If the test flights are successful it could lead to hybrid-electric aircraft zipping about the region.
It follows a successful bid to UK Research and Innovation’s £30 [M?] Future Flight Challenge from a consortium led by electric aviation firm Ampaire.
The consortium – which also includes Rolls-Royce Electrical, University of Nottingham, Loganair Ltd, Exeter and Devon Airport Ltd, Cornwall Airport Ltd, Heart of the South West LEP, and UK Power Network Services – has received £2.4m from the Future Flight Challenge for its £5m 2ZERO (Towards Zero Emissions in Regional Aircraft Operations) programme.
It involves putting in place and testing the infrastructure needed to enable electric planes to operate within existing airport and airline operations.
The 2ZERO project is running from December 2020 to May 2022. It will see electric aircraft test flights taking off at Exeter Airport and flying to Newquay Airport.
The demonstration flights will be carried out using Ampaire’s six-seat Electric EEL aircraft and, in a later phase, with a 19-seat Eco Otter, hybrid-electric retrofit of the workhorse Twin Otter commuter aircraft. These test aircraft will be used to develop and evaluate requirements for a fully integrated electric aviation infrastructure.
The 2ZERO team believes an effective demonstration of hybrid-electric aircraft in an integrated system, including the necessary charging and battery storage infrastructure, could lead to a fundamental shift in regional airline operations.
Emissions would be reduced by up to 70% with hybrid-electric aircraft and entirely with a subsequent generation of all-electric aircraft.
Successful demonstration up to 19 seats and 1 MW of power will help to shape regulations and standards which currently have gaps for these new classes of aircraft and airport operations.
2ZERO is seen as an important step towards being part of an exciting new market, forecast by UBS to be worth US$178billion to US$192billion globally between 2028 and 2040.
Andrew Bell, chief executive of Regional and City Airports, the owner of Exeter Airport, said: “Our 2ZERO programme is incredibly exciting for us and the South West region.
“Exeter is an important regional airport and this project really puts us on the map as a forward-looking airport and demonstrates our commitment, along with our partners, to making the future of aviation a sustainable one.”
Karl Tucker, chair of HotSW LEP, said: “We’re delighted to be part of this successful consortium bid to UKRI. The South West has so much to offer, including boasting the most highly skilled workforce in the aerospace sector and our smart aviation cluster.
“This programme is a huge step forwards in transforming the future of air travel and helping the UK to achieve its target of net carbon flights by 2050.”
Susan Ying, Ampaire senior vice president for Global Partnerships, said: “For electric aviation to become commonplace, and play a significant role in reducing greenhouse gases, we need to look at not only electric aircraft but the entire ecosystem to support electric aviation. That will be a key aim of the 2ZERO programme.”
“Councils should not hide details of their borrowing and investments from the public” an Information Tribunal has ruled in a decision that will help to shine a light on local authorities’ risky investment practices.
“Responsibility for holding local authorities to account for their borrowing and spending decisions ultimately falls on voters. Voters must be informed to make those decisions.” – Meg Hillier, Chair Public Accounts Committee
Argument that disclosure “would damage the council’s commercial interests” – rejected
This is an another exampled of a Conservative Council trying to hide its “secret deals” behind a screen of “commercial sensitivity”. They have been successfully called out by The Bureau of Investigative Journalism.
Councils should not hide details of their borrowing and investments from the public, a tribunal has ruled in a decision that will help to shine a light on local authorities’ risky investment practices.
In a victory for campaigners, a freedom of information tribunal has ordered Thurrock council in Essex to disclose which councils it borrowed £800 million from and what “green energy” deals the money financed.
The council took out loans from more than 150 local authorities and then poured more than £800 million into what it believed to be money-spinning renewable energy ventures. This may have been a breach of guidelines which state councils should not borrow in an attempt to make a profit.
Last year The Times revealed that in one £145 million solar power deal the council paid £5 million of taxpayers’ cash in commission to a globetrotting supercar fan.
The loans and investments were overseen by Sean Clark, the council’s finance director, who was also responsible for dealing with finance requests under the Freedom of Information Act. He rejected an FoI request from the Bureau of Investigative Journalism to reveal which councils Thurrock had borrowed from and what deals that money had financed, arguing that it would damage the council’s commercial interests. His decision was upheld by the information commissioner.
The Bureau pursued the case, supported by The Times, and this week the tribunal rejected the council’s argument, saying there was “significant public interest in transparency”.
Meg Hillier, chairwoman of the Commons public accounts committee, said: “Responsibility for holding local authorities to account for their borrowing and spending decisions ultimately falls on voters. Voters must be informed to make those decisions.”
Owl has found a fuller quote from Meg Hillier:
“I applaud the determination of The Bureau for pursuing this and winning a victory for taxpayers.
As the information rights tribunal judge says – responsibility for holding local authorities to account for their borrowing and spending decisions ultimately falls on voters. Voters must be informed to make those decisions. Let the public judge what level of risk they are content to bear with the money they pay in taxes for essential local services.“
Challenges posed by the covid pandemic have made it an incredibly tough year. As with all attractions, it has had to close for much of the past 12 months. But now the need “to undertake substantial, costly renovations to the attraction’s exhibitions” have led the trust to decide now is the time to hand over to another manager.
Owned by East Devon District Council, Seaton Jurassic opened in 2016 and a quarter of a million people have now visited to explore its interpretation of the story of life and its evolution from the Jurassic to the present day.
Devon Wildlife Trust’s Chief Executive, Harry Barton, said: “We’re very proud of what we have achieved at Seaton Jurassic over the past five years. The team of staff and volunteers we’ve built have done great work establishing the centre. We have also developed good and supportive partnerships with East Devon District Council and the wider community of Seaton.”
Councillor Nick Hookway, East Devon District Council’s portfolio holder for tourism, sports, leisure and culture, said: “We’re very sorry to hear this news but understand that the pandemic has had a dramatic impact on many, including Devon Wildlife Trust (DWT) and East Devon District Council (EDDC). Our partnership at Seaton Jurassic has been of immense benefit to the town and the many visitors that have enjoyed Seaton Jurassic.”
Councillor Paul Arnott, East Devon District Council’s leader, added: “We cannot let this moment pass without thanking the huge number of volunteers from Seaton who have given so much time to keep the centre going against the odds. EDDC will ensure that any future plans are the subject of a full community engagement with the people of Seaton.”
A shocking re-inspection of Devon’s NHS 111 and out of hours GP service has found that patients are still not all receiving safe care or treatment – six months after major failings were exposed.
