Agenda item

The Council has prepared an Interim Housing Statement because it is unable to demonstrate a 5-year Housing Land supply. The Interim Housing Statement does not introduce new policy. This document merely provides the Council with a mechanism for inviting landowners, developers and promoters to submit planning applications in the right locations at the right scale by providing a high level tick list and RAG rating of existing Development Plan and National Policy Guidance matters, which if they are addressed by applicants, will help speed up decision making. It will operate until a 5-year housing land supply is demonstrated.

The Sub-Committee received a report from the Planning Policy Team Leader confirming that the Council had prepared an Interim Housing Statement because it had been unable to demonstrate a 5-year Housing Land supply. It was explained that this document provided the Council with a mechanism for inviting landowners, developers and promotors to submit planning applications in the right locations at the right scale by providing a high level tick list and RAG rating of the existing Development Plan and National Policy Guidance matters, which if addressed by applicants, would help speed up decision making.  If approved, the interim Housing Statement would operate until a 5-year housing land supply could be demonstrated.

            A range of issues were raised in considering this report. With the HELAA sites it did feel like a dangerous road to go down as it seemed that if a site made it onto the HELAA, then it tended to progress onto full blown planning consent eventually.  Was this dangerous in terms of how it fitted in with the Local Plan in that it was not cohesive. It was explained that in reality the Council was unable to demonstrate a 5 year land supply and so proposals for development that might conflict with the polices of the Local Plan could come forward and have the risk of being determined favourably at appeal if the Council wanted to refuse them. It was also about giving some guidance to landowners in terms of where we would prefer them to look, as the HEELA was not meant to apply down to a level of decision making for planning applications.  Its purpose was to help the Council to look for the most suitable land available. All sites still had to go through a level of evidence gathering through the plan making process which they might not survive. The key point was whether the Council should provide guidance to potential applicants about where the authority saw where any proposals should come forward.

            Another issue of concern around land supply was that of land banking and the question was asked as to whether this contributed to the figures being so low in Arun.  There was a significant level of unimplemented planning consents to a figure of around 4,000 dwellings and that there were different reasons for this. If the implementation of 4,000 homes that had planning permission already, would it bring the Council back up to the 5-years and if it did, then this meant that the Council was in the position it was in due to developers.  In response, it was confirmed that the 4,000 was already in the Council’s 5-year classed as commitments.

Another point raised was that the Council’s position with regard to housing delivery was presumably measured against the phasing in the Local Plan and was this established or could it be changed.  Also, if the Council was doing a review of the Local Plan then the phasing needed to be changed and adjusted to avoid the Council being penalised. The Group Head of Planning confirmed that the Council could amend the trajectory but could not manipulate it.

            It was clear that the 5-year land supply was something that was beyond the Council’s control and a matter for developers to deal with. In view of this, a report was requested to outline what developers were responsible for the 4,000 figure and what the delays were on these sites. It was felt that this information was needed before Councillors could provide a view on the interim housing statement.

The Group Head of Planning confirmed that this work was underway to an extent, but a lack of staff resource made it difficult to contact the promoters of the committed sites. 

            It was pointed out that the Council had written to the Housing Minister questioning these targets with little success and so the targets needed to be challenged nationally as this was an issue that affected so many other Councils. The RAG system introduced was thought to be helpful but appeared to set higher targets than what was currently requested.  The concern was that this approach might not yield the developments that the Council was looking for and that it would not be a quick process. The Group Head of Planning pointed out that this was existing policy and that not all criteria would necessarily apply depending on relevance.

            Councillor Dixon confirmed that he had received a representation from a member of the public which he read out to the Sub-Committee. The question asked was whether Option 1 in the report, which was to agree the interim Housing Statement, was this a lawful option.   The Group Head of Planning responded stating that there were two elements of housing land supply and delivery which would ensure that a Policy afforded full development plan status.  One of those was the 5-Year Land Supply and the other was the Housing Delivery Test which were national policies which operated with the statutory development plan and required authorities to act in to address delivery. The Sub-Committee therefore needed to satisfy both measures in relation to housing delivery in order for the titled ‘presumption’ not to apply. He confirmed that Option 1 was therefore a lawful option.

            Following further discussion, the Sub-Committee

            The Sub-Committee

                        RECOMMEND TO FULL COUNCIL

That the Housing Interim Statement is recommended to Full Council on 17 March 2021 for approval.