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Posted on

5 Aug 2015

Posted under

Affordable and Social Housing, Beer, Blackdown Hills, Branscombe, Budleigh Salterton, Chardstock, Clyst St Mary, Dunkeswell, EDDC, Feniton/ Talaton, Lympstone, Newton Poppleford, Seaton/ Colyford / Colyton, Sidmouth/ Sidford/ Sidbury, Upottery

AND another consultation: Villages, small towns and their built-up boundaries – yep, another cart that went before horse!

Recall that, with no consultation whatsoever, built-up boundaries for Dunkeswell and Chardstock were changed and inserted into the latest draft of the Local Plan.

Dear Sir/Madam

East Devon Villages Plan – consultation on proposed criteria for defining built-up area boundaries for villages and small towns

The council is reviewing its approach to defining its ‘Built-up Area Boundaries’ and wants your input.

We have prepared a brief paper, which is attached, that sets out what we would like to do and how you can get involved. We have also included an update paper on the Villages Plan for information.

If you have any comments on the approach set out, please write to us on or before Monday 21 September 2015 so that we can consider them before we prepare the next stage of our ‘Villages Plan’.

You can submit your views by either writing to us at Planning Policy, East Devon District Council, Knowle, Sidmouth, EX10 8HL or sending an email to us at localplan@eastdevon.gov.uk. Please put ‘Villages Built-up Area Boundary Consultation’ in the subject box of the email or at the top of your letter. It would be helpful if you could respond to the 5 questions set out in the consultation paper.

Please contact the planning policy team on 01395 516551 if you have any queries.

Yours faithfully

Linda Renshaw (Mrs)
Senior Planning Officer

Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays
East Devon District Council

( 01395 571683
8 lrenshaw@eastdevon.gov.uk
” http://www.eastdevon.gov.uk
* Planning Policy Section, East Devon District Council, Knowle, Station Road, Sidmouth, EX10 8HL

Posted by

East Devon Watch

Posted on

4 Aug 2015

Posted under

Affordable and Social Housing, Environment (local), Land Supply, Local Plan, National Planning Policy Framework

Planning permission or planning completions: which is most important

Local authorities ( particularly East Devon District Council) are rushing through planning applications and consenting to them at high speed. But what is the point if developers can then drip-feed and cherry-pick which of those houses they build and when? Doing this allows for house prices to be kept artificially high and to ensure that only those houses that make the most profit get built, as this article points out:

Even though there is some evidence that public attitudes to housebuilding are shifting, it is a major achievement to secure approval for a quarter of a million homes through a system that is still largely in the control of local politicians.

As Department for Communities & Local Government minister Brandon Lewis acknowledged earlier this year, the planning system can no longer fairly be accused of stifling necessary development. He told Planning’s national summit at the end of March that “the planning system is delivering and land supply is coming forward”.

Nonetheless, the housebuilding industry is urging the government not to take its foot off the planning system’s accelerator pedal. The Home Builders Federation (HBF) said many of the units identified in the report still had to navigate the remainder of the planning system, a process that “continues to take far too long, delaying work starting on many of the sites”.

Clearly, from the evidence of the Summer Budget and the Productivity Plan, the government is minded to agree. Amongst other measures, it is aiming to introduce automatic permission in principle for housing on brownfield sites identified as suitable, a tougher development management performance regime for councils and new sanctions for councils that fail to produce local plans.

Some of these steps, notably the focus on local plan-making, are welcome. But there is a danger that ministers are focusing too much on permissions, and not enough on completions. The statistics for last year show just over 125,000 completions. While there will clearly be a time lag between an increase in consents and a rise in completions, the statistics suggest that the latter are not growing nearly as fast as the former. Ministers need to take steps to ensure that developers make more use, more quickly, of the good work done by planning authorities.

Richard Garlick, editor, Planning richard.garlick@haymarket.com
http://www.planningresource.co.uk/article/1358321/ministers-focus-completions-permissions-richard-garlick

Posted by

East Devon Watch

Posted on

2 Aug 2015

Posted under

Affordable and Social Housing, East Devon Tories, EDDC, Knowle/Honiton/Exmouth relocation

EDDC faces £7 million “black hole” – and blames the Tory government!

