council councillors - Hart District Council

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Sep 25, 2014 - Day supports the campaign to challenge negative attitudes and outdated stereotypes. ... coming months wit
COUNCIL Date and Time:

Thursday, 25 September 2014 at 7.00 pm

Place:

Council Chamber, Civic Offices, Fleet

Present:

COUNCILLORS – Billings (Chairman) Ambler Axam Bailey Bennison Blewett Burchfield Butler Clarke Cockarill Collett

Crampton Crisp Crookes Forster S Gorys Harward Ive Kinnell Makepeace-Browne Morris

Neighbour Oliver Parker Radley JE Radley JR Woods

Officers Present Patricia Hughes Daryl Phillips Alison Cottrell 26

Joint Chief Executive Joint Chief Executive Committee Services

MINUTES OF PREVIOUS MEETING An amendment was agreed to page CL.11 Merger of the Community Safety Partnerships to show the result of the vote as follows: Those who voted FOR the motion: Councillors Ambler, Bennison, Crampton, Crookes, Forster P, Forster S, Gorys, Kennett, Kinnell, Morris, Parker, Southern and Woods. Those who voted AGAINST the motion: Councillors Axam, Billings, Blewett, Clarke, Cockarill, Collett, Crisp, Ive, Makepeace-Browne, Neighbour and Oliver. Councillor Leeson abstained. Following that amendment the Minutes of the Meeting held on 31 July 2014 were confirmed and signed as a correct record.

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APOLOGIES FOR ABSENCE Apologies for absence had been received from Councillors Forster P, Leeson, Lewis, Southern and Wheale. CL.17

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DECLARATIONS OF INTEREST No declarations were made.

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COUNCIL PROCEDURE RULE 12 – QUESTIONS BY THE PUBLIC No questions received.

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COUNCIL PROCEDURE RULE 14 – QUESTIONS BY MEMBERS Questions put by Councillors are detailed in Appendix A attached to these Minutes.

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CHAIRMANS ANNOUNCEMENTS The Chairman announced that all tickets had been sold for the Curry Evening. The Chairman made a request for jumble for a sale in Yateley at the Monteagle Community Centre. She asked that those who had jumble contact her, and she would arrange for it to be collected. The Chairman had attended the following events on behalf of the Council. 4 August 22 August 4 September 9 September 12 September

Lights Out, Ghurkha Square War Memorial, Fleet Photocall for Green Flag Award – Hart’s Countryside Rangers at Civic Offices Induction and installation of the Revd Mark Haydon – new vicar at All Saints Church, Church Road, Fleet Opening evening for new artificial grass pitch at Frogmore Leisure Centre CAB AGM at The Tythings, Yateley

The Chairman advised those present that the new artificial grass pitch at Frogmore Leisure Centre was a significant investment in the community, being suitable for footballers of all ages and reacting like real grass, and would not wear out or suffer from rabbit holes. She reported that Matt le Tissier had attended the opening and had been charming and very good with the youngsters who had attended. She added that we needed to promote this valuable facility from Hart. The Vice Chairman had attended the following events on behalf of the Council: 4 August 9 September 10 September 19 September 32

Lights Out, Gally Hill Road War Memorial, Fleet Leader of HCC Reception and Beating Retreat to mark retirement of Lord Lieutenant at the Great Hall Winchester Mayor of Fareham Civic Day New Forest Civic Day

CABINET MEMBERS ANNOUNCEMENTS The Leader of the Council, Councillor Crookes, announced: CL.18

