Agenda item

The Planning Services Manager presented Members with a report ‘Planning guidance on the validation of planning applications’, which invited the Planning Committee to endorse the document which would allow the local validation requirements to be published and come into effect, assisting officers of the Planning Services team in the validation of planning applications.

The Town and Country Planning (Development Management Procedure) (England) Order (DMPO) 2015 set out certain national requirements for a planning application to be valid. In addition, further information could be sought locally where they were set out in a local list of information requirements specified by the local planning authority.

The purpose of the document outlining the information requirements both nationally and locally, was to advise agents and applicants of the information required when submitting applications for planning permission. This was aimed at enabling the Local Planning Authority to have sufficient information to determine planning applications from the outset, in order to provide a fast and efficient planning service.

However, local planning authority’s local information requirements must be reasonable, by having regard to the nature and scale of the proposed development. Additionally, the information required must be necessary and a material consideration in the determination of the application.

In order to inform the outcome of the Local Information requirements, engagement was carried with key stakeholders, before public consultation. The results of the consultation and analysis of representations received were contained within the validation report.

The Key topics discussed were as follows:

- There were 8 national validation requirements which had been introduced since 2018 however this had not yet happened in Stockton. There were also an additional 42 local validation requirements that Members were asked to consider and endorse

- Consultation should have included all 56 Ward Councillors as it affected the whole of the Borough.

- Discussion was had around public consultation in terms of when and where it took place.

- Questions were raised in terms of how the assessment and validation of applicants and planning applications had been undertaken without the necessary validation requirements over the last 10 years and whether previous applications could be challenged.

- Offices informed the committee that the consultation responses were detailed within the report pack. Officers also informed the Committee that there would be no grounds for past applications to be challenged

- It was suggested that if Members endorsed the ‘Planning guidance on the validation of planning applications’ then the Health Impact Statement should be adopted immediately.

- Brief discussion was had around how long the national requirements had been in force and whether there had been many amendments since then. It was also requested that an additional recommendation be added to include update reports be brought back to Planning Committee to keep Members updated as and when changes happened.

A vote took place and the officers recommendation within the report was approved.

RESOLVED that the Council’s ‘National and Local Validation Requirements List’ is approved and published on the Council’s website to allow it to be used for the purposes of validating planning applications, as detailed in the report.