Agenda and minutes
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Media
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Apologies for Absence and Declarations of Interest To receive any apologies and declarations of interest. Minutes: Apologies for absence were received from Councillors McBirnie, Emanuel, Loughlin, Criscione and Lemon.
Councillors Barker, Foley and Gooding declared an interest as Essex County Council members. |
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We the undersigned, under Part 4 paragraph 3.1.5 of the Constitution, call for an extraordinary meeting of the Council to discuss the Leader’s proposed response to the letter received from the Rt Hon Michael Gove, Secretary of State for Levelling up, Housing and Communities dated 19th December 2023. The purpose of the meeting is for the Leader to present her proposed response and to answer questions on the proposed response. The meeting to be held before any response is sent.
Councillors Susan Barker Tom Loveday Ray Gooding Mark Lemon Nick Church Brian Regan
Additional documents: Minutes: The Chair said Members had been summoned to consider the requisition regarding the Leader’s proposed response to the letter received from the Rt Hon Michael Gove, Secretary of State for Levelling up, Housing and Communities dated 19th December 2023. The purpose of the meeting was for the Leader to present her proposed response, which was attached to the agenda papers, and to answer questions on the proposed response.
The Leader said the draft response to the Secretary of State had been attached to the agenda papers for Members consideration, and that an email had been circulated before Christmas to all councillors which had expressed surprise at receipt of the letter relating to the Local Plan, as the Council had been in regular contact with department to keep them updated. She said the proposed response was factual and calm in tone; she did not intend to politicise the Local Plan.
Councillor Barker said the requisition had been submitted as she felt the response to the letter should be in the public domain. Furthermore, she had concerns regarding the spatial strategy and allocation numbers pertaining to the Regulation 18 decision in October 2023. Days before that decision, the Planning Inspector had approved 1,200 houses in Little Easton, which she said demonstrated that the spatial strategy was now “out of the window” as the site had not been deemed suitable by officers working on the Plan. These permissions were also a “game changer” in terms of the number of houses that needed to be allocated. She said questions relating to planning permissions had been raised at Council and by a Freedom of Information request but she had not received a response. She asked whether Council believed that there would be substantial changes to the Local Plan before the Regulation 19 stage, as the Chief Executive had previously said, or whether these would be less significant. She welcomed the recent information received regarding the setup of a new Local Plan working group, which suggested that changes were forthcoming, and more work was to be done before Regulation 19. She asked the Leader to reconsider her response and include reference to the permissions that had been granted between April 23 and April 24, which would reduce the Council’s housing allocation numbers before the Regulation 19 stage. In addition, she asked that the Leader reflect on ECC’s comments on the draft Plan as the statutory Highways and Education authority.
Councillor Gooding raised the issue of education and lack of school places in the district; particularly, he was concerned with the number of places for pre-school and early years learning, and special education needs were not mentioned in the draft Local Plan. He said the Council had to ensure such omissions did not cause any future delays.
Councillor Sell said he considered the Secretary of State’s letter political as he saw little merit in sending such an instruction when the Council had recently reached the Regulation 18 stage of the process. He said the Leader’s proposed ... view the full minutes text for item C70 |