[Owl would feel more confident if less use was made of stock buzz phrases such as: “build back better”]
Devon Doctors Limited, which is based in Exeter and provides an Urgent Integrated Care Service (UICS) across Devon and Somerset, was inspected by independent health and social care regulator the Care Quality Commission (CQC) in July 2020, after concerns were raised about the service, including safety fears and insufficient staffing to meet expected demand.
Following the focused inspection, the CQC imposed a timeframe to make urgent improvements after ‘deep rooted issues’ were identified.
‘Significant’ shortfalls in systems were uncovered which led to delays to care and treatment; call answering targets were not consistently being met; there were often adequate numbers of staff; and governance processes were not effective.
A further focused inspection was conducted between December 7 to 9, to follow up on the urgent conditions imposed.
However, due to further concerns found during the visit, a full comprehensive inspection was instead carried out and it has since been rated inadequate and placed in special measures.
The report from that inspection has been published today, March 17. Key findings include:
Sufficient numbers of staff available to run the service were inconsistent to ensure risk was minimised and the service could respond quickly to an increase in demand.
Risks to patients were not adequately assessed, monitored or managed to maintain patient safety.
Overall service performance was not always consistently monitored in a way that ensured patient safety.
There was a lack of clarity on how significant events and risks were identified and managed. Improvement was still needed to ensure learning and actions taken from incidents were understood and acted on by all relevant staff.
There were risks of patients not receiving effective care or treatment.
There were shortfalls in systems and processes that did always not enable safe and effective care to be provided.
There were still shortfalls in some of the personal development and support provision for staff.
There were shortfalls in communication between senior leaders and staff groups, and staff did not consider they had been fully engaged in the running of the service.
Governance arrangements were not consistent to support the delivery of a safe, effective and well-led service in a consistent manner.
Devon Doctors received an overall rating of ‘inadequate’. It was deemed as requiring improvements for its services to be safe, caring and responsive, and inadequate for being effective and well-led.
However, inspectors highlighted how staff were kind and caring, and responsive to patients‘ needs. It was also noted that performance levels had shown signs of improvement and were now in line with national performance levels.
Dr Rosie Benneyworth, chief inspector of Primary Medical Services and Integrated Care, said: “We extended the timescales for the urgent conditions to be met, as evidence gathered during this inspection showed some improvement, but it was insufficient to deem that the urgent conditions had been met.
“In addition, we imposed two new urgent conditions on the provider’s registration relating to taking calls from the NHS 111 national contingency service.
“National contingency is a systematic process available to all NHS 111 providers in England. This enables any other NHS 111 services nationally to route telephone calls of another provider during periods of high demand.
“The second condition was for the provider to produce duty rotas which clearly showed which staff were scheduled to work across the service; which staff actually worked; and reasons for absence of staff.
“We also made requirements related to meeting the fundamental standards; complaints handling; provision of staff training, appraisals and supervision; and health and safety.”
The service has now been put in special measures which means it will be inspected again within six months.
If insufficient improvements have been made, the CQC can begin the process of preventing the provider from operating the service.
The service will be kept under review and if needed could be escalated to urgent enforcement action.
Dr Rosie Benneyworth concluded: “Special measures will give people who use the service the reassurance that the care they get should improve.”
Devon Doctors has nine treatment centres in Devon, which are open at various times throughout the week and weekends to provide the out of hours GP service. It also has five treatment centres in Somerset.
Devon Doctors is responsible for providing the NHS 111 service and out of hours service in Devon and Somerset.
The NHS 111 service for Somerset is subcontracted to another provider. Devon Doctors Limited remains responsible for any services which it subcontracts out as the main contract holder.
Staff employed by Devon Doctors Limited include; call handlers, drivers, reception staff, GPs, nurse practitioners, call centre coordinators and supporting office staff holding lead roles such as clinical governance, recruitment, rotas and medicines.
Supporting staff also include communication and information governance staff. These members of staff are led by a management team overseen by a board of directors.
The out of hours service operates between 6pm and 8am Monday to Friday, and 24 hours on Saturdays, Sundays and bank holiday. The NHS 111 aspect of the service provision operates 24 hours a day, all year round.
A spokesperson for Devon Doctors said: “We recognise that we have fallen short of the high standards which characterised Devon Doctors Group services over more than two decades.
“We can only apologise that of late the care received by users of our integrated urgent care services in Devon and Somerset has not been as good as it should have been, while our staff and clinicians haven’t always enjoyed the level of support they might reasonably have expected.
“While putting patients first has always been our overriding objective, it has become apparent that, as Devon Doctors Group has grown and its responsibilities have swelled, some parts of the organisation have struggled to keep pace.
“Remedying this has not been easy and it has taken us longer than we would have hoped to resolve all the concerns raised by the CQC.
“However, after a year of unprecedented challenges, progress is being made. For instance, we have already: recruited significantly more staff; implemented heightened safeguarding measures; improved infection control procedures; and introduced enhanced governance processes.
“In addition, we acted swiftly to affect significant changes in personnel. A number of senior employees have left the organisation, which has been boosted by the recruitment of a number of new directors, and senior managers, with proven track records in the delivery of healthcare.
“Over the coming months, working in tandem with the CQC, National Health Service England (NHSE), our commissioners, and other healthcare partners, Devon Doctors Group will do whatever it takes to build back better and restore the confidence of service users, and other stakeholders, in our integrated urgent care services.
“In the meantime, patients in Devon and Somerset should continue to ‘Think 111 First’ when they need to swiftly and directly access urgent health services in Devon and Somerset. “
The prime minister’s former aide, Dominic Cummings, has criticised the Department of Health as “a smoking ruin in terms of procurement and PPE” at the start of the pandemic.
Note this was an aside, the “Disrupter in Chief” was actually giving evidence to MPs on the Science and Technology Committee about the creation of the Advanced Research and Invention Agency know as Aria.
Last four paragraphs from National Audit Office report summary: “Timeliness of local auditor reporting on local government in England, 2020”, under the heading “Underlying weaknesses of the local audit system”:
The COVID-19 pandemic has exacerbated problems which already existed within the local audit landscape. Our previous reports and consultation with the sector identified several long-standing problems within local audit. There is insufficient staff with the relevant qualifications, skills and experience in both local finance teams and firms serving the local audit sector, and a net loss of qualified staff from both. The requirements of International Financial Reporting Standards, along with the increased expectations from the Financial Reporting Council (FRC) following the high-profile corporate failures such as Carillion, have combined to produce a significant increase in audit work, such as on asset and pensions valuations, which local authorities found less useful. The relative lack of attractiveness of the audit of local public bodies, compared with alternative audit opportunities available to staff, has contributed to a high staff turnover level. Competing workload pressures, both within the finance function and elsewhere in local authorities, diverted staff resources from completing working papers and preparing accounts within the time available for submission to the external auditors which made the preparation of accounts increasingly challenging (paragraphs 2.15 to 2.22).
