Wokingham Borough Connect
The holiday season is nearly upon us. We'll take a short break and resume as normal on 15 January.
 Help us build a borough where everyone belongs
We're updating our Equality, Diversity and Inclusion (EDI) strategy, which is aimed at helping create communities where everyone feels welcome and belongs.
The new strategy will help us establish a series of objectives and local priorities to ensure that everybody's needs are properly considered and met.
We will use it to help ensure that the services we offer, and the policies we follow, are accessible, fair and representative of the communities we serve.
Why should you take part
We want to make sure our new strategy is truly representative of our local community so it's important we hear from as diverse a range of people as possible.
Your feedback will be shared with local organisations and community groups, like the Wokingham Equality Forum, to help identify the things which really matter to local people. This will help shape the new strategy and our objectives.
Taking the survey
The survey is open until 19 January. You can find out more and take the survey on our engagement website.
 Consulting on school admission numbers
There are currently significantly more primary school places in Wokingham Borough than are needed. This is due to a decline in the birth rate, which is steeper in the borough than the national average.
However, because of families moving into new housing and other demographic factors that are specific to certain areas, not all schools have experienced the same decline in applications.
In areas where this decline has occurred, it has a major impact on school operations, as funding received is per child, not per class.
Why should you take part
We are looking to reduce the number of school places offered to reception pupils in eight primary schools in the borough to help them to better plan for the future.
We want to hear your views on the changes, which would be in place for the 2026/27 school year.
Taking the survey
The survey is open until 7 January. Find out more, including the list of schools and proposed changes to admissions number, on our Engage website.
 You said, we did
We would like to thank all of our residents, partners, businesses and everyone else who takes the time to respond to our surveys. We know your time is valuable, and we want you to know that we do listen.
Here are a few of our recent surveys:
Local Plan Update
The local plan update consultation closed in November, with nearly 400 respondents giving us their views. We received representations across a wide range of topics, including the proposed site allocations and the draft policies, with some proposing changes to the plan.
We are currently preparing a report that will summarise the main issues raised in the consultation, which we will submit to the Planning Inspectorate along with the plan and its supporting documents in the New Year, likely mid-February.
The Planning Inspectorate will then conduct an examination of the plan throughout 2025.
Town Centre Strategy
In September, we sought your views on Twyford, Wokingham and Woodley to help us write a town centre strategy to support them and help them grow.
Since then, we’ve used feedback from 540 responses to help us understand the issues you experience. To get a clearer picture, we discussed common themes with several teams who work for us and checked our results against a recent survey by Wokingham Town Council.
We also held focus groups with our housing tenants, ran a workshop with businesses and created a separate survey for them, and attended several business networking groups.
Combined with footfall and national trend data, this has helped us understand where our towns are now and set a starting point for the next steps.
Our draft strategic town centre framework and strategy documents for Wokingham town, Woodley town and Twyford village are now being reviewed and are set to be considered by our decision-making Executive early in the new year.
Economic Development Strategy
In September, we also sought feedback from both our business community and our residents to inform our forthcoming Economic Development Strategy.
The responses we received have allowed us to better understand the wants and needs of those who live and work in the borough, and these will be reflected in the action plan we're aiming to produce in 2025.
We’ve also worked with colleagues across the council to make sure their priorities are considered, and held focus groups with the business community and our political leaders. We have given regular updates on our work to local business networking groups.
On top of this, we’ve been compiling a robust evidence base using data from the Office of National Statistics, which will underpin the strategy. This will allow us to ensure our action plan is having a meaningful impact by monitoring the figures that matter.
The draft strategy is set to be considered by our decision-making Executive early in the new year.
Thames Valley Police's local policing budget
Share your views on how your council tax supports local policing. Police and Crime Commissioner for Thames Valley, Matthew Barber, is seeking your views on next year's local policing budget.
Taking the survey
The survey is open until 12pm on Friday, 3 January. If you would like a hard copy, email pcc@thamesvalley.police.uk or call 01865 541957.
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