Moulton Neighbourhood Plan: Community Engagement Evaluation Report

This report provides an in-depth evaluation of the Moulton Neighbourhood Development Plan, focusing on the community profile, methods of community engagement, and the evaluation of these engagement strategies. The report details the community profile of Moulton, a village in Northamptonshire, including its demographics, facilities, and community spirit. It then explores the methods of community engagement employed, such as resident surveys, business surveys, and public meetings, highlighting the benefits and drawbacks of each approach. The report also addresses barriers to community engagement, including language and cultural issues, structural issues, and trust issues. Finally, the report evaluates the effectiveness of the engagement strategies, considering the plan's benefits and the need for additional capacity to ensure its successful completion. The analysis draws upon various sources to assess the plan's impact and offer insights into community involvement.

COMMUNITY EVALUATION
REPORT

TABLE OF CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................1
MAIN BODY...................................................................................................................................1
Community Profile......................................................................................................................1
Community Engagement.............................................................................................................4
Methods Of Engagement.............................................................................................................6
Evaluation of Engagement..........................................................................................................7
CONCLUSION................................................................................................................................8
REFERENCES................................................................................................................................8

INTRODUCTION
Neighbourhood plans are referred to as the city wide comprehensive plan (Maton and
et.al., 2017). The plan make use of general outline and intends at offering the land use based
deliverables that includes future land use map, capital facilities planning, community based
opportunities, identification of the areas related with key opportunities (Keating and et.al.,2017)
In the present report in-depth investigation has been done ). In the present report in-depth
investigation has been done in relation with the Moulton Neighbourhood development plan. This
has been devised by Moulton Neighbourhood plan Steering Group that is being led by Moulton
Parish Council in consultation with the community at local level. The present study would cover
the aspect such as community profile, engagement of community, methods of engagement as
well as evaluation of engagement.
MAIN BODY
Community Profile
Moulton is large village that possess 3500 people within the centre of Northamptonshire.
This is being situated certain four miles north east of the country town of Northampton. This is
close to the centre of England. There is presence of certain 1500 homes within the community.
The oldest one is in the central figure of the eight road system that is built of the rich dark honey
coloured local stone (Twigg, M. J. And et.al., 2017). The oldest part the village is being
designated as area of conservation and possess distinctive higher raised pathways and possess
various thatched cottages that are dating back hundreds of years.
The village is having stronger spirit within the community. Along with this it is warm
friendly place where one can reside. There is greater range of facilities in the community, groups
as well activities which can be enjoyed by the residents. Such to a greater extent are regulated by
the Parish Council Churches as well as voluntary based firms. It has four pubs along with
working Men's club, thriving church communities as well as greater number of clubs and
businesses. Every year in the month of May a week longer programme of the events is organized
under the title that is Moulton Village festival. At the end of the summer a music event that is
referred to as Party within the Park also takes place. Moulton Neighbourhood development plan
is being led by Moulton Parish council. Within September 2013 Moulton Parish Council has
made security of funding that is £17,000, £10,000 funded by the means of National Lottery
through big lottery fund. Along within £7,000 funded from the foundation of community
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development that assist in accomplishment of Neighbourhood development plan related with the
particular exceptional; community. The Moulton neighbourhood development plan (MNDP) is
considered as the planning document that would assist in attainment of vision for Moulton till
2029. This is considered as the new approach of the government towards planning that aims at
offering the local people grater say regarding the things that are going on within their area. Such
is set out in Localism act that has emerged in the force within April 2012. The MNDP offers
vision associated with Moulton for future course of time. Along with this it is setting out clear
policies in order facilities in realizing the particular vision (Pennel and et.al., 2017) Such policies
are in relation to national planning policy that is set out within National planning Policy
Framework (Källmén, Hed and Elgán, 2017).This generally confirms with the strategic policies
of the development plan which is being adopted. The MNDP is being developed through greater
consultation with the residents of Moulton as well as others having the interest in the community.
The plan offer greater opportunity to the local people towards keeping control on the areas where
development needs to be done and affect it for the sake of providing advantages to the
community.
A community profile provide the understanding about the people information related to their age,
gender, education, employment status, qualification, income level etc (Pianka, 2017).This type of
profile provide the information about the people age, gender, and ethnically, employment status,
occupation, income level etc. With assistance of this community report, researcher can easily get
entire information about the people who live in the particular area (Drennan, Calestani and
Littlejohns, 2017)
The MNDP related with the development of the community as well as its surroundings a
place wherein the people enjoys to live, work as well as visit. Further it is also making sure
leisure, facilities within the community as well as infrastructure in order to make sure the needs
are being fulfilled in an effective manner (De Roo, 2017) It is laying the foundation for
aspirations related with Moulton as well as its immediate surroundings to be the better place.
Neighbourhood development plan is providing description of the area it is serving and the list of
alterations, developments as well as improvements which local residents, community and the
voluntary groups and service offer are likely to view.
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3
Illustration 1 Moulton Neighbourhood area
(Source: Moulton Neighbourhood Development Plan. 2017)