The Committee of Public Accounts has continued to express concern about the system of local audit. The Department recognised these concerns and in July 2019 commissioned the Redmond Review to review the local audit landscape. The committee recommended that the review should ensure that concerns over current fee levels and the contribution of external audit to governance are examined fully and rigorously. The committee also recommended that the review should assess if external audit was providing an effective service and meeting the needs of local authorities (paragraph 1.13).
The Redmond Review reported in September 2020 and recommended major changes in the organisation and regulation of local audit in England. The Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government stated, on publication of the Redmond Review, that he would consider the findings and recommendations carefully and remained committed to strengthening the local audit system, so that it worked more effectively for taxpayers and councils. The Department’s response accepted some of the recommendations of the review and recognised the findings regarding the fragility of the local audit market, agreeing that urgent action is required. The Department set out actions to support market stability, to alleviate some of the immediate funding and timing pressures facing audit firms and local authorities, but decided to consider further the central recommendation to establish a new independent regulator for local audit (paragraphs 1.14 to 1.17).
Concerns over the quality of local audit have been raised by the FRC in its report on local audits in October 2020. The FRC inspected 15 financial statement audits in 2019-20 across seven local audit firms. It described the overall results as concerning, with only 40% of audits judged good or requiring no more than limited improvement, down from 64% in 2018-19. The FRC said that urgent action was required from some of the firms, to take appropriate action to respond to the findings and ensure improvements were made in audit quality, given the deterioration in quality in the year (paragraphs 2.25 to 2.29).
Conclusion
Given the increasing financial challenge and service pressures on local authorities since 2010, local councils need strong arrangements to manage finances and secure value for money. External auditors have a key role in providing independent assurance on whether these arrangements are strong enough and recommending any action. The late delivery of 2019-20 audit opinions is concerning, given the important part that external audit plays in assurance over taxpayers’ money both centrally and locally.
The London mayoral election and other local elections are to be changed to the First Past the Post system under plans being considered by the Government.
Priti Patel said the voting system for combined authority mayors, the mayor of London election and police and crime commissioners will all be changed.
Announcing the move, the Home Secretary said that First Past the Post “provides for strong and clear local accountability”.
The voting system awards seats to whoever has the highest vote count and does not take preferences into account.
The planned changes will need to be confirmed through Government legislation and will not be in place before the upcoming local elections on May 6.
Prime Minister Boris Johnson included in his 2019 election manifesto a pledge to further roll out the voting system, which is used for General Elections, at a local level.
The mayoral election in the capital is currently decided through a preference vote.
Two candidates go through to the second round if no one gets more than 50 per cent of the primary vote. A winner is then chosen by taking preferences into account from voters who chose eliminated candidates as their first preference.
In a ministerial written statement on Tuesday, Ms Patel said “transferable voting systems were rejected by the British people in the 2011 nationwide referendum”. Therefore, she said, local elections should be changed to reflect that.
Tony Travers, local government expert at the London School of Economics, said the change would “wipe out” many smaller parties like the Lib Dems and the Greens if it applied to the London Assembly.
The London Assembly is a 25-member body that holds the city’s mayor to account. It is made up of members directly elected through First Past the Post, and others who are elected through proportional London-wide voting.
“It’s hard to imagine them having the mayor and not the whole assembly as First Past the Post and if that happens it would disadvantage the Greens, Ukip and the Lib Dems,” he told City AM.
“It works very very well for the biggest and the second biggest party in the country.”
The London Mayor was created in 2000 following a referendum 1998. The type of voting system to elect the mayor was not on the referendum paper.
London Labour said the move amounted to “breathtaking arrogance” from the Government. A spokesperson said: “The people of London voted overwhelmingly in a referendum in 1998 for the creation of the Mayor of London in which voters would be able to state a first and second preference candidate.
“It’s a fairer system that promotes a wide choice for voters and it has served Londoners well for over twenty years and there’s no groundswell for a change.
“For the Tory Government to impose a change to the electoral system without first asking the views of Londoners in a follow-up referendum demonstrates their breathtaking arrogance and their utter disdain for devolution.”
The Standard has approached City Hall and the Home Office for comment on the move.
Public support for a statutory public inquiry into the UK’s handling of the Covid-19 pandemic is running more than twice as high as opposition to the idea, exclusive polling for the Guardian has revealed.
As a growing number of doctors, nurses, scientists and the bereaved call on the prime minister to trigger a formal independent investigation, 47% of people said they supported a public inquiry which has legal powers to compel people to give evidence under oath. Only 18% said they were opposed. 35% said they neither supported or opposed it or didn’t know, according to polling carried out by ICM last weekend.
The top priority among those wanting an inquiry was an investigation into the government’s preparedness for a pandemic which has left the UK with the highest mortality rate of any of the world’s largest economies. The death toll among people who tested positive reached 125,690 on Tuesday.
Those polled believe an inquiry’s next highest priorities should be examining how the UK controlled the movement of people through its borders and the timing and strategy of lockdowns, which epidemiologists have already concluded cost lives.
The focus on lockdowns comes amid reports that the prime minister Boris Johnson now regrets not locking down earlier in March 2020 and that he believes the advice he was receiving about infection spread was based on out of date projections.
Protection of care home residents, around 40,000 of whom died with Covid; the provision and procurement of PPE, which has been mired in allegations of cronyism; and the effectiveness of NHS test and trace, which parliament’s public accounts committee last week said had failed to avert further lockdowns despite a £37bn two-year budget, were the next priorities.
The highest levels of support for a statutory inquiry are in the north of England, Northern Ireland, Wales and the south-west, the poll revealed.
It follows calls by scientists, doctors, nurses, the bereaved and minority ethnic leaders for Boris Johnson to finally announce an independent inquiry with powers to compel witnesses to attend and to order the disclosure of documents. Downing Street said this week “now is not the right time to devote huge amounts of official time to an inquiry”.
A government spokesperson said: “There will be an appropriate time in the future to look back, analyse and reflect on all aspects of this global pandemic.”
Senior figures in the UK’s Covid response including Prof John Edmunds and Prof Andrew Hayward, who sit on the government’s scientific advisory group for emergencies (Sage), have spoken in support of an inquiry, while the former head of the civil service Lord Kerslake said it would be “criminal not to learn lessons”.
Amid increasing pressure on the prime minister to set up a statutory inquiry, the British Medical Association and the Royal College of Nursing also called for an inquiry, while Lord Woolley, the former chair of the advisory group to the government’s race disparity unit, said a public examination into the impact of Covid, which has disproportionately hit BAME communities, is a chance to rethink the nation’s social infrastructure.
