Agenda and draft minutes

Minutes of the previous meetings held on 20 September and 9 October 2024

The minutes of the previous meetings held on 20 September and 9 October 2024 were confirmed as true records.

Guidance is available online to Councillors and co-opted members on making declarations of interest

Minute 221. Cranbrook Town Centre.

Councillor Paul Hayward, Affects Non-registerable Interest, Close relations live in Cranbrook.

Minute 223. East Devon Local Plan - allocation site selections.

In accordance with the Code of Good Practice for Councillors and Officers dealing with planning matters as set out in the constitution the Chair, on behalf of Committee Members, advised lobbying in respect of numerous site selections

Minute 223. East Devon Local Plan - allocation site selections.

Councillor Bethany Collins, Affects and prejudicial Non-registerable Interest, Relation owns adjoining land to Honi_18 - Land at Kings Road, Hale Close, Honiton.

Minute 223. East Devon Local Plan - allocation site selections.

Councillor Paul Hayward, Affects Non-registerable Interest, In relation to all the Axminster site allocations employed as Town Clerk by Axminster Town Council.

Information on public speaking is available online

Henry Gent spoke about Exeter Airport addressing the airports decline over the years and its poor future, suggesting that Royal Mail would be withdrawing their services from March 2025.  He suggested that it would be a great place to put houses as it was close to Exeter and would benefit from existing connectivity.

Colin Danks referred to the Council’s current shortfall of 2,278 dwellings detailed in paragraph 3.4 of the report highlighting the difficult situation the Council was facing.  He referred to the most challenging sites that committee had previously ‘moved on’ from which were now back for committee’s consideration and suggested to help alleviate this issue that committee could bring forward the sites on the western side of the district that could accommodate smaller sized new settlements.  He referred to ‘land between Crealy and Greendale’ in particular, which could accommodate around 1,500 dwellings as detailed on pages 356 – 357.

Councillor Roy Collins reiterated his concerns about the loss of agricultural land that he previously spoke about at the Strategic Planning Committee meeting on 20 September 2024.

Information on matters of urgency is available online

There were no matters of urgency.

To agree any items to be dealt with after the public (including the Press) have been excluded. Thereare no itemswhich officersrecommendshould be dealtwithin thisway.

There were no confidential or exempt items.

The New Community Manager outlined the current plans for inclusion in the Cranbrook Town Centre Masterplan.  The plans identified buildings including key civic buildings and the order they were likely to be delivered which was critically important to support the residents.

The key civic buildings included:

Ø  Cranbrook Town Council’s building

Ø  Leisure Centre and Health and Wellbeing Centre

Ø  Till House multi-purpose building

Ø  Cranbox

Clarification was sought about whether there would be a need for a building for a Fire Station. The New Community Manager explained that following discussions with the Devon & Cornwall Fire Service they had advised that although there would be a presence it would co-locate in another building so a separate building would not be needed.

Ward Member, Councillor Kim Bloxham welcomed the report and the masterplan advising that Cranbrook needed facilities and this would be an opportunity to move forward the delivery of the town centre that had been anticipated for too long.

Councillor Bloxham expressed the importance of a leisure centre and decent health provision as the Younghayes Centre were barely coping and would be outgrown within the next year. She accepted that whilst the basic town infrastructure would be delivered by developers through the Section 106 Agreement there was an argument that the town should benefit from bidding into the current Community Infrastructure Levy pot, bearing in mind that Cranbrook is delivering approximately half of the current strategic housing need. 

Councillor Bloxham welcomed the move that the delivery of the town centre was to be under the Council’s control but stressed the delivery should be sooner rather than later to avoid the frustration of the community that had been shown towards the Consortium as they had been very slow to deliver key infrastructure and had failed to deliver the town centre road, pavements and crossings.

In response the New Community Manager advised that for the expansion of Cranbrook it is detailed in the Cranbrook Plan and the Development Planning Document that there is an expectation for developers to make capital contributions towards facilities including a leisure centre and a health and wellbeing centre and they will contribute £3m towards facilities for DCC to operate their services from.

Comments made by Committee Members included:

·       Heartening to see so much support from the residents for the town centre as well as for green space, social space and active travel.  It would be good if residents could get an opportunity to have a look at the Masterplan to envisage what their town centre would look like with an opportunity to provide any feedback.  The Chair advised Committee that suitable communications could be done if Members endorsed the recommendation.

·       Ward Member, Councillor Kevin Blakey advised that the proposed layout for the town centre was in line with what the Town Council and Ward Members had envisaged but reiterated the point raised by Councillor Bloxham that delivery was the key issue.

RESOLVED:

That the Cranbrook Town Centre Masterplan be endorsed as an evidence document for use by  ...  view the full minutes text for item 221.

The Assistant Director – Planning Strategy and Development Management presented the report drawing attention to the appended feedback report summarising the 1300 responses received via the Commonplace software and 250 separate emails to the Regulation 18 consultation that ran from May 2024 to June 2024.  Members noted that relevant feedback would continue to be provided to committee through reports relating to relevant redrafting of Local Plan chapters.

RESOLVED:

The proposed draft revised chapters in the Local Plan be endorsed, noting that they will need to be refined in readiness for the proposed Regulation 19 draft of the Plan.

The Assistant Director – Planning Strategy and Development Management set out his report to the Committee.

Throughout September and early November, the Committee had previously discussed and agreed a number of sites for allocation in the district along with a number of sites that Committee agreed to ‘move on’ from for potential further consideration at a later date.  The Assistant Director – Planning Strategy and Development Management advised Committee that it was now time to reconsider the ‘moved on’ sites to address the shortfall in housing allocations compared with the requirement figure.

Committee were reminded about the housing requirement set by Government and attention was drawn to paragraph 2.3 of the report that summarised the five options on how the council could achieve its overall numbers.  Officers preferred Option B which meant that the 10% buffer would not apply for the whole of the Local Plan period of 2020 – 2042 but apply from 2024 – 2042 leaving a remaining housing requirement of 2,278 dwellings still needing to be allocated.  It was noted that if all the ‘moved on’ sites detailed in the report were allocated the total allocation of dwellings would be 2,485 which would meet the shortfall and also give a small additional surplus of 177 dwellings.

The criteria applied by officers in respect of the ‘moved on’ sites for Committee’s reconsideration were detailed in paragraph 5.2.  Members noted that legal advice had been sought on a small number of new sites including some additional land in Honiton and the advice received was that if these sites were agreed for allocation they could be included in the Regulation 19 consultation which would give the public an opportunity to comment on them before it is submitted for examination.

The Assistant Director – Planning Strategy and Development Management invited Committee to consider Recommendation 1 before they started considering the ‘moved on’ sites as this would give Committee a clear picture on the number of dwellings needed to be allocated at this meeting.

Questions raised by Committee Members to Recommendation 1 and to the options set out in paragraph 2.3 of the report included:

·       An update was sought on the likely publication of Government’s new guidance on the National Planning Policy Framework.  The Assistant Director – Planning Strategy and Development Management could not give a definitive answer but advised that it was expected by the end of this year.

·       Several members sought clarification on the outcome for Option D and queried whether this option should be explored further so Committee were clear on whether this option could be ruled out.  It was advised that although Option D would result in slightly less houses it would entail considerable risks including the need for a new start date which could be challenged at examination.  Members noted that for Option D 18,731 dwellings were to be allocated compared with 20,182 for Option B.  However Members were advised that this difference was misleading and arises because of the reduced plan period proposed in Option D  ...  view the full minutes text for item 223.