Not for some time….see the paragraph copied below from http://susiebond.wordpress.com/2014/08/21/one-step-forward-and-two-steps-back/:
‘Following my email to the Planning Policy Manager on the likely date for the adoption of the Local Plan, he responded “At this stage I would not be able to give an adoption date but if things do go along at a decent pace, as I trust they will now do, I would still consider that Summer 2015 could be a reasonable adoption date.”’
Category Archives: Local Plan
Local Plan: do your research, agree the numbers – and then let developers change them!
From EDDC’s latest press release on the very, very delayed Local Plan:
The report to DMC explains that once consultants have provided a full SHMA report that addresses all the issues,
“an industry workshop should be held to consult with housebuilders before a final report can be produced and agreed with all of the commissioning authorities.”
i.e. AFTER the numbers have been decided (presumably taking necessary growth into account) developers will be allowed to change them! Can you honestly see any developer saying “Yeah, that looks about right” or “Oh, no, that’s far too much”!
It’s like a Bank Manager giving a burglar the keys to the vault and asking him to count the money!
A correspondent points out this is a central government initiative not a local one – which doesn’t improve matters one bit!
Source:
http://www.eastdevon.gov.uk/communications_and_consultation.htm?newsid=1174
The current situation with the Local Plan: worse than omnishambles
Below is a comment, left on a previous post, which is repeated here as it contains much useful information:
‘I have now had time to fully digest the report and do some further research and it looks like the LP resubmission is extremely unlikely to be this year, and possibly (if not probably) after the elections in May 2015.
A good starting point for documentation about the activities relating to fixing the Local Plan can be found at http://www.eastdevon.gov.uk/lpsubmission which has a chronology and links to all the major documents.
My analysis of the situation is as follows:
1. The SHMA consultancy contract seems to me to be in a shambles.
However, Section 3 of this recent report gives the breakdown of this Best Practice into 6 stages, and paragraph 3.2 states that the work on the SHMA has only reached the first of the 6 stages in the PAS guidance.
Moreover, in a both letter to the Planning Inspector in mid-April 2014 http://www.eastdevon.gov.uk/lettersinspector12.pdf and the draft action plan of 8 May http://www.eastdevon.gov.uk/actionplan02.pdf attached to a letter to the Planning Inspector on 22 May 2014 http://www.eastdevon.gov.uk/lettertomrthickett220514.pdf Mr Dickens was saying that the SHMA would be available in June 2014.
I have no reason to doubt that Mr Dickens was reporting these dates because that was what he was being told by DCA, but I cannot see how DCA could be reporting in May 2014 that they would finish in June 2014, and yet in August 2014 we have only completed the first of 6 stages to complete the SHMA.
The current report says NOTHING about the state of the SHMA contract with DCA. My experience in public sector outsourcing (having worked on both sides of the fence – though admittedly in IT rather than Planning Policy), this is likely now to be a major issue. DCA is certainly running late (and in consultancy, time is literally money) and so very likely to be running over budget and likely to make a loss on this piece of work, and it seems to me that there is a very high probability that there will need to be major contract renegotiations (DCA will likely claim a “change in scope”, EDDC will deny most of it, arguments will go back and forth – all of which will delay things further), and possibly eventually an agreement for EDDC to spend a lot more money spent to get this work completed by DCA – or worse still the contract being re-let and re-awarded to someone else to start again at the beginning.
So questions I want to know about the DCA contract:
A. Why has the SHMA not been delivered by DCA? Why were they still predicting they would deliver in in June as late as early May, and why were we surprised by its non-delivery with only 1 of 6 stages currently completed?
B. Is DCA still committed to deliver the SHMA within the current contract & existing costs?
If so, what is DCA’s revised schedule, and what happens if they miss it again?
If not, what are the EDDC plans to get the contract back on the rails so that the SHMA can be delivered, and what are the likely timescales and additional costs for revised or new contracts?
2. Timescales
The special DMC meeting on 8 May 2014 http://www.eastdevon.gov.uk/combined_dmc_agenda_080514.pdf page 5 onwards, discusses the draft Action Plan response to the Planning Inspector, and on page 19 there is a timetable which suggests that by now they would be providing “Feedback report on comments received [from the Consultation on the new SHMA] to Development Management Committee” for approval so that “Feedback sent to Inspector” by the end of August.