Hampshire Partnership The September meeting of the Partnership included items on Skills to support the Economy, a review of the responses to last winter’s flooding in Hampshire and The Better Care fund and the issues around supporting an ageing population. The agenda and papers are on the Partnership website at: http://www3.hants.gov.uk/thehampshirepartnership/thpmeetings/thpmeetings2014.htm#section618979-3 Enterprise M3 Local Enterprise Partnership (LEP) He had chaired the September meeting of the LEP Leaders’ Board. The Board received updates on the status of funded projects and the plan for the next round of Government bidding. In particular a report was received on the delivery of housing in the LEP area. The Leaders made some significant comments on this report which were carried forward to the September LEP Board meeting. The final housing report should be published in the next few days and may be of interest to Members. Please contact Mr. Phillips or myself if you would like a copy of this report. The Cabinet Member for Planning, Councillor Parker, reported: That the consultation on development options had received over 100 responses, had held three drop in sessions, with a further session later this month. He advised that the consultation remains open until October 10th 2014. He reported that he had attended a meeting on the 22nd September at which James Arbuthnot had spoken briefly. There would be no changes to rules to give the Council a moratorium until a new plan is in place but stressed the value of neighbourhood plans and that issues of inconsistency had been raised. The minister had offered the services of a senior retired planning inspector – Keith Holland – in completing our local plan, and that he would attend on the 20th October to meet senior officers and group leaders. He further reported that Hart had now officially been certified as a Fair Trade district and offered his thanks to all officers who had helped to achieve this, especially Carolyn Munns and Martine Fullbrook. The Cabinet Member for Community Wellbeing, Councillor Crampton, announced: Congratulations to our assistant senior ranger Leigh Neville, for successfully passing her qualifications to be a Green Flag Judge. Green Flag is the highest recognition for quality green space provision and this qualification will bring Leigh into contact with some of the highest achieving green spaces in the country. Not only will this be a valuable addition to Leigh’s professional development but also a great way for Hart to stay on top of the game as far as our own sites are concerned. By bringing her into contact with other high achieving authorities, she will be able to draw inspiration from the exposure and this will allow us, as a service, to keep our ideas contemporary and on the cutting edge of our delivery. It is the first time a member of Hart’s staff has achieved this and it will mean that we not only meet national standards for our own nature reserves but we are now part CL.19

of a national organisation advising other local authorities on how to manage and improve theirs. On Wednesday, 1 October 2014, Hart District Council will be supporting the national campaign, Older People’s Day. The day aims to celebrate achievements and contributions older people make to our society and the economy. Older People’s Day supports the campaign to challenge negative attitudes and outdated stereotypes. As part of our priority of Health and Wellbeing, the Council has teamed up with organisations across the district to support five local events that support the campaign. Funding has been provided to your local organisations to run events that include talks, activities and information stalls with some events including an afternoon tea party. Hart District Council has also provided funding for Fleet RVS to provide older people with pedometers for a competition to see who can take the most steps. Hart District Council sponsors events in Hartley Wintney, Crondall and Ewshot, Odiham, Yateley and Fleet. The Cabinet Member for Regulatory Services, Councillor Collett announced: He was grateful to Madam Chair for taking a few moments at the beginning of the meeting to remember Mel Colson who died suddenly two weeks ago. Mel was a highly respected and very reliable Building Control Surveyor who died of heart failure. This occurred very soon after fellow Building Control Surveyor Martin Hobley had left. This left our Building Control service in an extremely difficult position and we are very grateful to Rushmoor Borough Council for their support during this time. We were already in discussions with Rushmoor about the possibility of putting together a joint Building Control service which will give us greater resilience for the future and this has added to the urgency of this task. Members of the Licensing Committee recently considered a paper on the proposal to develop a shared Licensing Service with Basingstoke and Deane Borough Council. The committee raised a series of very pertinent issues which it is right to investigate further before any decision is made. Since then the Chair of the Licensing Committee and I have met with Linda Cannon, Basingstoke and Deane’s Licensing Manager to discuss these issues and a new paper will be prepared for the next meeting of the Licensing Committee, when Linda Cannon will be present to answer questions. The paper will then go to Cabinet for final decision. At the last meeting it was announced that we would soon be launching an Environmental Health Award for Excellence for local businesses and that more details would follow. He was pleased to announce that the launch event will take place on Friday 10th October. He was delighted to announce that we learned yesterday that our Dog Warden service has been awarded the RSPCA’s Golden Footprint award for Animal Welfare for the third year running. This is a great recognition of the first-class service being provided by Lynn Byfield and Jazmine Green. We will be putting out a press release in the near future. CL.20

