Issue - meetings

To consider a report of the Chief Planning Officer on the progress on implementing the solutions within the five improvement themes of the strategic review for Planning and Development Services.

The Chief Planning Officer submitted an update report on the strategic review of Planning and Development Services in order that Members could consider and comment on the progress on implementing the solutions within the five identified improvement themes.

The Chair welcomed to the meeting Phil Crabtree, Chief Planning Officer in the Development Department, who presented the report and responded to Members’ queries and comments. 

Issues raised and discussed by Members were in summary:

·  The benefits of involving Ward Members at the pre-application stage, that would, save time later and therefore free up resources in the longer term.

·  The procedures and process of notifying interested parties of planning applications and achieving a balance between the cost and more widely publicising applications.

·  The logging of controversial planning applications.

·  The operation of Plans Panels and the possibility of a fourth panel.

·  Giving better guidance as to what was permissible in planning applications and giving feedback where applications were turned down.

·  The importance of safeguarding officers from allegations of collusion between themselves and developers and the need for transparency.

·  The benefits that the further computerisation of the planning application process would bring.

·  The need to improve relationships and communication between officers and interested parties.

·  The need to provide better enforcement feedback to Members.

·  Concern regarding the number of applications that panels were advised to accept, which were rejected by Members and then overturned at the appeals stage.

·  The possible future use of external parties to deliver a whole range of services to the Department and measuring the performance of these external partners.

·  Performance targets and in particular those for major applications which were just hitting their targets but improving.

The Chair thanked Mr Crabtree for his report and response to the issues raised above by Members.

RESOLVED – That the report and comments made by Members as above be noted.

(Note: Councillor Davey left the meeting at 10.45 during the consideration of this item.)