Agenda and minutes

Apologies for absence were received from Councillors Mr T Adams, Mr D Baker, Ms V Gay and Mrs M Millership. 

None.

To approve as a correct record the Minutes of a meeting of the Working Party held on 22 July 2019.

The Minutes of a meeting of the Working Party held on 22 July 2019 were approved as a correct record and signed by the Chairman.

None.

None.

The Planning Policy Manager reported that advice had been sought with regard to the housing requirement as agreed at the previous meeting.  A response was awaited and a full report would be submitted to a future meeting.

The Chairman asked if this Council was alone in its concerns or if other authorities had raised issues.

The Planning Policy Manager confirmed that a number of other authorities were pursuing this matter independently.  The issue mainly concerned rural authorities where there were high rates of inward migration which drove housing targets upwards.

The Planning Policy Manager presented an update report on the progress of the Norfolk Strategic Planning Framework following a recent review and recommended that the Council formally endorses a revised document, subject to the modification of Agreement 10 as outlined in the report.  He also recommended the amendment of recommendation 1 set out in the report by the addition of the words “… as an interim statement pending further review.”

Councillor J Punchard referred to Agreement 19 and stated that he was pleased that the agreement included mobile technologies.  However, NNDC had invested heavily in better broadband but the Agreement did not mention better broadband for rural Norfolk on a County-wide basis.

The Planning Policy Manager stated that the supporting text to the Agreement included broadband but agreed that it could be worthwhile to include it within the Agreement.

Councillor Mrs P Grove-Jones expressed doubts that some of the matters contained in the Agreements would come to fruition. 

Councillor Mrs Grove-Jones questioned the inclusion of Egmere Business Zone as a Tier 1 Employment Site in Agreement 8 as she considered that this was not being pursued by NNDC.

As background, Councillor Ms K Ward explained that there had been no sites Tier 1 sites in the first version of the Framework and it had been agreed that Egmere and Scottow should be included.

The Planning Policy Manager advised that if Egmere was no longer of strategic significance the Working Party could either recommend its deletion or wait until a more substantive review of the Framework had taken place and make representations as to its removal at that time.

The Working Party discussed whether or not Egmere should be deleted from Agreement 10.  It was noted that a report on the future of Egmere would be discussed at Cabinet later in the week. 

Councillor N Dixon referred to possible interest in the site for seaweed processing.  Egmere was currently designated as an Enterprise Zone and enjoyed certain benefits from that designation.  He considered that there would be no benefit from removing Tier 1 status.

Councillor Ms K Ward suggested that the Agreement needed to be considered in the context of the wider document.  Tier 1 employment land was related to the Local Enterprise Partnership and extensive external investment.  She considered that it would not be problematic for Egmere to remain until the substantive review of the Framework had taken place.

Councillor N Dixon considered that the severity of water shortage issues had not been adequately reflected in Agreements 17, 18 and 22.  This was a County-wide issue and permanent damage was being done to wetlands from rising demand for domestic and agricultural use.  He considered that these Agreements should be strengthened.  He considered that the conclusion was deficient in that it did not reflect the current environmental impact of increased demand which exceeded supply and it was not going to improve.  There was a major infrastructure issue.  He considered that the Authority should put a marker down in the interim report  ...  view the full minutes text for item 16.

The Senior Planning Officer presented a report which gave an outline of the proposed approach for the delivery of a comprehensive development brief for the North Walsham Sustainable Western Extension.  He recommended that the Working Party agree to the approach, with the addition of the need to consider the extension to the link road and possible inclusion of further land to enable the delivery of the extended road.

The Chairman stated that he was pleased that it was recommended that NNDC take the lead in this matter.  Councillor Ms V Gay, who was unable attend this meeting, had expressed the view that there should be two or possibly three local members on the Delivery Group.  He supported her view.

Councillor P Heinrich welcomed the report.  He considered that it was critical that NNDC took the lead on this matter.  He also considered that two or three local members should sit on the Delivery Group.  It was important to avoid a fait accompli presented by the developer and he was concerned at one developer taking on the delivery of the western extension.  North Walsham did not oppose the scheme provided there were safeguards with regard to the quality of the overall design.  He considered that the extension of the link road was most important and could not see that any proposals would work effectively without it.  He recommended that recommendation 3 of the report should be amended to require decisions on the project lead and constitution of the Delivery Group to be made by the Working Party and that a minimum of two councillors from the affected Wards be included together with the Cabinet Member for Planning.  He also recommended that the Delivery Group should report to the Working Party on a regular basis and at least every three months.

Councillor N Dixon requested assurances that work on the Development Brief would not prejudice Local Plan work or place a workload on the Planning Policy Team which was not sustainable and that the current priorities would be maintained.

The Planning Policy Manager explained that the recommendation allowed the possibility of engaging external consultants where required.  The resource implications were not clear at present and the preparation of the Brief would be a lengthy process.  However, he considered that there were resources and capacity in the team to proceed with preparation of the Brief without too much impact on Local Plan work.  It had been agreed to prepare the Brief prior to undertaking Section 19 consultation.  At the request of North Walsham members it had been agreed to address ongoing concerns regarding deliverability before the Plan was submitted for independent examination.  It would be within the gift of the Council to revisit that decision if the Plan was slowed down. 

Councillor J Punchard asked the Planning Policy Manager to confirm if the process would be similar to the Fakenham Development Brief.

The Planning Policy Manager explained that the outcome of the process would be similar in that it would produce a document  ...  view the full minutes text for item 17.