Covid-19 Bereaved Families for Justice, which represents more than 2,800 families who lost loved ones during the pandemic, welcomed the poll as vindication of its calls since last summer for a full public inquiry.
“It’s as plain as day we need a proper public inquiry into the government’s handling of the pandemic,” said Jo Goodman, co-founder of the group, who lost her father, Stuart, to Covid. “Just one in five people think otherwise and as more and more information comes to light ever more people are realising how crucial this is for the whole country. This is a generation-defining crisis and if the government doesn’t learn from its mistakes then how will it save lives in the future.”
But in a sign that a decision on launching an inquiry – which is in the hands of the prime minister – could become highly political, the poll of more than 2,000 adults showed that Labour and Liberal Democrat voters at the 2019 general election were almost twice as likely to want an inquiry as Conservative supporters. The prime minister is likely to consider the impact of any conclusions from a public inquiry which could take several years may co-incide on the next general election expected no later than May 2024. Opponents of a public inquiry fear it could take years and an adversarial process that places as much emphasis on accountability as learning may hinder rather than help attempts to correct mistakes, in the short term at least.
Honiton Forward has been delighted by the response from members of the community who wish to stand for election as Honiton Independents for the Community (HICS).
[Owl notes that existing Town Councillors are trying to “hang on”, we have seen this sort of thing before haven’t we?]
A high calibre collection of candidates, of all ages and backgrounds, have put themselves forward and it is already clear that the Council would be safe in their hands.
Once their nominations are confirmed, it will be announced who they are and they will tell you why they want to be Town Councillors.
Meanwhile, remaining Town Councillors are trying to reduce the number of seats available for public election and instead co-opt a new member in themselves at the next full meeting in April.
The clear message to the Council for the past year has been that the community wants an election for all seats on the Council.
No one who believes in democracy could possibly apply for a co-opted seat when it is possible to stand for election and no fair-minded council would seek to fill a seat this way.
This “explains” how economic indices have been used to prioritise the distribution of the “Levelling Up” fund. Whether these funds replace what has been stripped out from Local Authorities over the years is another question – Owl
Maybe we should just call it another “mutant algorithm”?
This note sets out the methodology used to develop an index of priority places for the Levelling Up Fund. The methodology was developed to help the Fund deliver its core objective of improving local communities by investing in local infrastructure that has a visible impact on people. The Fund will achieve this by focusing on:
Town centre and high street regeneration, including remediation and repurposing of vacant and brownfield sites;
Improving local transport connectivity and infrastructure, including upgrades to local bus, road and cycle infrastructure; and
Maintaining and regenerating cultural, heritage and civic assets.
The index places local authorities into categories 1,2 or 3, depending on their identified level of need, with category 1 representing places deemed in most need of investment through this Fund. We will use the categories for two main purposes:
Across Great Britain, each place’s category will form one part of the process for assessing bids, as part of the ‘characteristics of place’ criteria, alongside the other 3 criteria – deliverability, value for money and strategic fit. While preference will be given to bids from higher priority areas, the bandings do not represent eligibility criteria, nor the amount or number of bids a place can submit. Bids from places in all categories will still be considered for funding on their merits of deliverability, value for money and strategic fit, and could still be successful if they are of high enough quality.
In England, category 1 places will be eligible to receive targeted capacity funding, to support them in preparing high-quality bids (all places in Scotland and Wales are eligible for capacity funding, independent of their place in the index).
General principles
The index was developed in accordance with the following core principles:
1. That any metrics used should be chosen in support of targeting places in need of the following, in line with the objectives of the fund:
economic recovery and growth (indicator 1)
improved transport connectivity (indicator 2)
regeneration (indicator 3)
2. That any data used should be publicly available, so that the calculations behind the index rankings are fully transparent.
3. That any comparison of need between places in different nations should be made using a consistent set of GB-wide metrics only.
4. That, in line with the Fund’s delivery geographies, the index should cover the following institutions (referred to as ‘eligible LAs’ throughout this document):
District councils, metropolitan and London boroughs and unitary authorities in England; and
Unitary authorities in Scotland and Wales.
The key challenge of developing a methodology in accordance with the above priorities was a lack of availability of GB-wide data to measure both regeneration and transport connectivity.
To address this, an approach was taken to ensure that additional England, Scotland and Wales-specific data could be incorporated into the index without jeopardising principle 3 above – the need to be consistent when comparing places across borders.
This approach comprised two steps:
Step 1: a GB-wide index was developed at eligible LA level, using only data available GB-wide, and used to determine the number of places that would be in categories 1, 2 and 3 across England, Scotland, and Wales.
Step 2: distinct indices for England, Scotland and Wales were developed at eligible LA level with both GB-wide and nation-specific data and used to determine the specific list of places that would be in categories 1, 2 and 3 within each nation.
Choice of metrics
The metrics used at each step of the process were as follows:
Step 1: This step uses GB-wide data only, measuring ‘need for economic recovery and growth’ – indicator 1 identified above, incorporating standard metrics measuring places’:
Productivity, measured using gross value added (GVA) per hour;
16+ Unemployment rate; and
Skills, measured using the proportion of the working-age population without a national vocational qualification (NVQ).
These metrics were chosen to best align with the fund’s focus on bringing investment to areas of low productivity and those lacking in labour market opportunities and economic resilience (as measured by unemployment rate and skills), as set out in the prospectus.
Step 2: This step uses the following data, by nation, to measure ‘need for improved transport connectivity’ (in England only) and ‘need for regeneration’ in addition to ‘need for economic recovery and growth’, the last of which is measured in the same way as in step 1. These metrics were chosen based on availability – for example, there was no publicly-available data on journey times for Scotland and Wales, or an equivalent alternative, so transport connectivity was not assessed in the Welsh and Scottish national indices:
Need for improved transport connectivity (indicator 2, data only available within England):
England: Average journey times to employment centres by car, public transport and bike.
Need for regeneration (indicator 3):
England: commercial and dwelling vacancy rates.
Scotland: dwelling vacancy rates (commercial vacancy rate date not available at time of calculation).
Wales: commercial and dwelling vacancy rates.
The average journey time metric was chosen (where available) to best align with the Fund’s focus on bringing transport upgrades to places with poor connectivity and identifying parts of England where local transport networks may be limiting local economies.
The commercial and dwelling vacancy rate metrics were chosen a proxy for places’ need for regeneration, given the Fund’s particular focus on repurposing and regenerating vacant and brownfield sites on high streets and within town centres.
The selection of metrics as set out above was subject to ministerial approval at the design stage based on alignment with the policy goals of the fund. Ministers did not see a list of specific places before agreeing the list of metrics. At no point did Ministers make changes to the index, weightings or metrics recommended by officials.
