Strategic Sites Committee - Thursday, 9th May, 2024 2.00 pm
May 9, 2024 View on council website Watch video of meetingTranscript
Good afternoon Councillors, ladies and gentlemen and welcome to the meeting. Please note that
the meeting will be well cast and the public and the press can see and hear the meeting
through that webcast. In the unlikely event that there is a technical issue, the meeting
will be paused until the issue is being resolved. There are a couple of housekeeping items to
cover. Members please note that the use of mobile phones is not permitted during the meeting.
So please either turn them off or on silent iPads can be used to access the modgov app.
As if you wish to speak, please raise your hand at the appropriate time and please remember
to turn on your microphone before speaking and switch off when you're finished. I'd also
remind all those taking part today in the meeting. The acoustics in here are always
perfect for soft speaking individuals. So please get quite close to the microphone and
speak loud enough for everyone present to hear. In the event of a far along, please
use the nearest file that sits at the same time as the year of the program.
It's definitely become temperamental. Okay, this one seems to be working. In the event
of a far along, please use the nearest fire exit and assembly in the overflow car park
which is situated to the right of the main entrance when you exit the building. If there
are any members of the present, can you please make yourself known? No? Okay. Now before we
move to the first agenda item, I'll ask each of the members and officers to introduce themselves
starting with from my left. Hi, I'm Sarah Armstrong. I'm the major team leader for Buckinghamshire
Council. Hello, I'm Sue Pilcher, principal planning officer for Buckinghamshire Council.
Good afternoon. I'm Andrew Cooper. I'm a highway's development management officer for Buckinghamshire
Council. Afternoon all, David Marsh, highway's team leader for highway's DM team leader for
Buckinghamshire Council. I'm Richard Newcomb and I'm a Councillor for the Wendover-Houlton
and Stoke-Manderville Ward which covers part of this site. I'm Peter Cooper and I represent
the Wing Ward. I'm Sue Lewin and I represent the Burnwood Ward. Good afternoon, I'm Councillor
Allison Wheelhouse for Beckinsfield Ward. Good afternoon, I'm Michael Rand, Councillor
for the Grenden Underwood Ward. Neil Marshall, Councillor for Mollum. Good afternoon, I'm
Patrick Fieldy and I represent Buckingham West. Good afternoon, I'm Rebecca Binstead, Democratic
Services and Half Buckinghamshire Council. Good afternoon, I'm Jonathan Waters and I
represent as Councillor for Pennwood and Old Amisham and Vice Chairman of the Committee.
Good afternoon, I'm Catherine Stubbs and I'm a senior planning solicitor with the Council.
I'm Councillor Alan Turner who represents in the Prince's Risborough Ward and I will be
chairing this afternoon's meeting. Turning now to agenda item number two, do we agree
the minutes of the committee meeting held on 15 December 2023. These can be found on
pages three to six of the agenda pack. Thank you, I'll now sign them.
Agenda item number three, declarations of interest. Do we have any declarations? They
speak to Councillor Newham. As ward member, I'd like to repeat declaration
which is set out in the minutes of the last meeting in December last year. In exactly
the same term, say of course that I did actually express some views of the last meeting which
I had not there to for. Thank you, that's duly noted. There are no further declarations
of interest. We will move on. We will now consider the officer report. First I'll clarify the
order in whichever. Sorry to interrupt before we continue. Are you happy with me to quickly
run through the apologies? Oh, sorry. No worries. Just want to say that we received apologies
from Councillor Trevor Eddleton and Councillor Jackson Ng. Councillor Ng asked that we know
that he wished to attend, but excused himself so that stakeholders in this application and
fellow Councillors will not be confused or to create any grounds for an appeal had Councillor
Ng attended and engaged in the debate and then not been allowed to vote. Thank you,
Chairman. Yes, Councillor. Thank you, Chair. I'd like to raise a point
of order. That's in connection with the paper that's on our desk that I've literally only
just seen and it concerns the fact that we're not allowing public speaking because I know
substantial change allegedly. However, it seems to me that there is a change in relation
to the neighbourhood plan which is a major change as far as I'm concerned in this debate
and also there's further reports on the alleged use or otherwise of the ground since 2018
and I'm assuming that the Paris Council would have wished to speak and I would like
to have heard from them on those two items. So I really think it's a shame that we're
not allowing public speaking. Okay, thank you for that. But I have consulted
with officers only on this and I fully agree with them that their art submission changes
that would mean that we would go through public speaking again. You have every right
to hold your opinion, of course, as to every member of this committee but in my point of
view the officers are correct in this. Yes, Councillor Luegum. Yes, Chairman, I'd like
to support Councillor Cooper and what he says and it's interesting that you use the phrase
aren't sufficient changes. Thus, there are changes and those changes particularly related
to Stuttmanville Parish Council and whilst I can understand why you may not wish a large
number of people to have made a further contribution, it does seem to me to be highly irregular
not to allow the parish council to deal with matters particularly as the Councillor Cooper
is quite right with regard to the neighbourhood plan but also I think in terms of the bid
that's been put forward by the parish council to buy this site so I concur with the Councillor
Cooper. Okay, just around this discussion I'll just
ask for the point of view. Sorry, you have no, yes, Councillor, yes, I don't have anything
material to add to the last two Councillors that spoke but I would also like to register
my concerns about this too. Yes, I think the decision was taken that there was no material
change in the circumstances as is usually in such cases the Chairman was asked his opinion
on this and concurred with that view. There was, as members will recall, a very thorough
discussion last time in which a number of speakers spoke at length on the matter and
of course the parish council has seen the agenda since it was published and had the opportunity
to make written representations on the same. There were matters that were subject to further
consideration both which were the reasons for deferral last time and so it was to be
expected that those would be considered at this meeting and I don't think there's any
material change in circumstances. As regards to the point on the neighbourhood plan that
still within the report the added weight that can be given to that due to the stages reached
but it still has limited weight as you'll see set up in the report.
You may come back very briefly but we are coming to the end.
Just to be clear, just on your last few words, you said that the neighbourhood plan has limited
weight. Now that's not the case anymore and this is the very point because it now has
been used. I'm sorry to Councillor CUMAR, that may be your opinion but in the opinion
of our legal advice then that's the situation. I'm sorry I'm not taking anything further
on that. That's the situation. We will now progress. We came to the end of apologies
I believe. Thank you. Right, we'll now consider the officer report and I'll clarify the order
in which the application will be considered. The planning officer will introduce the application
with any relevant updates. There is no public speaker on this item as in the opinion of
the planning officer. There are no significant amendments or changes to the substance of
the application. So, it will then ask members if they have any technical questions of officers.
Following this, the entire committee will then discuss the application. Officers will respond
to issues and questions raised by the members. The committee will then make a decision by
vote. Members will need to propose and second the recommendations. We will now move to item
4 which is the application before us this afternoon relating to the box, sports and
social club lower road state manual and I will now call on the case officer to introduce
the report on the application. Thank you Chairman. So, in the agenda, Pat, before members, you've
got the committee report from 15th of December last year along with the two update reports
of that committee and then the further update to today's committee and a supplemental report
as well. So, just to refresh members' memories of the application. So, before you've got
the site location plan, so you can clearly see the application is in two parts. The northern
area where the development would take place and the southern area of the site where a
sports pitch would be retained or provided rather. You've got the access at this point
here from lower road. So, this is a plan of the wider context of the site just to set
the scene. So, you've got the application site in this area here, Booker Park School
here, Mandeville School. You've got lower road coming along here and then State Mandeville
Hospital here. So, this plan just shows the context of the site in this area in connection
with the other or the garden town allocation. So, they include Kingsbrook over here, Woodlands,
Mountain Fields and then South Aylesbury and Southwest Aylesbury and this is Berra Fields
up here. So, this slide just shows the road and rail links. So, you've got the site location
at this point here. You've got the Southeast Aylesbury Link Road which is being commenced
now. So, you've got phase one between Wendover Road and Lower Road and then phase two which
is between Lower Road and connects into the State Mandeville relief road and also provides
around about to the South West Aylesbury Link Road going through ADT2. That's how we got
in town too. So, it's just some photographs. So, this is looking into the application site
from Lower Road. Looking out from the access over towards the access door and the ambulance
station. So, you can see the footpath and cycleway on the opposite side of Lower Road.
This is looking in the other direction. So, this is the Nealeyville Crescent Development
Harborne Manor and you've got the footway along this side of the road as well as along
outside the Harborne Manor Development. So, this is looking from within the site towards
the exit of Lower Road. So, you can see it's currently used for parking by the NHS. These
are the old tennis courts. So, this is looking back towards the entrance which is on beyond
the left-hand side. This row of hedging would be removed as part of the proposals. This
is looking towards Roblin Close which is in the top corner here and this is where a cycle
and pedestrian link would be proposed. So, just to go over the northern area of the illustrative
masterplan. So, you can see the access of Lower Road at this point here. So, part of an extension
to this property which is a children's care home would be demolished to enable the widening
of the access at this point and to provide a footway. So, then you've got housing development
around the edge of the site which would enable gardens to go back to back for the majority
of cases which was in important terms of secure by design. Within the central area, you've
got an area of open space and a play area and then in this area there would be subspaces.
So, there's a part connection down to the southern part of the site which I'll show
you in a second and this would be the exit point from the school if the one-way system
were to be implemented. So, just looking at the site as a whole, you can see the area
within the southern portion of the site where a sports pitch likely to be football would
be provided. They would be room for a footway cycle way to go around the site and connect
through to south of a salesbury and also to the law homes open space area in this location.
So, just in terms of the access, members will recall there was some discussion at the last
meeting and some last minute amendments that were considered. So, this is the proposal
before you. So, you've got the access, so I exit from the site which would allow two
vehicles to sit side by side to either go left or right and then, obviously, you keep
back to the site if that should occur, you've got the entrance into the site. There's connections
through for our two-metre wide footway which would link into the existing footway which
is three metres wide at this point. There would be a pedestrian island here which
would enable users to cross the road and access the public bus stops on the other side of
the road but also there will be a relocated bus stop in connection with the Bloor Homes
development which they would also be able to access. So, that does mean that the existing
bus stop which is located up here and the narrow foot part would no longer be required.
And then, this plan is just to show the achievement of the visibility's place from the site and
the within standard. So, there was some discussion at the last meeting about the existing facilities
sports and recreational facilities in the locality. So, the applicants provided this
information to the council, so you can see the site in this position here and then there's
a variety of different facilities. So, they've included public recreational park and sports
facilities in the yellow. The Bloor is where their sports club and outdoor facilities and
the green is where they are schools but they do have higher facilities available.
So, just to summarise, matters in respect of the previous use of the site as the County
Council's sports and social club site have been set out in the report and the objections
received are acknowledged but for the reasons given it's not considered that the loss of
this previous use would represent appropriate grounds to refuse the development since there
would not be a conflict with the neighbourhood plan or with the MPPF. So, overall, having
regard to all elements of policy conflict and compliance, the proposed development is
considered to accord with the development plan read as a whole and when weighed in the planning
balance, the benefits arising from the development are considered substantially outweighed the
any harms. Further comments were received from the ICB yesterday and they have reported
in the supplemental report to you but unfortunately it's still the case that the lack of detail
provided and justification for the contribution means that offices considered that they are
not self-compliant and therefore we should not include them within the memorandum of understanding
or sort from the applicant. So, the recommendation remains that it's to be deferred and delegated
to the service director of planning environment for approval subject to referral to the secretary
of state given the objection to the development from sport England. In the event that it's
not called in by the secretary of state for the application to be approved subject to
the completion of the memorandum of understanding, the details of which have been set out in
the report before you and subject to conditions within the amendments or additions as considered
appropriate biophysis and receipt of no new material in from representations or if these
are not achieved for the application to be refused for such reasons as the service director
of planning and environment considers appropriate.
Thank you.
All right, thank you for that. We'll now take any technical questions for officers which
I suspect there will be quite few and if you'd like to please raise your hand, you know,
Councillor McLoopa, you were first.
Thank you, Chairman. There's a couple of questions I'd like to ask, two very simple ones. The
first might seem a bit obvious really, but I'd just like somebody to actually say this
and the question is who is the applicant because we keep referring to the applicant as some
nebulous being. Can we just be clear for everyone's knowledge who the applicant actually is?
It's Buckinghamshire Council. Thank you. And secondly, as far as the neighbourhood
plan is concerned, as I understand it, it's at Regulation 16 with comments having come
back from the public, so it's ready to go to Inspector. On that basis, can you tell us
what weight the neighbourhood plan has?
This matter is dealt with a power of 10 of the updated report. It is true that if you're
absolutely correct, it has got to that regulation stage and the amount of weight to give policies
within the plan is from limited to moderate, depending on the objections that have been
received in relation to specific policies. So it's a very individual assessment we have
made dependent on what the policy has and what has been any objections, and this is detailed
in the report and we have undertaken that assessment.
I think the report does actually say slight, no, I can't remember the first word, it's
but too medium. It speaks about medium weight. Is that not true?
Limited to moderate weight, maybe. Yeah, I think we're talking the same. It's limited
to moderate weight. So there is a spectrum, as I'm explaining, and that spectrum, because
it's quite clear advice in the MPPF, how you have to give weight within that to an emerging
plan and that is what we've sought to undertake.
And do we have any reason to think that it is less than moderate weight based on the
comments that have come back?
Yes, again, individual policy by policy, when we've looked at the policies, if there's
objections or substantial objection to the principle of the policy, it is limited weight.
If there is no objection, then it raises to moderate weight. So I can't give you one
fits all it doesn't. It is very much based on the level of objection that has come through
the public consultation process and therefore then we can apply weight to the policies.
May I just go one further question? And that relates back to the site visit we made, I
think it was last summer, and I recall from that site that the site had a working football
field on it that had been mown actually fairly recently. Is my recollection correct? I don't
know whether other members remember that, but that's certainly my recollection.
But the site has been maintained in mown, but I wouldn't say it was used to football
pitch. So it was maintained in mowed? Yes, it can be.
Alright, next we have Councillor Martin. Thank you, Chairman. I just don't want to pick
up a couple of questions on a couple of the contentious areas from the last time around.
The Stoke-Manneville Parish Council's argument was that this site was an asset of community
volume and a lot of the discussion centered around the use of which has been documented
now in this report. And it appeared that there has been no lawful community use since the
place was closed down. And just to confirm that the use by the NHS, a parking does not
constitute community use if we can clarify on that.
So there's been no formal use of the site since June 2018. Yes, the NHS used it in a
private function to provide car parking for staff members, but I wouldn't say that that
was a community use available to the wider public. So then the site would not qualify
as an asset of community volume? That's a slightly different, well it's a different
consideration to have and that process to address that would have to take place outside
of the planning application. It's not something that needs to be addressed now.
Secondly, the integrating cable and the frustration of trying to get money to them, I'm aware that
Bucks Council are intending to introduce sale in the not too distant future. Perhaps quite early
or perhaps in line with the new local plan coming through. Once sale is inactive then
it's not reliant on specific site contributions, but the ICB could then apply for funding
either general sale fund to achieve what they're tending to deliver in this area.
That would be the case if silver was available then that could take place. But at the current
stage, you know, at this point in time it's not something that we can include but not
setting that aside. The project and the details that they gave us yesterday are not
sufficient to justify, you know, the contribution that they're requesting and it wouldn't meet
the sale requirements. Because we haven't got any information that we would require
at this stage, but it's not completely shilling the door on them because subsequently they can
apply for contributions to what they're building through the silver and as we went down against
something. I think talking about the sale, we're not close to the introduction of that.
We're aware that that's the case. I suppose it would depend on what the criteria are because
the sale that's in place for the west area and the silver is in place for the south and east
areas are different in the way that they're applied. So I don't think we can actually give
you any greater clarity on that because it would depend how we decide to go forward with
the sale for the whole of the council area. That's okay. Thank you. Next up, Councillor
Fieldy. Thank you, Chair. A couple of points, there's community outside. We talked about it,
but do the school want a community outside their judgement because clearly they're suffering
good parking in the moment and using a site. And the second point I wanted to find out about,
and this has been used by the Hetipot on occasions for the air ambulance. Is that something we've
approached or have the health service been in touch with us about that? And again, is it a community
outside or not? I'm not aware that the Hospital of Aperture Council about continued use of the site.
I think it's due to cease, it's my understanding. In terms of the school, the Capac school,
there is an issue with congestion. And so if the one-way system were to come on board,
although, as we said in the report, it's not required as a result of this development,
we would not be able to secure that. We can certainly encourage its use. And the provision
of that alongside the use of the sports field in the southern area of the site would enable the
school to be extended. So it's all sort of part and parcel of the considerations of improving
and increasing the send provision at the school. If they extended it, they would have to give up
the plane plane, plane area, wouldn't they? No, they would, they would be able to extend the school
itself. The sports pitches would be to provide that facility for the school children.
Right. Okay, can I move on to another area then? Could I have a, um,
the drawing of the access on the low road, please? Look at that, if we empty it.
And it's probably to, um, Mr Marshall, Mr Cooper. Where those two cars are coming out,
the vehicle was coming along the low road and wanted to turn in and they're going to have to
go across it. Does that include dust carts? It was like capable of being turned in there,
even if a car was parked on the brow of that turning.
Yeah, thank you, Chair. Um, the access is designed to accommodate the Council's
refuse vehicles turning in and out. We've, that has been tracked and high authority satisfied
that the access is sufficient to accommodate refuse vehicles along with traffic turning in and out.
Because this is the point I've raised last time because traffic coming towards the development,
would, would they be pulling off the main route or would they be holding up the main route?
Going towards, um, little south.
As such, it's not proposed to widen lower road and provide a right turn lane as part of the
current proposals. However, traffic assessments, recent traffic assessments have been undertaken
which demonstrate that right turning traffic into the site of lower road doesn't cause undue
delay and, and cues to general traffic using lower road. But that's not the information
we've got here because if we look at some of the, um, details on it, it says at certain points,
it's outside the acceptable levels. Yeah. So if you look at, we pay 47. So if we pay 47,
if you look down there at the ratio of low to capacity, lower is at 0.92. And if you keep on
going down again, you go on one level of 0.93. And this is in the AMP. If you look at PMP,
it's one in 8.85. You know, and that's, that's above what do you recommend at the moment.