However if you look at the draft Action Plan, it is clear that there are several other pieces of work to do before Feedback to the Inspector, so this seemed unrealistic even then.
As far as I can see, the following still need to be done:
A. The remaining 5 stages of the SHMA as documented in Section 3 of the current report.
B. The activities described in the draft Action Plan.
C. The activities in the timetable from 8 May.
Personally I cannot see these being completed this year, and I would guess that it might take considerably longer than that.
SUMMARY
The DMC needs to get a grip and take both control and responsibility for the completion of the Local Plan.
They need to find out the state of the contract with DCA and get it back on the rails.
They need to create a robust plan for redelivery of the revised Local Plan to the Inspector, providing additional resources to the Planning Policy unit if that is required to speed things up.‘
The delayed Local Plan – the missing document tracked down and a commentary on it (“What the Dickins”)
An EDA correspondent has tracked down the elusive “attachment” to the agenda of the Development Management Committee regarding the delay to the Local Plan (see post below)
DM260814-Emerging Housing Numbers
and a critique of this document is given below by the same correspondent:
What the Dickins?
A paper by Matt Dickins, EDDC’s Planning Policy Manager, to be presented to Development Mgmt Committee on 26 August (see link above) makes for depressing reading. Residents of East Devon hoping that EDDC will finally be getting its act together on housing land provision will be deeply disappointed.
As many will know, EDDC is obliged to prove that it has an objective evaluation of housing land provision. The absence of such an evaluation, and EDDC’s failure to prove both a five-year land supply and have a Local Plan in place, means that it remains open season for developers. An objective evaluation of housing land need is achieved through the production of a Strategic Housing Market Assessment (SHMA). In his scathing review of EDDC’s draft Local Plan earlier this year Planning Inspector Anthony Thickett called the absence of an up to date SHMA a “serious failing” on the part of the Council. (He also found that EDDC’s argument for 4,000 ‘overspill’ migration numbers, mostly from Exeter, had “no empirical basis”.)
Does Mr Dickins come bearing good news for EDDC and the people of East Devon that the day of the SHMA is at hand? Not at all. His paper comprises six pages of complacent waffle. Notwithstanding that some research should have already been done, “unfortunately there have been delays”. There may need to be discussions with adjacent authorities. (We know that, Mr Dickins. Exeter CC is looking to appropriate East Devon countryside.) While Mr Dickins’ paper points out that demographically East Devon is likely to see a major increase in population from the over 65s – surely implying a need for more sheltered accommodation in towns with services than new build on greenfield sites – his paper concludes lamely that “at this stage it is not possible to provide a timetable for completion of the full SHMA work”! The consequence? “We can only conclude that we do not have a 5 year housing land supply and continue to consider application [sic] accordingly”.
To translate: EDDC has no idea when the SHMA will be finished, it won’t even venture a guess, and in the meantime the lack of a five-year housing land supply [and Local Plan] means that developers will consider to maintain the upper hand in a district where two-thirds of the land is AONB. This is a woeful paper: DMC should send Mr Dickins to the Naughty Step and require him to try again. Time someone got a grip while there is any countryside left in East Devon.
Local Plan delayed again – unlikely to be approved for many months
Recap: our draft Local Plan was thrown out by the Planning Inspector, Mr Thickett, because – oh, so many reasons – mainly because pretty much all of the figures in it were either too old or too unreliable. We were told to go back to the drawing board.
A crucial aspect of a local plan is that there must be a “5 year land supply” – i.e. enough available land to meet the district’s agreed needs for the next 5 years to enable building to start quickly and to keep up with demand. Those local authorities which had persistently underperformed in this area over the previous period were told that they would have to have a 6 year land supply – EDDC was one of those authorities.
Whichever way EDDC seemed to cut it, we never reached that magic 5 or 6 year level. As a result, developers are pretty much given free rein to build anywhere in East Devon unless EDDC can provide very strong reasons that they cannot – this as a result of the Coalition government’s National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF) which ripped up all previous rules and gave the green light to building just about anywhere.