Banding process
The 368 eligible LAs in Great Britain were divided into roughly equal bands, with 123 places in category 1, 123 in category 2 and 122 in category 3 respectively.
Step 1: To determine the number of category 1, 2 and 3 ‘slots’ to assign to each nation, a GB-wide index was created to rank places against criterion A (need for economic recovery and growth) only, which contains only GB-wide data weighted as follows:
Table 1: GB-wide index seeking to capture places’ need for economic recovery and growth (criterion A) at the eligible LA level
Target metric
Indicator
Data source (year)
Weight
Productivity
Natural log of GVA per hour worked(1)
ONS (2018); For any LA that had changed boundaries since 2018, a data point was constructed using population sizes and the previous LA statistics
(33.3%)
Unemployment
Estimates of unemployment rate in the 16+ population
ONS model-based estimates of unemployment rates (October 2019 – September 2020) in the first instance; Where data was not available for an LA, ONS raw estimates of unemployment rates over aggregated geographies (October 2019 – September 2020) were used
(33.3%)
Skills
Proportion of the 16-64 population without NVQ qualifications
ONS (January 2019 – December 2019) in the first instance; Where data was not available for an LA, ONS estimates over aggregated geographies(2) (January 2019 – December 2019) were usedd
(33.3%)
1 ‘Natural logs are used to compare places according to the relative difference in their productivity levels rather than according to the absolute difference in their productivity levels.
2 ‘ONS aggregated data based on counties, unitary authorities, and groups of districts in England, groups of unitary authorities in Wales, and groups of council areas in Scotland.
Rationale for choice of indicators and weightings:
As set out above, the GB index seeks to measure places’ need on a consistent and comparable basis. Due to data availability, the GB-comparison could only be performed on the basis of indicator 1 – on measures of productivity, unemployment and skills – because this is where common GB-wide datasets were available. Within this indicator, each metric was applied with equal weight.
Had full and consistent datasets been available for indicators 1, 2 and 3 across Great Britain, a comprehensive GB-wide ranking would have been performed. This approach was prevented by data limitations, as already addressed.
Construction of GB-wide index
For each indicator, values were indexed to allow for consistent comparison of values across indicators in different units. The smallest value in the dataset was set to 0 and the largest value set to 100. All other values were allocated a score between 0 and 100 based on their relative distance from the minimum and maximum dataset values.
The composite index score was then calculated for each eligible LA by taking an average of the index scores, weighed according to the weights displayed in Table 1.
For the metrics outlined in Table 1, this resulted in the following assignment of category 1, 2 and 3 places between England, Scotland and Wales:
Table 2: Number of category 1, 2 and 3 slots assigned to England, Scotland and Wales respectively following step 1
Category
Number of LAs in England
Number of LAs in Scotland
Number of LAs in Wales
Total
1
93
13
17
123
2
108
12
3
123
3
113
7
2
122
Step 2: Having determined the number of category 1, 2 and 3 slots to assign to each nation using only GB-wide data, places were then sorted into these slots within each nation using additional England, Scotland and Wales-only metrics (in addition to the GB-wide metrics used in step 1) to account for the varying availability of data between nations relating to criteria B and C. The following data and weightings for England, Scotland and Wales were used:
Table 3: England national index
Target metric
Indicator
Data source (data for)
Indicator weight (Target metric weight)
Indicator 1: Need for economic recovery and growth
50%
Productivity
Natural log of GVA per hour worked
ONS (2018); For any LA that had changed boundaries since 2018, a data point was constructed using population sizes and the previous LA statistics
(33.3%)
Unemployment
Estimates of unemployment rate in the 16+ population
ONS model-based estimates of unemployment rates (October 2019 – September 2020) in the first instance; Where data was not available for an LA, ONS raw estimates of unemployment rates over aggregated geographies(2) (October 2019 – September 2020) were used
(33.3%)
Skills
Proportion of the 16-64 population without NVQ qualifications
ONS (January 2019 – December 2019) in the first instance; Where data was not available for an LA, ONS estimates over aggregated geographies(2) (January 2019 – December 2019) were used
(33.3%)
Indicator 2: Need for improved transport connectivity
25%
Journey time to employment by car
Average journey time to the nearest employment centre of at least 5,000 jobs when traveling by car
DfT (2017); For any LA that had changed boundaries since the 2017 data publication, weighted journey time stats were created based on population and previous LA statistics
(75.2%)
Journey time to employment by public transport
Average journey time to the nearest employment centre of at least 5,000 jobs when traveling by public transport
DfT (2017); For any LA that had changed boundaries since the 2017 publication, weighted journey time stats were created based on population and previous LA statistics
(21.2%)
Journey time to employment by cycle
Average journey time to the nearest employment centre of at least 5,000 jobs when traveling by cycle
DfT (2017); For any LA that had changed boundaries since the 2017 publication, weighted journey time stats were created based on population and previous LA statistics
(3.5%)
Indicator 3: Need for regeneration
25%
Commercial vacancy rate
Proportion of retail, industrial, office and leisure units that are vacant
Publicly available commercial location data from Whythawk and Sqwyre.com (July 2020); Where LAs did not share their vacancy rate data, the average vacancy rate of the LAs in the same ONS aggregated area(2) that did share their commercial vacancy rate was used as a proxy. Where no LA in the ONS aggregated area shared their vacancy rate, the average vacancy rate of the LAs over larger aggregated geographies(3) were used as a proxy. For any LAs where boundaries had changed since 2020, a data point was constructed using population sizes and the previous LA statistics
(75%)
Dwellings vacancy rate
Proportion of dwellings chargeable for council tax that are classed as long-term empty (empty for more than 6 months)(4)
MHCLG (2020)
(25%)
2 ‘ONS aggregated data based on counties, unitary authorities, and groups of districts in England, groups of unitary authorities in Wales, and groups of council areas in Scotland.
3 ‘ONS aggregated data based on counties in England (most grouped), groups of districts in Greater London, groups of unitary authorities in Wales and groups of council areas in Scotland.
4 ‘Dwellings vacancy rate in England are calculated as the ratio of the number of vacant units less those that are only empty due to flooding (Line 16 less lines 16.a and 16.b in the Council Tax Base 2020) to the total adjusted number of chargeable dwellings (Council Tax Base 2020 line 7).
Rationale for choice of indicators and weightings:
Had it been possible, national indices would have been developed in the same way for all nations. However, due to data availability limitations this was not possible.
The relative weights of places’ need for economic recovery and growth (indicator 1), places’ need for improved transport connectivity (indicator 2) and places’ need for regeneration (indicator 3) were weighted according to a ratio of 2:1:1. This weighting was chosen to best align with the overall objectives of the Fund – ‘to support economic recovery…prioritising places in need and areas of low productivity’ as per the prospectus, as well as to make the most of UK-wide data where available.
