Combined notes from Forum meetings January 2017 – mainly based on the meeting in Bodmin.

Marshall provided some background to the meeting. Some agents also went to the main Agents Forum at St Erme

Couple of Agents are on their Parish Council, one looking to be involved and address Neighbourhood Plan after elections in May.

Officers from the Public Health team gave a presentation on their chargeable advice service. Questions following EH presentation –

  • Prior notification for barns- not sure if preliminary or full service. If you go to farm is this going to get around contamination noise – could we use you for that? Yes – general advice arounddevelopment would charge at hourly rate – would advise on what required; what type of contamination, what investigation requested – what aspects to cover.
  • Am I right in thinkingdon’t use EA but use yourself. Yes - EA stepping back a bit but if ground water issue we will consult them.
  • App pre-app garage – significant contamination – how you see yourself and what level of investigation required – dependent on how far do youwant to go.
  • As Agents we can sign planning applications but not SDQ’s what is the reason for that. Land owner should have knowledge of land as owner. Going to remove SDQ from process. Also revising buffers around contaminated sites was 25m – high risk still 25m but smaller ones either no buffer or 10m buffer.
  • It we come to you what is the time turnaround – it would depend on what level of service is required or if preliminary meeting required. We have 4 officers in Env Protection Management, 1 officer Air quality; Community Protection Team, number noise specialists which are all based across the county.
  • We you give advice on historical sites – yes.
  • Do you have a date when SDQ will be phased out – just proposal at the moment – hoping to have new consultee guide and amend local validation list – when that done will start then.

Local Validation guide – To be revised. Expected by the end of March. Agents would prefer to retain the fast track validation process.

Mining areas contaminated land sites – constraints mapped where they are.

MP summing up better if by the hour – great product being offered.

Local Plan

MP asking for thoughts on the Local Plan

Need more guidance for planning officers some things missed out – need to help officers.

MP – recognise issue with officers implementing policies. We are taking to our Policy Advisory Committee to say we need to add guidance words to make more understandable. Issuing advice / briefing note to officers to clarify and extend.

Learning curve for us and officers – we compare with old Local Plan bit ambiguous the way modern document appearing. We have to get used to it – teething problems – lively discussion with case officers.

Asked if we could let Agents know quickly if any material changes are made to it. MP informed that Local Plan cannot be changed – but chief officer notes will be produced on the following topics;

  • Infill/Rounding off
  • Housing provisions in non-named towns
  • Implications for housing targets as a minimum
  • Design Quality
  • Air Quality
  • Holiday use conditions
  • Commercial diesel generators
  • Weight of NP
  • Weight of non-spd document

Complete version is on the website-

Comments from the Agents:-

  • Interested in exception sites and land value - £10K per plot - how is the Council and Local Plan looking to enforce. MP - complexity and viability work need to be consulting with land owners - expect land owners to have realistic value of their land.
  • Re Design Policy part – design advice not very good.
  • Frustration with not being able to speak with anyone in the Cornwall Archaeological unit – not returning calls etc., even if you leave a message they do not get back to you - when needing to speak with them on World Heritage sites etc.
  • Some officers fairly confident and speak with Parish Councils others lack of consultation with PC’s.
  • Briefing note – will all officers have the same notes? MP - recognise some difficulties – look at how we go about resolving.
  • Peter Phillips moved into Training co-ordinator role. Class Q meeting coming up would like him to come to these meetingsto bring you up to speed what he doing.
  • How familiar are Parish Councils with Local Plan – had meeting with PC’s few weeks ago – In Cornwall we have ability to work with PC’s to create Neighbourhood Plans. Some PC’s want their brownfield sites tidied up. If no Neighbourhood Plan will rely on Local Plan and NPPF.
  • Agents would like interactive map to include links to Neighbourhood Plans.
  • Some comments back from PC’s clearly indicate they do not understand the Local Plan.

Cornwall Planning Partnership Group, led by David Edmondson, is how we engage with Parishes. Conferences, training doing best to work with them. How we support them in becoming up to speed with items

Project work

There are a number of SPD’s to look at – provision in place to look at and make some link to new local plans. HJ informed some existing old local plan policies are listed at back of document.

Bat surveys – biodiversity officer close to completing SPD guide lines.

Purchasing powers, wage in Cornwall 18 months behind – many on minimum wage –when deliver ones dated 2012 – create problems for 2018 projection forward . Work on other things- CIL, Affordable Housing SPD’s. Working with Peter Phillips group get Agents in to help – can we do with SPD’s. Why not have a focus group with Agents with SPD’s as well.

Pre-app for householder apps/refresh of accredited agents scheme

Options:

  • PPA fee charged at £58 per hour (inc VAT)?
  • Subscription?
  • Partnership Agreement?
  • One off advice meeting with fixed fee and single e-mail response with advice?

From the above discussion followed covering:-

How to charge for what is required; what would response time be; reluctance in Householder team to attend site meetings, why looking at now; subscription may be complicated perhaps one off payment for advice meeting or small desktop assessment. Pre-app charging not viable householders not expected to pay more. £172 barely covers admin of planning applications; feel 2nd home owners or applicants in more affluent areas would not mind extra fee. Would only cover a proportion of householder applications. May be more demand in conservation areas for certain schemes. Some occasions where householders need pre-apps so feel options 1 and 4 would work. Agents would have something to sell to their clients. Feel 2 middle ones need to be combined and need something as to what Councils expectation is but feel need to bring in something. Perhaps have a walk-in service or phone service to named officers for specific area. Would be viable – perhaps start with fixed fee service first. Officer allocated to parish – get to know that officer. Offer continuity from application through to discharge of conditions. Need dedicated team – more efficiency from Council point of view.

Look to set up working group with Agents and explore options for access to Householder pre-application service. If anyone interested in this let MP know.

Self Build – interest from self-build plots but not a huge amount.

IT – Council is purchasing a new document management system which will make things easier to use. Public interface system will be better than the one we use now.

Agents page on website – Agents to check that area for any updates – notes /presentation of this meeting will be on there.

Plea from Parish Councils – when looking at plans electronically at their PC meetings quality of some plans could be better – please ensure they are of good quality and clear standard.

Permission in Principle Document – Government released this document yesterday – if you google ‘Permission in Principle’ should take you to the document.

Validation – reviewing document – from Main Agents Forum – Validation checking service response - do we validate but come back to agent if something is missing or make application invalid. Depends what is required but in Agents interest to provide information required.

Consultations – question asked why officers accepting consultations/representations after the deadline – cut-off date should mean cut off. Question asked if inappropriate comments submitted on-line could be removed. Informed that we have a process in place to remove these if they breach our website terms and conditions.

Pre-commencement conditions – officers will need to consult with Agents before we put them on (10 day default). MP to speak with officers regarding pre-commencement conditions and unnecessary conditions creeping back on.

IApply – why no BACS availability for payment.

Maps – Council to provide licensed O.S. location maps to buy.

Planning application file and plan accessibility/identification.

Felt valuable meeting today and yesterday – question who you want to see at next meeting/topics to cover – nominations as follows:

  • Nigel Doyle
  • Peter Phillips – (he will be asked along anyway)
  • Highways Officers
  • Mrs Jackie Smith (Local Drainage Lead officer)
  • Ecology Officer
  • Critical Drainage Areas
  • Affordable Housing – guidance on proposals which do not qualify for S106 contributions – cross over of numbers of 10 dwellings.

Question asked if we could have email sent to mailing list of Agents when a document has been update. Informed up to all to keep looking on the website.