EDDC thereafter took this to heart and passed pretty much anything and everything that came its way (and is still coming its way) from developers. It was left to local communities (Feniton, Seaton, Newton Poppleford) to argue their own corners and find their own money to fight developers. In Feniton and Seaton the communities rallied and defeated them (only to find that, in both places, it seems the developers are coming back to fight again). In Newton Poppleford there was a perverse decision from the DMC – yes to a Clinton Devon Estates development but no to another developer at Badger Close using the same reasoning, but turned on its head for the latter.
EDDC promised the Planning Inspector that there would be a fast review (which had to include dealing with other local authorities in the area where they said that they had run out of space for their developments and needed us to build to take up their shortfall). The Inspector told EDDC that he would be ready to re-examine the draft local plan in October or November 2014.
Bear in mind that the new draft local plan once again had to go out for public consultation – a project that lasts at least 6 weeks and then demands officer time to collate the results. It became pretty obvious that EDDC was not going to meet this target.
Now we have confirmation that this is the case. At the next
Development Management Committee on Tuesday 26 August 2014 at 2 pm
a report is tabled on the agenda entitled “Objectively Assessed Housing Numbers for East Devon – Emerging Work.
On that agenda, currently (21/8/2014 10.40 am) there is supposed to be a link to that report but the link is missing so anyone attempting to read the report will not be able to find it. However, an eagle-eyed correspondent on Councillor Claire Wright’s blog has traced it (unfortunately the link given does not work) and no amount of searching on the EDDC website brings it up. However, this is what the document says:
“At this stage it is not possible to provide a timetable for completion of the full SHMA (strategic housing market assessment) work. There are complexities to the task that will need working through. However, officers of all the authorities involved in the commission are working together to come to a final set of recommendations on the objectively assessed housing numbers for the SHMA as a whole and for the individual authorities”.
It adds “In the meantime based on the available information we can only conclude that we do not have a 5 year housing land supply and continue to consider applications accordingly”.
It then suggests that the growth point area near Skypark will cause many businesses to set up and as a result housing should be factored in to address the extra jobs (see below for a post on those extra jobs which are mostly self-employment and particularly self-employment in the construction industry – ephemeral jobs).
So, the status quo continues. No land supply, happy developers, very, very unhappy residents.
Most new jobs are consultancy or self- employment
The Office for National Statistics (ONS) said that 1.1 million jobs have been created since the start of 2008.
But of those, 732,000 are accounted for by the self-employed, a category of worker that tends to earn roughly half the wages of those in staff jobs.
Construction remains the single biggest sector for self employment.
Source:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-28866302
The mystery is that, if most are in construction (outdoors and not needing much office space)and many self-employed people work from home or at small business hubs (like the East Devon Business Centre that is being demolished to pay for Skypark relocation) why are we building smaller houses and more and more big industrial sheds in East Devon?
Tourism is our biggest industry and our biggest earner – where is the stimulus for it from our district council (apart from flogging the family silver in Exmouth).
EDDC “Tourism Champion” – hello, anyone out there?
East Devon homes cost more than 12 times average annual salaries
Fighting for Feniton – yet again; Wain Homes continues its onslaught
Rumours that Wainhomes is applying to extend its existing site by a further 31 houses are true: plans for these new houses have been on display at the sales office on site. Wainhomes claims that, as a ‘responsible developer’ it’s just to show prospective buyers what might happen, although it’s hard to read this as anything other than marketing houses for which permission has not even been granted. Fight for Feniton understands that one buyer who purchased one of the 50 houses to be built at Winchester Park, and who was assured solemnly that their countryside view would be protected, only discovered otherwise when Wainhomes cheerfully handed them the keys to their new property and said they’d be building 31 more houses, some of which would be blocking their view!
The history of this site is one of development by stealth. Wainhomes’ initial application in 2011 was for a staggering 170 properties stretching from Station Road across to Green Lane. Wainhomes then supposedly ‘listened’ to local opposition, and reduced its proposal to ‘just’ 50 houses, which were eventually allowed at appeal in 2012, despite massive opposition from the village, Parish and District Councils, owing to Feniton’s inadequate infrastructure, narrow roads, minimal employment opportunities and considerable flooding problems.
