EARLY ONE MORNING.........................
Liberal Democrat Councillor for Stansted North on Uttlesford District Council and former Leader of the Liberal Democrat Group Learn more
by Alan Dean on 3 December, 2014
Uttlesford’s Local Plan has been rejected by Inspector Roy Foster at today’s hearing of the Examination in Public in Saffron Walden. Eight years have been wasted on an unsound plan by the ruling Tories. Senior people at the council should consider their positions. They have failed the district, its residents and its businesses. A new planning regime is now needed to repair the damage and work with local people to create a credible plan before this district is ruined by yet more planning anarchy brought about by Tories who buried their heads in the sand, misled the public and were supported by officers who would not stand up to challenge elected member incompetence.
The plan was rejected on the grounds the housing need (numbers) had not been objectively assessed and that the Elsenham new settlement proposal – the Tory flagship – is not justified. A year ago this month the Liberal Democrats put a motion to council saying that the council should start again. The Tories rejection that motion. It has taken another 12 months for the inspector to give them the same message. This time they will have to listen!
This has been an Eight Year Disaster. £,00,000s have been wasted. Leading Tories in the cabinet should resign.
The full statement by Mr Foster may be read here.
19 Comments
Another one of those told you so, or we told them, moments! Can only hope that things can now go in a different direction with plenty of community input. The whole planning committee and council need to reflect on this. I hope Fairfield get the message and back off!
What a shameful waste of taxpayers money. It was obvious to anyone looking at the process objectively that the plan was unsound.
The cabinet were given a free ‘get out of jail’ card in October 2013 when they were formally asked to restart the process. Unfortunately arrogance prevailed and another year and thousands more have been wasted.
Heads need to roll over this.
Matt
We might start with the heads of the lead professional officers: they are our supposed experts whose task it has been to produce the Local Plan. In my view they should be offered early retirement or advised to advance their careers under the auspices of another authority, because they have failed to offer UDC the leadership and competence expected of highly-paid professionals. Over the past 6-8 years their performance has been abysmal, and for much of that time they have allowed themselves to be used as the political tools of the administration. Indeed, at times they have behaved with the same cavalier attitude as shown by Cllrs Ketteridge and Rolfe and their colleagues.
Had the Inspector seen fit to allow the LP Examination in Public to have followed its natural course, the council might have been in a position to take up the task afresh with renewed vigour under new leadership, with full public engagement in the ‘re-run’. As it is, the task is now thrown back at the same bunch of dunderheads as has made such a mess of it already.
It is now imperative that residents’ groups and those who have objected so vocally in the consultation process demand immediate discussions with the council and its leadership so that some useful progress may be made in plotting a way forward before the Local Elections in May.
I agree absolutely with your sentiment that some action against named individuals should follow, and, indeed, have suggested as much on several occasions, as others will confirm. I would not want to rule out legal action in the fullness of time.
I need to take some time to consider the implications of the momentous decision taken today. The fact that the inspector closed the inquiry early and gave such a devastating analysis of the failings inherent to the local plan call into question the position of those who were professionally responsible and those members who have expressed pride in the emerging local plan. I was one of those who over a year ago voted to have the emerging plan independently reviewed, the cabinet arrogantly whipped the Tory group to reject that sensible proposal.
I wonder how proud certain individuals are feeling now? This is possibly where we find how much integrity certain individuals have. Certainly there must be some deeply uncomfortable officers, indeed there ought to be after what has taken place. A plan process that has cost tens of thousands and taken several years has been dismissed in 8 days by an inspector in terms that a five-year old would understand.
We shan’t need to have a group convened to examine the inspectors decision in the way that an ombudsman report was recently treated. There does need to be an autopsy on the corpse of the draft plan however and blame needs to be ascribed. I got drummed out of the local Tory group for having the temerity to question the draft plan, frankly I consider myself fortunate to be free of them and their expensive suicide note
To borrow a phrase from Oscar Wilde, ‘One would need a heart of stone….not to laugh.’ So where to from here, imperious leader? I have to stop, I’m laughing so much I can barely see the keyboard….
Alan: To what extent will UDC be able to modify the existing draft? What is the extent of the overhaul needed and what aspects are likely to be retained? While the plan for Elsenham has been thrown out (no doubt leaving Haselhurst with a lot of egg on his face), has the Inspector challenged the proposed developments for Saffron Walden and other areas?
Hi Daniel, I will reply to your question about where next with Elsenham etc probably tomorrow morning. I have been pre-occupied with my grandson’s first birthday trip today, though I did get to tonight’s Cabinet meeting. I am pleased to report that Cllr Rolfe accepted my blog call this morning that future meetings of the Local Plan Working Group will be open to the public for the first time. That is progress. I also want residents’ group representatives to be able to participate, but that debate is for another day – the council meeting in two weeks’ time.
I remember many people baulking at the idea of allowing the public to attend the LDF working group and you were a minority of one. It’s a shame they didn’t listen until the Inspector’s ruling.
The plan has been found unsound, to the extent that it would not be possible to correct it in 6 months.
On that basis I would say that any allocations within it, Walden included, have just been scratched.
Incidentally, the initial statement from the inspector has cited two areas of concern. His full letter, yet to be written, may well list a series of problems.
Bear in mind that he was so unimpressed with the draft plan that he closed the hearing two days early, that speaks volumes. Judging from his body language during presentations on Walden and Dunmow I would anticipate that his full letter will have further concerns.