Indicator 1 was developed in the same way as for the GB-wide index, with equal weightings for each metric.
Indicator 2 captures a place’s need for improved transport connectivity. This was measured using DfT data on journey times to employment centres via different transport modes – car, public transport and bicycle. This measures a place’s access to jobs, identifying where the local transport network may be limiting the local economy. The DfT journey time stats were weighted according to transport modal split at nation level – in other words, weighted according to the proportion of total journeys made by each type of transport across each nation as a whole.
For indicator 3, commercial and dwellings vacancy rates were used as a proxy for places’ need for regeneration, given the Fund’s focus on repurposing and regeneration of vacant and brownfield sites on high streets and within town centres. A higher weighting was given to commercial vacancy rates in the indicator for regeneration because the objectives of the fund focus in particular on improving commercial spaces. The ratio of the commercial vacancy rate indicator weight to the dwelling vacancy rate indicator weight was set at 3:1.
An investigation is set to take place after a Conservative councillor in Plymouth was suspended due to a controversial and ‘offensive’ social media post where he was dressed as a woman.
Note: there’s going to be an “investigation” – Owl
The Conservative Group has confirmed that Mark Deacon’s suspension is with immediate effect after he posted an image of himself in women’s clothes in response to a proposal for a 6pm men’s curfew by The Green Party’s Baroness Jones.
The suggestion was made in the wake of the disappearance of Sarah Everard and vigils in held in London and across the UK. A fierce debate about women’s safety at night has been sparked by the tragic death of Sarah, aged 33.
Cllr Deacon, a councillor for Southway, is pictured wearing a wig and a dress in the picture. Posted alongside the image is the message: ‘If the Green Party and some Labour Party politicians get their way and impose this ridiculous 6pm curfew on men, then I’m going to wear my dress more often.’
He said: “Following a social media post Cllr Mark Deacon made on his Facebook account on Saturday, March 13 2021 which generated lots of differing views being shared about men being subject to a 6pm curfew, The Plymouth Conservative Council Group decided the most appropriate course of action was to suspend Cllr Deacon for an investigation to take place into his actions.
“This investigation will be in accordance with our Group rules and shall commence as soon as possible.
“Cllr Deacon has removed his post and has made a public apology on his Facebook page for any offence he may have caused.”
Cllr Deacon has removed the post and issued a short apology on his page for “any upset he may have caused”. PlymouthLive contacted Cllr Deacon but he said he would be making no further comment.
Also posted on Facebook, his statement reads: “I wholeheartedly apologise for the comments that I made on a post this Saturday Afternoon.
“I didn’t intend any offence that my comments might have caused to a section of the public.”
But the post received plenty of backlash on social media.
Plymouth Labour’s cabinet member for customer focus and community safety Cllr Sally Haydon said: “It’s extremely disappointing to see a senior councillor make a mockery of women’s deeply-felt worries about the issue of male violence.
“It is not befitting of the office of councillor and a member of the shadow cabinet of this council to poke fun at concerns of this nature.
I welcome his suspension and I hope Councillor Deacon will take some time to reflect on the anger his post has generated, to properly understand why it has caused such offence and offer a full apology for his actions.”
Taking to twitter, one user said: “Really unsettling to see sitting Plymouth Conservative councillor Mark Deacon mocking women’s concerns about male violence, trivialising such a serious matter in an extraordinarily offensive fashion.
Another person added: “@plymouthcc Really!? THIS is a PCC Councillor?! Mark Deacon, you should be ashamed of yourself. Couldn’t delete this fast enough, it seems.”
Former Labour MP candidate for Plymouth Moor View, Charlotte Holloway contacted Cllr Deacon via email urging him to remove the post and apologise.
The House of Commons Public Accounts Committee (PAC) has issued a warning about the costs of failed UK border IT projects, blaming a lack of effective management, leadership, and oversight at the Home Office.
According to the PAC, delays to the new Digital Services at the Border (DSAB) programme have so far cost the taxpayer £173m – exactly the cost that the National Audit Office warned about last year.
The Committee’s report [pdf] states that the Home Office had a poor record of launching immensely expensive IT projects that fail to deliver for the taxpayer, characterising them as a ‘litany of failures’.
In a statement to the BBC, the Home Office claimed the problems were ‘historical’ and had been fixed.
Earlier this year Matthew Rycroft, the Home Office’s permanent secretary, agreed that £173m was a “huge” amount of money. He claimed the Home Office was doing “everything” it could to avoid that figure going up any further.
The Home Office first launched its e-Borders programme in 2003, with a plan to complete it by 2011. However, there were repeated delays, and the Department announced the new DSAB programme in 2014, as the latest attempt to achieve its objectives by March 2019.
The programme was meant to replace the legacy Warnings Index and Semaphore systems with three new systems: Border Crossing, Advance Border Control (ABC), and Advanced Freight Targeting Capability (AFTC). The aim was to provide UK border officials with better information to make decisions about people and goods entering and exiting the UK.
Since 2014, the Department has changed its priorities to support its broader ambition for a digitised immigration system in the wake of Brexit.
In 2019, the Department announced it was resetting the DSAB programme and pushing delivery back to the end of March 2022. It decided to upgrade and improve Semaphore.
Despite spending millions on border IT systems in the past 10 years, workers still have to use outdated technology to decide whether an individual can be allowed to enter the UK, according to the PAC report.
Just 300 frontline users are currently using the new Border Crossing system at seven locations. 7,000 users were supposed to be using it at 56 locations by June this year.
When completed, the DSAB project should be able to process 140 million passengers a year at UK borders, although MPs doubt that the system would be able to cope.
‘It still has no proof that systems can cope with passenger volumes that existed prior to Covid-19, let alone the 6 per cent annual growth in the volume of passengers it is allowing for above the 140 million people that arrived in the UK annually prior to Covid-19,’ said the National Audit Office’s report in December last year.
Commenting on the delays in border IT projects, Tom Fairbairn, distinguished engineer at Solace, said: “The key to overcoming the problem of legacy technologies at the border, which is certain to have a wide range of effects on the UK, is that authorities appear to be attempting a point-to-point integration.”
“While a tried and tested method for some cases, this approach won’t work here, given the fact that there are over 20 government agencies whose systems need to be integrated. They are simply too many to go for the point-to-point approach, which is best for integrating two systems. With this amount of actors, loosely coupled systems and agility are the key, and the only way to achieve that is with an event-driven approach. This will allow for information to flow between points in real-time, seamlessly and accurately, ensuring citizens get the best possible experience.”
