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Stratford-on-Avon District Council’s councillors meet as Full Council today, Monday 12 October, at 4pm in the Council Chamber at Elizabeth House, Church Street. The biggest item for residents is a change in who decides planning applications: from 31 October, new national rules mean most applications will be decided by council officers rather than the Planning Committee. Here’s what’s on the agenda, in plain English.
On this page
The council’s listing notes a change to the meeting’s start time, so check the agenda page before you go.
Fewer planning applications will go to committee
New government regulations take effect on Saturday 31 October. They split planning applications into two groups. Schedule 1 applications will be decided by officers. Schedule 2 applications can still go to the Planning Committee, but only if they pass a “Gateway Test” and the committee chair and the council’s Head of Development agree. Councillors are asked to change the council’s constitution to match.
To show the effect, officers looked at the year from March 2025 to March 2026. The Planning Committee decided about 64 applications in that year, and 53 of them would have been Schedule 1 under the new rules, so they would never have reached the committee. In the same year the committee went against its officers’ advice ten times, and nine of those were applications officers had recommended refusing that councillors approved (Audit and Standards Committee report).
State of the District
Council Leader Cllr Susan Juned presents the annual State of the District report, which is debated and then used in setting the 2027/28 budget. Its headline figure is an estimated district population of 148,800 in mid-2025. That’s up 1.8% in a year, which puts the district among the fastest-growing 10% in England and Wales. Over the ten years from 2015 to 2025 the population grew by 21.1%, the fourth-highest rate of any council area.
Two motions: reorganisation costs and sewage spills
- Who pays for reorganisation? The government has paused local government reorganisation in Warwickshire. A motion from Cllr Pemberton, seconded by Cllr Parker, asks officers to work out what the council has spent preparing for it. It also asks the Leader to write to the Secretary of State and local MPs, asking the government to pay those costs back.
- Sewage and new housing: a motion from Cllr Hatch, seconded by Cllr Shenton, cites more than 60 sewage spills in Shipston-on-Stour since building started on the Campden Road estates in 2020. It says they have affected 17 gardens, two homes and a children’s play area. It asks the council to have planning officers consult Severn Trent on every major application that could affect the foul water system, and to seek Severn Trent’s explicit confirmation that there is enough capacity (full text of both motions).
Everything else on the agenda
- A bigger Overview and Scrutiny Committee, with a recalculated political balance.
- The revised Local Development Scheme, the timetable for the district’s planning policy documents, and a new policy on charging for environmental information requests. Both were referred by the Cabinet on 5 October.
- A community governance review for Welford-on-Avon, the 2027–28 calendar of meetings, a new climate change panel remit and an updated local code of governance.
- For noting: an urgent Cabinet decision on 7 September about The Three Tuns in High Street, Alcester. It was taken ahead of a possible auction on 10 September.
- An update on the April motion supporting a safe cycle route from Stratford-upon-Avon to Shipston-on-Stour, which has gone to the Cabinet.
- Councillors’ questions, including up to 30 minutes of questions to the Leader.
How to follow it
Council meetings are open to the public. Questions from the public needed notice in advance under the council’s rules. The council posts recordings of its meetings on its YouTube channel, usually the next day. We’ll report what was decided. For more council stories, see our council news page.
Alex Harrington
Alex Harrington grew up in Stratford-upon-Avon and runs What's up, Stratford? as an independent guide to the town.