You've been going ready greatly. If I could perhaps just explain a little bit more so,
we're talking about the right turn into the site of lower road. So those results that you
refer into are demonstrating satisfactory results. The 0.9s and the 0.81s refer to traffic turning
left out of the site and right out of the site. So they're on the minor arm. So there are some
delays and cues which may occur to those trapped to those movements because of
the flows of traffic along lower road. However, there's a short period of time in the peak and it
can't be determined that that is a severe harm. And I'm talking about traffic on the side road,
on the minor arm, but obviously going back to the original point about traffic turning in and out.
The cues that might occur on the side road wouldn't stop traffic turning
left in a flow road or turning right into the site of lower road or refuse vehicles turning
in and out of the site. I hope that is of some help. It was just a reading through it. I went
along and it indicated that these were at maximum capacity already.
The site the side road indicates some, even with the alterations indicate some issues, but as I say,
so we're going to add to that unacceptable capacity.
It's included as one of the conditions, actually third conditions,
that no part of the development permitted shall be occupied or brought into use until such
time as the southeast as we link road is operational. So these delays that you'll see
on that model are caused by the sealer not being implanted. So the condition states that
this development cannot come forward until the sealer is operational, open and operational,
which by that time the sealer will take all of that traffic or a large percentage of that traffic
off our road, so therefore you're going to see the delays diminish completely. That's why we've
put this condition on. And that includes the school traffic for book of school.
With school traffic it's going to go in one way and come out that way and lower road,
so the traffic levels AM and PM are going to be greatly increased because of school
traffic. But again, no part of the development can come forward until sealer is operational.
So regardless of whether we're talking about school traffic or not, I'll stand on that.
Okay, so it's trying to make you sure that whatever we put in there, we got 100 homes going in there
with more traffic. We've also got the school coming through. I think that's been completely
modeled and that's that's included in all the assessments. So the school,
the school access as proposed is going to come in through their existing access and out through
this site. Okay, yeah, so that's actually included in the assessment and that shows it works.
And then we've got this condition restricting the development coming forward until sealer is
operational and open. Okay, so Chairman, on the memorandum we're understanding
there was a main, you know, we need a provision there for the traffic
to come through the focus goal and happen to lower road. But understand that can't be a condition.
Yeah, so as we set out in the report, we've considered again the position with the one-way
system. So basically, because it's not required as a result of the residential development,
we can't insist that it's provided or required by conditional or within the MOU.
But it's likely that it would come forward because it's acknowledged and the school
is supported of it. So, you know, the Councillor principle is just you can't require it.
That it would, you know, assist with congestion in the locality by having that one-way system.
And as David said, it's being modeled to include it almost as a worst-case scenario
using load to lower road access. Because what we don't want is the parents
going in from lower road and just parking to pick the children up. Because that's just going to
cause major problems with the new restaurants and also cause congestion because we're people
coming out to pick it up. I just really want to understand, I understood that the amendment
of understanding is not watertight. They don't have to, they don't even have to install it.
The school. So, if I could just clarify, the memorandum of understanding is between
different directorates of the Council. So, it's an alternative to a section 106 agreement because
the Council is unable to enter into a section 106 agreement with itself or wouldn't be able to
enforce one against itself. So, it will become, should the site be sold onto a third party,
then at that point, there would be a section 106 entered into, which would be in the same terms.
But up to that point, it's a memorandum of understanding. So, the reason why the school
requirements are not in the memorandum of understanding is because that's an existing situation.
It's not a situation that's caused by this development. So, therefore, it wouldn't meet
self, still tests have been required to make this development acceptable in planning terms.
And therefore, it's considered that there's likely to be a community use agreement and that
that will deal with matters such as the facilities for the playing pitch and any parking and
potentially that one-way system. But it can't, the one-way system can't be required because it's
not required to make this development acceptable. It's an existing issue with the parking at the
school and the parent's access in the school. It's not actually in the MOU itself or a condition.
Okay, mister, I understand the name. The bit I wanted to just clarify, if it's sold on,
yeah, the memorandum of understanding falls. And therefore, you have to have an
Section 106 with conditions. Are those conditions enforceable? So, it's not a 106 with conditions,
it's a planning obligation agreement with obligations in it. And yes, at that point,
it would be completely enforceable against a third party. And in fact, the memorandum of
understanding, we are actually slightly amending the wording at the end to sort of
strengthen it even further. But it reflects the fact that there will be a Section 106 in
place prior to or simultaneously with it will come into force at the same time as the transfer
to a third party. Should there be a transfer to a third party from the Council? And then it would
be enforceable in the usual way that a 106 is. Okay, thank you. Can I just pick up in terms of
you mentioned parents parking within the site as well? So, you know, if the one-way system doesn't
happen, then that's unlikely to take place because there would be no route through
for the parents or children. If it is implemented, then as we set out in the report, we think it's
unlikely that parents would park there because there's sort of better opportunities for them
to park in the school site. But there are visitor spaces. So, you know, for a limited number that
might occur, they would be a vision within the site. But I believe parking is difficult in the
site anyway because of the particular needs of the children. Yeah, I mean, at schools always
with parking, but I don't think this application would make it worse. And it's, you know, the one-way
system in theory could alleviate some of those issues. Well, I'm not worried about them. I do
think this is this application not going to make you worse. I'm just trying to protect the people
that move there. They don't need to get the situation where people come along tonight,
just the part to be the children. Because the gate could be opened, the school could open the gate
at the moment. Yeah, I mean, at the minute, the school do have security gates, so there's control
over that. And if it does get implemented, they're not assuming they would do the same for the
access between these two sides. We presume. Okay. Next, I have Councillor Nukem.
Thank you, Chairman. Can I ask Mrs. Bill should, first of all, that the supplement which we've
been provided today, I think makes no reference to paragraph 11-1 of the report to be found on
page 21. So can I therefore assume that paragraph 11-1 on page 21 of report remains an accurate
statement of the current state of affairs?
Yes, so that what you're referring to is the offer made by State Madam? Absolutely, yes, I am.
So, yes, that's how kind of understanding this information is provided. Thank you very much.
So today's date, unless I'm very much mistaken, is the 9th of May. What it surprised you to learn
that a letter dated the 28th of February was sent by Stoke-Manneville Parish Council
to the relevant property department with a bid attached.
And the reason I'm aware is because I was sent an email this morning to 11-6 hours,
but I seem to be the only member of the committee who was actually sent that email.
No, I'm not in any way trying to make a reflection upon you, Mrs. Bill should, because you deal with
the information with which you are given. But unless I'm very much mistaken, there are some two-and-a-half
months or so between the dates of that letter, which I assume arrived within reasonable dispatch
if made before I've ever been emailed, and today. And it seems, would it not be, a reasonable
inference to draw from that that, and of course we can't hear from Stoke-Manneville Parish Council
today because there's no material changes to it told, that it would not be an unreasonable
inference to draw that the property department have failed to keep you completely up to date
with the current state of affairs with regard to their application.
I mean, I can only repeat really what's in that report, so we were aware that there were meetings,
I wasn't aware of that letter, but nevertheless it's, you know, the application before you needs
to be determined. Yeah, yes, but I'm asking very specific questions as opposed to asking for a
general speech about that. I'll get to the general speech in due force when it's remembered to comment.
So I'm putting it to you that it is not an unreasonable inference to draw that the property
department has failed to inform you of the fact that there has been a bit by Stoke-Manneville Parish
Council. I think the matter is that that's irrelevant to this as a planning application,
it's not a material consideration. Well, with respect, with respect, I'm conducting a course
of questioning which will arrive at the materiality of the point in due course. And if we, if you
don't allow me to conduct my course of questioning, then simply we won't get to the relevant point
in due course. Well, I'm going through the Chairman, can I speak Chairman? Thank you.
The fact of the matter is that whether the department has told us that there was a bit
or not, it's not relevant to the determination of this application because somebody can make
a planning application on the site, they don't even own. It's a question. Sorry, can I just finish
my legal advice? Yeah, but with respect, you're providing legal advice on a point that I'm not
sure maybe. Well, that's as maybe, but I'm going through the chair. So the question of whether or
not it's an asset of community value is a different issue. And the question of the sale
of a community, of asset of a community value, would be dealt with separately from the planning
process. And so therefore, whether there has been or has not been a bid or an offer,
or whatever, for the ownership of the site is not relevant to the determination of the application
before you. That's absolutely right. And that's why that's not the point I was making. But I'm
simply asking Mr. Pilcher twice about whether it's a reasonable inference interval from the fact
that there's been a bid in from a certain amount of old parish council to apply this to the property
department. And the Mrs. Pilcher was unaware of that bid that the property department has failed
to notify her. And the fact that I have, first of all, heard a number of answers which don't
actually answer that question. And then we put legal advice about a point which I'm not making.
I think we'll just simply have to allow that it is a reasonable inference to draw.
And so therefore, my question is to you, if the property department can't tell you something
about that, which is relevant to the, to the reportion of written, but admittedly not relevant
to the determination of the application, is it not also a reasonable inference to draw that
there might be some doubts of the veracity of some of the other points made by the property
department in the, in the, in the, when they have provided you with information.
I think that would be stretching things quite a mark out. Well, well, well, are you inference,
inference, and inference, inference. Yes. Well, if I may say so, Chairman, I come from the legal world
where if people don't tell the whole truth and the whole truth, which is the,
is the old menu draws certain inferences from the face. I could tell the truth.
I do. But I do, I do move on, Chairman, because I don't want to spend too much time.
Just before you do move on, you did mention about people not telling the truth. I just like
to say, I do not accept that any officer here, President, is deliberately not telling the truth.
I've not, and I'm not suggesting that in any way, shape or form.
I'm very pleased to hear it. Thank you. So let me, let me just move on from having
that particular line of, line of questioning to the highway junction, which does seem to me
to be a particularly important matter here. Now, there are a number of separate points about the,
the highway, highway junction. The, the first is that we were told
on the last occasion, when there was a last minute
junction detail provided to us, that the footpath on the northern eastern side was to be removed.
Am I right in my reading off the report we have today? That is no longer a proposal,
because there is no longer going to be a ghost lane in lower roads. Can I, can I just make
check that my understanding is, is, is correct? Thank you, Chair. If I've understood the question
correctly then, the little bit of footpath it's there at the moment is being removed, because
it just leads to the existing bus stop. No, I'm talking about on the eastern, eastern side,
not, not, not the western side. Okay. Okay. Well, there's no longer going to be a crossing point,
you know, to allow pedestrians to cross between the west and the east. Can I raise my question?
I didn't think it was quite so difficult. Though, my understanding was on the last occasion,
there was a last minute amendment to the junction plan, which basically meant that
traveling traffic coming from the centre of Alesbury was to be enabled to turn right into
this junction by the creation of, I think, what's called a ghost lane. But to create sufficient space
for that to occur, there would be a removal of the footpath on the eastern side, which I think I
took exception to on the last occasion. I am just checking that I need no longer take
exceptions to remove the footpath, because it's no longer the proposal to remove the footpath.
I thought it was a simple question. Am I right? That's correct. Thank you very much. Now, can I then
move on to the dust cart issue? My mobile has provided me with a plan, which is, I'm sorry,
I can't read exactly which planet is, but as I read this, the dust cart turning that would come
from the Alesbury direction and turn right into the access road would,
I'm sorry, I'm asking the wrong question, the dust cart turning out, turning left into lower road
would actually be forced to go across those bashed markings in the centre of the road. Is that not right?
Yep, that's correct. Thank you. So, in terms of oncoming traffic,
well, I appreciate the oncoming traffic shouldn't be going across the hash markings either. In terms
of the oncoming traffic, the narrowness of that junction could create a certain amount of traffic
hazard. Would that be a reasonable way of putting it? I would not agree with that. If you look at the
turning in front of you, the vehicle model is a 10.2m long refuse vehicle. Right, now we use a
9.5m long refuse vehicle. Right, so this is above and beyond what would be coming out of that side.
So, if you look at that, it's touching the corner of that. And this is the vehicle that's going to
come in once a week. Right, so that is going to have to be, it's been the right safety order fit,
we've assessed it, the right safety orders, we've assessed it, picked up no issues with that at all.
And I think that is misleading because the vehicle is like a meter long than the one that's actually
going to be visiting the side. Okay, so in other words, we needn't worry about that diagram so long
as the council continues to purchase the existing length of refuse lowering. If it goes further,
it may still be a problem. Well, it's been tracked for a vehicle above this size we use. Thank you,
that's all right. Moving on then, as I understood your responses to council fee and as it's written
in the document here, that there is a substantial amount of traffic, if I have too much traffic,
if I can put it in global terms, even after 2036 on lower road, it becomes congested. Is that right?
It depends which modelling you're looking at. Well, I'm asking, well, I thought I'd start with the
post-201336 modelling, which is the one when one sealer is opened. Okay, so at that point,
your indicative figures, I think a 0.92 is that right? Is this, well, where are we talking about what?
Well, I'm on lower road at the moment. In other words, there's a heavy traffic flow
on lower road, which is about the ultimate. That's the end. That's after sealer opens.
I think that is after both stages of sealer open. Well, this is what I want to get at. What exactly
we're talking about when we talk about sealer opening? And in particular, whether we are just
taking into account sealer, or whether we're taking into account the eastern link route,
and I think it's in the southwestern link route as well, in the 2006 modelling.
So I think this, we're conditioning this development, not to come forward before the
entire agency. Yes, I know that. Yes, I've got that. But you're still giving figures
for 2036, which is after sealer, and I'm trying to ask whether that also includes other link
roads, also being open, very mindful of 1936, by which time other link roads may have been opened,
or may not have been opened. So I'm just trying to find out exactly what the
parameters of your data are.
It's like, can you repeat it? Yes, probably. It's simple. In the in the Bajimcha Council
capital program, there is a proposal to build a number of link roads, or indeed in
other ways, link roads, for instance, the eastern link road south will be funded by the
Hamdenfields development. So there's a proposal for there to be a number of link roads.
Therefore, when we look at the level of traffic on any road going into Alesbury,
it's bound to be affected by the totality of the link roads that are open at a particular point
in time. If we look at sealer itself, what sealer face what and face to achieve
is effectively a potential redistribution of the roads along the Risborough road and along
the Wendover road, which then translates getting further into Alesbury, along the Wendover road,
and along the lower road, because that's all it distributes, because there's the only roads
it goes between. But once the eastern link road is open, and once the south-western link road
road, and that will take it all the way from road to Oxford, right the way round to
Bellingham Way, I think it is. So I'm really asking what the parameters of the 2036 modelling
are or is. So there are different scenarios within that model. Right, it tends to which
one you're looking at, but the modelling doesn't matter. Well, I'm asking which one you're looking
at. The model does include all of those strategic rates. So the 2036 one that you're referring to
in this report and to absorb those link roads. Some of those scenarios are that I'm not sure
exactly which figure you're looking at. Well, I don't know if you're the figure that's referred
to in this document. I would have to assume that it leads all the link right, I can't tell you
this. Right. And you see, that's part of the problem, isn't it? If we don't actually know
what data we're relying on, then it's difficult to judge things. Okay, so let me move on in the
question. Well, I think it's just before we go to just go back to that. We're looking at this
application. Yes, we are. Yes, we are. Just take a step back a little bit and the impact
of this development. Yes, it's about the impact of this development. But the impact of this
development is upon, in one of us in the back of the lower road. And so you've modeled the
lower road and you've modeled it for the post-2036 position. And I'm simply asking what roads would
be open in terms of the link in the 2036 model. It may be just the seeker or it may be the other
ones as well. I'm just simply asking. So I think all of those things are in the develop cumulative
scenario. And that's the one you've used here. Right. Thank you very much. So the situation,
therefore, is that even with a large number of link routes and the level of traffic on that road
is above the optimum level that you would like to see. It doesn't take, it would, there's a potential
for congestion, that's the point. So I think we need to get back to what we're looking at is this
application. This application? Yes, yes, yes, yes. Well, that's the stage, that's the state of the
road disease. And then this application adds more traffic here. So what does it not? So is this,
is the impact of this development severe? Is the cumulative impact of this development severe?
But that's not the question I was asking. Of course it's going to add traffic, yes. Yes, exactly.
Thank you very much. Any development you find without traffic? But I think this is an absolutely
sustainable location with goods, transport links, good sustainable transport links in and out.
Yes, I'm not asking you to advocate on behalf of the application. I'm just asking you
real questions about the highways. I think I think it's just to bring that discussion.
I would like to, I didn't realise there's these questions we're going to take.
Okay, and I do apologise for my poor phrasing of the question, but I'd like to spend it there.
I think we have now established clearly, as was stated, any development adds
traffic. That's very clear. And the question as to whether or not the
addition of that extra traffic from this application reaches the point of being severe,
or not, has also been in the opinion of the highways. Absolutely, fine.
So, but nevertheless, you do say that it may be better if traffic turned left when it comes out of
this access road. And I think it's saying that it would be better at saying the possibility.
Yes, it's a possibility, but it would be, it would stop tailbacks if traffic doesn't turn right.
I don't think it's this, but again, we're not saying it's better.
We're saying that in reality, if people find them very busy, that they may turn left.
Yes, and what will happen is people will become conditions turning left.
That all of that is considered without the seat of them.
Yes, the volume will still be there with cedar, and perhaps not quite such a lot.
Let me not go really further. So, this is for speech. So, why do you think it's appropriate then
to do away with the ghost lane for traffic turning from the road into this junction,
given that there will still be quite a heavy load of traffic?
I think all of the assessments show that it works without that right turn lane.
And will that traffic not tailback into the main lane
of traffic going from Alesbury to Stoke Manfield? The assessments don't show that at all.
There will never be sufficient traffic to cause a tailback.
I mean, I can't say no, but all of the assessments we have in front of us now do not show that.
And that capacity turned to the junction is acceptable,
and it's been modelled as it is now at 826.
That's my concern. You can't say never, and we have an ambulance station
only 15 to 20 yards away, and a heavy blue light usage on that room, don't we?
Have you taken that into account? Yes, we have. Thank you.
Okay, thank you.
The view I have counted to the waters next.
Thank you, Joan. A couple of questions I wasn't going to ask, I've already gone,
but one of the things I think is important is particularly on 11.1,
and I think most of us wanted to ensure that the parish council would not be
excluded in any way from making a bid for the site.
