Selling Land in Tamworth

Tamworth Borough Council covers the town of Tamworth and nothing else, from Amington and Glascote in the east to Wilnecote and Dosthill in the south. The adopted plan put the population at about 77,000 in 2012. It sits within the Greater Birmingham and Black Country housing market area, so its housing arithmetic is never only its own.

• One of the smallest districts in England. The adopted plan calls the borough "only 12 square miles in size", with a boundary the draft plan says is "drawn tightly around the urban area".
• Green Belt on the edges only. The adopted plan records that 7% of the borough lies within the Green Belt, to the south; the 2026 assessment below also finds a parcel on the eastern edge. Beyond the boundary is Lichfield district to the north and west and North Warwickshire to the east and south.
• Delivery well above target. The Housing Delivery Test 2025 measured 861 homes built against 391 required, a result of 220%.
• Land supply the other way. The council's latest statement finds 1.6 years, measured against the government's figure rather than its own.

The Tamworth Local Plan 2006 to 2031 found an objectively assessed need of 6,250 homes but set the borough's own target at a minimum of 4,425, with the remaining 1,825 to be built in neighbouring areas. Policy SS1 records how that was arranged under the duty to cooperate:

1. 500 homes each in Lichfield and North Warwickshire. Lichfield District Council "committed to deliver at least 500 dwellings in their Local Plan" and North Warwickshire Borough Council the same "in their Core Strategy", both for Tamworth's needs.
2. 825 still to place. The three councils agreed "to continue this co-operation on strategic planning issues to deliver the remaining unmet need of 825 dwellings and a minimum of 14 hectares of employment land".

The council's review of the plan in March 2020 records that under the statement of common ground "Lichfield agreed to take 912 dwellings and 6.5Ha of employment land whilst North Warwickshire agreed to take 913 dwellings and 14Ha of employment land", which between them cover the full 1,825. It concluded that "the level of changes required are significant enough to warrant the production of a new plan rather than a partial update". Where Lichfield stands is on our Staffordshire page; North Warwickshire is below.

The Staffordshire Green Belt Assessment of April 2026 has a Tamworth appendix whose key finding is this: "All three parcels were identified as potential grey belt, noting the presence of differing levels of footnote 7 constraints."

• TAM01, the southern edge. Farmland and farm buildings. Moderate against sprawl, weak against merging towns, strong for safeguarding the countryside.
• TAM02, also the southern edge. Includes the clay pit at the Wilnecote stoneware and pottery works. Moderate, weak and moderate on those purposes.
• TAM03, the eastern edge. Mostly the Middleton Lakes nature reserve. Moderate, weak and strong, and the parcel where the footnote 7 constraints weigh most: about 80% of it lies in flood zones 2 and 3 or is affected by surface water flooding.

A parcel counted where it did not perform strongly against sprawl, merging or historic towns; the countryside purpose alone does not disqualify it. That matters because policy S5 does not apply in the Green Belt. The grey belt test applies instead: homes can be approved on Green Belt land that does not strongly serve those three purposes where the need for them is shown, usually by either a supply under five years or a delivery result under 75%, with the Golden Rules on affordable homes, infrastructure and green space for larger schemes. With 1.6 years, the need limb is met today, and the draft plan's policy SP3 simply refers Green Belt proposals to national policy. A field inside a parcel is judged on its own contribution, not the parcel average, and land the plan does not release goes by application. Our grey belt guide explains how a site is judged against each purpose.