Planning free-for-all in East Devon? Almost certainly, yes

And that includes the Knowle.

No wonder Councillor Diviani was on the radio today talking about NIMBYs being the reason why houses have not been built in East Devon as the council has lost yet another planning appeal because it has not been able to prove that it has a five year land supply over the whole district.  He had to quickly deflect blame on to anyone but East Devon District Council and had to ensure that he engaged in damage limitation.

Why?

A planning appeal for 180 houses at Butts Road, Higher Ridgeway, Ottery St. Mary, Devon has been allowed by the Planning Inspector.  The  (layperson’s) summary appears to be:

1.  When it comes to housing figures, the Inspector put more trust in the numbers from the applicant than in those of the council and finds reason to dispute most figures provided by EDDC, particularly those provided for Cranbrook . (para 20, para 28, para 33)

2.  Because there is no agreed Local Plan and no 5 year land supply the Inspector does not have to take into account the built up area boundary at Ottery and therefore in any part of the district (para 40)

3.  Disaggregating numbers to two different parts of East Devon and finding one part over provided (east) and one part underprovided (west) is not a viable way of coming to a workable figure for the whole district.  It has no place in the National Planning Policy Framework and cannot therefore be used to prove anything at all.  The only figure that can be used is a figure for the whole district and it is shown that it does NOT have a five year land supply. (para 12, para 35, para 36)

4.  A number of sites put forward by the council as viable are not considered viable by the Inspector. (para 23)

5.  He disputes the EDDC  revised 5 year land supply figures it produced AFTER the Feniton appeal was allowed. (para 27)

6.  The Inspector says “it is by no means certain that the Local Plan will be adopted in its current form or that the emerging strategy will be found sound.” (para 31)

7.  Even if he is wrong on any issue, the fact that there is no 5 year housing supply is paramount (para 49) and over-rides all other objections.

The effect of this planning appeal:

Because EDDC has no Local Plan and does not have a 5 year land supply just about any planning application that now comes forward from any developer anywhere in East Devon (with the possible exclusion of AONBs but this is by no means certain as it has not yet been tested by the Planning Inspectorate) from now on will be allowed.

Take note:

(a) Had EDDC not wasted two years having secret Local Development Framework meetings that resulted in nothing but sites brought forward early by developers, we might have had a Local Plan which could have afforded us protection.

(b) If the EDDC Planning Department treated the district as a whole rather than splitting it into two, it might have helped to draw attention to the 5 year shortfall and allowed an opportunity to address it BEFORE this situation arose rather than AFTER.

(c) If all the current agreed and proposed planning applications had been brought forward and commenced by developers we might not be in this mess.  The fact that developers have NOT brought them forward makes one wonder if this was a strategic decision on their part.

Questions:

(i) When did EDDC realise that there was not a 5 year land supply?  Whose job was it to check and recheck the figures?  If no-one noticed that there was not a 5 year land supply, why?

(ii) What did it decide to do about it when it found out?

(iii) Whose idea was it to split the district into two parts when calculating the 5 year and supply?  Why did they not check whether this would be allowed under the NPPF?

(iv)Who has ultimate responsibility for this omnishambles?