“The council, along with other local authorities who have housing stock, has a 30-year business plan to ensure that it is able to maintain its properties.

According to the authority’s calculations, the one per cent rent cut could mean East Devon’s ring-fenced Housing Revenue Account would reduce by £77.2 million over the next three decades. The council said this loss of income makes the business plan unviable.

The proposal has also been described as “particularly unwelcome” because the Government required East Devon District Council to take on £84.5 million of debt in 2012 in return for freedoms and flexibilities to run its council housing free from government interference.

The debt was based on the Government’s assessment of income and expenditure over 30 years, and three years into that arrangement, the government has been accused of proposing to “move the goalposts”.

Councillor Elson is urging the Government to reconsider the policy. She said: “This is very short sighted and this policy has tough consequences on us as a council and on tenants too. We need to secure a more effective balance between the needs of present and future tenants in the long term”

http://www.exeterexpressandecho.co.uk/East-Devon-Council-facing-7m-black-hole/story-27530755-detail/story.html

But, of course, it won’t stop them spending £8m plus on a new HQ – just cut down the amount of social housing they will finance.

And how interesting they had a 30 year maintenance plan for their housing stock, but not for their HQ!

Someone has also added a trenchant comment:

More blackmail from the Council. Their response to anything is “if you don’t do what we say, we’ll throw our toys out of the pram” but I notice they’re still spending £££s on moving offices, and more £££s on the seafront scheme which no one wants. Priorities! They’re always blackmailing the residents about something, anytime they have to toe the line. they threaten to make someone suffer for it.

Posted by

East Devon Watch

Posted on

27 Jul 2015

Posted under

Affordable and Social Housing, AONB, Blackdown Hills, East Devon Tories, EDDC, Paul Diviani

That Messianic speech from Our Glorious Leader translated for the masses

We aim to secure an outstanding and sustainable quality of life for everyone in East Devon.

Now, let’s get it straight: we are talking about developers here – who did you think I was talking about?

Where we live, work and play has a tremendous influence on our well-being. We shall seek to conserve and enhance the environment through the social and economic well-being of the people who live and work here. We must achieve a proper balance between the environment, the economy and our communities by weighing the relative merits to ensure sustainability and resultant harmony.

Of course, I am talking only about the Blackdown Hills here – the rest of you will just have to cope with whatever developments we decide to throw at you.

We want to be safe in our communities and to that end we will work in partnership with the other authorities to achieve that. We will look after the disadvantaged of all ages, to ensure that lack of finance and opportunity is not a barrier to the quality of life we all desire. With local housing for local people our top priority, we shall enable good quality and sustainable development to produce the 250 affordable homes we need every year. Then, at last, we will enable families to live and work in close proximity to each other, emulating the cohesive neighbourhoods we remember and desire.

I’m not daft: I shall be needing the police to provide me with a bodyguard if things get any worse and they cut 25-40% of our government grant AND we build a new HQ for ourselves. And we are still talking about developers: we will ensure that they never lack finance or opportunity to ensure that they have the quality of life they all desire and we will always look after them. 250 affordable homes – well, 90% of a massive average house price is affordable to our pals, what are you grizzling about.

We want our public realm to remain attractive; whether it be the award-winning parks and gardens or the pavements and pathways we traverse daily. We are fortunate that we can all share not only the nationally designated Blackdown Hills and East Devon AONBs (Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty), but also the only English, internationally recognised, natural World Heritage Site, known as the Jurassic Coast, which together comprise two-thirds of our District. As our landscape defines our style, so we shall recognise that renewable energy will have an increasingly important part to play in the way our district looks and powers itself.

Did you really have to put parks and gardens in there (those Sidmouth people will moan about that) and AONBs and the Jurassic Coast in this bit speechwriter? Oh, well, if you must, just don’t expect us to worry too much about them if they are not in the Blackdown Hills.

