Issue - meetings

The Council was required to produce and keep an up-to-date Statement of Community Involvement (SCI) to ensure effective community involvement at all stages in the planning process.  The Council had consulted on a draft SCI from February to April 2021.  The SCI had been updated to respond to the feedback from the consultation and this updated version was submitted to Cabinet for adoption by the Council.  It set out the main issues raised and the Council’s response to those issues.

The SCI explained when, how, and for what reasons the community would be able to participate in planning issues. These included plan making (local plans), Supplementary Planning Documents, neighbourhood plans, planning applications, and planning enforcement.

The main aim of the SCI was to make consultation and involvement in planning more transparent, accessible, collaborative, inclusive and consistent.  As a minimum, the Council would comply with any legislation that was currently in force or came into force in the future. These legal requirements were therefore included as actions that ‘we will’ do in the SCI as opposed to ones that ‘we may’ do. It was however recognised that there needed to be a flexible approach to engagement depending on the scale, subject matter and sensitivity of the matter in hand.

RESOLVED –

That the Statement of Community Involvement (SCI) be adopted.

The Council was required to produce and keep an up-to-date Statement of Community Involvement (SCI) to ensure effective community involvement at all stages in the planning process.  The Council had consulted on a draft SCI from February to April 2021.  The SCI had been updated to respond to the feedback from the consultation and this updated version was submitted to Cabinet for adoption by the Council.  It set out the main issues raised and the Council’s response to those issues.

The SCI explained when, how, and for what reasons the community would be able to participate in planning issues. These included plan making (local plans), Supplementary Planning Documents, neighbourhood plans, planning applications, and planning enforcement.

The main aim of the SCI was to make consultation and involvement in planning more transparent, accessible, collaborative, inclusive and consistent.  As a minimum, the Council would comply with any legislation that was currently in force or came into force in the future. These legal requirements were therefore included as actions that ‘we will’ do in the SCI as opposed to ones that ‘we may’ do. It was however recognised that there needed to be a flexible approach to engagement depending on the scale, subject matter and sensitivity of the matter in hand.

The Cabinet Member for Planning and Regeneration reported that this document went out to consultation. 700 responses were received although 140 of those were identical and these comments had been fed into the final draft before Cabinet, including increasing the number of commitments, being clear on commitments relating to planning notifications, a commitment to consulting on a draft Local Plan through a sites consultation and a policy consultation (in two stages) and improving involvement in planning. With regard to the draft Planning White Paper it was unclear currently what approach the Government would take on this area as the related legislation would probably come forward early next year. Under the current proposals a draft Local Plan stage did not exist. However, Buckinghamshire Council needed to start work on the Local Plan with current guidance.

Cabinet welcomed the flexibility of the various stages and engagement with communities which covered modern and traditional ways of engaging. It was important for local members to inform residents of key messages regarding this to ensure they became involved in local area planning so the notification process was critical. Members noted that one call for brownfield sites had allocated space for 5,000 homes but there was still a shortfall. There was a second call for brownfield sites which was being kept open permanently.

RESOLVED –

That the Statement of Community Involvement (SCI) be adopted.