Agenda item

The Specialist (Strategic Planning) advised that Highways England were expected to submit their Development Consent Order (DCO) planning application to the Planning Inspectorate on 27^th July. They had asked for Statements of Common Ground to be signed between SCC, SSDC and Highway England, setting out where issues had been agreed, not agreed or where further work was required in association with the planning application however, as the DCO application had not been submitted and officers had not seen or had time to consider the detail contained within the planning application, it was proposed to sign a joint Statement of in Principle Support at this time.  This statement should give the Planning Inspectorate the confidence that both authorities supported the scheme and were committed to working with Highways England to enter into Statements of Common Ground.   Highways England was content with this approach.  She noted that the Scheme of Delegation proposed at Appendix 2 would allow the Lead Specialist (Strategic Planning) to progress the proposal on behalf of SSDC. 

She explained that Highways England had agreed to reimburse the Council its costs for certain activities which required the Council to provide additional resources over and above their statutory requirements, via a Planning Performance Agreement (PPA).  The sum offered was £60,000 between SCC and SSDC.  The Lead Specialist (Strategic Planning) explained that in reality this may only be £15,000 to £20,000 for SSDC.  District Executive was asked to support the principle of entering into the PPA with Highways England.  It was noted that officers would continue to negotiate with Highways England.

Additional funding was requested from District Executive to bring in the external specialist resource that would be required to support the project.  The Lead Specialist (Strategic Planning) explained that assistance would be needed in key areas such as conservation and project management which would free up the Specialist (Strategic Planning) to focus on her Local Plan work which she had been diverted from to lead on this project.  The Chairman agreed to write to the Highways England to ask for a review of this offer in order to meet their accelerated time scales for the development.

The Senior Planning Lawyer advised that recommendation (b) should be amended to include the detail and completion of a Planning Performance Agreement and Members were in agreement with this.

The Chairman of the Scrutiny Committee noted they had also queried whether the funding from Highways England was adequate to cover SSDC resources.

At the conclusion of the debate, Members were content to confirm the amended recommendations of the report.