Mike Kiersey, principal technologist at Boomi, said: “The successful digitalisation of processes at the border will be the fundamental step to successful operations and data management in the months and years to come. If the border continues to rely on outdated legacy technologies, the technical issues outlined will continue, causing massive disruption.”
“Systems modernisation can be a significant challenge, but in this instance, it is imperative that proactive steps are made. Core legacy applications across government departments need to be open via APIs to enable emerging technologies to enter into the architecture, to digitally capture information at the borders. These systems need to be able to capture, prepare and process the data within, to ensure swift processing times and avoid deadlock.”
A Devon based artist has created a magnificent sculpture of Neptune, god of the sea, currently on display in Exmouth. Zen Wood Design designed the sculpture, standing at 2m and 12ft, using materials including local driftwood, fir wood and docking blocks from Plymouth dock yard.
Zen Wood Design says after lockdown, they’ll bring him down to Exmouth beach for the public to look at. Writing on Facebook, they said: “Happy Friday Exmouth!!!
“Here he is! Standing at 2m and 12ft to the top of his trident, Neptune or Poseidon, it doesn’t matter. The piece is called ‘Old Gods Assemble’ this king of the sea is summoning the rest of the gang in Earths time of need.
I’ve used two reclaimed docking blocks from Plymouth dock yard and local driftwood for the head, trident and shield.”
As Children head back into the Classroom Devon Education stakeholders to Question Shadow Education Secretary
On Wednesday 17th March, educators across Devon will have the chance to share their experiences and questions with Shadow Secretary of State for Education Kate Green MP on the quality of education in Devon.
This follows on from a successful listening event at the end of February which brought together parents, teachers and students to discuss topics such as academisation of schools, exams and the effect of COVID on students and teachers.
Current Labour Councillors were at hand to answer questions which arose, as well as prospective candidates in the May 2021 elections.
Cllr Su Aves from Devon County Council Children’s Scrutiny Committee who attended February’s event commented, “it is an unjust reality that students in Devon receive less funding per pupil than the national average and the pandemic has exacerbated the lack of resources in our schools and the achievement gap between students.”
“As children went back into the classroom last week, this event with the Shadow Secretary will be a welcome opportunity for educators to discuss the state of education in Devon. We extend the invitation to any members of the public interested in working to make education better in Devon.”
Remember when senior officers in EDDC were found to have been “discourteous and unhelpful”, to have provided “inaccurate statements” and admitted to “amending” documents given to the Council’s own Scrutiny Committee, by no less than a Judge led Tribunal?
The context is the relocation of EDDC HQ from The Knowle, Sidmouth.
Note the ”formative” stages of this saga were taking place contemporaneously with the Graham Brown scandal which broke in the National press in March 2013.
To cut a long story short. A formal Cabinet decision to relocate was made in July 2011 in a move described as “cost neutral”. In 2012 an EDDC planning application to redevelop its site, to prepare for a sale with planning permission, failed. The Council’s own Scrutiny Committee attempted in January 2013 (unanimously) to ask EDDC to delay until more information was produced and had been examined, particularly on estimated costs and options for refurbishing existing office buildings. This was rejected by the then cabinet (see post script below).
On 17 February 2013, a member of the public, Jeremy Woodward asked under Freedom of Information for copies of the full unredacted Minutes of both Officer and Member Relocation Working Parties, and the full Relocation Manager’s formal progress reports.EDDC refused but he persisted, so did they. (Sequence of his requests can be found here).
It ended up with EDDC appearing at two formal hearings in front of an Information Tribunal, an initial one in August 2014 and a final one in 2015. In the final decision notice of May 2015 Judge Kennedy, chairing the Information Tribunal took, in his words: the unusual and unfortunate step of commenting on the conduct of the appeal itself.
From these we learn that the Tribunal considered that EDDC, whose response was led by the Deputy Chief Executive, Richard Cohen, had been at times discourteous and unhelpful and indeed that statements made at earlier hearings had been inaccurate.This related to whether or not a fully legible copy of the disputed informationcould be produced for the Tribunal. (It eventually was).
During the Tribunal hearing the deputy Chief Executive, Richard Cohen, also made the extraordinary admission that he had not given an original version of a document to the Scrutiny Committee but an “amended” one.
Despite the Tribunal ruling that the Council were required to publish documentation for a ‘live project’, EDDC still refused citing that: “certain events have to occur before the sale to Pegasus can be concluded. Should those events not happen then we may well have to go back to negotiate with other parties (being those who were not successful the first time around) or go back to the open market and in either of those circumstance the Council’s position could be prejudiced by the information you seek being in the public domain.” Eventually this information was released in Jan 2017.
In 2018 PegasusLife won a planning appeal for the site.
We now know, from the information squeezed out of EDDC that this site, with planning approval, is estimated to have a “developable value” of £50M.
It would be usual for a developer to pay up to a third of this (£16.7M) for the purchase of the land. So a sale price of £7.5M reached by EDDC was not good value for the ratepayer. It’s less than half of what should have been obtained
Graham Brown resigned as a councillor in 2013 and died in 2019. Richard Cohen was made redundant a year ago.
In Owl’s view the reputational damage that was done to the public’s view of probity amongst Tory Councillors and EDDC senior officers by these events lingers.
There has never been any evidence of the sort of deep “soul searching” within EDDC that is necessary to “cleanse the stables” and remove the taint.
How can anyone have confidence in an organisation whose “Top Team” appears, by inaction, to condone such behaviour?
“Nothing to see here” would seem to be a good summary.
PS Owl believes the spring 2013 cabinet comprised the following councillors, three or four of whom are still district or county councillors, some of whom seem to think they are qualified to cast stones; notably, a few lost their seats in 2019 (apologies to anyone left out):
Paul Diviani (Chairman/Leader); Andrew Moulding (Vice Chairman); Ray Bloxham; David Cox; Jill Elson; Graham Godbeer; Stephanie Jones; Ian Thomas; Phil Twiss
Labour leader Sir Keir Starmer said: “If you end up with a list of 45 areas where the funding is going in and ‘by coincidence’ 40 of them are where there is a Conservative MP, I think people would be saying, ‘What’s going on here? This looks fishy.'”
But Prime Minister Boris Johnson said: “The criteria is entirely objective, looking at data, poverty, employment.”
He said the government wanted to “level up” the country in “a completely impartial way”.
Chancellor Rishi Sunak, meanwhile, said: “The formula for the grant payments for the new fund is based on an index of economic need.”
But that is certainly not the only factor.
Picking a shortlist
BBC News analysis found 56 constituencies would benefit, as some of the 45 towns cover multiple constituencies.