As it is, they already have. It would be nice if everyone had been told that
by the parish, because that would have been helpful to us.
But I think within this, I think the main thing is that it does make it clear
that the decision in terms of what happens in terms of what, how it's forward,
I think, what you're trying to, from here, I'm trying to get a feeling that the guarantee is
it's not this committee's going to make the decision on what actually happens to the site.
It will be the owners of the site who will make that, so that's that.
I'm just trying to make sure we're all clear on what the officers confirm.
That is not the decision we're making here, but by making the decision here,
we're not in any way precluding the ability of the parish of putting in a bid,
and it is not this committee that is actually doing it, so that's one of my first questions.
Yes, we can confirm that your understanding of a level point one is correct.
Thank you. One of the other questions I had was actually about the road.
Obviously, at this point, I don't know whether that road
in the estate is going to be an adopted road or not. If it was going to be an adopted road,
I think it would be a very good thing to have some kind of restrictions on it,
particularly if the school is going to use the road as a one-way system or a pedestrian access
to the school that actually we do restrict parking at school drop-off and school pick-up time,
because if you want a road to actually run smoothly, and we might actually be able to create
some kind of support for those people who are actually going to live in that area,
if we actually are able to do something about parking upfront, because every other place in
the holding box near a school is an absolute disaster at those particular points in time,
and it would be nice to actually have one where we haven't actually built in a disaster
and take some action so that it is something we take forward to whoever it does develop the site,
if that is the case, so I think that's one of the things I'd like to know, whether that
is going to be something that's feasible to be done, if it is, I think it's something we should be
recommending. Firstly, on the adoption issue, it's for the developer to offer the site for adoption,
so we don't have a say on that if they choose to open it up forward for adoption,
we will assess it, and if it's suitable, we would adopt it. I think it's important to note that this
is an outline application, so we have reserve matters application to follow this, where we can
consider any issues with parking that we think will happen, if they will happen with the school
so we can kind of build something in, visit to parking, things like that, potential for that
to be to be assessed, but we're not assessing that now, because this is... No, because we have an
informative, because one of the things that keeps coming up is what is going to happen to that road,
if the school uses it or don't use it, but I have an access point into it, because that is actually
creating an issue for a new estate, and in terms of just basic amenity for any resident, that would
be good. I don't know whether we can put an informative on it in terms of this committee
recognises and does have a view, but actually that would create, could create problems,
but a strong feeling that it could create problems if something isn't done from our experience,
and I think everybody else goes back to experience, it would be silly not to do something if we
could, so that's really the question I'm putting. Okay, that's all I'm asking this point.
Okay, thank you. Next I have Councillor LUNY. Thank you, Chair. My question is very straightforward.
For I've gone on from the last meeting and knowing how much farther a long
Stoke-Manderville Parish Council is with its neighbourhood plan,
I'm curious to know why we're here today and why this meeting wasn't deferred for longer.
We can't delay a planning application for the progress on neighbourhood plan that would be
unreasonable to any applicant, and we wouldn't be able to take it, wait for a planning application,
there's clear guidance in the, clear planning guidance that you cannot, it's premature,
you cannot wait for an event to occur, so you have to take the assessment of the planning
application at the point in time, so if that's why we haven't, once we've resolved and got the
information and it has taken a while, we've come back with the information that was requested by
committee, and it's there for consideration again. Thank you, Councillor Wilkes, I think
you have your hand up. Thank you, Chair. I did have the same question as Councillor
Waters actually about whether or not the estate roads are going to be adopted, so my question
has now morphed into a comment, and I share Councillor's Waters concerns that this is going to be a
very busy site, there is going to be a change of ownership, and I'm very worried about the
safety of the roads, how the roads are going to be maintained, the safety of the pupils and the
traffic collecting the pupils from school and the parking situation, so it's morphed into a comment.
Thank you. Thank you. Councillor for you. Thank you, Chair. I just wanted to pick up on the point,
the agents saying it's going to be 40% affordable housing, would that be transferable onto anyone who
buys the property? Yes, that would be your condition. Yes, it is a requirement, the planning
application builds it in 40%, and it was in the memorandum of understanding which would then
subsequently go into the Section 106 agreement. Thank you. Councillor Cooper.
Can I just say to begin with, I'm surprised and slightly shocked by the fact that Stoke Mandible
had made an offer and we didn't know about it, we've discussed this already.
It's been suggested in the report that it doesn't matter whether we give approval or not in terms of
whether the parish couldn't take up this sign. It seems to me that if we were to give approval
today, it will dramatically increase the value of the site. So I'm just wondering whether officers
agree with that, and I believe that would make it impossible for the parish to take it any further.
So could you just explain your thinking behind saying that it's okay to approve today?
We have to assess the planning application on the merits of the application, on whether the
ownership of that site, wherever that is, that is not a material consideration for this planning
application. So there may be other concerns you have, but we have to consider the planning
application. As put before us, with the information we have against our planning policies,
against the emerging neighbourhood plan and all about is dealt with in our reports. So that is
the basis upon which we must consider the planning application. But do you agree there would be a
dramatic increase in the value of the site? If you grant planning permission for this site,
you will be granted a residential planning permission for the site. So that is, that will be a fact.
Thank you. And can I ask a second question, Gemma? It sort of goes back to where I was
previously, but it is a different question. So I'm going back to paragraph 10.5. Perhaps I can
just read the first bit of it. The aims and requirements of policy G11, so that's the
state management of policy G11 are acknowledged. During the consultation period, objections were
received to this policy, specifically in relation to the site. Now those objections are, I can't
see those objections in reports, a big report may be able to miss them, but I'm just wondering
what objections are being referred to there and who the objections have come from.
So as part of the consultation process, which is a completely separate process to the assessment
planning application, there were objections received. And we were in contact with our
neighbourhood plan team in the local council and we asked them, do you have those objections?
And what do they relate to? And we were told that there are been objections to these policies.
So this is a very standard process within the plan making process, that they were, when you
go to public consultation, they may be support for policies, they may be objections to policies,
and they are documented, and then they form the basis upon which then they go to consider
examination by inspector. Perhaps it needs to be a bit more specific,
because I'm concerned that those objections may have come from the council or from the applicant.
Is that the case? I mean, I think who has made the objection is not relevant,
because what will happen was an inspector will consider the reasons for putting those.
I believe that there were a number of objections to this policy.
But can I ask a specific question? Is it yes or no answer really? Have the council made an objection?
I would have to check. Can I just add that I think this is particularly important,
because we're talking about the weights that the neighbourhood plan will have.
What it says in the report is the weights that have been reduced from moderate,
because there are objections. So if the objection has been made by the council,
by the applicant, then I think the committee would want to take that into account.
Any further interruptions of that matter, and I will ask for the Chamber to be cleared,
I will not give a second warning.
So I can say that there has been objections from two planning consultancies in relation to
that one policy. And are those consultancies working on behalf of the council?
Well, one of them is samples, and the other is another company. So I can't tell you specifically
if they are, but equally, there are more than one objection to this policy.
OK, well we know that samples are working for the council by inference. I might sort of suggest
that the others are too, but clearly you're not going to tell us that.
I simply don't have that information at that level, because it's not something that's specific
to the planning application. We sort of get as much information as we could for my neighbourhood
plan policy team, and that to inform you. But I haven't gone into that level of detail to see,
but it is just to give you the advice as officers to the way that you can
attribute to policies within the plan.
OK, thank you, Chairman. I think that answers my question sufficiently.
Thank you. For the Council, right.
Just one point, thank you, Chair, for clarification. Assuming that the Stoke-Mantle
Paris Council has made an offer, and if we knew about it, could we use that information at all
influence on our decision? What planning way could we put to it? It wouldn't, if we couldn't
use that to influence our decision, could we?
No, Chair, you have to treat every planning application on its merits, regardless of who
the applicant is. So I would suggest that, just as it wouldn't be expected, that we would give
undue favour to an application by the Council, we wouldn't give undue
disfavor to it either. And therefore, the fact that somebody else has come along and made an offer
for that land for a different use, or the same use, or whatever, we wouldn't ordinarily, obviously,
know that in terms of who the applicant was, that's only in the public domain, because it is the Council,
and it's an asset of community value, but that's not relevant to your determination
of a planning application, and neither is the valuation of the land in this respect.
And I suggest that, has this site been registered as an asset of community?
Because, I mean, my understanding here has to go to be, has to be applied for to become an asset
of community value, and is that application been made? It is currently an asset
of community value. Oh, it is. Yeah, so there will be that separate process that has to be gone through
to resolve that aspect of it. Thank you. Any further points?
Okay, then, we will move on to the open debate, and I will answer any comments?
Councillor MARF. Just following up on Councillor COOKER's
concern that if we do make approval of the planning application, it then increases the value of the land.
The response, the asset was provisioned by ratepayers of the holy books. It wasn't
provisioned, I presume, as it was a council building, it would have been an asset that was
contributed by all ratepayers, and the obligation of the Councillors to achieve best value for all
ratepayers, so that increased value would represent the responsibility of the Council to achieve that.
Councillor interjecting.
Councillor COOKER.
Chairman, I had a horrible feeling we're heading towards an unsafe decision here,
should we decide to approve this. The situation with the neighbourhood plan really concerns me,
because I think we are sort of jumping the gun, really, if we were to wait a month or two
until Inspector had come to his conclusions, and this has gone to referendum.
Judging by the figures that are in the report about the opinion of the electorate, of course,
we don't know what they will actually vote, but it looks to me like the chances are that this
would be a made neighbourhood plan. If this was a made neighbourhood plan,
I don't think there is any question other than we would refuse this, because the neighbourhood
plan is quite clear on this matter and on this particular side. So there's all sorts of arguments
about highways and all the other things, should we approve it, but I think we have to look at the
situation before all of that and say to ourselves, are we doing the right thing here,
because I think we're not doing the right thing. So I'm really not going to concentrate on any
of the other detail that we might consider, should we approve, because I think we're doing the wrong
thing. Now, I know we've had legal advice and sort of works against what I'm saying here,
but nevertheless, this doesn't sit well with me. I can't possibly, I can't support this as it
stands. I think the report has been written in a biased way. I'm not accusing anyone of lying,
by the way, but I do think it's a biased report, and the problem is that, you know,
we are sold to the applicants. And as Councillor Marshall has pointed out,
there's an asset here that the Council can take, and perhaps the, you know, you could argue that
the big Lebuckeumshire sort of owned that asset. But we're arguing from, as a Council, from a
position of strength, because we are the owners, we are the applicants, we're going to make the money,
and there's nobody to stop us from going ahead with it. So all of that really does concern me.
I think we're heading off in a dangerous direction here, and for those reasons, and I'm sure there's
going to be much more comes out of this, the debates we've had already today have highlighted a number
of areas where information we've got is incomplete, slightly obscure, and you know, that's why I say
I think we're heading towards an unsafe decision. And for those reasons, I'm going to propose that
we refuse this application. Obviously, you've expected me to respond to some of those accusations,
and I would hold and refute them, as you might well expect. You've already heard from our
legal team, from the planning officers, that the situation with the neighbourhood plan is that
that's not a cause for delaying, that we have to deal with the application before us. Quite simple.
The fact that it is an application that's made by the Council has of course been taken
duly into consideration. Hence, we come under extreme scrutiny, and I think that's been made
very clear today, and I would certainly refute the fact that we somehow or rather have biased the
report on that basis. I think that's an unsafe point to make. I really do. So, if we're talking
about unsafe decisions, I would ask you to reconsider some of the points you've made,
but you have the right to consider things as you do. Right.
Council borders. Thank you, Chairman. Obviously, listening to a Council of Coopers, I think we
do want to make sure we do the right thing on this, but we do have to make sure we do keep thinking
about it as any applicant. It is a difficult thing to do, but we have to think of it in that way,
and that's hard. I think on the advice that we have been given, particularly where it is not
in the gift of this committee to decide when an application comes before us, and it is definitely
not our ability to hold up any application waiting for something that may or may not happen,
that may or may not impact things. I know those feelings in terms of how it's written and what
that might do, but that might be, it's not where we are today, and we have to actually look at
what documents in front of us, where have they got to, what part of the process they are,
and I know some of the detail you were talking about was who had objected, exceptram and abode
plan. I think we've got to look at things as they are, and we've got to look at a site in terms of
its feasibility, its acceptability, its traffic, its layout, its amenities, all of the different
things which we've got there, and some of the conditions which have been added into this
particular one, I think sealer has been very important that actually, that nothing is actually
definitely built or occupied on this site until that is completed, is really important
in terms of the traffic. We are dealing with very busy roads here, and any additional development
has to be done in the right facing, so it doesn't cause one problem, particularly being there,
Stowe Mandeville. Also, I know one of the areas that I believe I was concerned about when this
application came to us before was whether there had been usage on the school site,
which though it was not formal in terms of part of the old County Council club,
was in some way recognised and accepted by the local authority. I think from the
additional information that we've had, it's showing all the methods that have been used to
actually restrict that and make sure it doesn't happen, and so I think that's where it is, and
that definitely there wasn't somebody within the Council who actually knew something was going on
in a semi formal and accepted way, and I think that was the thing I was thinking of, and that's
how it seemed to be coming across, but that is not from the further information that's come back,
something that sits there. We definitely, in terms of looking at the decision and what value that
creates, that is not a decision we make with any other applicant, we know as soon as he has an
application go through, and it's got some outline related to it, values go up, but that isn't a
decision that we make here on the committee, nor should it be, we have to look at all the planning
reasons which are there, and though I think there will be disagreements on this and nuances,
I've just got to look at the clear information. I would definitely like to see, as I said earlier,
if this was to go through, that we are able to make some clear statement about restrictions,
parking and traffic on the roads within the estate at the school drop off of pickup times,
because that would be a real benefit, and maybe a model for the future in future estates which
certainly are schools, so that actually the school has to, as you manage it, manage things properly,
so those things I would like to see, overall, and also, I am pleased to see that, basically,
that there is nothing that precludes offers being made and discussions taking place between the
council and the parish council on this site, but that has to be done within a commercial sense
within those within the council who are involved in that, that is not something for this committee,
but what I wouldn't like to see is that any way that a decision we make today would prevent you
from actually making those offers and having those discussions, so we have to look at it as an
application and its feasibility, and in those terms, on balance, I would be supporting the application.
Thank you. Thank you, Councillor Thiele, if you were next.
Thank you, Chairman. I'm disappointed on a couple of areas.
About two hours before we started this meeting, we found out that the agency would be looking for
some funding from her house, which actually is a step forward for this committee,
that we actually had an evening for them, but it's late and they couldn't be taken into account,
so I think that's really unfortunate. I'm also, and I'm going to call you just saying about the
highways, that the information we have around about four classes, the Stoneman who was one,
is going to be above capacity and very much in the soon future, so that element of it is a concern
for me as well. I think this is a piece of land that could be really used well. I know we've got
to look at the application before us, but we have got the hospital there, where we have tremendous
problems with parking. We look in, they wanted to have an air ambulance centre, that's something
they could be made, and obviously the school. So I think that this piece of land could well be put
to a greater use, but nonetheless I have to look at the application before us. So from those three
points really, I'm quite disappointed with this application. It doesn't give us the final version
of it because we don't know what's going to happen with the medical side. I'm happy about the
highways, and we need to now move forward and make a decision on it.
Thank you. Thank you for that, Councillor Nougam.
Thank you, Chairman. The reason that this committee is hearing this application,
in the way it is, is because this council has a constitution that says applications by the
council must be heard by a committee, not dealt with by officers, and the reason for that is that
it gives transparency to applications. And that's the reason why I pursued the line of questioning
with regard to the bid made by Stone Mandeville Parish Council, not to cast any aspersions upon
Mrs. Pilcher, but simply it's right and proper that members of the committee know what the
situation is, and that it's seen that we are really acting so that the public have confidence
in our decisions for each and every decision that we make, that we are being fair to everybody
involved, bearing in mind that we have to deal with applications on the merits of the application.
But there's a lot of paperwork involved in this, and I only received the note about the bid
by Stone Mandeville Parish Council, as I said at 11.08 this morning, and in fact, I didn't open my
computer until I got here this afternoon. But I note in the papers, at page 60, what I know to
be more precise, page 63, is the exact page, we have a letter from a Neil Rowley of Director of
Savours, a company that's already been mentioned once this afternoon. And in that letter, he says
in the final paragraph, For the above reasons, the strategic sites committee can make its
decision based on the planning merits of the case. This decision can be made in the knowledge
that no office or proposals have been made other than the submitted planning application.
We rise that letter on the 16th of January, and on the 16th of January that would have been
wholly accurate. What worries me is that the council is using a firm, which, because Mrs
Pilcher would have included it in the supplementary bundle, if she'd had a letter from Savours,
updating this and saying, Ah, well actually, at the end of February or the beginning of March,
we did actually receive an offer from Stone Mandeville Parish Council, and therefore my paragraph
at the bottom of the third page of my letter of the 16th of January is no longer accurate.
And so, I'm disappointed in that, because as I say, we should be transparent with the public,
but we can only be transparent with the public when all the relevant information is provided
at the right time. And the right time is immediately up to the points of which we actually make the
determine the application, which is, of course, why we have a supplement with some extra information
in it. And I'm really, really, really disappointed that even though it's something that we're not
allowed to take into account the situation of all the interested parties in this matter,
and this matter has been a really, a very live issue in Stone Mandeville, a really, really live
issue. And it's so disappointing. It really is. And I'm sure Mrs Armstrong will convey that
to Mr. Bambrick, my disappointment to him, and I hope that he will then mention that
at the corporate management team meeting, in terms of the behaviour of whoever it is,
in terms of the, who's representing the council, in terms of the applicants. Terribly, terribly
disability. But anyway, let's get on to the matters in hand. And the matters in hand are
that we have to determine a planning application, because we're a planning committee. And there
are all sorts of reasons why we have to make decisions in accordance with certain factors.
They're all ultimately factors in accordance with the law. But we still have to exercise
judgement. And I thought Council fee, he made some really good points. But as he mentioned,
that what was a rare occurrence in terms of the integrated commissioning board.
But there's really, for me, there's one real elephant in the room, as it were, on this whole matter.
The junction involved gets an extra hundred cars, or more than a hundred cars, during the Russia.
