Refusal for Harworth’s ‘too big’ Rothwell industrial park
A 1.8m sq ft logistics development has been refused by councillors in North Northamptonshire, going against the recommendations of the council’s planning officers.
Harworth had submitted a hybrid planning application in December 2024 for its 160-acre development, proposing an industrial and logistics park that would cover an area equivalent to more than a third of the nearby town of Rothwell.
Despite local opposition to the scale of the proposals, planning officers had recommended the scheme be given the green light ahead of a meeting of the council’s planning committee on 11 November.
During a three hour session, the council’s planning policy manager told councillors it would be “very difficult” to refuse the scheme on policy grounds, given that the spatial strategy in the authority’s dated local plan was now at odds with national planning policy.
A report to councillors had set out the council’s position, which had been further undermined by an earlier 185-acre development at Thrapston, which was allowed on appeal by government inspectors in October 2025.
During that appeal, planning inspectors had ruled that several parts of the North Northamptonshire Joint Core Strategy were at out of date, including specific policies areas on the county’s “Network of Urban and Rural Areas”, distribution of new jobs, and logistics.
“Notwithstanding the conflict with the largely out-of-date relevant development plan policies which would resist development in this location, officers conclude that the proposal satisfies the requirements of NPPF Policy S5 in terms of location and need,” said a report to committee.
But councillors voted down a proposal to approve the scheme by four votes to seven, citing the visual and landscape impacts of the proposals, as well as the loss of farming land as potential reasons for refusal – the precise wording of which was then delegated to officers.
An indicative masterplan submitted with the application identified up to eight units ranging up to 350,000 sq ft in size, four of which would be to the north of Harrington Road, with the remaining four to the south.
During the consultation period all seven town and parish councils consulted had lodged objections to the proposals, with Rothwell Town Council describing the size of the application as “off the scale”, and “entirely inappropriate”.
The Campaign for Rural England had also lodged an objection, arguing that the proposals were “too big and in the wrong place”.
Documents and plans relating to the proposals can be viewed on North Northamptonshire’s planning portal using reference: NK/2024/0717
