Our town planning engagement teams cover the south west, south east, Midlands, London and the north of England. We work on behalf of developers to encourage local authorities to allocate strategic land in local plans. We prepare a strategy with the politics in mind. With every local councillor having the final say on their local plan, it is critical that we tell a positive story about how a land allocation will support sustainable communities, economic regeneration and help to tackle the climate change emergency. We view proposals with the widest possible lens to understand the bigger picture for infrastructure, site constraints (including green belt) and the history of the site.
We live and breathe local government. Our colleagues have extensive local authority experience either as council officers, politically appointed public servants or councillors – including service on the Local Government Association. This knowledge of the system gives our developer clients a distinct advantage in to unlock their project ambitions.
We ensure that we are informed and up-to-date on the latest changes to planning guidance and legislation. Our commitment to furthering our planning knowledge includes employing communications specialists with town planning qualifications and hands-on planning experience. This approach provides us with a complete picture of the task in hand and ensures our work dovetails with the planning strategy.
Information about stakeholders, press cuttings, hard to reach groups and social media is useless unless it can turn into intelligence to support the success of the project. Unlike some consultancies, we do not just monitor and click ‘send’ – we interpret and spell out the practical implications for the project.
There are many ways to engage with your audience, so choosing the right channel is key.
From traditional printed materials to digital methods through social media advertising and websites, we can deliver the right message about your project, to encourage feedback from the community.
We work ‘hand in glove’ with all members of the project team, including planning and transport consultants, ecologist, architect, and solicitors, to secure planning permission from your local council. Planning is political – and our strategy will always seek to engage with the local communities who influence the views of their local councillors, and then communicate with the decision-makers to secure a majority of votes on the planning committee to approve your application.
We develop a stakeholder engagement plan and will cover the arrangement, agenda, presentation content, FAQs, reporting and actions points for those meetings. We provide every possible means of support for project team members to understand what makes the audience tick.
Whether using digital or face-to-face, we plan and organise events to meet with local communities and your stakeholders. Our analysis of feedback helps you shape your proposal and provides the foundation for the Statement of Community Involvement.
Because of our knowledge and experience of local government we can perform tasks with great efficiency. We pass this efficiency onto our customer in the form of highly competitive commercial rates and always consider different charging structures to incentivise our relationship with you, such as success fees, to reduce client exposure to financial risk.
We are passionate about the homes industry and selling homes. Our support includes being the PR provider for the launch of the internationally renowned Bristol Housing Festival. Our colleagues contribute articles to housing publications, such as The Planner and our subscription with Dods Parliamentary Monitoring provides us with insight into the homes and community agenda in Westminster.
Digital engagement is now the norm. Our website design studio is imaginative, creative and involve themselves at the start of a project to make sure that the digital presence reflects the ambition of your PR and marketing. Examples include our work for Sharpness Natural Neighbours
Our Westminster-based public affairs team create briefings about the latest issues that face the property market and analyse the impact of major government announcements on the housing market, for example the budget. We also report on key election results. These are free of charge for all clients.
Conversations, exchanging views and networking. Our thought leadership events programme brings together the political decision-makers, like Secretaries of State and Council Leaders, of the planning policy process with the key players in the property market from developers to planning consultants. We limit numbers to our events to guarantee the opportunity to ask questions and express opinions.
