District council warns planning reform would “weaken local democracy”

The Oxfordshire local authority said it strongly opposed plans to introduce a national scheme of delegation for planning decisions, which were detailed in a Government consultation launched in May.

This would see some applications automatically determined by officers, removing the right for councillors to consider planning applications at the planning committee.

They would also remove the right of councillors to call in certain applications, such as housing developments up to nine houses, to the committee.

Councillors at Vale of White Horse unanimously voted through a motion expressing the council's opposition to the reforms at a full council meeting on July 16. 

The council's leader, Cllr Bethia Thomas, has since issued a statement on the proposals, describing them as "unnecessary" and warning that they would not improve the decision-making process.

"Indeed, they will make the decision-making process less transparent and will undermine a vital principle of local democracy," she said.

She also expressed opposition to the removal of the right of councillors to call in an application to committee, stating: "It is a vital principle of democracy and transparency that applications can be called in by ward members in consultation with local stakeholders and with the agreement of elected members, the Chair/Vice-Chair of planning committees."

The council's chair of planning, Cllr Max Thompson, meanwhile said that over 95% of planning applications are already determined by planning officers without coming before the planning committee.

He added: "Each year Vale's planning committee determine around the 30-40 most complex and contentious applications in an open forum that allows opponents and supporters, including Town and Parish Councillors, to be heard.

"If this scheme was in operation, around 3/4 of applications that committee have heard in recent years would not have come to us." 

The council's criticisms follow warnings from the Local Government Association (LGA) about the plans.

Responding to the consultation, the LGA raised concerns about the democratic impact and "limited flexibility" of the Government's proposals to introduce a national scheme of delegation for planning decisions.

It also partially echoed the Vale of White Horse in suggesting the impact of the proposals on local democracy "must be considered".

It added that the involvement of elected councillors in planning decisions "is the backbone of the English planning system and our reservations about a national scheme of delegation centre on this role potentially being eroded".

Adam Carey