Agenda and minutes

Apologies for absence were received from Councillors M Hobson and J Shaw-Wright. Councillor Paul Welch was in attendance as a substitute for Councillor Shaw-Wright.

A copy of the Register of Interest for each Selby District Councillor is available for inspection at www.selby.gov.uk.

Councillors should declare to the meeting any disclosable pecuniary interest in any item of business on this agenda which is not already entered in their Register of Interests.

Councillors should leave the meeting and take no part in the consideration, discussion or vote on any matter in which they have a disclosable pecuniary interest.

Councillors should also declare any other interests. Having made the declaration, provided the other interest is not a disclosable pecuniary interest, the Councillor may stay in the meeting, speak and vote on that item of business.

If in doubt, Councillors are advised to seek advice from the Monitoring Officer.

There were no disclosures of interest.

To confirm as a correct record the minutes of the meeting of the Policy Review Committee held on 17 April 2018.

The Committee considered the minutes of the meeting held on 17 April 2018.

RESOLVED:           

To approve the minutes of the Policy Review Committee held on 17 April 2018for signing by the Chair.

The Chair asked Members to avoid making reference to specific enforcement cases when discussing agenda item 5 – Planning Enforcement Management Plan.

To consider the report which outlines the current policy position on Planning Enforcement and recommend improvements.

The Committee received a report from the Planning Development Officer and was asked to agree the use of a specific Planning Enforcement Management Plan (PEMP) to improve the performance of planning enforcement, and note that a specific PEMP would enable the embedding of policy and practice, which would improve responses and output, whilst at the same time setting clear standards for delivery. The Executive Lead Member for Place Shaping was in attendance at the meeting.

The Head of Planning explained that the report before Members set out the current policy governing planning enforcement and established the principles of forward planning for service improvement. The service was underpinned by Selby District Council’s Corporate Enforcement Policy and formed the overarching general approach to enforcement of planning, licensing, housing and environmental issues.

The Committee noted that their views were being sought on the principle of moving towards a specific PEMP in order to facilitate service improvement. When the PEMP had been drafted it would be brought back to the Committee in November 2018 for further comment and consideration.

The Committee was pleased to note that work had already begun to improve the Planning Enforcement service in a number of ways, such as active management of the case load and improving levels of communication. Members acknowledged that around 20% of the cases causing a backlog were either non-planning matters, duplicates or out of time, and emphasised the importance of these cases being filtered out appropriately, in order for the legitimate enforcement matters to be dealt with. Officers explained that this approach was part of the work currently taking place to build a clearer picture of the current situation, and subsequently formulate a strategy of how to move forward work more efficiently.

The Committee expressed concern that prioritisation of enforcement matters was not working, and that better information about enforcement procedures and processes would be useful to both the public and Members. Reporting and monitoring of enforcement was also a key element of the service which Members felt required improvement; Officers confirmed that work would be undertaken on these aspects as part of the development of the PEMP.

Officers explained that recruitment to the Enforcement Team had been an issue in the past, but that the team would be fully staffed from October. The provision of additional resource and ways of integrating the work of the Enforcement Team with that of Development Management were being explored in order to begin clearing the backlog of cases.

Staff training was identified as another area requiring attention, particularly on the effective use of software and existing workflow/project management systems.

Members noted that Officers were expecting the PEMP to be in force by the end of 2018, and for the service to begin to demonstrate improvements by then. It was suggested by the Executive Member for Place Shaping that an all-Member briefing on planning enforcement could be arranged when the PEMP was in place; the Committee were supportive of this suggestion.

RESOLVED:

i.              To strongly support the development and  ...  view the full minutes text for item 5.

To consider the current Policy Review Committee Work Programme for 2018-19.

The Committee considered the work programme and were asked to consider items for inclusion in the 2018/19 municipal year.

The Chair emphasised the importance of Officers preparing and submitting reports to the Committee at the meetings for which their items were scheduled on the work programme. The Committee agreed that their work programme required further development

The Committee asked the Democratic Services Officer to contact Officers who had items under the ‘potential items for 2018/19’ section at the end of the work programme, in order to ascertain which committee meetings these would be presented at.

RESOLVED:

i)       To note the Work Programme for 2018/19.

ii)     To ask the Democratic Services Officer to contact Officers with items listed under the ‘potential items for 2018/19’ section at the end of the plan in order to ascertain which committee meetings these would be presented at.