Agenda item

JDoe summarised some of the items in the report. He referred to paragraphs 3 to 7 of the report, noting that planning fees income had picked up quite considerably over the remainder of the year and was almost breaking even and there had been a substantial rise in the number of planning applications. However, income targets for land charges had always been a challenge, but there was a sustained level of property searches coming in as the property market remained buoyant. This would need to be monitored closely to see whether the strong performance of the market continued, particularly since the stamp duty holiday had been extended in the recent budget.  

Turning to Development Management performance from paragraph 8 onwards, performance in turning around planning applications was generally high, the main exception in the quarterly outturn being the appeals. These were running at only a 50% success rate for the 12 cases in this quarter. The department monitors appeals quite closely and the latest appeals update that went to the Development Management Committee was included in the report. The department was also sending out details of the appeal decisions with Members News so members could be appraised early of appeal outcomes. There was a common thread in the 6 appeals around the size of new buildings and extensions and these may have been cases where the inspector had taken a different view to the Council as it could be a subjective opinion. However those particular trends would continue to be monitored to see whether it was just peculiar to this quarter or whether was something which needed to be addressed through the way appeals were handled.

Finally, he addressed enforcement, where the turnaround time to get out to site was down and was likely to remain down for some time because of the different lockdowns which had  restricted the ability of officers to get to site in a timely way. Coupled with a rising level in the enforcement caseload, a backlog had built up. The department had put in processes to tackle this on a geographical basis and he wanted to reassure Members that top priority cases would be prioritised in a review that was just about to start on reducing the backlog.

Cllr Timmis referred to page 30, PE02 and the site visits and the inability to complete them and commented that it would have been helpful for a visit to have taken place. Also in LC04 on page 30, the report mentioned the effect of stamp duty in 2021, but this holiday only lasts until Sept 2021. Thirdly it mentioned on page 31 a rise in the number of planning applications and Cllr Timmis wondered if this could be related to the decrease in the number of houses being proposed for the new local plan.

JDoe Responded to the first point on indicator PE02, commenting that these visits were purely for planning enforcement as opposed to planning applications. They were very different. The enforcement mentioned does require an officer actually to go on site to make investigations to establish what’s happening at a point in time and not necessarily at the applicant’s or developer’s convenience. Managing such site visits during a pandemic is problematic. However, with planning applications actual site visits were not usually necessary because the applicants were able to send in pictures or electronic searches can be made through Google Earth and other remote sources. If more information was needed, the planning Officer could also go back to the applicant and ask for further photographs.

He said in terms of the land charges, Cllr Timmis was absolutely correct, the stamp duty holiday had been extended and that was included in the covering report. It will continue through to June on the £500,000 purchase price threshold and will then drop down to a threshold of £250,000 and then by October it will go back to the rate it was previously, which was £125,000, so tapering out.

In response to Cllr Timmis’s final point, there had certainly been a very large number of householder applications for extension works to domestic properties, which may just be reflective of the fact the housing market was still strong and so people were taking the opportunity to improve their properties. The volume of planning applications was often directly linked to the national and local economy and as such the economic picture both locally and nationally over the next few months must be monitored closely.

Cllr Stevens referred to page 29 and asked for details of current judicial reviews

JDoe said there had been two recent judicial reviews. One involved a small supermarket proposal in Markyate, where one of the businesses on the high-street launched a judicial review that was successful and on which the Council has had to pay costs. He said that he would have to get back to the committee with details of the other one.

Cllr Birnie asked if we had to pay costs on the second one.

JDoe confirmed that this was the case and it was in the region of £40,000.

Cllr Birnie commented that it was not just individual appeals that involved losses but judicial review costs related to the council’s decisions.

JDoe confirmed that it was not the legal basis of the planning decision that this related to, but the process and lessons had been learned about delaying sending applications to committee until the statutory deadlines for consultation had expired. In the case of Markyate, Officers had to re-consult and they took the report to committee to ask it to delegate the application with a view to approve, pending the expiration of the consultation period. This did not sit well with the court, so now Officers did not bring reports to committee while there was an open consultation period.