Of those, 47 have Conservative MPs, including 14 gained from Labour at the 2019 election.
The other nine have Labour MPs.
The Conservatives tend to do better in towns, though, with Labour support generally stronger in cities.
Sir Keir has called on the government to publish the full criteria.
But we already know quite a lot about why the towns were chosen.
The first step was to pick a shortlist of 101 towns, which would be invited to apply for £25m, or £50m in exceptional circumstances.
Ranking towns
Following concern about the lack of transparency in that process, the National Audit Office (NAO) published a report setting out how the shortlist had been compiled.
Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government (MHCLG) officials took a ranking of English towns by an Office for National Statistics (ONS) index of deprivation and then further ranked the 541 most deprived, about half of the total, using a formula based on:
income deprivation
skills deprivation
productivity (the amount produced per hour of work)
exposure to Brexit
exposure to economic shocks
level of private investment
eligibility for other government funding, which could be combined with Towns Fund money
The first four of those criteria were judged on official statistics and the last three on the judgement of officials.
Another factor was towns in more deprived areas were more likely to be shortlisted.
Setting priorities
The towns were then divided into priority groups:
high
medium
low
But the 40 high-priority towns did not necessarily have the highest scores based on the formula – some adjustments were made to ensure the most deprived areas in each region of England were included.
There were 318 medium-priority towns and 183 low.
The officials recommended ministers shortlist:
all 40 high priority
60 of the medium
none of the low
They also suggested the 15 biggest towns should be excluded because they could also be eligible for city funding.
But the ministers ignored the advice on the biggest towns, putting 10 of the 15 on the shortlist.
And the final shortlist comprised:
all 40 high priority
49 of the medium
12 of the low
In choosing these 12 low-priority towns, ministers used criteria other than scores devised by civil servants, including:
being on the coast
poor transport links or a good geographical spread of towns across a region
potential for investment or growth
Officials concluded the shortlist met Treasury rules for managing public money.
But it is clear there was considerable divergence from the formula devised by the civil servants.
We do not know exactly how the 45 winning towns were chosen from the 101 invited to apply.
19 of the high priority
21 of the medium
five of the low
And the five low-priority towns, Cheadle, Leyland, Morley, Southport and Stocksbridge are all in constituencies with a Conservative MP.
The most striking choice was Cheadle.
It had the seventh lowest score on the MHCLG officials’ list.
But ministers said it was primed for investment because of recent transport improvements in the area, as well as being strategically located between Stockport and Manchester Airport and having strong motorway links.
In a report on the process, the Public Accounts Committee of MPs said they were “not convinced by the rationales for selecting some towns and not others”.
It added that: “The justification offered by ministers for selecting individual towns are vague and based on sweeping assumptions.”
From a personal perspective having spent hours, days, weeks . . . . no actually . . . . . seven years voluntarily taking an interest in representing and contributing the views of the community on the future development in our village to the East Devon District Council for the Local Plan 2013-2031, the Villages Plan (including BUABs) and our Neighbourhood Plan – may I suggest that (even with much prompting on Facebook and social media from District Councillors to remind us that time is running out for making representations for the New Local Plan) – the reason why many previously interested parties in our communities do not wish to comment on the new Local Plan going forward is that after multitudinous time spent and huge efforts in the past – one local community found that inappropriate development was approved by the Planning Committee recently (in spite of hundreds of local residents’ objections) on green fields, on high risk flood areas with proposals supported that will increase traffic substantially in an area which already suffers with massive traffic congestion!
There was approval for 54 new homes on an agricultural greenfield outside of the Local Plan, the BUAB and the Neighbourhood Plan;
There was approval for a change of proposals from a supportable, modest amount of homes shown at a Public Consultation to a block of 40 two-three storey apartments overlooking existing residents’ homes directly opposite to a Grade II* Listed Building when, surprisingly, proposals for blocks of two/three storey apartments were not included in the Neighbourhood Plan for an historic, rural village;
There was approval for increased provision of multiple commercial uses, in tandem with adding 94 dwellings to the mix, in a countryside location because the developers’ viability reports maintained that the whole masterplan would be financially unviable without building homes on green fields;
There was approval for a significant increase in traffic (with no extra provision for public transport) in an area that already suffers with major gridlock, noise and air pollution. . . when most of us are trying to improve our carbon footprint and EDDC state they are committed to policies to improve climate change;
There was approval for a large impermeable car park on green, agricultural fields adjacent to a watercourse that is within an area of high flood risk.
It must be remembered that the preparation of the current Local Plan 2013-2031 incurred exorbitant costs, magnified by the need for a Planning Inspector to advise for many months to ensure that the Plan was sound, with copious, administration costs that accumulated over ‘eons’ – so it is fair to say that Local Plans cost East Devon tax payers very highly!!
However, when all local representations have been taken into account and the policies have been written and the Local Plan is adopted and in place – the bad news is that around 16 elected Local Authority Councillors (as the ultimate decision makers) with recommendations from Planning Officers can ignore the Local Plan, BUAB, the Neighbourhood Plan and National Planning Policies and approve an application that offers substantial economical growth to the entire district, which in their opinion, outweighs the social and environmental policies set down for the protection of a village community in East Devon!
There is little point in giving people confidence that planning policies will protect their areas with Local Plans or pretend that local democracy and community involvement has any value in decision making when, in fact, such policies can be overridden and the local people’s representations ignored!
There were, indeed, a great deal of positive aspects attached to the approved development that were hugely innovative and supportable – but sadly planners deemed that environmental and social aspects within their Local Plan could be ignored for the greater good of providing economic benefits for the entire district to fill a funding gap black hole!
The electorate had sent a clear message to the Council that after five decades of Conservative dominance, they wanted change and they were hoping for a reformed and improved council whose administration would bring stability and direction for the benefit of all its residents. In this context all residents must be interpreted as some residents because some residents have had to tolerate a build, build, build policy because East Devon has vast swathes of protected Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty – so some communities in the planning lottery will have to draw ‘the short straw’ resulting in an historic, rural village being sacrificed and residents’ views being brushed aside!
And that’s why many people have lost faith in the local planning system and will not waste any more of their precious time responding to a new East Devon Local Plan Consultation that can equally be ignored if it suits the decision makers!
The Localism Act sought to decentralise power away from Whitehall and back into the hands of local councils, communities and individuals to act on local priorities and this concept is applauded.
The pandemic has shown us that our personal choices and decisions can have huge impacts on other peoples’ lives – flippancy is not supported and there will be no hand- clapping for planners in this community!
However, in an effort to end on a positive note – us ‘minions’ have all been assured by our elected members that this is the way democracy works – we elect them to be our representatives and they make the decisions – Mmmmmm!
East Devon Watch 