We want there to be equal opportunity for work and in particular to achieve high quality jobs in the emerging high tech and green industries. No longer should our young people be forced to leave through lack of housing or employment. Those who wish to depart will always have the option to return to their roots in later years. If they do, we will be there to look after them.

High-tech jobs for rich but dim kids for whom we will buy houses or buy-to-let properties in their names from our profits or cashed-in pensions. Er, what exactly are “green industries” speechwriter? Oh, that’s right, industrial sheds at the Growth Point painted in Racing Green!

Recognising our foremost economic activity, we welcome visitors drawn to our stunning coastline, our vibrant market towns and villages set in our beautiful countryside, which would not be so but for the custodianship of our farmers who we will support in their efforts to maintain food security and in the process, bring delicious local produce to market. In recognition of the many small rural businesses which are the backbone of our economy, we shall continue to lobby for fast broadband which will also stop our youngsters being disadvantaged solely through location.

I will always support the Farmers Market in the Blackdown Hills and will ensure that we get broadband before everyone else in the countryside, the rest of you will just have to cope as best you can. And any farmers out there who want to put up your land for great big developments like others have before you – come and see us very soon!

We shall communicate in a positive manner with all our residents which will ensure positive leadership and positive partnerships. We want people to feel they really can influence public decision-making but realise, in the spirit of localism, individual and community initiatives reflect responsibilities rather than rights. Truly sustainable places are about happy communities, living and working together in wonderful places.

We ALWAYS communicate with our residents in a positive manner, even when it is bad, bad news and we DEFINITELY have positive partnerships with our developers. And NO WAY are the plebs going to influence us – we have the rights, they have the responsibility to do as we say! And if our developers are happy, we are happy.

We all want to be proud to live in East Devon and when that is realised, we shall be content.”

Except that WE will build dark, Satanic mills!

Fade out with the Monty Python film with the famous scene of the masses offering adulation to the Messiah and his mother saying

“He isn’t the Messiah, he is a Very Naughty Boy”.

Original taken from – notes in RED from The Owl.

http://www.conservativehome.com/localgovernment/2015/07/cllr-paul-diviani-our-mission-in-east-devon.html

Posted by

East Devon Watch

Posted on

27 Jul 2015

Posted under

Affordable and Social Housing, AONB, Austerity cuts, East Devon Tories, EDDC, Environment (local)

Comments

6 Comments

Joke of the millenium: Paul Diviani’s “vision” for East Devon!

We have had clean, green and seen – now we have the ultimate in hypocrisy. a full critique will appear after Owl has lain in a darkened room for some hours mulling on this triumphalist nonsense.

Moses and his Ten Commandments and Ed Milliband’s Tablet of Stone have nothing on this guy!

On the “Conservative Home” website today:

“We aim to secure an outstanding and sustainable quality of life for everyone in East Devon.

Where we live, work and play has a tremendous influence on our well-being. We shall seek to conserve and enhance the environment through the social and economic well-being of the people who live and work here. We must achieve a proper balance between the environment, the economy and our communities by weighing the relative merits to ensure sustainability and resultant harmony.

We want to be safe in our communities and to that end we will work in partnership with the other authorities to achieve that. We will look after the disadvantaged of all ages, to ensure that lack of finance and opportunity is not a barrier to the quality of life we all desire. With local housing for local people our top priority, we shall enable good quality and sustainable development to produce the 250 affordable homes we need every year. Then, at last, we will enable families to live and work in close proximity to each other, emulating the cohesive neighbourhoods we remember and desire.

We want our public realm to remain attractive; whether it be the award-winning parks and gardens or the pavements and pathways we traverse daily. We are fortunate that we can all share not only the nationally designated Blackdown Hills and East Devon AONBs (Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty), but also the only English, internationally recognised, natural World Heritage Site, known as the Jurassic Coast, which together comprise two thirds of our District. As our landscape defines our style, so we shall recognise that renewable energy will have an increasingly important part to play in the way our district looks and powers itself.