Community Engagement
The development of Moulton neighbourhood development plan has been generated on
the behalf of people who are living in Moulton. This has been devised from the views that is
attained from the local people as well as organization by the means of wide range of consultation
methods that is comprised of following:
 Resident surveys
 Business surveys
 Survey of all the local groups as well as businesses (Kanel and Niraula, 2017)
 Meetings on continuous basis of the MNDP steering group
 Feedback from MNDP open days
 Exhibitions
A greater amount of information related with the background has informed the
development of particular neighbourhood development plan (NDP). This assist in providing
support to the data that has been determined in the evidence base (Lüneberg and et.ala., 2017)
A consultation statement that details the procedure of consultation to date is being
developed for the sake of accompanying the NDP. The evidence based has been enumerated in
the manner stated as under:
Consultation statement summary
It makes recognition of the outcomes related with the earlier consultations that has been
conducted. Further it laid emphasis on the strengths of living within Moulton. The manner in
which greater assets of the region are being made. In addition this it make an attempt towards
making determination of the practical, achievable steps that can be considered in order to address
the concerns which have been enhanced to a significant level. Along with this it also
acknowledges certain kind of issues that are of higher complexity and there is lack of possibility
attached with no immediate actions. However the plan demonstrates the time where in it can be
resolved in an effective manner (Hedman, Thompson and Hansen, 2017) There is greater
importance that the issues that are not resolved are not being forgotten to a greater extent. The
MNDP offers greater mechanism in order to keep on the agenda. It seeks at capitalizing the
strengths of the community at local level and exceptional skills, knowledge of the one who are
residing as well as working in it. The important developments have already been established in
the motion through local, voluntary as well as other firms. It makes sure that greater number of
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individuals, groups as well as agencies have taken the responsibility in the direction for ensuring
the execution of the practical measure in order to resolve the issues that are being raised.
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Illustration 2: Neighbourhood plan process diagram

