Countryside Developments have posted on their own website:
Countryside submits appeal to Planning Inspectorate
27 March 2015Countryside has this week submitted an appeal to the Planning Inspectorate against Rochford District Council?s refusal of the outline planning application for the site west of Rayleigh.
Andrew Carrington, Managing Director of Strategic Land at Countryside said: ?The site at Rayleigh has already been allocated for housing and was recommended for approval by planning officers and as such we felt we were left with little option but to appeal the unsubstantiated grounds for refusal, which were not supported by the evidence.?
It is not yet known when the outcome of the appeal can be expected.
Planning Appeals are handled by the Planning Inspectorate, a government body.There doesn’t seem to be anything yet on the Inspectorates website about this, hopefully there will be something soon.
Unlike with planning applications, councillors can be very actively involved with planning appeals, so it looks like there’s a busy time ahead of us.
Countryside are right in one respect – this land has already been allocated for housing (despite our opposition at the time). But that doesn’t mean RDC have to approve every planning application for this site…
And for a company that thinks it’s got all its facts right, it disappointing that their Managing Director doesn’t seem to know that the application is actually in Rawreth, not Rayleigh!
Thanks for starting a thread on this –
And the point you make about Councillors being actively involved is vital as I see
little hope of the RDC Tech Officers / Planning Team putting up a defence against
their own scheme ( as Countryside point out – they accepted the OPP ).
But they are not elected by the public , Councillors are – and have the vote , I hope
they all put Rayleigh first on this?.
It seems we will have a way to be heard if the RDC decide not to challenge the appeal. Of course they could, to protect their reputation due to the failures at Core Strategy stage choose to put forward a less than ROBUST (good word that heard Scrutton use it a few times)argument setting out the Councillors and Mark Francois MP objections to the scheme.
If you play chess or poker that will seemingly allow the plans to get the green light and thus,like Pontius Pilot,they can all wash their hands and deny any culpability. (Its Easter you understand) According to Cllr.John Mason we can apply a rule 6 application. http://www.planningportal.gov.uk/…/pins/guide_rule_6.pdf
This process is above my pay grade but we ask anyone that can help our team to step up and help please.
Jim @ 1. There is no vote for Councillors in an Appeal. Only Ward Councillors will be permitted to speak plus our MP, RAG and some residents.
The Appellant’s Barrister will argue this out with expert witnesses, case precedents and legal argument in front of a Planning Inspector who will make a recommendation to the Secretary of State.
Linda@2 The Ward Councillors can help you with understanding Rule 6. Beware of a possible costs ward.
Thanks John @ 3, I did’nt mean vote at the Appeal – but the fact that we elect people to represent us who decide issues by a vote , as opposed to non-elected offices who have only opinions – which Councillors choose to accept or not ( in this case ).
It concerns me that it is these non-elected people who drive policy , let’s face it the Planners would see the chance as a career highlight when given the freedom to launch a massive project over 15 years.
The words ” Done Deal ” loom large in this methinks……
Jim @ 4 I’m not sure if its seen quite like that – it’s a professional challenge for an officer to deal with a big planning application like this, but its also a thankless task.
Admin@5 I reason you are really quite kind but please start to realise that these people doing the ‘thankless task’ are the architects of this diabolical set of proposals in the first place. They and the ‘Tory’ junta that have run RDC for years orchestrated this situation which has been totally rejected by every organisation in this area. Town Council Parish Councils and now as the bulldozers are revving up to destroy the greenbelt on the edge of our town, the MP pops up and says in effect ‘ohh you naughty boys you are upsetting my applecart’, and speaks against it. As usual too little, too late Mark Francois.
It’s important that we don’t forget about this appeal just because there’s an election on….
RAG have a large team of residents working on the four main reasons for refusal just in case that The Planning Department at Rochford District Council don’t want to put up a proper defence at the Appeal Hearing.
Admin – I assure you it has’nt been forgotten , we have four teams of three people ,
each team working on one of the four points of refusal in readiness to support the
refusal –
Flooding
Traffic
Education
Sport
And some interesting facts have come to light from the source documents……..
🙂