The EDDC Press Release is linked in the post below.

EDA Response:

“The East Devon Alliance notes with disappointment that the recent Briefing for Editors by EDDC does nothing at all to address the issues that really matter. EDDC is still unable to give a date for delivery of the Local Plan and the SHMA, relying instead on patronising assurances that all will be well. The crucial Local Plan, promised for two years ago, now seems unlikely to be agreed before next summer. How much more vulnerable East Devon countryside will be lost while the Council dithers?”

And if anyone wishes to reassure themselves that these are not new problems, please read pages 10 to 21 of the document below:  a damning report by the Planning Advisory Service in 2009, commissioned by EDDC when they realised that their first Local Plan project was not going to plan:

PAS report 2009

Also refer to a post on the Sidmouth Independent News of 31 January 2013 which identified many of the issues brought up by Mr Thickett, the Planning Inspector, when he threw out the latest Local Plan in March 2014:

Interesting that the potential problems with the 5 year land supply were all highlighted HERE [Note this reference has since been removed from the EDDC website] in July 2009 in the report of a Task and Finish Forum on 5 year land supply and that everything negative that was predicted in this document has come to pass.  Here are a few extracts:

1. Our assessment of our District wide figures shows that we have only just over five years availability. An Inspector at a planning application appeal could take the view that this is close enough to the five year threshold to side with an applicant/dismiss our arguments.
2. The District wide five year figure is based on our assessment and assumptions we have made. A developer might challenge these and come to a different conclusion (i.e. that land supply falls under five years) and persuade an Inspector that his/her evaluation is the more accurate.
3. Circumstances change and assessment/s done at the present time (and initially in 2008) can and will be out of date in the future.

4.  In the past we had intentionally split the District in to two, 1. the West End and 2. the Rest of East Devon. ….. It is now considered, however, that it is more appropriate to have a single 5 year housing figure for ACROSS THE WHOLE DISTRICT. This will give the Council the ability to deliver housing outside the West End which will encompass not only the Towns but villages too.

The latest outbreak of foot in mouth disease to hit the EDDC – turmoil surrounding the absence of a Local Plan and Strategic Housing Market Assessment (SHMA) – has seemingly roused from his slumbers Deputy Chief Executive Richard Cohen. In a Press Release – er, sorry,

SHMA briefing for editors and members 27 Aug final

he provides a guide to recent events that might just as well have been subtitled ‘Everything is Under Control – Honest!”.

Readers will be fascinated to learn that, while the draft Local Plan envisaged 15,000 more homes for East Devon and recent independent research estimates a figure closer to 11,358 …. this is not enough for the economic powerhouse that is East Devon. In keeping with Cllr Paul Diviani’s interview on Radio Devon the other day – a contribution composed chiefly of stumbling ineptitude, the only incontrovertible fact being that he refused twice to answer the question when the Local Plan might be ready – the implication would appear to be that EDDC is hellbent on allowing as many houses on the East Devon countryside as it can get away with. Hence the ‘Briefing for Editors’ writing evangelically about the “explosion of activity .. at the Growth Point” where “new businesses can be expected to move into sites like SkyPark and Exeter Science Park”. That’d be the same Growth Point where Sainsburys was going to build a distribution centre creating hundreds of jobs, only to pull out earlier this month, right?

Consultants should have been putting together data to enable the SHMA to have been all but finished by this stage. But doubting Thomases will be reassured by Mr Cohen’s assurance that “our consultants will now continue with the work required to fully evidence housing need into the future.” Um, “now continue”? So what have they been doing previously? Knitting? And just when will the SHMA finally see the light of day?

The document ‘Briefing for Editors’ belongs more to the days of Pravda than the Knowle. Next up, expect a statement from Mr Cohen that EDDC can look forward to record tractor production and grain harvest in 2015.