This week has been Graffiti Focus Week, where any known graffiti in the district is cleared away. If any members are aware of graffiti that needs cleaning up, the Safer Hart team can still deal with this if they are made aware by tomorrow morning. 17th to 21st of November will be Anti-Bullying Week. The Safer North Hampshire team have sent out a survey to all secondary schools across North Hampshire to find out more about the scale of bullying in our schools and where they need to concentrate efforts to address it. They have also drafted a booklet for Anti-Bullying Week, the contents of which will be guided by the findings of the survey. In addition a young man called Brandon Henry, who is a student at Calthorpe Park School, has set up a group called “no more bullying” and our team are now working with him. Finally, the new Anti-social Behaviour, Crime and Policing Act 2014 introduced a new range of powers available to local authorities for dealing with anti-social behaviour issues. Two of these powers, Community Protection Notices and Public Spaces Protection Orders, were the subject of a report to Cabinet on 4th September, the minutes of which we will receive this evening. Other powers will be used by the Police, the Safer North Hampshire team and other agencies. If any member would like to learn more about this range of powers, a very user-friendly online training kit is available, which takes about 20 minutes. If contact is made with David Lipscombe, he will be very happy to email the web link. The Cabinet Member for Environment, Councillor Oliver announced: He was pleased to advise that Hart will again support a number of events in the coming months with free parking in its public car parks. These include: Small Business Saturday - 6th December Hook Christmas Cracker - also on 6th December Fleet Festivities - 26th November These are popular and well attended events that bring business and community together across the district. He was aware that many Councillors support and help at these events and hoped they are even more successful than they were last year. He was also pleased to announce that we have today launched our virtual parking ticket service. This enables users to buy tickets on-line (7 days – 12 months) and park in chosen locations without the need to display a ticket. It was hoped to role this out to resident parking schemes later in the year. This provides another easy payment option for car park users. Our Waste Services Team has been nominated for an award in the ‘Best New Idea’ category of the national LARAC awards for the waste and recycling industry. A representative from the team will be attending the awards event in Nottingham on the 15th October. We wish them success and well done to the whole team for being recognised by the industry as thought leaders. The ‘Best New Idea’ was our schools project ‘The BIG recycling count’ which involved nearly 3000 pupils and their families in looking at how recycling could be improved. Hook Infants were the winners this year. CL.21

As members are aware we have been working with our waste services contractor Veolia on an action plan to improve the service and reduce the number of missed and late bin collections. Progress is being made and I am sure members will have questions for me when I attend Scrutiny in November. However it has uncovered a long running issue as to the safe collection from a number of properties and roads across the district. Veolia have requested that we inform these households (in excess of 200) that their bin collection site will need to change to a safe kerbside position. This could entail residents having to move their bins a significant distance. The process of informing them has already started but I have asked for a full review next week in advance of any further notices being sent out to ensure that only where there are no alternative solutions (resident or contractor) should these changes be made. This is being driven for reasons of health and safety of operatives and not by cost. To assist Councillors I will be sending out a briefing note in their envelopes Wednesday 9th October. This will allow them to answer questions from impacted households if contacted directly. The Cabinet Member for Housing, Councillor Neighbour, had no announcements. The Cabinet Member for Corporate Services, Councillor Radley JE, had no announcements. 33

JOINT CHIEF EXECUTIVE’S REPORT The report of the Joint Chief Executives is attached as Appendix B to these Minutes.

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MINUTES OF COMMITTEES Meeting

Date

Cabinet

7 August

No questions asked. Cabinet

4 September

No questions asked. Licensing

2 September

No questions asked. Planning Committee

13 August

No questions asked.

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14/01289/FUL - Clare Park Private Retirement Residences, Farnham Departure from Local Plan. Since no request to debate had been received the recommendation from Planning Committee to grant planning permission was deemed to be ACCEPTED Planning Committee

10 September

14/00504/MAJOR - Land at Watery Lane Church Crookham Departure from Local Plan. Since no request to debate had been received the recommendation from Planning Committee to refuse planning permission was deemed to be ACCEPTED Councillor Burchfield asked Councillor Cockarill that given his experience in planning, did he feel that should there be an Appeal in relation to the Land at Watery Lane, Church Crookham, did he believe it would fail, and if so, what the cost would be? He further asked that given the importance of the application site, the impact on the community and the five year land supply and cost, that if Hart were to lose at Appeal, why it was not referred to Full Council for the decision to be taken rather than at Planning Committee? Councillor Cockarill responded that to send an application directly to Council rather than dealing with it at Planning Committee was not something that had ever taken place in his experience. He added that Planning Committee had started debating on Watery Lane at 8.10 pm and finished at around 10.50 pm and that he was not sure that Full Council would have welcomed a three hour debate on one item, along with all the other business it has to complete. Councillor Cockarill further responded that he would not like to put a figure on the costs for a potential Appeal and suggested that a conversation with the Officers may assist. He added that on a layman’s perspective he would not say that we have a great chance of winning it, possibly 50/50, but stated that there had been past situations where Officers indicated that it would be difficult to sustain an argument for Appeal, but that on the basis of evidence provided by the public, that an Appeal had been won. Councillor Burchfield indicated that he wanted information on the record and that the public should be aware of potential for costs.