And only 15 yards, or 20 yards, down the road is actually on one of the photographs produced by
Mrs. Pilcher. It's an ambulance station. Now anybody who lives, or frequents,
major rooms in the vicinity of Stoke Mandeville, is aware how often they hear the sirens,
they see the blue lights. I don't live on the road, and I would hate to live on the road,
because I've been interrupted so much by those sirens. What's the traffic situation with regard
to the ambulance station? Well, we don't have anything from the ambulance people. I don't know
why we don't. I don't know whether it's because we didn't consult them. I suspect they're not
statutory consultees. And perhaps they don't go around looking at the notices or lambs.
But we don't actually have anything from them at all. But we know that when it comes to the
emergency services, seconds count. Those of us who were present at the last meeting
heard the chief fire officer, I now talk about fire rather than ambulance, but heard the chief
fire officer give statistics in terms of the time it took the fire engines to reach the locations.
And she was packed and rightly so that they had managed to reduce their response time
by a matter of seconds, because when it comes to the blue light services, seconds really, really
matter. And if we are ever in need of an ambulance, seconds matter to us, and we hear so much through
the news how important it is that there is a response time, which is as fast as possible.
You hear about screws, how is the people need to get to hospital within a certain period of time.
There are advertisements on it and everything else. But nowhere in these papers is there any
relevant mention, as far as I can understand them, it's built to interrupt me about the ambulance
station and the effect upon the ambulance station. And that really, really worries me.
So I ask some rather inept questions of the highways people. And I'm interested in what
happens after 2036, because these hands are designed to be demolished in 2035 with their
built, they'll be put here for another 100 years or 200 years or whatever, unless the ambulance
service moves the ambulance station, the same question will therefore apply. So that's why I'm
interested in post-2036, that's why I'm interested in the time. After the sea, there is open,
because I accept the point there's a condition that basically these houses can't be finished off
until the sea there itself is open. As I've said, the sea there really only redistributes
roads between two major access routes. It makes these more efficient, but it still only
will distribute them in that minor way. And so what we do know from the
officer's report here, which I'm glad you've got it now, because we didn't have it last time,
it is that if there's an RFC of 0.85 or above, a junction is over capacity.
And in paragraph 6.9, there's a mention of an RFC of 0.92, and I'm not going to spend ages
going into the detail of it. But what worries me is that also actually, there are a number of ways
in which the traffic can get out of that junction and get into it. Quite clearly, the Booker Park
one way proposal is a sensible proposal. And I'm really disappointed that the legal advice has
been that we can't in a way condition it because of the technicalities on it, and it's quite extraordinary,
and I'm not sure where Booker Park is in the Academy office or a council school, but we can't
condition it. But that seems to me to be sensible in solving another problem. But ultimately,
traffic is going to want to emerge, on to lower road. A busy road at any time was a busy road,
particularly during the rush hour. And it wasn't so long ago that there was a problem in the rush
hour, just near the ambulance station. I think I'm right in saying that contractors turned up early
and started digging whilst the rush hour was still on rather than turning up after the rush hour
had finished. And the whole of Alesbury almost worked properly. It's not exaggerating. The whole
of the eastern side fails. It was brought to a halt as a result. So it's that finely balanced
at the movement. And so, if you're coming out and turning left, that's obviously going to be
the optimum thing to do. You might find it difficult in the rush hour, not so difficult,
outside the morning rush hour, and that's so forth. But that's going to be a relatively easy
thing to do. And people, when they're going really quite slowly, are quite helpful and allow you
to turn them out. If you want to turn right, I think there's no question about it. Within a
short period of time, everybody will learn the best way to turn left. Nobody wants to turn right.
Because they'll all go down to the round about and turn around and do the user in which the office
got right, said there's a beautiful thing to do and come back again and that'll be faster.
I would like to have seen highways recommending that there'd be a new right turn sign there.
But they haven't recommended it because they seem to think that people will either
find the optimum thing to do or alternatively, and there will always be people, of course,
who are new to it and therefore can't turn right because it's too much traffic and therefore
they're gated, who is tailed back behind and can live leading down, et cetera, et cetera.
But I would have liked to have seen a new left turn sign. But what really concerns me is traffic
coming out of Alesbury in the evening rush hour, could be the morning or evening. But effectively
finding it difficult to turn right into the road there. And as a result, causing a tailback,
and there will be occasions when there will be more than one car. Alesbury is peppered with
junctions like that. If you're coming in from Aston Clinton on, just where the new estates have been,
but it's the left turn into Campbell on Avenue. Traffic turns right there, suddenly the outside
lane is blocked, Dickens way on the other side. The lane is blocked again and there's a third
one which you can't remember on the top. Oh yeah, so Oakfield Road and Tring Road, the same house,
all these junctions. Traffic wanting to turn right causes a problem to traffic going straight,
straight ahead. And so the easiest thing to do would be effectively to have a no right turn
sign there. And as a result of having a no right turn sign, the traffic would go on to the round
about, which will really be in the future, be a few hours down the road at the sea of the junction,
go round that round about and then come along and turn left in. But no without doing that.
And so every time there's a tail back or a problem or something of that nature,
there is a risk. And I don't really know higher than that, but there is a risk that an ambulance
will be delayed. Delayed only by a few seconds perhaps, but if you're the person who they're
going to treat at the other end of that journey, that's a few seconds that may make all the difference.
And because it may make all the difference, I'm going to vote against this application.
And our second character, Cooper. Thank you for that. Just as a point of the
ambulance, this is somebody that was a recipient of the emergency services last year
and came very close to not being here today. I fully understand the concerns
about this, but of course they can happen anywhere at any time. There is no set time of day
for something to require their services. And of course we are looking at the application
before us. Councillor LAND.
Thank you, Chairman. I wasn't expecting to come on as quick as that.
Thank you very much. I've listened to a long time to Councillor Newman making various points,
and I wasn't anticipating him match it, eventually getting to the point and seconding
chaos and Cooper's proposal. But I have been on the Planning Committee for several years,
and after listening to Councillor Newham and his traffic flows and what have you,
I've sat at these meetings with David many years, and I've come to respect David and his expertise.
And he's got years of expertise on traffic flow, so it's with regret, Councillor Newham,
that I go along with David's predictions rather than yourselves. And I've also looked at that.
We're never going to get an ideal application coming front of us. We can't take into consideration
whether or not the parish council have made an offer for the land. We can't defer it until
the parish council have got the neighbourhood planned through. So it's what we've got in front
of us, and I, of the opinion that I support the application. So I won't be voting on
Councillor in favour of Councillor Cooper's motion. Thank you.
Chair, we do have a motion that's been seconded. I would just ask for clarification of the
reasons for refusal. I understand Councillor Newham's concerns, but they don't appear to be the
concerns that were raised by Councillor Cooper. So can I just ask whether you are actually,
what reasons for refusal? You jointly are putting forward.
Well, I'm putting forward, I'm putting forward. I'm only seconding because it's a binary choice.
Well, we still need reasons for refusal. So I understand that you're saying that there's a
problem with right-hand turning to the site that would cause highways issues, and I'm just trying
to clarify whether that's what Councillor Cooper was proposing when he proposed his reason
for refusal. So I think, Councillor Cooper, you need to explain your reasons for a
recommended record. Yes, okay, that's probably a good idea. So the first point I would make is
about the weight applied to the neighbourhood plan, because that has an effect on the
recommendation, in my view. So I think we've established bearing in mind what was said about
who's been objecting to this, to the consultations, et cetera, that we're probably talking here
about moderate weight. And I don't think that's been fully taken into account in establishing
the recommendation as in front of us. So that's my first point.
You want me to go on? Yes, be on the camera. The second thing that I believe we established
is that the site, when we visited it 12 months ago and nine months ago and everyone, appeared
to be in a condition where it was certainly usable. There's questions about whether it was used,
although I think if we had been able to hear from members of the public and from the parish
council, they would have told us how it was being used in that period. But it seems that the
pictures were maintained and mowed up until last year, not 2018. And you know, that is relevant to
whether it's a green space, a valid green space or not. So my understanding from the evidence,
we did have last time and from what I hear is that it's still a valid green space. So I think
that's a really good reason for the parish council having this site develop the way they wish it
to develop in other words in relation to the neighbourhood plan. I think we've already established
the fact that the lawful or formal use of the site had ceased. Well, I'm disputing that and I'm
suggesting... I'm not proof. Well, I'm suggesting that... Bearing in mind that the races for
reviews have got to stand up, you know, on their merits, and there isn't a strict test for that.
Just as a matter of interest can I be really cynical and say this is not going to go to appeal,
I suspect. Well, regardless of whether it does or whether it doesn't, we're here to remind them
the application before is not what may or may not happen at some point in the future or not.
There is a legal duty to provide reasons for refusal and the applicant is entitled to have
proper planning reasons for refusal. Well, I believe the evidence is that the site has been
used since 2018. That's my understanding of what I've seen and read. But what evidence are you putting
forward on that? What evidence are you relying on? Well, I've had evidence today from the questions
I asked earlier that the area has been maintained as a football pitch. I do recognise that the
clubber search ceased operation was closed. You know, I might argue that that is perhaps a
cynical move, but I'm not going to do that by the way. Yeah, I would stress there's an awful
lot of evidence that we've all seen in relation to the club having ceased some time ago.
So, you know, I think you, again, I have to remind you again, Councillor COO. But the making statements
which would, they're coming fairly close to inappropriate statements, I would suggest.
You've been a member of this committee for some years now. You also have previous
experience on planning committees. You know what the regulations are. You understand,
I know you understand the seriousness of things that are said. So, I would just remind you to be
very cautious in your comments. So, I'm now going to, and they're going to hang over to.
So, just on point of clarity, the reason we said that grounds were maintained, there is quite a
distinction between being maintained and being used. So, we didn't, what we confirmed to you,
was maintenance. And the way that you're considering that concern, it would have to be
contrary to a policy. And the policy is about sport recreation and existing use.
So, our point was about that the grass were maintained. I don't think the evidence would
suggest that it was still in use. No, that's your version of things. And I do believe that
had we been able to question the parish council members of the public, we might have found evidence
to the contrary, but we've not been able to do that. However, my situation here today,
and all of us here today, is that we have to make our own minds up as to what we consider to be
correct. And, you know, I apologise if I've gone a bit close to the line here, but nevertheless,
that is my judgement. But again, we've come back to the point as to whether or not the
reasons for refusal are relevant. So, again, is there anything that you, from a legal perspective,
that would suggest that the Councillor Cooper's points are of a material nature that would
change more? Is it not for the committee to make that decision? I mean, that's my point of view.
Councillor CUMMING, but you've been a member of this committee for some long time. You know that
before we can make a decision to refuse an application, any application, that we have to have
relevant reasons. So, I would make a point, Chair, there's a difference between whether
there's a matter of planning judgement or whether it's a matter of planning law.
When we're looking at the decision in this case, we have to look at the presumption in favour
of sustainable development. We have to look at paragraph 11 of the MPPF, and in particular,
paragraph 11D, which states, When there are no relevant development plan policies,
or the policies which are most important for determining the application are out of date,
and a situation due to footnote 8, as to when policies are taken to be out of date,
is if the Councillor cannot show a five-year housing land supply, then one looks at two
particular circumstances. So, the first is that permission should be granted on less. One,
the application of policies in the framework that protect assets or areas of particular importance
provide a clear reason for refusing the development proposed. We're not suggesting that's the case
here. But secondly, any adverse of impacts of doing so is significantly and demonstrably
outweigh the benefits when assessed against the policies in this framework taken as a whole.
Now, I heard what you say about re-evaluating the weight that you would give to the neighbourhood
plan policies, but my guidance would be that that can only be given a limited weight,
given the stage of which it has reached the neighbourhood plan and the amount of objections
that have been received to the relevant policies. But even if you were to give the neighbourhood
plan policy moderate weight, you would then have to consider the other matters that are set out
in the report in that balance in exercise to assess whether any adverse impacts of
granted permission would significantly and demonstrably outweigh the benefits when assessed
against the policy in the framework taken as a whole. And therefore, you must also bear in mind
the benefits of the development. And it's been put to you in the report that there's significant
benefits derived both from the provision of affordable housing, which is above the policy
standard and the provision of housing as a whole, given the five-year housing land supply situation.
And so, if you would have to balance that significant weight, I would suggest against
the albeit your suggesting moderate, we are suggesting limited weight to be given to the
neighbourhood plan policy, and you would have to explain how you are weighing those matters in the balance.
Can I say in all the training we've had? I think it's been made clear that
policy is there for our guidance. It's not necessarily 100% to be absolutely followed.
We, as members of the planning committee, have the ability to make our own mind up.
And sometimes it doesn't necessarily follow all policy. I think you're suggesting that
we simply have to follow exactly what you're saying in your interpretation of the policy.
That's not my understanding of our situation. And in any case, I cannot support this application.
So, that's my position. And it's now up to the other members of the committee to either support
me or reject what I'm saying. Simple as that, really.
At the end of the day, it still comes out of the fact that to get a valid refusal or stand up in
a court floor, then you have to have relevant planning reasons. Councillor Nukem.
Yes, I'm sorry, Chairman. I seem to have caused some confusion by seconding Councillor Koopa.
I mean, I've been made it quite clear as to what my ground of wanting to reject this is.
I'm not suggesting that I'm actually supporting Councillor Koopa on some of his
reasons, which would be the hard reasons. Perhaps it might be easier.
But the complication is that I was the last to speak of several that nobody has actually proposed
a motion supporting the application. It may be easier if I was to withdraw my second date.
We could then hear if anybody else wants to propose any form of motion.
If then, at some point, anybody who's proposed the motion should be ultimately defeated the motion.
If that motion should be defeated, then we'd have to fight reasons for us.
And we could then have a list of them as it were, which not all of us need to support.
If that may be a helpful suggestion, I don't know.
Yes, I think that's very useful, Councillor Nukem.
Do we have a following that line of argument? Do we have a proposal for recommendation, Councillor
Wainte? Thank you. I've just one point with Councillor Koopa, the evidence of it being used or not used
the area. I must admit, when we went on our side visit, I thought that some of the best maintained
grants in the county. But there was no evidence of it being used. The gold posts in the smaller
area. I've never seen gold posts with such good grants between the posts. There's no evidence
that that was being used. So, yes, Chairman, I forward the officers to support the officers'
recommendations. Thank you. Councillor WATERS.
I would like to second it, but I don't want to call to confusion. I would very much like to have
some kind of controls put in or some mention of them in terms of the pick up and drop up time
in terms of the schools. I actually would also quite like to have a no right turn out of the site
sign put up. And if we were able to get that and not cause too much confusion, I think that would
actually be very helpful. So, I don't know if the officers want to comment on that. I'm going to
try and squeeze it out if I can. Okay, thank you. I could suggest an informative and see whether
that you would be happy with that. So, I'm suggesting an informative rather than a condition.
An informative would be to consider the impact of the proximity of the site when it exists in
school and consider and seek to mitigate the potential impacts on the street and parking
within the site at school times. And could we also have the no right turn sign as you leave?
I would need to speak to my homework on this. So, we did initially consider that. It was our
opinion that that would not be very effective. That if it's just a sign, people would turn right
if they saw it was clear. I think the law is the law basically and I don't think that's our
judgment. You can't make that judgment. If the law says actually it's a no right turn, it's a no
right turn. Generally, if we're looking to ban a right turn, we would look for physical structures.
So, we did pursue that route, went down that route, had that road safety lawsuit and there's
quite a few safety issues with having a physical structure on that main road, especially as it's a
blue light route. Could you have a no right turn without a tiaro?
I don't see why not, I'd have to go back and have another look. So, that would be a possibility.
I'd be uncomfortable just conditioning it straight away, but we could certainly have a look at that.
If you could, then I'd like to be added as long as the composer is happy.
I was in a move of no compromise really because we've had the facts put in front of us from David,
which I totally believe. And as far as parking goes, I think because of the proximity to the
hospital anyway, there'd be no parking there after a period because people would be parking
out free of charge instead of paying to go to the hospital, some of the roads around that area are.
I'll back down on it if you would prefer it, but thank you.
Councillor. Thank you. I just, again, I'm struggling to come up with a good reason for the refusal
as well, but however, I just want to refer to something that Councillor Ransett about, it's just,
it's about what we have in front of us. It's actually so much more than what we have in front of us.
We're talking about a green space. The reason that people haven't been able to use it is because
it was fenced off and painted with anti-climb paint. So it would have been used. This is not a black
and white situation. Technically it hasn't been used and it was fenced off and it hasn't been a club
since 2018. It is a green space. It is one of the only green spaces near. I know we've seen the picture
with all the open spaces on. A lot of those are places you would have to rent. We're talking about
a space that you can fall into the children and run around. I just, I don't think we should
lose sight of the fact. It's so much more than what we have in front of us. That's just really,
I needed to get that off my chest. That's fine. Thank you. Right. Well, I think we've reached that
point where we have the proposal seconder for approval. We will then see whether or not once we
have a vote, whether or not that's carried and if not then whether there's a capital
proposal and if so what the reasons for a refusal are that are acceptable. So we go to
a vote now on the officer recommendation with the informative as suggested on parking etc.
All of those in favour of approval.
Okay. All of those against.
I've against, there are no abstentions by my calculations. I think my maths is correct.
Which again comes down to the way about it and my decision.
It's clearly a very evocative situation. I'm a great believer in maintaining open spaces
and I understand the concerns have been expressed today. I also found the report to be very thorough
and of course I am as ever mindful of the fact that we have to deal with
relevant planning matters and that weighing and balancing act that we have to perform
on every application. It's never easy. It's never straightforward and it will never satisfy
everybody. Sometimes it satisfies no one but we have a duty to perform and we have to
make our own personal mind up according to everything that we have to abide by.
On this occasion I will use my deciding vote to vote
in favour of the officer recommendation.
Accordingly there is application approved and thank you very much everyone.
And the next meeting will be on the 30th of May and again it will not be an easy application
and I suspect it will be a very long one. So I think we can run to sandwiches for lunch on that
because I'm sure we'll be here most of the day. So thank you very much and have a safe journey
and also I would just like to say that this is our last meeting as this committee makeup.
So a huge thank you to everyone that's sat on it throughout the year.
Once again we've had some very interesting applications, discussions and thank you all
for the recording we've shown. Thank you.
