and private individuals through the often complex land promotion process, providing tailored advice depending on your prior experience of the plan making system. For those individuals less familiar with the process, developing large sites (referred to as Major or Strategic sites by planners), for either residential or employment uses normally requires the land to be allocated for that purpose in the Development Plan (or Local Plan). Normally, the increase in value of the land is substantial, and can be life changing for the land owner and their family.

The Land Promotion process, by which an area of land is allocated as a proposal site in those plans, can take years of complex preparation, promotions, and representation through the various stages of consultation and public examination.

At ET Planning, we have the in house experience and expertise to help guide and steer you through this process. We have research and intelligence led Land Promotion expertise, and have key contacts within Local Authorities throughout the South East, London and the Midlands. We will advise you on an engagement strategy with key Members, who will having influence over the plan making process.

If you are a private individual wishing to promote a site – we can either take you the full way through the process, or provide you with a developer introduction from our extensive list of contacts.

We can also provide an Estate Development Strategy, to deliver a series of smaller developments over a short timeframe to help release cash profits out of the land asset early, to assist with the funding of the land promotion program.