We want there to be equal opportunity for work and in particular to achieve high quality jobs in the emerging high tech and green industries. No longer should our young people be forced to leave through lack of housing or employment. Those who wish to depart will always have the option to return to their roots in later years. If they do, we will be there to look after them.

Recognising our foremost economic activity, we welcome visitors drawn to our stunning coastline, our vibrant market towns and villages set in our beautiful countryside, which would not be so but for the custodianship of our farmers who we will support in their efforts to maintain food security and in the process, bring delicious local produce to market. In recognition of the many small rural businesses which are the backbone of our economy, we shall continue to lobby for fast broadband which will also stop our youngsters being disadvantaged solely through location.

We shall communicate in a positive manner with all our residents which will ensure positive leadership and positive partnerships. We want people to feel they really can influence public decision making but realise, in the spirit of localism, individual and community initiatives reflect responsibilities rather than rights. Truly sustainable places are about happy communities, living and working together in wonderful places.

We all want to be proud to live in East Devon and when that is realised, we shall be content.”

http://www.conservativehome.com/localgovernment/2015/07/cllr-paul-diviani-our-mission-in-east-devon.html

Posted by

East Devon Watch

Posted on

20 Jul 2015

Posted under

Affordable and Social Housing, Cranbrook, DCC, EDDC, Land Supply, Local Plan

Comments

1 Comment

Cranbrook: the numbers just don’t stack up

Following on from the post where Devon County Council foresees a town “as big as Barnstaple” at Cranbrook. we have received the following comment which is upscaled to a post here:

Here are some historical EDDC statements about the size of Cranbrook:

Cabinet 2 May 2012 – “The Local Plan anticipates the completion of 6,000 homes at Cranbrook in the period to 2026 representing a likely population in excess of 13,000 people.”

Cabinet 3 April 2013 – “More broadly this pace of delivery is fundamental to supporting the achievement of the Local Plan, with circa. 60% of the remaining strategic housing requirement due to be accommodated at Cranbrook with expansion up to circa 6,500 homes over the plan period.”

Cabinet 4 Sept 2013 – “It is anticipated that by 2026, 6,000 new homes and associated town centre and other facilities will have been built. Assuming an occupancy rate of 2.2 persons per dwelling this is likely to mean that Cranbrook’s population will reach approximately 13,000 people – similar to Honiton by 2026. These 6,000 new homes are anticipated to come forward as a consequence of the following: Outline planning application 03/P1900 granted in October 2010 for the first 2,900; A Full Planning application for 600 homes (submitted on 2 August 2013) and (at the time of writing, being checked for validation) the ‘East and West Expansion Areas’ – allocated for approximately 2,500 homes in the emerging Submission East Devon Local Plan 2006-2026.”

Cabinet 4 June 2014 – “The vision for Cranbrook clearly anticipates that it will be much more than a housing estate with it being seen instead as a “new East Devon ‘market town’” with a “fully functional town centre” that is “ideally placed to perform a role in serving tourism in East Devon”.”

Cabinet 5 Nov 2014 – “The new Local Plan identifies both east and west expansion areas for Cranbrook to bring the overall level of development to about 6,000 houses. The new local plan does also show an indicative location for about 1500 houses to the south of the old A30 Honiton Road after 2016. New Community Partners (NCP) have advised that they will be submitting an outline planning application for the east, west and southern expansion of Cranbrook comprising possibly 4,000 houses before the end of 2014. The NCP held a “Cranbrook to 2031’ public exhibition on 15 and 16 October and before the end of this calendar year we expect to receive an application or applications for the largest residential scheme East Devon DC has seen in many years.”

EDDC Web site today – What is Cranbrook all about? – “Currently, a total of 3,561 homes, two primary schools, a secondary school, town centre, local centre and associated infrastructure and green spaces have planning permission but there are plans for a further 4,000 homes and associated infrastructure set out in the New Local Plan meaning that the town is planned to grow to a total of around 6,000 homes by the year 2026 and to 7,500 homes beyond that. This equates to a town of approximately 15,500 people (slightly larger than Sidmouth or Honiton).”

