From 31 October, objections and councillor requests stop sending Fareham planning applications to committee. Home extensions can never go there now.

From Friday 31 October, five objections will no longer send a Fareham planning application to the council’s Planning Committee. Nor will a councillor’s request. A new national scheme decides which applications councillors can hear, and the council is changing its rules on Thursday to match.

The change is in a report to full council on 22 October by the council’s Director of Planning and Regeneration. The council has no choice about the substance. The report says the national scheme becomes “mandatory from 31 October 2026” under regulations made this year.

What happens now

About 95% of Fareham’s planning applications are already decided by officers, the report says. The rest go to the Planning Committee, in public, in one of three ways:

  • a councillor asks for it before the 21-day neighbour consultation ends
  • the applicant is a councillor or council officer, or a close relative of one
  • five or more households object on planning grounds, against what the Head of Planning intends to decide

What changes on 31 October

The first and third routes end. The report says:

“Member call-in requests and representation thresholds will no longer determine whether an application is considered by Planning Committee.”

Applications are split into two groups.

Schedule 1 must be decided by officers. These can never go to committee, unless they are a council, councillor or staff application. They include:

  • householder applications, such as extensions, loft conversions and garages
  • minor housing schemes and minor commercial schemes
  • reserved matters on outline permissions, except schemes of 500 homes or more
  • discharge of conditions and prior approvals
  • certificates of lawfulness

Schedule 2 is decided by officers by default. This covers larger schemes, listed building consent, adverts, protected trees and retrospective applications. One of these can go to committee only if two people agree: the Head of Planning and the chair of the Planning Committee. They must find that it raises an economic, social or environmental issue “of significance to the local area”, or a significant planning matter.

The report lists what does not, on its own, justify sending an application to committee:

  • the number of representations received
  • the level of public support or objection
  • requests from individual councillors
  • political or media interest

How many applications this touches

The council decided about 1,100 applications in the 2025/26 financial year. The report says 35% to 40% of them would have fallen into Schedule 2, roughly 385 to 440. It expects “only a small proportion” of those to get as far as the two-person review.

Before 31 October From 31 October
Five or more objections Goes to committee Does not count, on its own
A councillor asks Goes to committee Does not count, on its own
Householder extension Can go to committee Officers must decide
Larger scheme of local significance Committee if called in Committee if the Head of Planning and the chair both agree
Councillor or staff application Goes to committee Reviewed, and likely to go to committee

Fareham’s own extra step

The national rules do not say how a council should spot the cases that might matter. Fareham will add a triage step. The case officer and a team leader check each Schedule 2 application against the significance tests. If one might apply, it goes to a “Gateway Review Meeting” between the Head of Planning and the committee chair.

The report says a written record of each review, and its reasons, will go on the application file. A summary of the decisions will go to the Planning Committee every quarter and be published on the council’s website.

The Audit and Governance Committee endorsed the changes on 8 September. The Planning Committee saw the report on 7 October and passed no further comments to full council.

What it means for you

  • Objecting still counts. Officers still take planning objections into account when they decide. What changes is that the number of objections no longer moves the decision into a public committee.
  • If you want a councillor involved, a call-in request no longer works after 31 October. Your ward councillor can still raise your points with the case officer.
  • If you are planning an extension, it will be decided by an officer, as almost all already are.
  • To follow an application, search the council’s planning case tracker. Our Fareham planning news page covers the bigger schemes.
  • The council vote is on Thursday 22 October, at the full council meeting from 6pm at the Civic Offices.

Sources