Action Point:J.Doe to provide the committee with details, including costs, of both judicial reviews.

Cllr Riddick welcomed the increased fee income but regretted situations that took up the time of Officers but did not attract an income, one being appeals and the other where an applicant can return an application within 6 months free of charge.

Cllr Birnie added that he had read in the report that this loss of income will apply unless we can prevent new plans being submitted when the officer was minded to refuse or possibly after refusal and in his response to Cllr Riddick, he would like clarification from James Doe.

JDoe said he wanted to be clear that Cllr Birnie’s point concerned where we receive an application and the plans are subsequently amended and re-sent,

Cllr Birnie confirmed that this was the point he was making.

JDoe confirmed that they were related problems. The appeal statistics in the report did show there was a rise in the rate of challenges to the Council when planning applications are refused.  This was another trend that Officers are monitoring to see if it is a long term trend or not. Cllr Riddick was correct that there is a cost that the Council has to bear and it is absorbed within the service and that is why it was really important to have sound decisions so that there were fewer challenges and fewer cases lost. Referring to resubmission of an application within 6 months, the applicant did get that free of charge and to deal with that Officers encouraged applicants to get pre-application advice. This provided an opportunity to flush out any issues which may lead to refusal which would then lead to a resubmission within 6 months. It was the applicant’s statutory right to do that. The department was trying to improve the efficiency of getting applications through the system in a more timely way and to reduce backlogs by dealing with applications expeditiously and not inviting amended plans where there is no prospect of being able to arrive at an acceptable scheme within the statutory time period, be that the 8 week or the 13 week period. The aim was to maintain high performance, which the government does monitor. If Officers were constantly receiving amended plans, not only was there a cost implication, but performance targets will slip.

Cllr Hearn made two points. Firstly, at a Tring town council meeting on Monday there were two planning applications that had already been considered by the Officers at Dacorum, but Tring had not been advised of this. She hoped that that was not going to continue. She hoped that at Town Council they would be able to consider applications before they are decided by DBC. Secondly, she was currently dealing with two matters that involved enforcement and she welcomed the statement that there was going to be a reduction of the backlog. She felt that this department did need supporting and that the Officers  had been struggling for some time to keep up with the work and with the increase in planning fees it is worth considering supporting this hard working  department more than had been the case.

JDoe thanked Cllr Hearn for her comments and requested an email detailing the planning applications on the Tring Council agenda that she had referred to as he would like to check which type they were as sometimes Officers do not consult the parishes on minor things and some lawful development proposals are also excluded. In relation to the enforcement, this was a difficult area as enforcement cases can be very long running. However, the department was at the point of appointing a further temporary enforcement officer for the year for which it received some additional resource and he thanked committee members for their support.

Cllr Birnie commented that the appeals lost are still high despite a lower percentage of refusals and asked why this was.

JDoe responded that of the 6 that the Council lost last quarter, the prevailing theme seemed to be about the appearance or size and proportionality of the building, where the Council had taken the view that it was too large or inappropriate but the inspector had taken a different view. Overall six was a very small number so it should not be taken out of context.

Cllr Birnie agreed the numbers were not sufficient to make an out an out decision on but the same situation had recurred in quarterly reports. He recalled questioning whether it was because of a new DMC committee but it was thought that this was not the case. However, it needed to be closely monitored because, whilst costs are not always charged when appeals are lost, it can be a source of loss for the Council.

JDoe responded that the department’s performance was very good and over 70% of appeals were won, but there was a trend that had persisted over a couple of quarters and Officers needed to see if this was a longer term trend.

Cllr Birnie said he would be grateful if James could report on this from time to time.

Cllr Anderson said that this indicator had been controversial for some time and Members should remember that the DMC had only had a very small amount of its decisions overturned on appeal, leaving aside whether or not the decisions deserved to be overturned on appeal. How the Development Management committee is performing was for obvious reasons always under review and he felt that this was just a blip.

The report was noted