So, EDDC’s official position is originally 6,000 houses / 13,000 people , and now targeted at 7,500 homes (which would be c. 16,250 people). So I am not sure where 30,000 people has come from – or why a second station is needed when the population is actually projected to be only half the size of Barnstaple.

Posted by

East Devon Watch

Posted on

13 Jul 2015

Posted under

Affordable and Social Housing, Planning System, Rural communities

Scrapping planning laws doesn’t speed up house building

…”Planning experts say that countries with zonal systems usually have quite tight constraints on, for example, the design and quality of what can be built on them; abolishing the need for planning permission, without putting something of the sort in place, risks merely constructing tomorrows slums. And more than a few brownfield sites are important for wildlife: two evocatively named species – the Streaked Bombadier Beetle and the Distinguished Jumping Spider – entirely depend on them. Ending the need for planning permission puts it at greater risk.” …

…”Big housing estates may be waved through by central government without locals having a say – something the coalition considered but then dropped as inconsistent with ‘localism’ – under plans to legislate to allow “major infrastructure projects with an element of housing” to be determined in Whitehall. And though the document proposes speeding up implementing or amending local plans, it looks as if councils without them (about half the total) will remain at the mercy of speculative builders wishing to put developments wherever they like.” …

…”Above all, however, the government assumes too easily that freeing up planning will get more houses built and that building more houses will necessarily bring down prices. Housebuilders often sit on land, while its value goes up, instead of developing it: at present they are holding enough land, with planning permission, for 400,000 homes, enough – even if built in a traditional terrace – to reach from London to Rome.

They also naturally prefer to build expensive homes than cheap ones and may well restrict supply to keep prices up. And supply and demand works differently in housing than many other markets; the relatively wealthy often buy second and third homes as investments or to rent, pricing out those who most need them.

So despite some improvements in today’s document, the Government still has a way to go in working out how really to tackle Britain’s scandalous housing crisis.”

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/earth/environment/11732373/Despite-some-positive-signs-the-Government-still-has-some-way-to-go-to-tackle-our-housing-crisis.html

Posted by

East Devon Watch

Posted on

11 Jul 2015

Posted under

Affordable and Social Housing, Brownfield sites

Osborne’s planning reforms risk creating ‘slums of the future’

… “Zoning is certainly not a panacea for speed,” says Janet Askew, president of the Royal Town Planning Institute, whose research has focused on regulatory systems in planning. “It is an incredibly complex process, with zonal plans undergoing convoluted discussions before they are agreed. The fact that land is zoned for housing doesn’t mean it goes through the planning system more quickly aht all.”

To Askew, introducing a zonal system makes little sense, because once land has been designated for housing in a local plan (which goes through a statutory consultation process), it will almost certainly get permission. “It simply threatens to remove power from the local authorities to negotiate over the crucial details of a scheme, in terms of mitigating what impacts it could have on the area,” she adds. “It completely flies in the face of localism.”

Kate Henderson, chief executive of the Town and Country Planning Association, agrees, arguing that granting automatic planning permission for housing schemes would “undermine any possibility for making good quality places where people want to live.”

“Our real concern is if you can’t have a conversation about things like internal space standards, accessibility and green space, we’re really risking creating slums of the future,” she says. “We appreciate the government wants to speed things up, but it shouldn’t just be about quantity but quality. If planning is deregulated any further, we’ll end up with places that we’re going to regret building.” …”

…”“What we really need is to rebuild the planning service,” says Henderson. “It is demoralised, deregulated and poorly resourced, which makes it challenging to make decisions quickly and efficiently. Rather than imposing harsher penalties, it should be about investing in skills.”

By prioritising his abstract dream of productivity over the reality of making decent places to live, Osborne risks ushering in a new generation of poorly planned and hastily built housing that will bring none of the community benefits the planning system is there to provide. Instead of relentlessly chipping away at local authorities (as a distraction from addressing the real obstacles to housing supply) he should be strengthening planners’ ability to plan – not to mention lifting the borrowing cap, reviving affordable housing grants and stopping developers squatting on empty land for years.”

http://gu.com/p/4ahhz?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other

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