Methods Of Engagement
The Moulton neighbourhood makes utilization of the questionnaires as a method of
consultation in order to collect the opinions of the residents that are residing in Moulton area.
The major benefit that is attached with the utilization of technique of questionnaire as method of
consultation is that it offers the respondents with the time to think responses relating with their
answers (Liotta and et.al., 2017). Questionnaire offers the respondents with the opportunity to
think regarding the issue or possess the opportunity to possess greater investigation to have better
understanding with respect to specific issue, to write in full answers to open as well as close
questions. On the other hand the disadvantage of self completion questionnaires is that an
instruction within the question for the respondents towards giving their initial expression that
cannot be enforced and cannot be promoted in comparison with face to face interview (Avan and
Berhanu, 2017). Though self completion questionnaire can be considered as have negative
impact on the people as there is no follow up in order to make determination of whether or not
respondents have been interpreted something or requirement of clarification, for the sake of
giving their opinions in order to enhance the community. Possessing access to varied kind of the
tools of involvement is being respected (Woodcote: a case study about community engagement.
2017). This can be challenge in terms of gaining insight to the facts of individual through
requesting them towards providing the answer to the questions that are direct questions like use
of the questionnaires that are considered as positivist science.
The Moulton Neighbourhood plan of Parish council have assisted through making
utilization of the several methods related with the technique of consultation for the sake of
gathering public thoughts in order to motivate the residents in order to get involved within the
activity associated with the neighbourhood planning. For example, organizing a focus group
meetings or public meetings (Keating and et.al., 2017)The focus offers opportunity towards
informal communications among the group of individual in relation to particular subject matter.
This is for the sake of understanding the reasons beside their opinions in order to bring
improvement in the community wherein they reside without exerting any kind of pressure over
the participants for getting a consensus.
The aim of the focus group is the ideal approach in order to access the experiences, points
of opinions, beliefs, needs and concerns up to six individuals that are experiencing similar kind
of issues. The method of making use of focus group is considered suitable while the participants
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are feeling comfortable towards sharing their experiences without being judged or discriminated
by the other individuals within the group (Taking time out to listen: the benefits of focus groups.
2017).
Focus cannot be always considered suitable for use. Focus group discussion can be
insufficient towards attaining better understanding with respect to the experiences of the
participants. As the people are engaged within the discussion such possess varied opinions that
are creating greater challenge that are attached with the utilization of the approach relating with
the focus group. For example, the outcomes can be biased by the members who possess
confidence in sharing their opinions to a significant level.
Following are some some barriers in the community engagement-
Languages and culture issue- Due to different region, state, culture, people get confuse to share
their knowledge and thoughts of each other. Some people have very lack knowledge about
the English and they have also literacy problem by which they unable to communicate with
each other. (Participation Models. 2017)
Structure issue- Lack an understanding among the citizen due to cultural differences there any
arise the issue within the community involvement. (Garcia-Cardenas, V. and et.al., 2017)
Trust issue- In the community involvement process, trust issue is one major barrier among the
people because most of the people have nature that they have very lack of trust on the other
people while they live in the society. (Bond, M. A. and et.al., 2017)
Other tool that can be effective in bringing enhancement in the method of consultation
utilized within Neighbourhood plan can be organization of the public meeting. This is
considered as the social gatherings that can be accessible by everyone for attending. Public
meeting is serving several purposes when making utilization of the consultation method for
discovering various objectives.
Evaluation of Engagement
This plan has been beneficial for both houses and population as well. From the
development plan it is found that it requires additional capacity so that plan be successfully
completely. From the above report it can be evaluated that housing in Moulton has been
expanded in very short time duration but facilities still are not increased to that extent. It is
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required new development plan so that facilities can be improved soon. On other hand it can be
evaluated that it is favourable for the protecting environment (Keating and et.al.,2017) It is
essential for the plan that to retain distinct village character, they need to ensure that it provides
benefits to community. The objective of neighbourhood development plan is to avoid physical
coalescence with urban area. Another objective of the plan was to provide housing which can
meet with the needs of community. This objective has been achieved successfully and it has meet
with the needs of diverse and growing community (Plastino and et.al., 2017)
From the evaluation of engagement results has been found that as village will grow then
there would be requirement of taking initiatives. For controlling over the traffic there is required
to improve car parking facilities and highway improvements. Authorities are needed to pay
attention on development of safer routes so that plan can accomplish its objective. From the
evaluation of engagement it is analysed that Moulton is currently facing the issue of inadequate
parking issues. When students will get raised then college and schools will face the problem of
parking. From the engagement of community, results has been found that in the conservation
area there would require adding new local green space for development of green space. It is
needed to pay close attention non senior citizens within Parish. That includes village car scheme,
housebound support and development of other social activities. During the consultation with
community several key issues have been raised. One of the major issue is found that housing in
Moulton is expanding with a very fast speed and as per its expansion facilities have not been
increased, there is significant gap in provision.(Liotta and et.al., 2017)
From the engagement with community it has been resulted that new housing may be
beneficial for resolving difficulties such as provision of land for community, infrastructure issue
etc. Another issue has been raised during consultation with community is that protection of
heritage is very important for both listed and non-listed buildings. It has been analysed that
conservation and promotion of the heritage assets will be beneficial for environment to great
extent (Funk, M. J. and McCombs, M., 2017) . From the engagement it has found that
neighbourhood plan is encouraging local business and recognizing them their contribution
significantly. Which is good for the community because it will support in improving facilities in
the village. It is encouraging local enterprises so that jobs opportunity will get raised and that can
help in making local economy stronger. This engagement has raised many of the issues currently
faced by the place and development needs has been identified. It is found that providing capital
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and on-going revenues steam to funding will be beneficial and will enhance facilities. Following
are some model through which defines that how people interact with each other-
Ladder of citizen participation- According to the model of ladder of citizen participation model.
In the community, citizen participation is the huge aspect for developing the society in the
country. This is one of the classic and most influential participation theories which decries
that citizen participation is a citizen power. (Hatala, R. et.al., 2017)
Ladder of children participation- This model emphasis that in the community children
participation is very important through which community and group of people can provide
the opportunity to children for their growth. With the growth of children's right people are
beginning to see an increasing recognition of children's abilities to speak for themselves.
Children is another major part in the community development as in the absence of children
no community can develop. Thus, it can be said that community should provide the
opportunity for growth in the society.(Källmén, Hed and Elgán, 2017)
Wheel of participation- This is another way of participation by which people of the Moulton
village can interact and communicate with each other. In this technique of participation four
major stages are included that is empowered, inform, consult and participate. (Garcia-
Cardenas, V. and et.al., 2017)
CONCLUSION
It can be concluded from the present investigation that development in the designated
area need careful consideration and there is requirement to make sure that the proposal makes
positive contribution towards the local character as well as distinctiveness as this is being
advised within NPPF. Permission with respect to planning is being granted for the sake of
bringing development in the Moulton conservation area. This is being provided that they
preserve as well as bring enhancement in the character of the specific region. The proposal
regarding development would be assessed for the purpose of making sure that they do not affect
the open spaces, street scenes as well as views to greater extent.
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