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The Chairman indicated that it would be to everyone’s advantage for this information to be available and that as soon as it was available, it would be attached to the Minutes of this meeting. (Appendix C) Councillor Axam asked for clarification on the wording and the way in which a departure works. He further stated that he had attended a meeting this week regarding information on planning for the future. He indicated that he felt that we would have a high chance of winning this Appeal should it come forward, but felt that it would be very difficult to pre-judge what any costs would be and that to attempt to extract a figure out of the air would be absurd. Mr Phillips clarified as follows; he stated that the Planning Committee has three specific grounds upon which to refuse planning permission. Saved Local Plan policy RUR2 (Development in the open countryside) however, was not one of the grounds for refusal. The development however, was in the open countryside outside the defined settlement boundaries and would not normally be permitted. This therefore required a referral to Full Council as not pursuing such an objection on Policy RUR2 grounds represented a departure from the Local Plan. Councillor Bailey stated that whilst he was not a planning expert, he felt that the Planning Committee would not have made the decision if that Committee had not been confident it would win an Appeal. Councillor Radley indicated that the Planning Committee has delegated powers from full Council to determine all planning applications that that the only time they are referred back to full Council are when the Planning Committee has gone beyond delegated powers. It was therefore right and proper that the Planning Committee had debated this matter. Council Forster indicated that on page PL.50 the attendees should also show Forster S. Overview and Scrutiny

19 August

No questions asked.

The meeting closed at 7.50 pm.

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Appendix A COUNCIL PROCEDURE RULE 14 QUESTIONS BY MEMBERS Councillor Blewett asked: From Oct 1 when the issue of road tax discs will cease and no longer have to be displayed, I understand that Rushmoor will be charging all blue badge holders (who are still qualified holders after the disqualifications in 2012) for use of their car parks. Could I be re-assured that Hart will continue to give free parking to those automatically qualified for blue badges and others who remain discretionally qualified? Councillor Oliver responded: I think it is worth clarifying that Rushmoor Borough Council currently do not provide free parking for disabled blue badge holders. Only those who have had a free tax disc issued due to their disability are entitled to free parking, which is why the tax disc changes are having an impact in Rushmoor. As far as Hart is concerned I am pleased to be able to re-assure Members that this Council has no plans to change its policy of providing free parking for disabled blue badge holders. Councillor Blewett asked a supplementary question: One thing that Rushmoor has done as a quid pro quo for this action is to give more time to disabled parkers as they think they will need more time than ordinary users to do their shopping etc. Has Councillor Oliver or the Council corporately seen any evidence that disabled people do not have enough time in any of the car parks or when using street parking? Councillor Oliver responded: I can advise that we have seen no evidence of this; as we provide free parking there is plenty of time for them to do their shopping and therefore no need to increase parking for disabled or blue badge holders. Councillor Cockarill asked: As Chair of the Planning Committee, I have, on numerous occasions, received complaints from the public who have been unable to hear proceedings, because of the inefficient sound system within the Chamber. It has also been brought to my attention that the public TV screen is also often not working, so members of the public cannot see the Officers' presentation. Planning Committee, as the Portfolio-holder is aware, is probably the bestattended public meeting of the Council. It is important that the public are able to follow proceedings. Will the Portfolio-holder investigate ways to improve the audio-visual equipment in the Chamber, to benefit public, officers and members?

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Councillor Radley responded: There have been occasions where previous users of the council's facilities have taken it upon themselves to reconfigure some of our equipment. This has unfortunately affected some public meetings of the council. We are looking at formalising a process whereby the audio/visual equipment is checked when setting up the council chamber for a public meeting. I would however suggest that chairmen of committees take the precautionary step of doing their own check before a meeting starts if this particularly concerns them. The council is evaluating options for new equipment but as we are all reluctant to spend our residents’ money on our own toys we will not be rushing into anything unless it represents a cost effective and long term benefit.

