South Cambs District Council: Faith and Community Land

Northstowe Church Network allocated Phase 1 Faith Community/Voluntary Land at Northstowe

Northstowe Church Network has been awarded the first plot of land for faith and community groups in Northstowe. A total of four opportunities for faith and/or community groups was secured by the Council as part of the planning process, with the remaining three parcels of land set to come forward in each phase as it is built out over the coming years.

Background

In 2020, the Council adopted the Northstowe Faith and Community Land Allocation policy which provided a fair and transparent process for the district council to allocate land provided by developers for faith and community purposes. In December 2024 Cabinet agreed to initiate a bidding round for the first parcel of Faith and Community land.

The Phase 1 land is currently owned by the lead developer, Urban&Civic, and is set to transfer to South Cambridgeshire District Council's ownership, as set out in the s106 agreement.

In anticipation of this transfer, we opened the bidding process, in January 2025 and invited eligible faith and community groups to put forward their proposals, to secure a 999 year-long lease to develop the land.

We received 2 bids within the bidding window, which ran from January 2025 to January 2026.

The application process required applicants to provide information about themselves and their proposals. Both bids have now been judged by an assessment panel of officers in accordance with the assessment matrix, which can be found in the Supporting Information section below.

Views were invited from the community to inform the council decision.The feedback received through the public engagement exercise was assessed and factored into the overall score for each proposal.

Northstowe Church Network’s bid was the highest scoring of the two proposals. This group was therefore recommended for a 999-year leasehold agreement, with details discussed at Council’s Scrutiny and Overview Committee meeting on Thursday 4 June before a final decision was made to progress a leasehold agreement with Northstowe Church Network at a Cabinet meeting on Tuesday 23 June.

The process allowed for a period of one month during which an applicant can appeal this decision. Bidders were notified of the outcome of the Cabinet meeting and of the process for requesting an appeal. The window for appeals was open from Wednesday 1 July 2026 through to Friday 31 July 2026.

The proposals

The following bid summaries are a reflection of the bids summitted and were provided in order that the public could provide feedback on the proposals; these summaries do not reflect the view of the Council or of the assessment panel. A separate officer assessment summary indicating the response of the officer assessment panel was also provided to give further context for those responding to the survey.

Please note that any development of the Faith and Community Land will be subject to the formal planning process, which is fully independent of the allocation process.

Hindu Samaj Northstowe:

Northstowe Church Network:

The final decision was published in the agenda for Cabinet on Tuesday 23 June 2026 at 10amand was followed by an appeals process with the applicants informed of the outcome when resolved. Work towards a leasehold agreement between South Cambridgeshire District Council and Northstowe Church Network can now progress.

A withdrawal of any offer and/or the termination of any leasehold agreement with the successful bidder could result if they:

fail to disclose relevant information during or post application
fail to adhere to the policies they provide
fail to deliver to agreed project milestones

A draft leasehold agreement is available in the supporting information section.

Criteria

Submissions were invited from groups who could show that their proposal met the following criteria:

The applicant faith or community/voluntary group has a local association with Northstowe.
The applicant group or lead organisation of a consortium is a registered charity.
The organisation that would manage the faith/voluntary land and any building delivered would have charitable status.
The applicant organisation has the financial resources and organisational capacity to deliver their project proposal.
The applicant can achieve construction within the time frame laid out in their project proposal (which should include clear milestones to show the progress anticipated within the first five years post award).
The land and any building delivered must have space to accommodate shared spaces for community activities open to all, in addition to any dedicated worship space that it may include.
Any building delivered would be staffed and the managing group would make the shared space available to other community and faith groups regardless of faith, belief or lifestyle.

Supporting Information

The following information was made available to potential applicants:

A location plan [PDF, 0.5MB] of the 0.25 hectares parcel of serviced land in Phase 1 Northstowe.
A layout plan of services to the plot [PDF, 1MB], approved by Greater Cambridge Shared Planning, and installed by Urban & Civic prior to the transfer to us. Please note that we will certify that the land is serviced accordingly, prior to accepting transfer of the land. The electricity supply will be delivered at 104 KVA.
Development Guidance Faith/Volunteer Land [PDF, 3.5MB] and Addendum to Development Guidance Faith/Volunteer Land [PDF, 1MB].
A Ground Condition Survey [PDF, 74Kb] summary prepared for us which applicants may refer to (but does not offer reliance to third parties). If you wish to receive the report in full, please email northstowe.community@scambs.gov.uk
A draft Heads of Terms for Lease Agreement [PDF, 93Kb]
Assessment Matrix [PDF, 84Kb]
Clarifications issued - November 2025 [PDF, 81Kb]
Clarifications issued - December 2025 [PDF, 35Kb]

Within the Addendum to Development Guidance for Faith | Volunteer Land, Nov 2024 document there is a response from the Local Authority Planning officer which has a table using colour coding, to provide comment on the key issues associated with the proposed development.

The colour used indicate the acceptability, partial acceptability and unacceptability of the guidance within the document. Red means an in-principle issue remains unresolved, Amber means another type of issue remains unresolved and Green means the issue is resolved.

Post-Assessment Feedback To Applicants

Total assessment scores and rankings were available to all applicants following the conclusion of the Council’s assessment of all eligible applications.

Further feedback on the breakdown of scoring as per the Assessment Matrix was made available to all applicants on request, within the window for appeals.