Wainhomes’ next attack on the village was for an application for 83 units, which was comprehensively thrown out at a ‘Super Inquiry’ of the Planning Inspectorate in January this year: roughly four months after that result was announced, Wainhomes has now come back with its proposal for 31 houses. Let there be no doubt that Wainhomes has no intention of stopping at 31, 83 or anything else until it has concreted over the entire site and built (at least) the 170 it always intended.
It’s the Wainhomes way: the village of Dobwalls, in Cornwall, is faced with a proposal by the same developer to build 62 houses, the local Parish Council being up in arms since their roads are narrow, the infrastructure can’t cope, and it’d increase the size of the village by 20%. Sound familiar? – see
As of writing Wainhomes has only announced its intention to build these extra houses: a formal application is likely to be made in September. Fight for Feniton will continue the battle against inappropriate development in the village. Keep up to date with the latest news by attending Feniton Parish Council meetings, and checking the following websites:
Fight for Feniton
http://theffff.wordpress.com/
blogs for District Councillor Susie Bond
http://www.susiebond.co.uk) and
County Councillor Claire Wright
http://www.claire-wright.org/index.php/site/blog
the East Devon Alliance (http://eastdevonalliance.org/
and of course Feniton Parish Council http://fenitonparishcouncil.wordpress.com/
Dear Mr Thickett …
EDDC does not seem to have written to our Local Plan Planning Inspector since 22 May 2014. He wrote back immediately suggesting October/November 2014 for re-examination.
The next Development Management Committee is scheduled for 23 September 2014 (there is no item on the agenda in August for the Local Plan). Even if the revised Draft Local Plan were ready then (which it won’t be it appears) there would need to be a six week re-consultation period which, even if it started the next day (always assuming we WILL be consulted), would take us to the middle of November and then time would be needed to collate comments so October/November re-examination is looking near impossible. And then, of course, comes Christmas.
Perhaps time for EDDC to write to Mr Thickett again? And perhaps let the public know what is going on – we can assume, of course, that developers are up to speed.
Interesting that all these delays take us just about up to council elections in May 2015 (with or without those missing voters!).
Rural housing – smoke and mirrors
… “But we’re back to smoke-and-mirrors because it is simply not a fact that, once more new houses are built, they mean more new jobs.
Add this to the constant watering-down of agreements concocted in things called “pre-applications” (known as pre-apps for short) and what we see are housing developments, originally given planning permission IF they included a healthy percentage of affordable homes, being built with just one or two per 100.
I do not know many people in the Westcountry who would welcome a politician saying: “We are going to build all these new houses – and just building them is going to create so many new jobs we will have to bring workers in from Eastern Europe to help – then they can live in some of the few affordable homes that have gone up and look for new jobs once the last slate has been put on the last bijou, unaffordable, home.”
But it is exactly the kind of crazy scenario we are looking at when we smash through the smoke-and-mirrors surrounding magic catchphrases like “cut-red-tape” and “seeding economic opportunity”.
Careful development aimed at the region’s many brown-field sites is what is needed first and foremost – not the killing of the beautiful rural goose that lays our golden tourism egg. That seems to be the result of the New Planning Policy Framework which many see as a government induced land-grab or developer’s charter.”
But the plans were on display …
“But the plans were on display…”
“On display? I eventually had to go down to the cellar to find them.”
“That’s the display department.”
“With a flashlight.”
“Ah, well, the lights had probably gone.”
“So had the stairs.”
“But look, you found the notice, didn’t you?”
“Yes,” said Arthur, “yes I did. It was on display in the bottom of a locked filing cabinet stuck in a disused lavatory with a sign on the door saying ‘Beware of the Leopard.”
― Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy
Green field housing estates in the South West – CPRE notes dismay
More on those proposed planning changes
Warehouses to houses, nightclubs to houses, click and collect extensions – can we keep up!
More changes to planning rules …
With only nine months to go to next year’s General Election, the government’s appetite for messing about with the planning system seems to be unabated. De-CLoG has recently published a miscellaneous rag-bag of quite far-reaching proposals for further changes to the planning system aimed (they say) at furthering their objective of streamlining planning.
