Agenda and minutes

Councillor R Bailey and Councillor S Nazir declared an ‘Other Interest’ in the matter the subject of Minute 15 below headed “Householder Design Guide Supplementary Planning Document (SPD) Public Consultation”. As they were both present in the meeting by invitation, Councillor Bailey in his role as Shadow Cabinet Member and Councillor Nazir in her role as Deputy Cabinet Member, and not in a decision making capacity, they remained in the meeting.

a)  To agree the minutes of the meeting held on 28 July 2022

b)  Matters arising

The minutes of the meeting held on 28 July 2022 were agreed and signed as a true record. There were no matters arising.

Report of the Director of Streetscene and Regulatory Services

The Cabinet Member considered a report of the Director of Streetscene and Regulatory Services which sought authority to consult for a seven week period on the draft Householder Design Guide Supplementary Planning Document (SPD).

SPDs add further detail to the policies in the Local plan but cannot introduce new policy. They provided additional information and are a material consideration when determining planning applications. This SPD would give residents design guidance when adapting, extending and improving their properties and, upon adoption, would replace the existing Householder Design Guide.

The current Householder Design Guide was adopted in 2013, and residents considering alterations to their properties would benefit from up-to-date guidance regarding what is expected in order to receive a successful planning determination.

The draft Householder Design Guide is a comprehensive review and updating of the previous document and would provide clear guidance for residents when making applications, as well s to officers when determining planning applications.

Regulations 11 to 15 of the Town and Country Planning (Local Planning) (England) Regulations 2012 set out the requirements for producing SPDs; including a minimum statutory public consultation period of four weeks. The Council’s recently adopted Statement of Community Involvement set a local standard that SPDs should be consulted on for six weeks, therefore this would be adhered to.

It was also a legal requirement, as set out in the Environmental Assessment of Plans and Programmes Regulations 2004 (SEA Regulations), to consider whether or not a Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA) of the SPD should be undertaken. The process for determining whether an SEA would be required is called screening and this would determine whether a plan would have significant environmental effects. The screening opinion that was undertaken, as attached at Appendix 2 of the report, concluded that no SEA was needed as the SPD elaborated on existing policy. This screening report must be consulted on so that three statutory bodies (Historic England, Natural England and the Environment Agency) could respond. For this reason, it made sense to make the screening report publicly available for comment at the same time as the SPD was being consulted on.

An Equalities Impact Assessment (EIA) was also undertaken, as attached at Appendix 3 of the report. This would also form part of the public consultation.

Responses would be analysed and the SPD amended accordingly, before submitting to Cabinet for final adoption. In line with legislation, the Cabinet report would include a statement setting out the details of the consultation, a summary of the main issues raised and how they had been addressed.

It was noted that SPD consultations would normally be six weeks long. However, as this consultation would run over the Christmas period, an additional week was proposed, making a seven week consultation period.

RESOLVED that the Cabinet Member authorises a seven week public consultation on the draft Householder Design Guide Supplementary Planning Document.

There are no outstanding issues

There were no outstanding issues.

David Butler, Head of Planning Policy and Environment

The Cabinet Member reported that this was David Butler’s last meeting before moving to a new role at a different authority. The Cabinet Member and Members present thanked David for all his hard work and wished him well for the future.