Transcript
Good afternoon Councillors, ladies and gentlemen and welcome to the meeting. Please note that the meeting will be well cast and the public and the press can see and hear the meeting through that webcast. In the unlikely event that there is a technical issue, the meeting will be paused until the issue is being resolved. There are a couple of housekeeping items to cover. Members, please note that the use of mobile phones is not permitted during the meeting. So please either turn them off or on silent iPads can be used to access the or the Gov app. Members, if you wish to speak, please raise your hand at the appropriate time and please remember to turn on your microphone before speaking and switch off when you're finished. I also remind all those taking part today in the meeting. The acoustics in here aren't always perfect for soft speaking individuals, so please get quite close to the microphone and speak loud enough for everyone present to hear. In the event of a fire alarm, please use the nearest fire. It's definitely become temperamental. Okay, this one seems to be working. Right, in the event of a fire alarm, please use the nearest fire exit and assembly in the overflow car park which is situated to the right of the main entrance when you exit the building. If there are any members of the press presence, can you please make yourself known? No, okay. Now, before we move to the first agenda item, I'll ask each of the members and officers to introduce themselves, starting with from my left. Oh, I'm Sarah Armstrong. I'm the major team leader for Buckinghamshire Council. Hello, I'm C Pilcher, Principal Planning Officer for Buckinghamshire Council. Good afternoon, I'm Andrew Cooper, I'm a High Waste Development Management Officer for Buckinghamshire Council. Afternoon all, David Marsh, High Waste Team Leader, for High Waste DM, Team Leader, for Buckinghamshire Council. I'm Richard Newcomb and I'm the Councillor for the Wendover-Houlton and Stoke-Manderville Ward, which covers part of this site. I'm Peter Cooper and I represent the Wing Ward. I'm Sue Lewin and I represent the Burnwood Ward. Good afternoon, I'm Councillor Allison Wheelhouse for Buckinghamshire Ward. Good afternoon, I'm Michael Rand, Councillor for the Brendan Underwood Ward and Neil Marshall, Councillor Formala. Good afternoon, I'm Patrick Fieldy and I represent Buckingham Wayst. Good afternoon, I'm Rebecca Binstead, Democratic Services and Half Buckinghamshire Council. Good afternoon, I'm Jonathan Waters and I represent as Councillor for Penn Wood and Old Amisham and Vice Chairman of the Committee. Good afternoon, I'm Catherine Stubbs and I'm a senior planning solicitor with the Council. And I'm Councillor Owen Turner, representing the Prince's Risborough Ward and I will be chairing this afternoon's meeting. Turning now to agenda item number two, do we agree the minutes of the committee meeting held on 15 December 2023? Are these going to be found on pages 3 to 6 of the agenda pack? Thank you, I'll now sign them. Gender item number three, declarations of interest. Do we have any declarations? Councillor Nukem. Yes, as ward member, I'd like to repeat declaration which is set out in the minutes of the last meeting in December last year. In exactly the same term, say of course that I did actually express some views of the last meeting which I had not there to for. Thank you, that's duly noted. There are no further declarations of interest. We will move on. We will now consider the officer report. First I will clarify the order. Sorry to interrupt before we continue. Are you happy with me to quickly run through the apologies? Oh sorry. No worries. First I would say that we received apologies from Councillor Trevor Egluten and Councillor Jackson Ng. Councillor Ng asked that we know that he wished to attend, but excused himself so that stakeholders in this application and fellow Councillors will not be confused or to create any grounds for an appeal. Had Councillor Ng attended and engaged in the debate and then not been allowed to vote. Thank you, Chairman. Yes, Councillor Gooderson. Thank you, Chairman. I'd like to raise the points of order. That's in connection with the paper that's on our desk that I've literally only just seen. And it concerns the fact that we're not allowing public speaking because there's no substantial change allegedly. However, it seems to me that there is a change in relation to the neighbourhood plan which is a major change as far as I'm concerned in this debate. And also there's further reports on the alleged use or otherwise of the ground since 2018. And I'm assuming that the Paris Council would have wished to speak and I would like to have heard from them on those two items. So I really think it's a shame that we're not allowing public speaking. Okay, thank you for that. But I have consulted with officers only on this and I fully agree with them that the art submission changes that would mean that we would go through public speaking again. You have every right to hold your opinion, of course, as to every member of this committee. So in my point of view, the officers are correct in this. Yes, Councillor Luegum. Yes, Chairman, I'd like to support Councillor Cooper and what he says. And it's interesting that you use the phrase 'art sufficient' changes. Thus, there are changes and those changes particularly related to Stuttmanville Parish Council. And whilst I can understand why you may not wish a large number of people to have made a further contribution, it does seem to me to be highly irregular not to allow the parish council to deal with matters, particularly as Councillor Cooper is quite right with regard to the neighbourhood plan. But also I think in terms of the bid that's been put forward by the parish council to buy this site. So I concur with Councillor Cooper. Okay, I'm just just around this discussion off of just ask, leaving for that point of view. Oh, sorry, you have another? Yes, Councillor. I don't have anything material to add to the last two Councillors that spoke, but I also would like to register my concerns about this too. Yes, I think the decision was taken that there was no material change in circumstances. As is usually in such cases, the Chairman was asked his opinion on this and concurred with that view. There was, as members will recall, a very thorough discussion last time in which a number of speakers spoke at length on the matter and of course the parish council has seen the agenda since it was published and had the opportunity to make written representations on the same. There were matters that were subject to further consideration, which were the reasons for deferral last time. So it was to be expected that those would be considered at this meeting. I don't think there's any material change in circumstances. As regards to the point on the neighbourhood plan, that still within the report, the added weight that can be given to that due to the stage is reached, but it still has limited weight as you'll see set up in the report. You may have come back very briefly, but we are coming to the end. Just to be clear, just on your last few words, you said that the neighbourhood plan has limited weight. Now, that's not the case anymore. This is the very point, because it now has – I'm sorry, Councillor CUMAR, that may be your opinion, but in the opinion of our legal advice, then that's the situation. I'm sorry, I'm not taking anything further on that. That's the situation. We will now progress. We came to the end of apologies, I believe. Thank you. Right, we'll now consider the officer report, and I'll clarify the order in which the application will be considered. The planning officer will introduce the application with any relevant updates. There is no public speaker on this item, as in the opinion of the planning officer, there are no significant amendments or changes to the substance of the application. So, it will then ask members if they have any technical questions of officers. Following this, the entire committee will then discuss the application. Officers will respond to issues and questions raised by the members. The committee will then make a decision by vote. Members will need to propose and second the recommendations. We will now move to item 4, which is the application before us this afternoon relating to the box, sports and social club lower road stoke manual, and I will now call on the case officer, to introduce the report on the application. Thank you, Chairman. So, in the agenda, Pat, before members, you've got the committee report from 15th of December last year, along with the two update reports of that committee, and then the further update to today's committee and a supplemental report as well. So, just to refresh members' memories of the application. So, before you've got the site location plan, so you can clearly see the application is in two parts, the northern area where the development would take place, and the southern area of the site where a sports pitch would be retained, or provided rather, you've got the access at this point here, from lower road. So, this is a plan of the wider context of the site, just to set the scene. So, you've got the application site in this area here, Booker Park School, here, Mandeville School, you've got lower road coming along here, and then State Mandeville Hospital, here. So, this plan just shows the context of the site in this area, in connection with the other, or the garden town allocations. So, they include Kingsbrook over here, Woodlands, Mountain Fields, and then South Aylesbury and Southwest Aylesbury, and this is Berra Fields up here. So, this slide just shows the road and rail links. So, you've got the site location at this point here. You've got the Southeast Aylesbury link road, which is being commenced now. So, you've got phase one between Wendover Road and Lower Road, and then phase two, which is between Lower Road and connects into the State Mandeville relief road, and also provides a roundabout to the South West Aylesbury link road, going through AGT-2. That's how we got on town, too. So, just some photographs. So, this is looking into the application site from Lower Road, looking out from the access over towards the access door and the ambulance station. So, you can see the footpath and cycleway on the opposite side of Lower Road. This is looking in the other direction. So, this is the Nealeyville Crescent Development Harborne Manor, and you've got the footway along this side of the road, as well as along side the Harborne Manor Development. So, this is looking from within the site towards the exit of Lower Road. So, you can see it's currently used for parking by the NHS. These are the old tennis courts. So, this is looking back towards the entrance, which is on beyond the left-hand side. This row of hedging would be removed as part of the proposals. This is looking towards Roblin Close, which is in the top corner here, and this is where our cycle and pedestrian link would be proposed. So, just to go over the northern area of the illustrative master plan. So, you can see the access of Lower Road at this point here. So, part of an extension to this property, which is a children's care home, would be demolished to enable the widening of the access at this point, and to provide a footway. So, then you've got housing development around the edge of the site, which would enable gardens to go back-to-back for the majority of cases, which was in important terms of secure by design. Within the central area, you've got an area of open space and a play area, and then in this area there would be sunspaces. So, there's a path connection down to the southern part of the site, which I'll show you in a second, and this would be the exit point from the school if the one-way system were to be implemented. So, just looking at the site as a whole, you can see the area within the southern portion of the site where a sports pitch, likely to be football, would be provided. There would be room for a footway cycle way to go around the site and connect through to south of Salisbury and also to the Blue Homes open space area in this location. So, just in terms of the access, members will recall there was some discussion at the last meeting and some last-minute amendments that were considered. So, this is the proposal before you. So, you've got the exit from the site, which would allow two vehicles to sit side-by-side to either go left or right, and then, obviously, you can keep back to the site if that should occur. You've got the entrance into the site. There's connections through for our two-metre wide footway, which would link into the existing footway, which is three metres wide at this point. There would be a pedestrian island here, which would enable users to cross the road and access the public bus stops on the other side of the road, but also, there will be a relocated bus stop in connection with the Blue Homes development, which they would also be able to access. So, that does mean that the existing bus stop, which is located up here, and the narrow foot part would no longer be required. And then, this plan is just to show the achievement of the visibility space from the site and within standard. So, there was some discussion at the last meeting about the existing facilities and recreational facilities in the locality. So, the applicants provided this information to the Council, so you can see the site in this position here. And then, there's a variety of different facilities. So, they've included public recreational park and sports facilities in the yellow. The blue is where their sports club and outdoor facilities, and then the green is where they are schools, but they do have higher facilities available. So, just to summarize, matters in respect of the previous use of the site as the County Council's sports and social club site have been set out in the report, and the objections received are acknowledged, but for the reasons given, it's not considered that the loss of this previous use would represent appropriate grounds to refuse the development, since there would not be a conflict with the neighbourhood plan or with the MPPF. So overall, having regard to all elements of policy conflict and compliance, the proposed development is considered to accord with the development plan, read as a whole. And when weighed in the planning balance, the benefits arising from the development are considered to substantially outweigh any harms. Further comments were received from the ICB yesterday, and they're reported in the supplemental report to you. But unfortunately, it's still the case that the lack of detox provided and justification for the contribution means that offices considered that they are not so compliant, and therefore we should not include them within the memorandum of understanding or sort from the applicant. So the recommendation remains that it's to be deferred and delegated to the Service Director of Planning and Environment for approval, subject to referral to the Secretary of State, given the objection to the development from Sport England. In the event that it's not called in by the Secretary of State for the application to be approved, subject to the completion of the memorandum of understanding, the details of which have been set out in the report before you, and subject to conditions with any amendments or additions as considered appropriate biopuses and receipt of no new material representations. Or if these are not you for the application to be refused for such reasons as the Service Director of Planning issues. I suspect there will be quite few, and if you'd like to please raise your hand, Councillor McLACHLAN, you're at first. Thank you, Chairman. There's a couple of questions I'd like to ask, two very simple ones. The first might seem a bit obvious, really, but I would just like somebody to actually say this, and the question is, who is the applicant, is we keep referring to the applicant as some enabulous being. Can we just be clear for everyone's knowledge who the applicant actually is? Here's the Buckinghamshire Council. Thank you. And secondly, as far as the neighbourhood plans concerned, as I understand it, it's a regulation 16 with comments having come back from the public, so it's ready to go to Inspector. On that basis, can you tell us what weight the neighbourhood plan has? This matter is dealt with a power of 10 of the updated report. It is true that you're absolutely correct. It has got to that regulation stage, and the amount of weight to give policies within the plan is from limited to moderate, depending on the objections that have been received in relation to specific policies. So, it's a very individual assessment we have to make, depending on what the policy is and what has been any objections, and this is detailed in the report, and we have undertaken that assessment. I think the report does actually say slight - no, I can't remember the first word - but two medium, it speaks about medium weight. Is that not true? Limited to moderate weight, yeah. I think we're talking the same. It's limited to moderate weight, so there is a spectrum, as I'm explaining, and that spectrum, because it's quite clear advice in the MPPF, how you have to give weight within that to an emerging plan, and that is what we've sought to undertake. And do we have any reason to think that it is less than moderate weight, based on the comments that have come back? Yes, again, individual policy by policy, when we look to the policies, if there's objections or substantial objection to the principle of the policy, it is limited weight. If there is no objection, then it raises to moderate weight. So, I can't give you one fits all it doesn't. It is very much based on the level of objection that has come through the public consultation process, and therefore, then, we can apply weight to the policies. OK, and may I just go one further question, and that relates back to the site visit we made, I think it was last summer. And I recall from that site that the site had a working football field on it that had been mown, actually fairly recently. Is my recollection correct? I don't know if there are other members, remember that, but that's certainly my recollection. But the site had been maintained in mown, but I wouldn't say it was the used football pitch. So it was maintained in mown? Yes, it can. Thank you. All right, next I have Councillor MARSHALL. Thank you, Chairman. I just don't want to pick up a couple of questions on a couple of the contentious areas from the last time around. The Stoke Manneville Parish Council, so I can force that this site was an asset of community volume, and a lot of the discussion is centered around the use of which has been documented now in this report, and it will appear that there has been no lawful community use since the place was closed down. And just to confirm that the use of the NHS, a park, does not constitute community use if we can have that. So there has been no formal use of the site since June 2018. Yes, the NHS use it in a private function to provide car parking for staff members, but I wouldn't say that that was a community use available to the wider public. So then the site would not qualify as an asset of community volume? That's a slightly different—it's a different consideration to have, and that process to address that would have to take place outside of the planning application. It's not something that needs to be addressed now. And then secondly, the integrating cable and the frustration of trying to get money to them, I'm aware that Bucks Council are intending to introduce CIL in the not too distant future, perhaps quite early or perhaps in line with the new local plan coming through. Once CIL is inactive, then it's not relying on specific site contributions, but the ICB could then apply for funding over the general CIL fund to achieve what they're tending to deliver in this area. And yeah, that would be the case if CIL was available that could take place. But at the current stage, at this point in time, it's not something that we can include, but not setting that aside. The project and the details that they gave us yesterday are not sufficient to justify the contribution that they're requesting and it wouldn't meet the CIL requirements. Because we haven't got any information that we would require at this stage, but it's not completely shutting the door of them, because subsequently they can apply for contributions to what they're building through the CIL fund as and when them gets up to it. I think talking about CIL, we're not close to the introduction of that. We're aware that that's the case. I suppose it would depend on what the criteria are because the CIL that's in place for the West area and the Silvers in place for the South and East areas are different in the way that they're applied. So I don't think we can actually give you any greater clarity on that because it would depend how we decide to go forward with CIL for the whole of the Council area. Thank you. Next up, Councillor Feedly. A couple of pointers, community asset. We talked about it, but do the school want a community asset judgment because clearly they're suffering with parking in the moment and using a site. And the second point I'd want to find out about, and this has been used by the Hettyport on occasions for the AR ambulance. Is that something we've approached or how the health service has been in touch with us about that? And again, is it a community asset at all? I'm not aware that the Hospital of Aperture Council about continued use of the site. I think it's due to cease, it's my understanding. In terms of the park school, there is an issue with congestion. And so if the one-way system were to come on board, although as we've said in a report, it's not required as a result of this development, so we would not be able to secure that. We can certainly encourage its use. And the provision of that alongside the use of the sports field in the southern area of the site would enable the school to be extended. So it's all sort of part parts of the considerations of improving and increasing the send provision at the school. If they extended it, they would have to give up the plane plane area, wouldn't they? No, they would, they would be able to extend the school itself. The sports pitches would be to provide that facility for the school children. Right. Okay, can I move on to another area then? Could I have a drawing of the access on the low road up, please? Look at how he put him to it. And it's probably to Mr Marshall and Mr Cooper. When those two cars are coming out, the vehicle was coming along the low road and wanted to turn in. They're going to have to go across it. Does that include dust cards? It's like capable of being turned in there, even if a car is parked on the brow of that attorney. Yeah, thank you, Chair. The access is designed to accommodate the Council's refuse vehicles turning in and out. That has been tracked and the high authority is satisfied that the access is sufficient to accommodate refuse vehicles, along with traffic turning in and out. This is a point I've raised last time because traffic coming towards the development. Would they be pulling off the main road or would they be holding on the main road? Going towards Little South? As such, it's not proposed to widen the lower road and provide a right turn lane as part of the current proposals. However, traffic assessments, recent traffic assessments have been undertaken which demonstrate the right turning traffic into the site off lower road, doesn't cause undue delay and cues to general traffic using lower road. But that's not the information we've got here, because if we look at some of the details on it, it says at certain points, it's outside the acceptable levels. So if you look at, we pay 47. So if we pay 47. If you look down there at the ratio of low to capacity, lower is it 0.92. And if you keep on going down again, you go on one level 0.93. And this is in the AMP peak. If you look at the PMP, it's one in 8.85. And that's above what do you recommend at the moment? If I could perhaps just explain a little bit more. So we're talking about the right turn into the site off lower road. So those results that you refer into are demonstrating satisfactory results. The 0.9s and the 0.81s refer to traffic turning left out of the site and right out of the site, on the minor arm. So there are some delays and cues which may occur to those movements because of the flows of traffic along lower road. However, for a short period of time in the peak, it can't be determined that that is a severe harm. And I'm talking about traffic on the side road on the minor arm, but obviously going back to the original point about traffic turning in and out. The cues that might occur on the side road wouldn't stop traffic turning left in off lower road or turning right into the site off lower road or refuse vehicles turning in and out of the site. I hope that is of some help. Well, it's just a wicking through here, I've read a whole lot. I've indicated that these were at maximum capacity already. Yeah? So the side road indicates some, even with the alterations, it indicates some issues. But as I say, we're going to add to that unacceptable way of capacity. So I got, is included as one of the conditions, actually third conditions, that no part of the development permitted shall be occupied or brought into use until such time as the