Anyway, it was a marvellous result for Uttlesford residents and thoroughly vindicates those of us who have been arguing against the draft plan consistently for over a year.
UDC was offered the opportunity to have the plan independently reviewed last year and the cabinet arrogantly dismissed the suggestion. Perhaps their incompetence can now be revealed to all. Mr Foster has done us a great service.
Alan has been consistently campaigning against the way in which the Local Plan was devised for over three years, warning that an exclusive and secretive process would go awry and would be in danger of failing the credibility test. Others were happy to sit in a working group that excluded members of the public. Many residents have fought for many years against the Tories’ Elsenham proposals – starting with an “eco town” back in 2007, I think. It is a victory for many of those who campaigned, particularly for Elsenham which has been threatened for many years. It would be good to hear what Alan thinks will be the next challenge.
I spent the evening with Catherine in the West End at an hilarious play called “Neville’s Island”. It is about a group of work colleagues on a team building weekend in the Lake District. They manage to maroon themselves on a small island. It tests their teamwork to the limit.
Apart from thinking there are some similarities with the ULP team and maybe some lessons for them, I will reserve further comment until another day.
I think it fair to say that some of us, me included, have been entirely vindicated by the inspector.
I was drummed out of the local group (some wanted to expel me completely) for having the temerity to question the soundness of the local plan.
Given that the Local Plan Working Group was dominated by the cabinet (5 members) and never properly debated what was presented, perhaps residents will excuse me for feeling a surge of delight at being proven right by the inspector. There was no nuance in what he said, the draft plan absolutely stunk, to the extent tht he could not envisage it being corrected in 6 months.
I would again invite the individuals directly involved in presenting this disastrous rejected plan to consider their positions and resign
While the defeat of Hellsenham (again) was positive news, on the downside the council will have to five 10% more housing than planned in the draft local plan. This means whoever is in control in May 2015 will have a bigger political headache. It certainly means that Saffron Walden, Dunmow and Stansted, as the bigger communities, are likely to bear the burden of far greater development. I’m uncertain whether there is anything to celebrate.
Plus, whoever wins power in Westminster will be carrying out billions in further cuts to public services. This probably means less infrastructure will accompany any development. The entire political class is failing everyone but the rich. There’s no-one worth voting for.
Daniel, it is a disaster whichever way you look at this. I liken it to having gangrene in a leg. To save your life it has to amputated. Neither option is pleasant. There are 18-24 difficult months ahead. The present regime is so discredited, I doubt little credible progress will be made in the next six months. The first step is to abandon private and secret meetings, but they may be in denial over even that.
You’ve said before that the lack of a local plan will be exploited by developers, enabling unconstrained housing development. This means they could still get housing in Elsenham but the council will have even less leverage to determine what needs to be in place to make it sustainable.
The lack of transparency and accountability has crippled the process of developing a coherent plan that can enable communities to absorb this level of growth. However, it’s unclear to me how much the council will be able to leverage much in terms of services it does not control, particularly at a time when the Tory-LibDem government is loosening S106 agreements and councils are set for yet more cuts. Still, the local electorate will vote like morons for a Tory MP and probably a Tory council. You get the government you deserve, people.
I would challenge your assessment of planning generally and Elsenham particularly. I think my record of successful appeals and court cases (and my consistent challenges to the draft plan) suggests that I know what I’m talking about.
Any development proposals will have to be sustainable and acceptable within the terms of the exisiting local plan and the NPPF, just has been the case for the past couple of years. Using precisely these criteria we were able to successfully fend off Bentfield Green and Cambridge Road in Stansted.
The inspectors revised housing numbers would lift the council requirement from about 10500 to 11500 over a 20 year period, hardly a major problem. Also, we could advance the argument that Uttlesford is a rural district and should not be assessed in the same way as Harlow or Cambridge.
The reality is that the inspector has saved the district from a dire draft plan, we now have to hope that residents will take the opportunity in May to rid themselves of a dire Tory administration and replace it with a group that has the interests of residents at heart.
I was actually asking Alan his opinion. He has also been part of winning appeals far longer than you have been a councillor. I believe he has previously warned that we’re in a state of planning “anarchy”, which will be exploited by developers. I would like to know whether he still thinks this is the case and if we could still be in a situation where Elsenham is threatened by unsustainable development (I note that you have mooted that east of Elsenham could be considered for development, which is hardly better than north of Elsenham). Perhaps he can answer for himself.
My apologies, I did not read your previous post as posing a question.
I am happy to agree that Alan has far more experience than I but by the same token I think that he would agree that the pair of us have worked well together on various planning appeals.
I have no illusions about my place in the general scheme of things, I try to do what is right for residents for the right reasons.
The decision on the draft plan honestly did not surprise me because it was so patently unfit for purpose.
I would also be interested in Alan’s response to your suggestion that a “garden city” could be considered east of Elsenham, among a number of sites you proposed.
The discussion of potential sites for a garden city development is something that needs to be carried out.
The inspector made it very clear that he considered a large single settlement would be an important element in our housing provision.
As to where this might take place, I have no fixed preference, seriously. There are a variety of possibilities and each has pros and cons. Residents might favour a new town near Chesterford, they might prefer the Rodings (with easy access to Chelmsford and Harlow for education, retail and health provision)
Consultation by the current Tory group has been derisory, they have disregarded any opinion that contradicted what they had decided upon. R4U would consult properly, listen to what residents say and act upon it.