The government is proposing to tinker with the procedures for neighbourhood plans. They propose to introduce a 10-week time limit for LPAs to respond to applications for a neighbourhood area to be designated (or for a community right-to-build proposal), as well as modifying pre-submission, consultation and publicity requirements for neighbourhood plans. The requirement for a six-week consultation period on a proposal for a neighbourhood plan would be removed, but affected landowners would have to be consulted. The changes will also address the need to comply with the Strategic Environmental Assessment Directive. The general aim is to speed up the Neighbourhood Plan-making process, and to reduce the ability of reluctant LPAs and opposing developers to disrupt or delay Neighbourhood Plans.
These proposals are most probably prompted by the limited take-up of neighbourhood plans so far, and the difficulties and delays that have been encountered by those who have embarked on the neighbourhood planning process. The government’s aim seems to be to beef up Neighbourhood Plans in an effort to demonstrate in their next election manifesto that they have put ‘localism’ into action, whereas these much-vaunted initiatives have proved up to now to be a rather damp squib, and are unlikely to counter the impression that the government effectively strangled localism at birth by imposing a requirement on LPAs to approve significantly more development in their areas, whether their councillors or voters like it or not.
This is the one area of change among those proposed in this consultation paper that would appear to require primary legislation. The government says that it intends to introduce new legislation to implement any changes at the earliest opportunity, subject to the parliamentary process. It may in practice prove difficult to introduce and pass such legislation in the time left in this parliament, in which case these ideas about neighbourhood plans could end up being no more than Tory manifesto commitments – a convenient fig-leaf to cover the nakedness of their originally much-trumpeted notions of Localism.
More changes to the General Permitted Development Order are proposed to enable further changes of use in addition to those previously introduced within the past two years. These will include the change of use of light industrial units (B1(c)), warehouses and storage units (B8) and some sui generis uses (launderettes, amusement arcades/centres, casinos and nightclubs) to residential use (C3), and changes of some sui generis uses to restaurants (C3) and leisure uses (D2).
In addition to these changes, the government is also considering making permanent those permitted development rights which currently expire in May 2016. This flies in the face of the growing opposition among some LPAs to office-to-residential conversions, so this proposal can be expected to cause quite an outcry.
First, the existing time limit for completing office-to-residential conversions that have obtained prior approval will be extended from 30 May 2016 to 30 May 2019. But a revised PD right for change of use from office to residential use is intended to be introduced from May 2016 (so it is entirely dependent on the rather doubtful prospect of the Tories securing a majority at the next General Election). It will replace the existing PD right, and the exemptions which apply to the current PD right will not be extended to apply to the new PD right. The amended Class J will still be subject to prior approval in relation to highways and transport, flooding and contamination risk, but in future (i.e. after May 2016) it will also be subject to a consideration of the potential impact of the significant loss of the most strategically important office accommodation (although this criterion will be tightly defined).
The right to build larger domestic extensions (under Part 1), currently expiring in May 2016, is also to be made permanent. A single storey rear extension or conservatory that extends beyond the rear wall by between four metres and eight metres for a detached house, and by between three metres and six metres for any other type of house, will be PD, subject to neighbour consultation for these larger householder extensions, which will continue to require prior approval by the LPA.
The right to make alterations to commercial premises has not so far been extended to shops, and so it is now proposed that the GPDO should be extended to allow retailers to alter their premises. PD rights are also proposed to facilitate commercial filming, the installation of larger solar panels on commercial buildings, minor alterations within waste management facilities and for sewerage undertakers, and further extensions (in addition to those already allowed) to houses and business premises.
There is also a proposal to limit the compensation payable where an Article 4 Direction is made to remove permitted development rights. (Any planning lawyer’s hackles will rises at that.)
It is also proposed to amend the Fees Regulations for prior approval applications. Where the permitted development is for change of use only, and a prior approval is required, a fee of £80 will apply. Where the permitted development is for change of use and allows for some physical development and prior approval is required a fee of £172 will apply, including change of use from sui generi to residential. Where a prior approval is required to carry out physical development it is intended to introduce a fee of £80, including for the erection of a structure in a retail car park or the installation of solar panels on a non-domestic building.
While mucking about with the GPDO, the government has decided that it is high time to consolidate this much-amended Order. But consolidation is no more than window-dressing; what the GPDO really needs is thorough re-drafting, to remove the numerous anomalies and ambiguities that have plagued us all for far too long.