southeast as we link road is operational. So these delays that you'll see on that model are caused by the sealer not being implanted. So the condition states that this development cannot come forward until the sealer is operational open and operational, which by that time the sealer will take all of that traffic or a large percentage of that traffic off lower road. So therefore you're going to see the delays diminish completely. That's why we've put this condition on. I'd say, and that includes the school traffic for book of school. How do you mean school traffic is going to go in one way and come out that way? Yeah, lower road, yeah. So the traffic levels, AM and PM, are going to be greatly increased because of school traffic. But again, no part of the development can come forward until sealer is operational. So regardless of whether we're talking about school traffic or whatever we put in there, we've got 100 homes going in there with more traffic. We've also got the school coming through. That's been completely modeled, and that's included in all the assessments. So the school access as proposed is going to come in through their existing access and out through this site. So that's all we included in the assessment, and that shows it works. And then we've got this condition restricting the development coming forward until sealer is operational and open. So Chairman, on the memorandum of understanding, there was a major provision there for the traffic to come through Book of School and have to lower road, but understand that can't be a condition. Yeah, so as we set out in the report, we've considered again the position with the one way system. So basically because it's not required as a result of the residential development, we can't insist that it's provided or required by conditional or within the MOU. But it's likely that it would come forward because it's acknowledged and the school is supported of it. So, you know, the Councillor principle is just you can't require it, that it would assist with congestion in the locality by having that one way system. And as David said, it's been modelled to include it almost as a worst-case scenario using low lower road access. Because what we don't want is the parents going in from lower road and just parking to pick the children up, because that's just going to cause major problems with the new restaurants and also cause congestion, because we're people coming out to pick it up. I just really want to understand, I understood that the member of an understanding is not water-type. They don't have to, they don't even have to install it. The school. So, if I could just clarify, the member of an understanding is between different directorates of the Council. So, it's an alternative to a Section 106 agreement because the Council is unable to enter into a Section 106 agreement with itself or wouldn't be able to enforce one against itself. So, it will become, should the site be sold onto a third party, then at that point there would be a Section 106 entered into, which would be in the same terms. But up to that point, it's a member of an understanding. So, the reason why the school requirements are not in the member of an understanding is because that's an existing situation. It's not a situation that's caused by this development, so therefore it wouldn't meet that. Still tests have been required to make this development acceptable in planning terms. And therefore, it's considered that there's likely to be a community use agreement and that that will deal with matters such as the facilities for the playing pitch and any parking and potentially that one-way system. But it can't, the one-way system can't be required because it's not required to make this development acceptable. It's an existing issue with the parking of the school and the parent's access in the school. It's not actually in the MOU itself or a condition. Okay, Mr. I understand that. The bit on one of it is kind of why. If it's sold on, the member of an understanding falls and therefore you have to have an Section 106 with conditions. Are those conditions enforceable? So it's not a 106 with conditions. It's a planning obligation agreement with obligations in it. And yes, at that point it would be completely enforceable against the third party. And in fact, the member of an understanding, we are actually slightly amending the wording at the end to sort of strengthen it even further. But it reflects the fact that there will be a Section 106 in place prior to or simultaneously with it will come into force at the same time as the transfer to a third party. Should there be a transfer to a third party from the council? And then it would be enforceable in the usual way that a 106 is. Okay. Thank you. Can I just pick up in terms of, you mentioned parents parking within the site as well. So if the one-way system doesn't happen, then that's unlikely to take place because there would be no route through for parents or children. If it is implemented then as we set out in the report, we think it's unlikely that parents would park there because there's sort of better opportunities for them to park in the school site. But there are visitor spaces. So, you know, for a limited number that might occur, there would be a provision within the site. But I believe parking is difficult within the site anyway because of the particular needs of the children. Yeah, I mean at schools always difficult only with parking, but I don't think this application would make it worse and it's, you know, the one-way system in theory could alleviate some of those issues. Well, I'm not worried about them. I do think this is, this application not going to make it worse. I'm just trying to protect the people that move there. They don't again, the situation where people come along to find just a part of it to be a children, because the gate could be opened, the school could open the gate, let them out. Yeah, I mean at the minute the school do have security gates, so there's control over that. And if it does get implemented, they're not assuming they would do the same for the access between these two sides. Okay. Next, I have Councillor Nueggem. Thank you, Chairman. Can I ask Mrs. Billmanship, first of all, that the supplement which we've been provided today, I think makes no reference to paragraph 11(1) of the report to be found on page 21. So can I therefore assume that paragraph 11(1) on page 21 of report remains an accurate statement of the current state of affairs? Yes, so that the, what you're referring to is the offer made by State Madam? Absolutely, yes I am. So, yes, that's how I kind of understanding this information is provided. Thank you very much. So today's date, unless I'm very much mistaken, is the 9th of May. Would it surprise you to learn that a letter dated the 28th of February was sent by Stoke-Manuel Parish Council to the relevant property department with a bid attached? I'm not aware of it. And the reason I am aware is because I was sent an email this morning to 11.06 hours, but I seem to be the only member of the committee who was actually sent that email. Now, I'm not in any way trying to make a reflection upon you, Mrs. Billmanship, because you deal with the information with which you are given. But unless I'm very much mistaken, there are some two and a half months or so between the dates of that letter, which I assume arrive within reasonable dispatch, if made for whatever email, and today. And seems would it not be a reasonable inference to draw from that? And of course, we can't hear from Stoke-Manuel Parish Council today, because there's no material changes to it, so we're told. It would not be an unreasonable inference to draw that the property department have failed to keep you completely up to date with the current state of affairs with regard to their application. I mean, I can only repeat really what's in that report, so we were aware that there were meetings. I wasn't aware of that letter, but nevertheless, it's, you know, the application before you needs to be determined. Yes, but I'm asked for a specific question, as opposed to asking for a general speech about the matter. I'll get to the general speech in due force when it's remembered to comment. So I'm putting it to you that it's not an unreasonable inference to draw that the property department has failed to inform you of the fact that there has been a bit by Stoke-Manuel Parish Council. I think the matter is that that's irrelevant to this as a planning application. It's not a material consideration. Well, with respect, with respect, I'm conducting a course of questioning which will arrive at the materiality of the point in due force. And if you don't allow me to conduct my course of questioning, then simply we won't get to the relevant point in due force. Well, I'm going through the chairman. Can I speak chairman? Thank you. The fact of the matter is that whether the department has told us that there was a bit or not, it's not relevant to the determination of this application because somebody can make a planning application on the site. They don't even own. It's a question of, sorry, can I just finish my legal advice? But with respect, you're providing legal advice on a point that I'm not natural to make. Well, that's as maybe, but I'm going through the chair. So, the question of whether or not it's an asset of community value is a different issue and the question of the sale of a community, a asset of a community value, would be dealt with separately from the planning process. And so therefore, whether there has been or has not been a bid or an offer or whatever for the ownership of the site is not relevant to the determination of the application before you. That's absolutely right and that's why that's not the point I was making. But I'm simply asking Mr. Pilcher twice about whether it's a reasonable influence to trouble from the fact that there's been a bid in from Stone Mountain Park parish council to the property department and the Mrs. Pilcher was unaware of that bid that the property department has failed to notify her. And the fact that I have, first of all, heard a number of answers which don't actually answer that question. And then we put legal advice about a point which I'm not making. I think we'll just simply have to allow that it is a reasonable influence to draw. And so therefore, my question is to you, if the property department can't tell you something about that, which is relevant to the, to the portion of Britain, but admittedly not relevant to the determination of the application, is it not also a reasonable influence to draw that there might be some doubt of the veracity of some of the other points made by the property department in the, in the, when they have provided you with information. I think that would be stretching things quite a mark out. Well, well, well, are you? Inference, inference and inference, inference. Yes. Well, you could go on and head in for the night. If I may say so, Chairman, I come from the legal world where if people don't tell the truth and the whole truth, which is, of course, is the, is the oath, then you draw certain inferences from the faith to tell the truth. But I do, I do move on, Chairman, because I don't want to spend too much time. Just before you do move on, you did mention about people not telling the truth. I would just like to say, I do not accept that any officer here present is deliberately not telling the truth. I'm not suggesting that in any way, shape or form. I'm very pleased to hear it. Thank you. So, let me, let me just move on from having that, that particular line, line of, line of questioning to the hybrid junction, which does seem to me to be a particularly important matter here. Now, there are a number of separate points about the, the hybrid, hybrid junction. The, the first is that we were told on the last occasion when there was a last minute junction detail provided to us that the footpath on the northern or eastern side was to be removed. Am I writing my reading off the report we have today? So that is no longer a proposal because there is no longer going to be a ghost lane in lower roads. Can I, can I just make check that my understanding is, is, is correct? Thank you, Chair. If I've understood the question correctly then, the little bit of footpath is there at the moment, it is being removed because it just leads to the existing bust up. No, I'm talking about on the eastern, eastern side. Not, not, not the western side. Okay. Okay. Well, there's no longer going to be a crossing point. Yeah. To allow pedestrians to cross between the west and the east. Right. Can I rephrase my question? I didn't think it was quite so difficult. Though, my understanding was on the last occasion, there was a last minute amendment to the junction plan, which basically meant the traffic coming from the centre of Alesbury was to be able to turn right into this junction by the creation of, I think, what's called a ghost lane. But to create sufficient space for that to occur, there would be a removal of the footpath on the eastern side, which I think I took exception to on the last occasion. I am just checking that I need no longer take exceptions to remove the footpath because it's no longer the proposal to remove the footpath. I thought it was a simple question. Am I right? That's correct. Thank you very much. Now, can I then move on to the dust cart issue? My mobile has provided me with a plan, which is, I'm sorry, I can't read exactly which plan it is, but as I read this, the dust cart turning that would come from the Alesbury direction and turn right into the access road would, I'm sorry, I'm asking the wrong question. The dust cart turning out, turning left into lower road would actually be forced to go across those hash markings in the centre of the road. Is that not right? Yep, that's correct. Thank you. So, in terms of oncoming traffic, I also appreciate the oncoming traffic shouldn't be going across the hash markings either. In terms of the oncoming traffic, the narrowness of that junction could create a certain amount of traffic hazard. Would that be a reasonable way of putting it? I would not agree with that. If you look at the turning in front of you, the vehicle model is a 10.2m long refuse vehicle. Right, now we use a 9.5m long refuse vehicle. Right, so this is above and beyond what would be coming out of that site. Right. So, if you look at that, it's touching the corner of that and this is a vehicle that's going to come in once a week. Right. So, that is going to have to be, it's been the right safety orders, it's, we've assessed it, the right safety orders, we've assessed it, picked up no issues with that at all. And I think that is misleading because the vehicle is like a meter long than the one that's actually going to be visiting the site. Okay. So, in other words, we didn't worry about that diagram so long as the council continues to purchase the existing length of refuse law, if it goes further, it may still be a problem. Well, it's been tracked for a vehicle above the size we use. Thank you. That's all right. We can let you know. Moving on then, as I understood your responses to kinds of fee, and as it's written in the document here, that there is a substantial amount of traffic, if I have too much traffic, if I can put it in global terms, even after 2036 on a lower road, it becomes congested. Is that right? It depends on which modelling you're looking at. Well, I'm asking, well, I thought I'd start with the post-201336 modelling, which is the one when one sealer is opened. Okay. So, at that point, your indicative figures, I think, are 0.92. Is that right? Well, I'm on lower road in the moment. In other words, there's a heavy traffic flow on lower road, which is above the ultimate. That's the end. And that's after sealer opens. I think that is after both stages of sealer open. Right. Well, this is what I want to get at. What exactly we're talking about when we talk about sealer opening? And in particular, whether we are just taking into account sealer, or whether we're taking into account the eastern link road, and I think it's in the south-western link road as well, but in the 2006, 36th modelling. So, I think we are conditioning this development, not coupled before the entire agency. Yes, I've got that. You're still giving figures for 2036, which is after sealer. And I'm trying to ask whether that also includes other link roads, also being open, very much of 2036, by which time other link roads may have been opened, or may not have been opened. So, I'm just trying to find out exactly what the parameters of your data are. It's like, can you repeat it? Yes. Right. Well, in the in the Bahimshah Council capital program, there is a proposal to build a number of link roads, or indeed in other ways link roads, for instance, the eastern link road south will be funded by the Hamdenfields development. So, there's a proposal for that to be a number of link roads. Therefore, when we look at the level of traffic on any road going into Alesbury, it's bound to be affected by the totality of the link roads that are open at a particular point in time. If we look at sealer itself, what sealer face what and face to achieve is effectively a potential redistribution of the one thing roads along the Risborough road and along the Wendover road, which then translates getting further into Alesbury along the Wendover road and along the on the lower road. It's because that's all it distributes because there's the only roads it goes between. But once the eastern link road is open, and once the southwestern link road open, that will take it all the way from road to Oxford, right the way round to Belly, I think it is. So, I'm really asking what the parameters of the 2036 modelling are or is. So, there are different scenarios within that model. Right. It tends to which one you're looking at, but the modelling does. Well, I'm asking in which one you're looking at. The model does include all of those strategic rates. So, the 2036 one that you're referring to in this report includes all those link roads. Some of those scenarios do. I'm not sure exactly which figure you're looking at. Well, I don't know if you're the figure that's referred to in this document. I would have to assume that you can use all the link right, I can't do this. Right. And you see, that's part of the problem, isn't it? That if we don't actually know what data we're relying on, then it's difficult to judge things. Okay. So, let me move on in the question. Well, I think it's just before we go back to that. We're looking at this application and rather than the whole entire link where it sits. That's right. Just take a step back a little bit, and the impact of this development. Yes, it's about the impact of this development, but the impact of this development is upon, in what I'm asking, in the back of the lower road. And so, you've modeled the lower road, and you've modeled it for the post-2036 position. And I'm simply asking, what roads would be open in terms of the link in the 2036 model? It may be just the seeker, or it may be the other ones as well. I'm just simply asking. So, I think, yes, all of those things are in the develop cumulative scenario. And that's the one you've used here. Right. Thank you very much. So, the situation, therefore, is that even with a large number of link roads and the level of traffic on that road is above the optimum level that you would like to see. It doesn't change. There's a potential for congestion, that's the point. So, I think we need to get back to what we're looking at is this application. Yes, yes, yes, yes. Well, that's the stage, the state of the road is, and then this application adds more traffic in, and what does it not? So, is the impact of this development severe? Is the cumulative impact of this development severe? And it is, in our opinion, that is not. But that's not the question I was asking. Of course, it's going to add traffic, yes. Yes, exactly. Thank you very much. Any development you find without traffic, but I think this is an absolutely sustainable location with good sustainable links, good sustainable transport links in and out. Yes, I'm not asking you to advocate on behalf of the application. I'm just asking you two questions about the highways. I think I think it's just to bring that discussion too. I would like to, I didn't realise there's these questions we're going to take. Okay, I do apologise for my poor phrasing of the question, but I would like to respond to it. I think we have now established clearly, as was stated, any development adds traffic. That's very clear, and the question as to whether or not the addition of that extra traffic from this application reaches the point of being severe, or not has also been, in the opinion of the highways. Absolutely, fine. So, but nevertheless, you do say that it may be better if traffic turned left when it comes out of this access road. I don't think it's saying that it would be better at saying the possibility. Yes, it's a possibility, but it would be, it would stop tailbacks if traffic doesn't turn right. I don't think it's, again, we're not saying it's better. We're saying that in reality if people find the road busy that they may turn left. Yes, and what will happen is people will become conditioned to turn left, and all of that is considered without the seat of them. Yes, the volume will still be there with seat of them, perhaps not quite such a little however. Let me, let me not go really further. So, is this for a speech? So, why, why do you think it's appropriate then to do away with the goose lane for traffic turning from the road into this junction, given that there will still be quite a heavy load of traffic? I think all of the assessments show that it works without that right tail lane. And will that traffic not tailback into the main lane of traffic going from Alesbury to Stoke Manfield? The assessments don't show that at all. There will never be sufficient traffic to cause a tailback. I mean, I can't say that, but I mean, all of the assessments we have in front of us now do not show that. I think my capacity turned to the junction is acceptable, and it's been modelled as it is now and in 2016. That's my concern. You can't say it never, and we have an ambulance station only 15 to 20 yards away, and a heavy, blue light usage on that room, don't we? Have you taken that into account? Yes, we have. Thank you. OK, thank you. The view I have counted to the waters next. Thank you, Joan. A couple of questions I was going to ask, I've already gone, but one of the things I think is important is particularly on 11.1, and I think most of us wanted to ensure that the parish council would not be excluded in any way from making a bid for the site. As it is, they already have. It would be nice if everyone had been told that by the parish, because that would have been helpful to us. But I think within this, I think the main thing is that it does make it clear that the decision in terms of what happens in terms of what, how it's forward, I think we're trying to, from here, I'm trying to get a feeling that the guarantee is, it's not this committee that's going to make the decision on what actually happens to the site. It will be the owners of the site who will make that, so that that I'm just trying to make sure we're all clear on, and what the officers have confirmed, that is not the decision we're making here. But by making the decision here, we're not in any way precluding the ability of the parish, of putting in a bid, and it is not this committee that is actually doing it. So that's one of my first questions. Yeah, we can confirm that your, are you understanding of a level point one is correct? Thank you. One of the other questions I had was actually about the road. Obviously, at this point, I don't know whether that road in the estate is going to be an adopted road or not. If it was going to be an adopted road, I think it would be a very good thing to have some kind of restrictions on it, particularly if the school is going to use the road as a one-way system, or a pedestrian access to the school, that actually we do restrict parking at school drop-off and school pick-up time. Because if you want a road to actually run smoothly, and we might actually be able to create some kind of support for those people who actually are going to live in that area if we actually are able to do something about parking up front, because every other place in the holding box near a school is an absolute disaster at those particular points in time. And it'd be nice to actually have one where we haven't actually built in a disaster and take some action so that it is something we take forward to whoever it does develop the site, if that is the case. I think that's one of the things I'd like to know, whether that is going to be feasible to be done, if it is, I think it's something we should be recommending. Firstly, on the adoption issue, it's for the developer to offer the site for adoption. So we don't have a say in that if they choose to open it up forward for adoption, we will assess it, and if it's suitable, we will adopt it. I think it's important to note that this is an outline application. So we have reserve matters application to follow this, where we can consider any issues with parking that we think will happen, if they will happen with the school so we can kind of build something in, visit to parking, things like