SOUTH Somerset residents could soon find it much harder to influence major developments with their council potentially at risk of losing its planning powers.

South Somerset District Council will lose its ability to turn down large housing developments if the number of successful appeals made against it rises above the Government’s target.

If that happens, developers can apply directly to the Planning Inspectorate, which will take decisions on all major applications with “a very strong presumption of approval as the starting point.”

The council said it would be reviewing its planning policy to ensure Government intervention would not be necessary.

The number of major applications – meaning ten or more homes, or large industrial sites – which are put before councils is closely monitored by the Department for Communities and Local Government.

The department keeps a running tally of what percentage of major developments in a given period were refused and subsequently granted on appeal.

If a council loses ten per cent or more of the appeals against its decisions on major developments, the Government can intervene and take away its planning powers, in a process known as ‘designation’.

In the two years up to March 2017, South Somerset District Council had 9.3 per cent of its decisions on major developments overturned – one of the highest rates of all English district councils, and the second highest in the South West.

The council has confirmed this has since risen to 9.6 per cent.
If the Government intervened, all major developments would be approached with a view towards approval unless there was clear evidence that they would be detrimental or go against Government policy.

A spokesman said: “There would be a very strong presumption of approval as the starting point, and local views would inevitably carry much less weight than national policy, but it wouldn’t lead to any development being granted without public input.

“The whole planning process would be handled by the planning inspector. The public would be entitled to express their views as they are now, but the inspector’s decision would be final with no right of appeal by any party.

“Councils are not empowered to make decisions contrary to those nationally directed policies.”

Since 1997, all significant planning decisions have been taken by the council’s four area committees (north, east, south and west), which meet on a monthly basis.

But, in what it has described as “a temporary and precautionary measure”, the council has ruled that all major developments should be “two-starred”, with the power to refuse plans being taken away from the area committees.

If a committee is minded to refuse a major application, the decision will be referred to the council’s regulation committee, which is made up of 12 representatives drawn equally from all four district areas.

This issue reared its head at a meeting of the area north committee in Yeovil on Wednesday, March 28, where plans for 34 new homes in South Petherton were discussed.

Dee Hodson-Wright, from South Petherton Parish Council, said the village’s two schools “had no more space to expand” and the possible loss of the library could turn it into a “dormitory town”.

She added: “We want local homes for local people, instead of ‘in-comers’ who do not contribute to the area.”

Council planning officer Mike Hicks admitted in his report that if the plans were approved, South Petherton would have exceeded its minimum housing allocation – the number of homes planned up to 2028 – by 35 per cent.

Councillor Neil Bloomfield said the council was “being neutered” and that the problem lay with developers not building, rather than councils refusing planning permission.

He said: “We have banked permissions in this district for 5,200 homes – which gives us a seven-year supply. But the builders aren’t building them. This development will be detrimental to residents’ amenity. It is an over-intensive use of the site.”

The committee narrowly voted (by five to four, with one abstention) that the plans should be refused, meaning that the regulation committee will have to take the final decision at its next meeting.

Council leader Ric Pallister said the authority would be reviewing its planning processes in the coming weeks to ensure that the Government was satisfied while retaining the power and accountability of the area system.

He said: “What Government will not do is to order intervention if the local authority is clearly reacting positively to the threat.”

“Not only have we taken advice and guidance externally, we have also introduced the two-star process for all major applications going to committee as an interim step, and in advance of bringing forward any long term changes that may be needed.

“We and the public value our area planning system and we will do all we can to ensure that it can continue, but that may require some changes.”