Turning to the Use Classes Order, contrary to the general trend, but unsurprisingly, there is a proposal to restrict Class A2, so that betting offices and pay-day loan shops (both currently falling within this Use Class) would become sui generis uses. Planning permission will be required in future for a change of use to either of those uses.
Other changes include the possible merger of Use Classes A1 and A2 (perhaps with other ‘town centre’ uses), so as to create a much more flexible range of uses in our High Streets. [Somebody in De-CLoG seems to have been reading old posts in this blog again!] This will be accompanied by a further amendment of the GPDO to allow change of use to the widened retail (A1) class from betting shops and pay day loan shops (A2), restaurants and cafés (A3), drinking establishments (A4), and hot food takeaways (A5). The existing PD right to allow the change of use from A1 and A2 to a flexible use for a period of two years will remain, as will the right to allow for up to two flats above, and the change of use to residential (C3). On the other hand, the Government proposes to remove the existing PD rights applying to the A2 use class, so as to allow LPAs to control these developments.
With effect from 10 May 2006, any internal increase in floorspace of 200 square metres or more (including the introduction of mezzanine floors) in a building in non-food retail use has been included within the definition of development under section 55, and requires planning permission. As previously announced, the government intends to increase the limit to allow retailers to build a mezzanine floor (but they have not yet settled on a maximum floorspace limit).
Sainsbury’s confirm they will not be needing their massive M5 site in the EDDC district
Many will recall that there was considerable scepticism from many quarters at the time that this project would ever progress. And with it goes the so-called “inter-modal freight depot” which was also talked up too soon and too much. Eggs … baskets.
The site is included in the draft local plan – what now? Another developer for a depot or more housing (but no new jobs for anyone who might live in them)? Cranbrook had been developed with the idea of hundreds if not thousands of jobs on this site. Sainsbury’s currently retains ownership of the site so calls all the shots.
EDDC loses not only the project but also the promise of vital infrastructure which went with it – and see below re the lack of an agreed Community Infrastrructure Levy in the district and its implications.
And now another possible consequence of our Local Plan omnishambles
As well as having no Local Plan EDDC also has no Community Infrastructure Levy (CIL)as the Planning Inspector threw out EDDC’s plan for this at the sMe time.
Now, in a rather lawyerly article, is seems that this will cause major problems for infrastructure in East Devon if we do not have a charging schedule by April 2015.
… “These provisions [CIL] present a real and significant restriction on the use of s106 agreements to secure infrastructure payments or provision, and therefore a serious risk of funding gaps becoming an issue (if they are not already), particularly in relation to the pooling provisions, which may be a concern from ‘day one’ as authorities will need to look back to all planning obligations given since 2010.
If CIL is being charged, and a Reg 123 list has been published, then authorities may feel more in control of the situation but if not they may find themselves determining applications for development proposals which will have significant infrastructure demands and finding that they cannot rely on developer covenants in order to mitigate those impacts.” …
5 year land supply for dummies
Just in case some of our councillors or officers were “away” when this blew up or perhaps haven’t read their papers on the subject:
http://www.pas.gov.uk/local-planning/-/journal_content/56/332612/3757749/ARTICLE
Local Independent councillors share their views on “localism”
Another developer’s appeal refused in an AONB despite no Local Plan
… “The inspector also concurred that the fields formed part of the setting for the area of outstanding natural beauty (AONB) celebrated in Laurie Lee’s memoir Cider with Rosie, and was therefore valued landscape that the government’s National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF) should protect.
As in many areas the lack of a local plan had left the land exposed under the NPPF’s presumption in favour of sustainable development. Yet the inspector’s decision establishes that land can be a valued landscape even without official designation, and that the lack of a local plan for meeting housing targets did not necessarily undermine the protection that our countryside merits.”
Why do so many developers apply for outline planning permission rather than full planning permission?
A possible reason is given in a comment on a blog quoted below which is about a shortage of planning officers due to cuts:
“The reason for the gap is developers have found a gap. They go for outline planning permission with the minimum of detail hoping the details will be left to reserved matters, and with planning departments under pressure to provide housing, the developer hopes he can push the development through with the minimum of restrictions Laurie Pocock”
East Devon Watch 