that. Potential for that to be to be assessed, but we're not assessing that now. Could we have an informative, because one of the things that keeps coming up is what is going to happen to that road. If the school uses it or don't use it, but I have an access point into it, because that is actually creating an issue for a new estate. In terms of just basic amenity for any resident, that would be good. I don't know whether we can put an informative on it in terms of this committee recognises and does have a view that actually that would create, could create problems. But the strong feeling that it could create problems if something isn't done from our experience, and I think everybody else has got a tax experience, it would be silly not to do something if we could. So that's really the question I'm putting. Okay, that's all I'm asking this point. Thank you. Next I have Councillor Luey. Thank you, Chair. My question is very straightforward. For I've gone on from the last meeting and knowing how much further a long stoke-mandiful parish council is with its neighbourhood plan, I'm curious to know why we're here today and why this meeting wasn't deferred for longer. We can't delay a planning application for the progress on neighbourhood plan that would be unreasonable to any applicant, and we wouldn't be able to take it, wait for a planning application, there's clear guidance in the clear planning guidance that you cannot, it's premature, you cannot wait for an event to occur. So you have to take the assessment of the planning application at the point in time. So that's why we haven't, once we've resolved and got the information and it has taken a while, we've come back with the information that was requested by committee, and it's there for consideration again. Thank you, Councillor Wilcox, I think you have your hand up. Thank you, Chair. I did have the same question as Councillor Wart is actually about whether or not the estate roads are going to be adopted, so my question has now morphed into a comment, and I share Councillor Wart is concerns that this is going to be a very busy site, there is going to be a change of ownership, and I'm very worried about the safety of the roads, how the roads are going to be maintained, the safety of the pupils and the traffic collecting, the people from school and the parking situation. So it's morphed into a comment. Thank you. Thank you, Councillor for your hand. Thank you, Chair. I just wanted to pick up on the point, the agents saying it's going to be 40% affordable housing, would that be transferable onto anyone who buys the property? Yes, that would be your condition. Yes, it's a requirement, the planning application builds it in 40%, and it was in the memorandum of understanding which would then subsequently go into the Section 106 agreement. Thank you. Councillor Cooper. Can I just say to begin with, I'm surprised and slightly shocked by the fact that Stoke Mandible had made an offer and we didn't know about it. We've discussed this already. It's been suggested in the report that it doesn't matter whether we give approval or not in terms of whether the parish couldn't take up this sign. It seems to me that if we were to give approval today, it will dramatically increase the value of the sign. So I'm just wondering whether officers agree with that, and I believe that would make it impossible for the parish to take it any further. So could you just explain your thinking behind saying that it's okay to approve today? We have to assess the planning application on the merits of the application, on whether the ownership of that site, wherever that is, that is not a material consideration for this planning application. So there may be other concerns you have, but we have to consider the planning application. As put before us, with the information we have against our planning policies, against the emergency neighbourhood plan and all about is dealt within our reports. So that is the basis upon which we must consider the planning application. But do you agree there would be a dramatic increase in the value of the sign? If you grant planning permission for this site, you will be granted a residential planning permission for the site. So that is, that will be a factor. Thank you. And can I ask a second question, Gemma? It sort of goes back to where I was previously, but it is a different question. So I'm going back to paragraph 10.5. Perhaps I can just read the first bit of it. The aims and requirements of policy G11, so that's the state of mandible policy G11, are acknowledged. During the consultation period, objections were received to this policy, specifically in relation to the site. Now those objections, I can't see those objections in reports, a big report may be I've missed them, but I'm just wondering what objections are being referred to there and who the objections have come from? So as part of the consultation process, which is a completely separate process to the assessment planning application, there were objections received. And we were in contact with our neighbourhood plan team in the local council. We asked them, do you have those objections? And what do they relate to? And we were told that there are been objections to these policies. So this is a very standard process within the plan making process, that they were, when you go to public consultation, they may be support for policies, there may be objections to policies, and they are documented and then they form the basis upon which then they go to consider examination by inspector. Perhaps it needs to be a bit more specific because I'm concerned that those objections may have come from the council or from the applicant. Isn't that the case? I mean, I think who has made the objection is not relevant because what will happen was an inspector will consider the reasons for putting those. I believe that there were a number of objections to this policy. But can I ask a specific question? Is it yes or no answer really? Have the council made an objection? I would have to check. Do we have any information? And can I just add that I think this is particularly important because we're talking about the weights that the neighbourhood plan will have. What it says in the report is the weights that have been reduced from moderate because there are objections. So if the objection has been made by the council, by the applicant, then I think the committee would want to take that into account. Any further interruptions of that matter and I will ask for the Chamber to be cleared? I will not give a second warning. So I can say that there has been objections from two planning consultancies in relation to that one policy. And are those consultancies working on behalf of the council? Well, one of them is samples and the other is another company. So I can't tell you specifically if they are, but equally, there are more than one objection to this policy. Okay, well we know that samples are working for the council by inference. I might sort of suggest that the others are too, but clearly you're not going to tell us that. I simply don't have that information at that level because it's not something that's specific to the planning application. We sought to get as much information as we could from our neighbourhood plan policy team and that to inform you. But I haven't gone into that level of detail to see, but it is just to give you the advice as officers to the weight that you can attribute to policies within the plan. Okay, thank you, Chairman. I think that answers my question sufficiently. Thank you. For the Council, all right. Just one point, thank you, Chair, on the planning application, assuming that the Stoke Mountain Palace Council has made an offer, and if we knew about it, could we use that information at all in influencing our decision, or planning way, could we put to it? Is it worth it? It wouldn't, if we couldn't use that to influence our decision, could we? No, Chairman, you have to treat every planning application on its merits, regardless of who the applicant is. So I would suggest that just as it wouldn't be expected that we would give undue favour to an application by the Council, we wouldn't give undue disfavor to it either. And therefore, the fact that somebody else has come along and made an offer for that land for a different use, or the same use, or whatever, we wouldn't ordinarily, obviously, know that in terms of who the applicant was. That's only in the public domain, because it is the Council, and it's an asset of community value, but that's not relevant to your determination of a planning application. And neither is the valuation of the land in this respect. Can I suggest the community? Has this site been registered as an asset of community? Because I mean, my understanding, it has to go to be, has to be applied for to become an asset of community value, and is that application being made? It is currently an asset of community value. Yeah, so there will be that separate process that has to be gone through to resolve that aspect of it. Any further points? Okay, then we will move on to the open debate, and I will answer any comments? Councillor? Just following up on Councillor Cooper's concern that if we do make approval of the planning application, it then increases the value of the land. The responsibility, the asset was provisioned by ratepayers of the holobooks. It wasn't provisioned, I presume, as it was a council building, it would have been an asset that was contributed by all ratepayers. And the obligation of the council is to achieve best value for all ratepayers, so that increased value would represent the responsibility of the council to achieve that by a second. Councillor Cooper. Chairman, I had a horrible feeling we're heading towards an unsafe decision here, should we decide to approve this. The situation with the neighbourhood plan really concerns me, because I think we are sort of jumping the gun really. If we were to wait a month or two, until Inspector had come to his conclusions, and this has gone to referendum, judging by the figures that are in the reports about the opinion of the electorate, of course, we don't know what they will actually vote, but it looks to me like the chances are that this would be a made neighbourhood plan. If this was a made neighbourhood plan, I don't think there is any question other than we would refuse this, because the neighbourhood plan is quite clear on this matter and on this particular side. So there's all sorts of arguments about highways and all the other things. Should we approve it? But I think we have to look at the situation before all of that and say to ourselves, are we doing the right thing here, because I think we're not doing the right thing. So I'm really not going to concentrate on any of the other detail that we might consider should we approve, because I think we're doing the wrong thing. Now, I know we've had legal advice that sort of works against what I'm saying here, but nevertheless, this doesn't sit well with me. I can't possibly, I can't support this as it stands. I think the report has been written in a biased way. I'm not accusing anyone of lying, by the way, but I do think it's a biased report, and the problem is that we ourselves are the applicants. And as Councillor Marshall has pointed out, there's an asset here that the Council can take, and perhaps you could argue that the big Lebuckeumshire sort of own that asset. But we're arguing from, as a Council, from a position of strength, because we are the owners, we are the applicants, we're going to make the money, and there's nobody to stop us from going ahead with it. So all of that really does concern me. I think we're heading off in a dangerous direction here. And for those reasons, and I'm sure there's going to be much more comes out of this, the debates we've had already today have highlighted a number of areas where information we've got is incomplete, slightly obscure, and that's why I say I think we're heading towards an unsafe decision. And for those reasons, I'm going to propose that we refuse this application. Obviously, you'd be expecting me to respond to some of those accusations, and I would hold and refute them, as you might well expect. You've already heard from our legal team, from the planning officers, that the situation with the neighbourhood plan is that that's not a cause for delaying, that we have to deal with the application before us. Quite simple. The fact that it is an application that's made by the Council has of course been taken due into consideration. Hence, we come under extreme scrutiny, and I think that's been made very clear today, and I would certainly refute the fact that we somehow or rather have biased the report on that basis. I think that's an unsafe point to make. I really do. So if we're talking about unsafe decisions, I would ask you to reconsider some of the points you've made, but you have the right to consider things as you do. Right. Council borders. Thank you, Chairman. Obviously listening to a Council of Coopers, I think we do want to make sure we do the right thing on this, but we do have to make sure we do keep thinking about it as any applicant. It is a difficult thing to do, but we have to think of it in that way, and that's hard. I think on the advice that we have been given, particularly where it is not in the gift of this committee to decide when an application comes before us, and it is definitely not our ability to hold up any application waiting for something that may or may not happen, that may or may not impact things, and I know those feelings in terms of how it's written and what that might do, but that might be, it's not where we are today, and we have to actually look at what documents in front of us, where have they got to, what part of the process they are, and I know some of the detail you were talking about was who would have objected, except you're on the neighborhood plan. I think we've got to look at things as they are, and we've got to look at a site in terms of its feasibility, its acceptability, its traffic, its layout, its amenities, all of the different things which we've got there, and some of the conditions which have been added into this particular one, I think sealer has been very important, but actually that nothing is actually definitely built or occupied on this site until that is completed, is really important in terms of the traffic, we are dealing with very busy roads here, and any additional development has to be done in the right facing, so it doesn't cause more from particularly being there, stood Mandeville. Also, I know one of the areas that I politically was concerned about when this application came to us before was whether there had been usage on the school site, which though it was sort of formal in terms of part of the old County Council club, was in some way recognised and accepted by the local authority. I think from the additional information that we've had, it's showing all the methods that have been used to actually restrict that and make sure it doesn't happen, and so I think that's where it is, and definitely there wasn't somebody within the Council who actually knew something was going on in a semi-formal and accepted way, and I think that was the thing I was thinking of, and that's how it seemed to be coming across, but that is not from the further information has come back, something that sits there. We definitely, in terms of looking at the decision and what value that creates, that is not a decision we make with any other applicant, and we know as soon as he has an application go through, and it's got some outline related to it, values go up, but that isn't a decision that we make here on the committee, nor should it be, we have to look at all the planning reasons which are there, and though I think there will be disagreements on this and nuances, I've just got to look at the clear information. I would definitely like to see, as I said earlier, if this was to go through that we are able to make some clear statement about restrictions, parking and traffic on the roads within the estate at the school drop off at pick up times, because that would be a real benefit, and maybe a model for the future in future estates which are near schools, so that actually the school has to, as you manage it, manage things properly. So those things I would like to see, overall, and also I am pleased to see that there is nothing that precludes offers being made and discussions taking place between the Council and the parish council on this side, but that has to be done within a commercial sense within those within the Council who are involved in that. That is not something of this committee, but what I wouldn't like to have seen is that any way that a decision we make today would prevent you from actually making those offers and having those discussions, so we have to look at it as an application and its feasibility, and in those terms, on balance, I would be supporting the application. Thank you. Thank you, Councillor Fealey, if you were next. Thank you, Chairman. I'm disappointed on a couple of areas. About two hours before we started this meeting, we found out that the F&C we were looking for, some funding for the window of a house, something, which actually is a step forward for this committee that we actually had an evening for, but it was late and it couldn't be taken into account, so I think that's really unfortunate. I'm also, an London College is saying about the highways, that the information we have, the roundabout forecast, is the Stoneman who was the one who's going to be above capacity, very much in the soon future, so that element of it is a concern for me as well. I think this is a piece of land that could be really used well. I know we've got to look at the application before us, but we have got the hospital there where we have tremendous problems with parking. We look in, they want to have an ambulance centre, that's something that they've really made, and obviously the school, so I think that this piece of land could well be put to a greater use, but nonetheless I have to look at the application before us. So from those three points really I'm quite disappointed with this application. It doesn't give us the final version of it because we don't know what's going to happen with the medical side, I'm happy about the highways and we need to now move forward and make a decision on it. Thank you. Thank you for that, Councillor Nougam. Thank you, Chairman. The reason that this committee is hearing this application in the way it is, is because this Council has a constitution that says applications by the Council must be heard by a committee, not dealt with by officers, and the reason for that is that it gives transparency to applications. And that's the reason why I pursued the line of questioning with regard to the bid made by Stoke-Manville Parish Council, not to cast any aspersions upon Mrs. Pilcher, but simply it's right and proper that members of the committee know what the situation is, and that it's seen that we are really acting so that the Republic have confidence in our decisions for each and every decision that we make, that we are being fair to everybody involved, bearing in mind that we have to deal with applications on the merits of the application. But there's a lot of paperwork involved in this, and I only received the note about the bid by Stoke-Manville Parish Council, as I said at 11.08 this morning, and in fact I didn't open my computer until I got here this afternoon, but I note in the papers that page 60, what I know to be more precise, page 63, is the exact page, we have a letter from a Neil Rowley of Director of Savours, the company that's already been mentioned once this afternoon, and in that letter he says in the final paragraph, for the above reasons the strategic sites committee can make its decision based on the planning merits of the case. This decision can be made in the knowledge that no office or proposals have been made other than the submitted planning application. We rise that letter on the 16th of January, and on the 16th of January that would have been wholly accurate. What worries me is that the council is using a firm, which, because Mrs. Peel, she would have included it in the supplementary bundle, if she'd had a letter from Savours, updating this and saying, ah, well actually, at the end of February or the beginning of March, we did actually receive an offer from Stoke-Manville Parish Council, and therefore my paragraph at the bottom is the third page of my letter of the 16th of January is no longer accurate, and so I'm disappointed in that, because as I say, we should be transparent with the public, but we can only be transparent with the public when all the relevant information is provided at the right time, and the right time is immediately up to the points of which we actually make the determine the application, which is of course why we have a supplement with some extra information, and I'm really, really, really disappointed that even though it's something that we're not allowed to take into account the situation of all the, all the interested parties in this matter, as matter has been a really, a very live issue in Stoke-Manville, a really, really live, live issue, and it's so disappointing, it really is, and I'm sure Mrs Armstrong will convey that to Mr Bambrick, my disappointment to him, and I hope that he will then mention that at the corporate management team meeting in terms of the behaviour of, of whoever it is, in terms of the, whose representative council in terms of the, the applicants, terribly, terribly, disability. But anyway, let's get on to the matters in hand, and the matters in hand are that we have to determine a planning application, because we're a planning committee, and there are all sorts of reasons why we have to make decisions in accordance with certain factors, they're all ultimately factors in accordance with, with the law, but we still have to exercise judgment, and I thought Council fee, he made some really good points, but as he mentioned that what was a rare occurrence in terms of the integrated commissioning board, but there's really, for me, there's one real elephant in the room, as it were, on this whole matter. The junction involved gets an extra hundred cars, or more than a hundred cars, during the Russia, and only 15 yards, or 20 yards, down the road is actually on one of the photographs produced by Mrs. Pilcher. It's an ambulance station. Now anybody who lives, or frequents, major rooms in the vicinity of Stoke Mandeville, is aware how often they hear the sirens to see the blue lights. I, I wouldn't, I don't live on the road, and I would hate to live on the road, because I'd be interrupted so much by, by those sirens. What's the traffic situation with regard to the ambulance station? Well, we don't have anything from the ambulance people. I don't know why we don't. I don't know whether it's because we didn't consult them. I suspect they're not statutory consultees, and perhaps they don't go around looking at the notices or lambs, but we don't actually have anything from them at all. But we know that when it comes to the emergency services, seconds can't. Those of us who were present at the last council meeting heard the chief fire officer, I know I'm talking about fire rather than ambulance, but heard the chief fire officer give statistics in terms of the time it took the fire engines to reach the locations, and she was packed and rightly so that they had managed to reduce their response time by a matter of seconds, because when it comes to the blue light services, seconds really, really matter. And if we are ever in need of an ambulance, seconds matter to us, and we hear so much through the news how important it is that there is a response time, which is, which is as fast as possible. You hear about screws, how is it that people need to get to hospital within a certain period of time. There are advertisements on it and everything else. But nowhere in these papers is there any relevant mention as far as I can understand, and it was built to interrupt me, about the ambulance station and the effect upon the ambulance station, and that really, really worries me. So I ask them rather inept questions of the highways, people. And I'm interested in what happens after 2036, because these houses aren't going to be demolished in 2035 with their bill. They'll be put here for another 100 years or 200 years or whatever, unless the ambulance service moves the ambulance station, the same question will therefore apply. So that's why I'm interested in post-2036. That's why I'm interested in the time. After the sealer is open, because I accept the point there's a condition that basically these houses can't be finished off until the sealer itself is open. As I've said, the sealer really only redistributes roads between two major access routes. It makes these more efficient, but it still only distributes them in that minor way. And so what we do know from the officer's report here, which I'm glad we've got it now, because we didn't have it last time, it is that if there's an RFC of 0.85 or above, a junction is over capacity. And in paragraph 6.9, there's a mention of an RFC of 0.92, and I'm not going to spend ages going into the detail of it. But what worries me is that, also actually, there are a number of ways in which the traffic can get out of that junction and get into it. Quite clearly, the