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Appendix B Joint Chief Executives’ Report There will be a report to Full Council on the 27th November 2014 seeking approval for the proposed option for housing growth. Following on from a recent Cabinet report on the joint procurement of back offices services, I am pleased to announce that DCLG have approved our bid for £125,000 to provide consultative support to the five authorities in taking this project forward, and we will also be bringing forward the exciting new design for the Leisure Centre.

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Appendix C The Role of the Planning Committee and Implications of Planning Appeals Following the last meeting of Council I am writing to confirm the role of Planning Committee and the implications of planning appeals. Council has delegated to Planning Committee the power to determine planning applications except where the decision would be contrary to the Local Plan or approved Council policy. Planning Committee makes decisions by majority vote. The Chairman of Planning has no individual powers of intervention or referral. Planning decisions are often challenged by dissatisfied applicants. Planning appeals are determined by the Planning Inspectorate on behalf of the Secretary of State. Hart's current success rate in defending its decisions at appeal is above the national average - on average over 70% of planning appeals against Hart's decision to refuse planning permission are dismissed Statistically however, appellants nationally have a far greater chance of success if the appeal is heard at a Public Inquiry. Major development proposals therefore, are more often than not dealt with by public inquiry. The mere threat of challenge by planning appeal should never be a material consideration that carries any weight in any decision made by the Planning Committee to refuse planning permission. Unacceptable development that causes demonstrable harm should always be resisted - whatever the cost. The key issue however, is that in exercising its discretion to determine planning applications, Planning Committee must always act in a reasonable manner and not expose the Council to a challenge of unreasonable behaviour through refusing planning permission without having proper regard to material planning considerations. In this regard Planning Committee must always look to the consequences of any decision to refuse planning permission to ensure that it is using public resources wisely. All parties in planning appeals are normally expected to meet their own expenses. It does not follow that simply because an appellant has challenged a decision of the Council to refuse planning permission then the Council will inevitably be exposed to an award of costs if it were subsequently to lose the appeal. The Council will only be at risk of an award of costs if it is seen to have behaved “unreasonably” with respect to the substance of the matter under appeal, for example, by unreasonably refusing or failing to determine planning applications, or by unreasonably defending appeals. Example of this include: preventing or delaying development which should clearly be permitted, having regard to its accordance with the development plan, national policy and any other material considerations. failure to produce evidence to substantiate each reason for refusal on appeal. vague, generalized or inaccurate assertions about a proposal’s impact, which are unsupported by any objective analysis. refusing planning permission on a planning ground capable of being dealt with by conditions. CL.28

acting contrary to, or not following, well-established case law. persisting in objections to a scheme or elements of a scheme which the Secretary of State or an Inspector has previously indicated to be acceptable. not determining similar cases in a consistent manner. failing to grant a further planning permission for a scheme that is the subject of an extant or recently expired permission where there has been no material change in circumstances. refusing to approve reserved matters when the objections relate to issues that should already have been considered at the outline stage. imposing a condition that is not necessary, relevant to planning and to the development to be permitted, enforceable, precise and reasonable in all other respects. requiring that the appellant enter into a planning obligation which does not accord with the law or relevant national policy. refusing to enter into pre-application discussions, or to provide reasonably requested information, when a more helpful approach would probably have resulted in either the appeal being avoided altogether, or the issues to be considered being narrowed, thus reducing the expense associated with the appeal. not reviewing their case promptly following the lodging of an appeal. (This list is not exhaustive). It is very difficult to estimate how much it would cost the Council if an appeal goes to public inquiry. It depends very much upon the scale and nature of the appeal proposal. A single day appeal at public inquiry would on average cost the Council about £35k (this includes all advance preparation work) but the total cost of say a 3 day public inquiry would be in the region of £70K-£80k which in effect would be at least doubled in the event that the appellant could show to an Inspector that the Council had acted unreasonably to the extent that costs should be awarded against it. The cost could be significantly greater if technical evidence were in dispute.

Daryl Phillips Joint Chief Executive Hart District Council

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