Agenda item

To acknowledge the issues raised in the petition received from residents of Beadnell in respect of inappropriate development and to agree the Council’s response.

The Petitions Committee were requested to acknowledge the issues raised in the petition received from residents of Beadnell in respect of inappropriate development and to agree the Council’s response.  (A copy of the report is enclosed with the signed minutes).

Joan Brown, the lead petitioner, addressed the Committee and commented:

·        Beadnell was a close-knit community of 300 permanent residents.

·        The petition had been started in response to residents’ concerns regarding planning approvals which were having a detrimental effect on people’s lives and the character of the village.

·        They welcomed comments in the report that the matters raised would be taken seriously to identify where improvements could be made in the planning decision making process.

·        The Council needed to commit to the production of a Northumberland Design Guide and set a target date for its production.

·        They did not think that in practice planning decisions in Beadnell followed the method outlined in the report.  Specifically, that policies in Neighbourhood Plans should be afforded significant and relevant weight in the determination of planning applications and discussed within the officers report.  The planning report for 4 The Haven made no reference to the Neighbourhood Plan.  It was wrong that it should be given no consideration as Neighbourhood Plans were statutory documents and part of planning law.  The Conservation Officer had also not been consulted despite the development being in a Conservation Area.

·        In the examples identified within the petition, AONB and Parish Council input had been ignored.  The purpose of consultation was queried if it carried no weight.

·        Not enough emphasis was placed on local knowledge.  If weight was not given to the comments of the Parish Council and the AONB, the planning officers should be assigned specific geographic areas so they could become familiar with them, their history and development pressures.

·        They requested that:

-       The Neighbourhood Plan be included in all planning decisions for Beadnell.

-       The appropriate consultees are always consulted.

-       More weight be given to comments from the AONB and Parish Council who had local knowledge.

-       A target date be set for the production and implementation of the Northumberland Design Guide.

·        Residents be given an opportunity to bring their comments about the report to the attention of the Interim Executive Director of Planning and Local Services and arrangements be made to do this.

Rob Murfin, Interim Executive Director of Planning and Local Services, responded by setting out a few guiding principles for the determination of planning applications.

·        The planning system had to balance individual rights, against community, public and third-party rights.

·        There was sometimes a presumption by residents that applications were approved as fait accompli despite comments.  It should be recognised that as a binary decision making system, applicants also often complained that too much emphasis was placed on parish council, neighbour and consultee comments.

·        He would be happy to meet residents to discuss individual cases.

·        Views of residents or parish councils were never ignored; however, officers might not agree with them.

·        Communities changed over time.  There needed to be an assessment of demonstrable harm to character, location, privacy or amenity.  This included the wider harm and benefit of climate change and affordable housing and broader view of harm versus benefit.

·        Significant weight was attached to the views of the AONB, parish councils and Neighbourhood Plans.  Appeals had been won on the basis of Neighbourhood Plan policies where applications had been refused and appealed.

·        The Local Plan or Neighbourhood Plan did not give an automatic series of refusals or approvals.  The weight to be given to policies and whether they were relevant in a particular case had to be assessed.  Neighbourhood Plans deserved to be given their full statutory weight, but other material issues also had to be considered.

·        Relevant statutory consultees including Public Protection, the Environment Agency and the Local Lead Flood Authority could not be compelled to make comments, however, where they did, significant weight was placed on them.  If they had an objection on a fundamental principle which was material, it would go to committee for a decision.

·        The authority was dealing with almost 6,000 planning applications each year.  To manage workloads, consultees would be consulted where their views were needed and case officers had been empowered to deal with more applications which may previously have been referred to the Conservation Team in a Conservation Area.  It was confirmed that they would be consulted where there was a significant development or if it affected a listed building.

·        A 2-stage process was adopted to ensure all recommendations of a junior officer were reviewed by a senior officer.

·        Planning guidance was not black and white and required that the harm and balance of an application be assessed.  The planning process looked for improvements in schemes and increasing design standards with consultation carried out several times, if required.  These were driven by consultee views, officer experience and responses made by parish council or neighbour comments.

·        A new validation list of information required when a planning application was submitted had recently been approved by Cabinet and would be updated again when the Local Plan was adopted and would focus more heavily on design issues.

·        He regularly attended Town and Parish Council meetings and NALC training sessions and confirmed that he would be happy to meet with the residents.

·        The National Design Code would give local planning authorities more leverage to secure better quality design in all forms of development.  It would be beneficial for communities to also develop their own design guides in order that it be set out how design be improved and used when making a decision to refuse an application.  Discussions had been held with central government and neighbouring authorities how this could best be implemented.  A timescale would be published for the creation of a Northumberland Design Guide, and other supplementary guidance on tourism, health and climate change, when the Northumberland Local Plan was formally adopted.

·        The planning profession had been seeking more powers to seek better quality design.  The message within the Planning for Beauty Agenda published in 2021 would provide powers to local authorities to refuse applications where design did not meet the standards that were required, based on an objective position within a design guide.

·        Planning decisions could not be made on the basis of non-material considerations, however establishing what was meant by character would be incorporated with a design guide.

Councillor Colin Horncastle, Portfolio Holder for Community Services, commented on the complexity of the planning decision process which was not an exact science of views and policies.  The new Northumberland Local Plan will include a design guide to assist all parties.  Decisions were made by professional officers or committee following consultation with the AONB and parish councils which may have their own priorities.  Committee members were trained and had many years of experience.  In his role, he had no knowledge of procedures which were not carried out properly and had full confidence in the council’s planning system, officers and planning committees and endorsed the recommendations.

Members of the Petitions Committee commented that:

·        A Neighbourhood Plan should not be created to prevent development but provide guidance on what was desired.

·        There were 155 councils in the Northumberland Association of Parish Councils which had benefitted from an excellent training programme provided by the Interim Executive Director of Planning and Local Services which enabled Parish and Town Councillors to have a better understanding of issues.

·        Beadnell was a victim of its reputation as a desirable place to live in Northumberland.  The local representative for Beadnell had been vocal in the issues that the area faced.  It was inevitable that not all parties would be pleased with a planning decision.

·        There was a responsibility to ensure that the characteristics of these towns and villages were protected and perhaps a review of planning rules to ensure that local residents were not priced out of the market by second home ownership.

·        Other locations, such as the village of Medburn, were experiencing similar problems.

·        Officers were working behind the scenes on the problem of second homes and lack of affordable homes in coastal and other rural locations.

Members of the Committee noted that the Interim Executive Director of Planning and Local Services had confirmed that he would meet with the residents of Beadnell.

RESOLVED that the Petitions Committee noted:

a)      The issues raised in the petition.

b)      The explanation of the role of planning and how planning decisions were made.

c)      The inherently controversial nature of planning.

d)      The matters the Planning Service will be refining including the new Validation List, and following the adoption of the new Local Plan, including a new Northumberland Design Guide.