Booker Park, one way proposal, is a sensible proposal, and I'm really disappointed that the lead advice has been that we can't, in a way, condition it because of the technicalities on it, because, and it's quite extraordinary. I'm not sure where Booker Park is in the academy, a council school, but we can't condition it. But that seems to me to be sensible in solving another problem. But ultimately, traffic is going to want to emerge, on to lower road. A busy road at any time was a busy road, particularly during the rush hour. And it wasn't so long ago that there was a problem in the rush hour, just near the ambulance station. I think I'm right in saying that contractors turned up early and started digging whilst the rush hour is still on rather than turning up after the rush hour had finished. And the whole of Ailes, we almost worked on. It's not exaggerating. The whole of the eastern side there was brought to a halt as a result. So it's that finely balanced at the moment. And so, if you're coming out and turning left, that's obviously going to be the optimum thing to do. You might find it difficult in the rush hour, not so difficult. I have sightly morning rush hour and that's so forth. But that's going to be a relatively easy thing to do. And people, when they're going really quite slowly, are quite helpful and allow you out. If you want to turn right, I think there's no question about it. Within the short period of time, everybody will learn the best way to do is to turn left. Nobody wants to turn right. Because they'll all go down to the round, turn right, do the user in which the officer's quite right said there's a beautiful thing to do and come back again and nothing faster. I would like to have seen highways recommending that there be a new right turn sign there. But they haven't recommended it because they seem to think that people will either find the optimum thing to do or alternatively, and there will always be people, of course, who are new to it and therefore can't turn right because it's too much traffic and therefore they get the tail back behind and they're leading down, et cetera, et cetera. But I would have liked to have seen a new left turn sign. But what really concerns me is traffic coming out of Walesbury in the evening rush hour in, well, could be in the morning or evening, but effectively finding it difficult to turn right into the road there. And as a result, causing a tailback, and there will be occasions when there will be more than one car. Walesbury is peppered with junctions like that. If you're coming in from Aston Clinton on or in just where the new estates have been, so I've got the left turn into Campbell on Avenue. Traffic turns right there, suddenly the outside lane is blocked, Dickens way on the other side. The lane is blocked again and there's a third one which you can't turn over on the top. Oh yeah, so Oakfield Road and Tring Road, the same house, all these junctions. Traffic wanting to turn right causes a problem to traffic going straight, straight ahead. And so the easiest thing to do would be effectively to have a no right turn sign there. And as a result of having a no right turn sign, the traffic would go on to the roundabout, which will really be in the future, but if you guys down the road, at the ceiling junction, go round that roundabout and then come along and turn lefty. But no thought of doing that. And so every time there's a tailback or a problem or something of that nature, there is a risk. And I put it no higher than that, but there is a risk that an ambulance will be delayed. Delayed only by a few seconds perhaps, but if you're the person who they're going to street at the other end of that journey, that's a few seconds that may make all the difference. And because it may make all the difference, I'm going to vote against this application. And our second character, Cooper. Thank you for that. Jessa's point of the ambulance is somebody that was a recipient of the emergency services last year and came very close to not being here today. I fully understand the concerns about this, but of course they can happen anywhere at any time. There is no set time of day for something to require their services. And of course we are looking at the application before us. Councillor LAND. Thank you, Chairman. I wasn't expecting to come on as quick as that. Thank you very much. I've listened to a long time to Councillor Newman making various points. And I wasn't anticipating you match it, eventually getting to the point and seconding chaos and Cooper's proposal. But I have been on the Planning Committee for several years. And after listening to Councillor Newham and his traffic flows and what have you, I've sat at these meetings with David many years and I've come to respect David and his expertise. And he's got years of expertise on traffic flow. So it's with regret, Councillor Newham, that I go along with David's predictions rather than yourselves. And I've also looked at the, we're never going to get an ideal application coming front of us. We can't take into consideration whether or not the parish council have made an offer for the land. We can't defer it until the parish council have got the neighbourhood planned through. So it's what we've got in front of us. And I, of the opinion that I support the application. So I won't be voting on favour of Councillor Cooper's motion. Thank you. Chen, we do have a motion that's been seconded. I would just ask for clarification of the reasons for refusal. I understand Councillor Newham's concerns, but they don't appear to be the concerns that were raised by Councillor Cooper. So can I just ask whether you are actually, what reasons refuse from you jointly are putting forward? Well, I'm putting forward, why I'm putting forward. I'm only seconding because it's a binary choice. Well, we still need reasons for refusal. So I understand that you're saying that there's a problem with right hand turning to the site that would cause highways issues. And I'm just trying to clarify whether that's what Councillor Cooper was proposing when he proposed his reason for refusal. So I think, Councillor Cooper, you need to explain your reasons for recommending that. Yes, okay, that's probably a good idea. So the first point I would make is about the the weight applied to the neighbourhood plan, because that has an effect on the recommendation in my view. So I think we've established bearing in mind what was said about who's been objecting to the consultations, et cetera, that we're probably talking here about moderate weight. And I don't think that's been fully taken into account in establishing the recommendation that's in front of us. So that's my first point. Do you want me to go on? Yeah, the second thing that I believe we established is that the site, when we visited 12 months ago or nine months ago and everyone's, appeared to be in a condition where it was certainly usable. There's questions about whether it was used, although I think if we had been able to hear from members of the public and from the parish council, they would have told us how it was being used in that period. But it seems that the pictures were maintained and mowed up until last year, not 2018. And that is relevant to whether it's a green space, a valid green space or not. So my understanding from the evidence, we did have last time and from what I hear is that it's still a valid green space. So I think that's a really good reason for the parish council having this site develop the way they wish it to develop. In other words, in relation to the neighbourhood plan. I think we've already established the fact that all lawful or formal use of the site had ceased. I'm disputing that and I'm suggesting. I'm not proof. Well, I'm suggesting that bearing in mind that the reasons for reviews have got to stand up on their merits and there isn't a strict test for that. Just as a matter of interest can I be really cynical and say this is not going to go to appeal, I suspect. Well, regardless of whether it does or whether it doesn't, we're here to find the application before. It's not what may or may not happen at some point in the future or not. There is a legal duty to provide reasons for refusal and the applicant is entitled to have proper planning reasons for refusal. Well, I believe the evidence is that the site has been used since 2018. That's my understanding of what I've seen and read. But what evidence are you putting forward on that? What evidence you rely on? Well, I've had evidence today from the questions I asked earlier that that area has been maintained as a football pitch. I do recognise that the clubber search ceased operation and was closed. I might argue that that is perhaps a cynical move but I'm not going to do that, by the way. Yeah, and I would stress there's an awful lot of evidence that we've all seen in relation to the club having ceased some time ago. So, you know, I think you, again, I have to remind you again, Councillor COO. But the making statements, which would, they're coming fairly close to inappropriate statements, I would suggest. You've been a member of this committee for some years now. You also have previous experience on planning committees. You know what the regulations are, you understand, I know you understand the seriousness of things that are said. So, I would just remind you to be very cautious in your comments. I know. So, I'm now going to now go and hand over to so. So, just on point of clarity, the reason we said that grounds were maintained, there isn't quite a distinction between being maintained and being used. So, we didn't, what we confirmed to you was maintenance and that the way that you're considering that concern, it would have to be contrary to a policy and the policy is about sport recreation and existing use. So, our point was about that the grass were maintained. I don't think the evidence would suggest that it was still in use. No, that's your, your version of things and I do believe that had we been able to question the parish council and members of the public, we might have found evidence to the contrary, but we've not been able to do that. However, my situation here today and all of us here today is that we have to make our own minds up as to what we consider to be correct. And, you know, I apologise if I've gone a bit close to the line here, but nevertheless, that is my judgement. Again, we come back to the point as to whether or not the reasons for refuse are already. So, again, is there anything that you for from a legal perspective that would suggest that the Council of Coopers points are of a material nature that would... Actually, Chair, is it not for the committee to make that decision? I mean, that's my point of view. I think that you've been a member of this committee for some long time. You know that before we can make a decision to refuse an application, any application that we have to have relevant reasons. So, I would make a point, Chair, there's a difference between whether there's a matter of planning judgement or whether it's a matter of planning law. When we're looking at the decision in this case, we have to look at the presumption in favour of sustainable development. We have to look at paragraph 11 of the MPPF, and in particular, paragraph 11D, which states when there are no relevant development plan policies or the policies which are most important for determining the application are out of date, and a situation due to footpath, sorry, footnote 8, as to when policies are taken to be out of date, is if the Council cannot show a five-year housing land supply, then one looks at two particular circumstances. So, the first is that permission should be granted on less. One, the application of policies in the framework that protect assets or areas of particular importance provide a clear reason for refusing the development proposed. We're not suggesting that's the case here. But secondly, any adverse of impacts of doing so but significantly and demonstrably outweigh the benefits when assessed against the policies in this framework taken as a whole. Now, I have heard what you say about re-evaluating the weight that you would give to the neighbourhood plan policies, but my guidance would be that that can only be given a limited weight given the stage of which it has reached the neighbourhood plan and the amount of objections that have been received to the relevant policies. But even if you were to give the neighbourhood plan policy moderate weight, you would then have to consider the other matters that are set out in the report in that balance in exercise to assess whether any adverse impacts of grant permission would significantly and demonstrably – sorry, any adverse impacts of refusal would significantly and demonstrably outweigh the benefits when assessed against the policy in the framework taken as a whole. And therefore, you must also bear in mind the benefits of the development and it's been put to you in the report that there's significant benefits derived both from the provision of affordable housing which is above the policy standard and the provision of housing as a whole given the five-year housing land supply situation. And so if you would have to balance that significant weight, I would suggest against the – albeit your suggesting moderate – we are suggesting limited weight to be given to the neighbourhood plan policy and you would have to explain how you are weighing those matters in the balance. Can I say in all the training we've had? I think it's been made clear that policy is there for our guidance. It's not necessarily 100% to be absolutely followed. We, as members of the planning committee, have the ability to make our own mind up and sometimes it doesn't necessarily follow all policy. I think you're suggesting that we simply have to follow exactly what you're saying in your interpretation of the policy. That's not my understanding of our situation and in any case, I cannot support this application. So that's my position. And it's now up to the other members of the committee to either support me or reject what I'm saying. Simple as that, really. At the end of the day, it still comes out of the fact that to get a valid refusal or stand up in a court floor, then you have to have relevant planning reasons. Councillor Nukem. Yes, I'm sorry, Chairman. I seem to, of course, some confusion by seconding Councillor Koopa. I mean, I've been made it quite clear as to what my ground of wanting to reject this is. I'm not suggesting that I'm actually supporting Councillor Koopa on some of his reasons, which would be the hard reasons. Perhaps it might be easier. But the complication is that I was the last to speak of several and nobody has actually proposed a motion supporting the application. It may be easier if I was to withdraw my second day. We could then hear if anybody else wants to propose any form of motion. If then, at some point, anybody who's proposed the motion should be ultimately defeated the motion. If that motion should be defeated, then we'd have to find reasons for us. And we could then have a list of them, as it were, which not all of us need to support. If that may be a helpful suggestion, I don't know. Yes, I think that's very useful, Councillor NU. Do we have a following that line of argument? Do we have a proposal for recommendation, Councillor Ryan? Thank you. Just one point with Councillor Koopa, the evidence of it being used or not used the area, I must admit, when we went on our side visit, I thought it was some of the best maintained grants in the county. But there was no evidence of it being used. The gold posts in the smaller area, I've never seen gold posts with such good grants between the posts. There's no evidence that that was being used. So, yes, Chairman, I forward the officers' recommendations. I would like to second it, but I don't want to close to confusion. I would very much like to have some kind of controls put in or some mention of them in terms of the pick up and drop up of time in terms of the schools. I actually would also quite like to have a no right turn out of the site sign put up. And if we were able to get that and not cause too much confusion, I think that would actually be very helpful. So, I don't know if the officer's wanted to comment on that, not hopefully not dash me down too much on that point. But I'm going to try and squeeze it out if I can. Okay, thank you. I could suggest an informative and see whether that you would be happy with that. So, I'm suggesting an informative rather than a condition. An informative would be to consider the impact of the proximity of the site to an existing school and consider and seek to mitigate the potential impacts on the street and parking within the site and school times. And could we also have the no right turn and sign after as you leave? I would need to speak to my highly colleagues. So, we did initially consider that. It was our opinion that that would not be very effective. That if it's just a sign, people would turn right if they saw it was clear. I think the law's the law basically and I don't think that's our judgment. You can't make that judgment. If the law says actually it's a no right turn, it's a no right turn. Generally, if we're looking to ban a right turn, we would look for physical structures. So, we did pursue that route, went down that route, had that road safety lawsuit and there's quite a few safety issues with having a physical structure on that main road. Especially as it's a blue light route. Could you have a no right turn without a tiaro? I don't see why not. I'd have to go back and have another look. So, that would be a possibility. I'd be uncomfortable just conditioning it straight away but we could certainly have a look at that. If you could, then I'd like to be added as long as the composer is happy. I was in a move of no compromise really because we've had the facts put in front of us from David which I totally believe. And as far as parking goes, I think because of the proximity to the hospital anyway, there'd be no parking there after a period because people would be parking there free of charge instead of paying to go to the hospital as some of the roads around that area are. But I'll back down on it if you would prefer it. But thank you. Thank you. Councillor Lewid. Thank you. I'm struggling to come up with a good reason for the refusal roundabout. However, I just want to refer to something that Councillor Ransett about. It's about what we have in front of us. It's actually so much more than what we have in front of us. We're talking about a green space. The reason that people haven't been able to use it is because it was fenced off and painted with anti-climb paint. So, it would have been used. This is not a black and white situation. Technically, it hasn't been used and it was fenced off and it hasn't been a club since 2018. It is a green space. It is one of the only green spaces near. I know we've seen the picture with all the open spaces on. A lot of those are places you would have to rent. We're talking about a space that you can fall into the children and run around. I just don't think we should lose sight of the fact. It's so much more than what we have in front of us. That's just really, I need to just get that off my chest. That's fine. Thank you. Right. Well, I think we've reached that point where we have the proposal seconder for approval. We will then see whether or not once we have a vote, whether or not that's carried, and if not, then whether there's a count of proposal and if so, what the reasons for a refusal are that are acceptable. So, we go to a vote now on the officer recommendation with the informative as suggested on parking, etc. All those in favour of approval. Okay. All those against. I've against. There are no abstentions by my calculations. I think my maths is correct, which again comes down to the way about it and my decision. It's clearly a very evocative situation. I'm a great believer in maintaining open spaces and I understand the concerns that have been expressed today. I also found the report to be very thorough and, of course, I am as ever mindful of the fact that we have to deal with relevant planning matters and that weighing and balancing act that we have to perform on every application. It's never easy. It's never straightforward and it will never satisfy everybody. Sometimes it satisfies no one, but we have a duty to perform and we have to make our own personal mind up according to everything that we have to abide by. On this occasion, I will use my deciding vote to vote in favour of the officer recommendation. Accordingly, there is application approved and thank you very much, everyone. The next meeting will be on the 30th of May and again, it will not be an easy application and I suspect it will be a very long one. I think we can run to sandwiches for lunch on that because I'm sure we'll be here most of the day. Thank you very much and have a safe journey. Also, I would just like to say that this is our last meeting as this committee make-up, so a huge thank you to everyone that's sat on it throughout the year. Once again, we've had some very interesting applications, discussions and thank you all for letting call and we've shown them. Thank you.
Summary
The council meeting primarily focused on a contentious planning application by Buckinghamshire Council to develop a site previously used as a sports and social club. The application proposed residential development and retention of a sports pitch, sparking debate over community asset value, traffic impact, and the weight of an emerging neighbourhood plan.
Planning Application Approval: The application to develop the site into residential housing and a sports pitch was approved. Proponents argued the development would provide much-needed housing and enhance local sports facilities. Opponents raised concerns about the loss of a community asset and potential traffic issues near an ambulance station. The decision was narrowly passed with the chair's deciding vote, highlighting the division within the council. The approval implies an increase in housing stock and sports facilities but may face public backlash due to perceived loss of community space.
Discussion on Traffic Management: There was significant discussion about the potential traffic impact of the new development, especially concerning emergency services access and school traffic. Suggestions included implementing a no-right-turn sign out of the development and restricting parking during school pickup and drop-off times. Although these were not formalized into the decision, they reflected ongoing concerns about traffic management in the area.
Neighbourhood Plan Considerations: The weight given to the emerging neighbourhood plan was a critical issue. Some councillors felt that the plan, which was close to being finalized, should have been given more consideration, particularly as it might designate the site as a community asset. The decision to proceed with the development despite this suggests a prioritization of housing development over community sentiment, which could influence future council and community relations.
Surprising Element: It was revealed during the meeting that Stoke Mandeville Parish Council had made a bid to purchase the site, which was not widely known before the discussion. This revelation added a layer of complexity to the debate and raised questions about transparency and communication within different council departments. In the recent Buckinghamshire Council meeting, the main focus was on a planning application concerning the development of a site previously used as the County Council's sports and social club. The site is proposed to be developed for housing while retaining a sports pitch in the southern area.
The application was contentious, with significant debate over the site's previous use, its maintenance, and its potential as a community asset. The site had been maintained but not formally used since June 2018, leading to discussions about whether it still qualified as a community asset. The local parish council, Stoke Mandeville, had expressed interest in the site, which was a point of contention during the meeting.
The planning officer presented a detailed report, including updates on traffic assessments and the impact of the proposed development on local infrastructure. Concerns were raised about traffic, especially the impact on emergency services like ambulances due to the site's proximity to an ambulance station. The planning officer assured that the traffic assessments accounted for current and future conditions, including the completion of the Southeast Aylesbury Link Road (SEAL), which is expected to alleviate traffic issues.
Despite these assurances, some council members expressed dissatisfaction with the traffic solutions and the potential impact on emergency services. The discussion also touched on the maintenance of the site, with some members recalling that the site appeared well-maintained during a site visit, suggesting it could still be used for recreational purposes.
Ultimately, the committee voted on the application, with a tie-breaking vote from the chair in favor of approving the development, subject to conditions like the completion of the SEAL before the development proceeds. This decision highlighted the complexities of local planning decisions, especially when balancing development needs with community interests and infrastructure concerns.