ISSUE 3FYSH M H015

Response of

Marcus Fysh

To the request from the Planning Inspector for information exchange between SSDC and M Fysh, pertaining to follow-up to a meeting between M Fysh and officers of SSDC on matters to be discussed further under Issue 3.

South Somerset Local Plan Inquiry

6th June 2013

Please treat as

Footnotes to the Tables appended to the Planning Inspector’s further question under Item 2.

In order to make sensible like-for-like comparisons of historic data for employment in different locations in South Somerset, without over-counting, the method outlined in my discussions with ONS, which incorporates data from the MoD and DEFRA as well as ONS, has been used in the Tables appended my response to the Inspector’s further question under Item 2. It determines that average job growth during the period 2003-2011, five out of eight years of which were a period of rapid UK growth and credit expansion, was 195 jobs per annum, including part time as well as full time jobs.
BRES Employees and Employment for each ward in 2008-2010 were adjusted according to the discontinuity adjustment contained in the tables for Employees and Employment by industry sector in the ONS discontinuity advice note 2010. The source Excel table showing the workings for this can be made available to anyone who can confirm to me that they have a NOMIS licence, but it cannot be made public because of issues around disclosure of data. These workings are available to SSDC as SSDC is a licence holder.

For the prior years 2003-2007, where only Employees were available under ABI, and mindful that SIC industry classifications changed in 2007 making comparisons by industry through the prior series unreliable, ABI Employees for each ward were adjusted by the Employees overall discontinuity adjustment for the South West region contained in the ONS discontinuity advice note for 2010 (+2.0%), being the closest geographical discontinuity adjustment available from ONS in respect of 2010 and prior years contained in that advice note.
The 2008 discontinuity adjustment for the 2003-2007 years was made on the same principle, for the same reasons and to be consistent. That means the South West region adjustment as per the ONS advice note 2008 (+1.2%) was applied for 2003-2007, on top of the 2010 adjustment.

The 2006 discontinuity adjustment for the 2003-2005 years was made according to the advice notes from ONS published in NOMIS (as appended in Appendices 1, 2 and 3) which made Local Authority level adjustment possible, leading to the conclusion as per the appended table / work sheet, that a 1.8% adjustment should be made at South Somerset Local Authority, on top of the 2010 and 2008 adjustments referred to above, for those 2003-2005 years.

The effect of this as per the Tables is that the adjustment to be made by scaling factors:
- to 2003-2005 years is by 1.02 x 1.012 x 1.018 = 1.0508 , to the District figure
- to 2006-2007 years is by 1.02 x 1.012 = 1.0322 , to the District figure
- to the BRES years 2008-2010 is by the various industrial sector scaling factors as set out in the 2010 discontinuity note, to the different industrial sectors in each District Ward.

Agricultural employee jobs and agricultural self-employed jobs, which are not included in the raw ABI and BRES figures broken down by ward, have been added to the ABI/BRES data in the Rural Settlements and Rural Centres, pro rata according to the discontinuity-adjusted 2008 BRES Employment jobs in the Rural Settlements and Rural Centres. This is because agricultural work takes place in rural, not built-up, areas. This method probably underestimates the degree to which that work is undertaken in the wards which are categorised as Rural Settlements, since there are more built up areas within those wards categorised as Rural Centres than those categorised as Rural Settlements. It is therefore conservative as to the extent of adjustment upwards that should be made to Rural Settlements as a result of this factor.

HM Forces employee jobs,which are not included in the raw ABI and BRES figures broken down by ward, have been added within the Rural Centres category in view of the classification of Ilchester as a Rural Centre (within Ivelchester ward), in which the vast majority of those jobs would be based at Yeovilton.

Wards used in the hierarchy for 2003-2007 figures in the tables are the following 2003 CAS wards (by hierarchy);
those used for 2008-2011 figures are the 2011 wards available under BRES (and have the same names):

Yeovil (6)

40UDLB : Yeovil Central
40UDLC : Yeovil East
40UDLD : Yeovil South
40UDLE : Yeovil West
40UDLF : Yeovil Without
40UDJS : Brympton

Market Towns (11)

40UDJW : Cary
40UDJX : Chard Avishayes
40UDJY : Chard Combe
40UDJZ : Chard Crimchard
40UDKA : Chard Holyrood
40UDKB : Chard Jocelyn
40UDKD : Crewkerne
40UDKH : Ilminster
40UDKL : Langport and Huish
40UDKY : Wessex (includes Compton Dundon)
40UDKZ : Wincanton

Rural Centres (5)

40UDJR : Bruton

40UDKK : Ivelchester

40UDKM : Martock
40UDKN : Milborne Port
40UDKT : South Petherton

Rural Settlements (17)

40UDJP : Blackdown
40UDJQ : Blackmoor Vale
40UDJT : Burrow Hill
40UDJU : Camelot
40UDKC : Coker
40UDKE : Curry Rivel
40UDKF : Eggwood
40UDKG : Hamdon (includes Stoke Sub Hamdon)
40UDKJ : Islemoor
40UDKP : Neroche
40UDKQ : Northstone
40UDKR : Parrett
40UDKS : St Michael's
40UDKU : Tatworth and Forton
40UDKW : Tower
40UDKX : Turn Hill
40UDLA : Windwhistle
The Rural Settlementscategory in the Tables includes 1 rural centre, Stoke sub Hamdon, because it is part of the Hamdon ward which is otherwise rural,
and because Stoke is allocated only 33 further houses to 2028 in the PSSSLP, which is
0.23% annual growth in Stoke housing proposed by SSDC.
Annual growth in Rural Settlements housing proposed by SSDC of 0.35% is greater than that for Stoke, therefore Stoke can be takenamong Rural Settlements for purpose of analysing employment balance without thinking that it flatters Rural Settlements in any way.
The Rural Settlement category excludes Compton Dundon despite it being rural because it is in the same ward as Somerton, (Wessex ward) and the data for Wessex ward is more appropriately allocated to Market Towns because of Somerton’s predominance in the Wessex ward.

These anomalies within the ward categorisation were considered easier to understand and more robust than making adjustments to ward data from ONS based on inclusion or exclusion of particular settlements in particular years. They are also of minor significance to the overall settlement strategy, balancing each other out in terms of the effect on Rural Settlements, and only slightly increasing Market Towns relative to Rural Centres.

In the absence of accurate data for self-employment jobs in particular areas from workplace based survey such as BRES or ABI in the 2003-2007 years, which are available for the BRES years, the average ratio of self-employed jobs to employee jobs during the BRES years 2008-2011 as per the Tables has been applied to the adjusted employee jobs figure for each of the 2003-2007 years, in order to approximate self-employment jobs by ward for those prior years. Only by doing this can a sensible like-for-like comparison be made.