Agenda item

Question from Councillor Stuart Wilson to Councillor Peter Strachan, Cabinet Member for Planning and Regeneration

 

“Application of Legacy Authority Planning Policies to Former Wycombe Area for Little Marlow Lakes Country Park and Burnham Beeches SAC SPD

 

Natural England have given late consent to the Slate Meadow Reserved Matters planning application (21/07006/REM) to mitigate Burnham Beeches SAC recreational impacts through a payment due under the Burnham Beeches SAC Strategic Access Management and Monitoring Strategy Supplementary Planning Document (SAMMS), November 2020. This contravenes the application of the SAMMS policy which clearly states: “This Supplementary Planning Document solely applies to the south and east planning areas of Buckinghamshire Council. Whilst the 5.6km zone… takes in part of the western area of Buckinghamshire, the Wycombe Local Plan has its own mitigation strategy for growth in the western planning area. [Paragraph 1.2.1] It does not apply to the former Wycombe District Council area which now forms part of Buckinghamshire Council. This is because the former council agreed its own avoidance and mitigation measures with the government’s conservation advisors”. [Paragraph 2.2.6]

 

Can the Cabinet Member categorically confirm today that:

 

a)    the Burnham Beeches SAC SAMMS SPD does not apply in any way to development sites in the former Wycombe Area in accordance with recent mandatory planning training on legacy Local Plan policies?

b)    that Planning Officers have not and will not seek to apply this specific SAMMS SPD to development sites in the former Wycombe Area?

c)    that Natural England will be advised by Planning Officers to withdraw their consent immediately to the Slate Meadow 21/07006/REM application until such time this may be given or refused in accordance with the relevant Wycombe Local Plan policies and its own previously stated preferences?

d)    that the long overdue report on Little Marlow Lakes Country Park will presented to the next Cabinet meeting on July 12^th, 2022?

 

Question from Councillor Robin Stuchbury to Councillor Peter Strachan, Cabinet Member for Planning and Regeneration

 

“Buckinghamshire Local Plan

At the Council meeting on 27 April 2022, the Cabinet Member for Planning and Regeneration (Councillor G Williams at that time) informed Members that they would have the opportunity to be involved with the oversight of the Local Plan, which would include Member briefings and scrutiny and oversight from the cross party Growth, Infrastructure and Housing Select Committee.

 

Could the Cabinet Member please advise whether a separate cross party Working Group, standing Committee or Local Plan Select Committee will be established to enable the wider membership of the Buckinghamshire Council, including local Councillors, to question key and important elements of the development plan as it is being developed?”

 

Question from Councillor Penny Drayton to Councillor Gareth Williams, Deputy Leader and Cabinet Member for Climate Change and Environment  

 

“New Household Waste Collection Service

Since the change of contracts for waste services at the start of May 2022 there have been a huge number of complaints from residents across the whole of the South of the County.  This includes missed collections, issues with not being able to report problems, automated responses and no follow up collections.  Some residents have reported not having had a collection since the new contract began.

 

Could the Cabinet Member please advise what is being done to resolve these issues and ensure they do not continue?  I would be grateful if the answer could include: an explanation of why bin collections are being missed, what assurances can we offer residents, and how they can raise the issue if their collection is missed to ensure that the data received is correct?  There needs to be accountability.”

 

 

 

Question from Councillor Stuart Wilson to Councillor Peter Strachan, Cabinet Member for Planning and Regeneration

 

“Application of Legacy Authority Planning Policies to Former Wycombe Area for Little Marlow Lakes Country Park and Burnham Beeches SAC SPD

 

Natural England have given late consent to the Slate Meadow Reserved Matters planning application (21/07006/REM) to mitigate Burnham Beeches SAC recreational impacts through a payment due under the Burnham Beeches SAC Strategic Access Management and Monitoring Strategy Supplementary Planning Document (SAMMS), November 2020. This contravenes the application of the SAMMS policy which clearly states: “This Supplementary Planning Document solely applies to the south and east planning areas of Buckinghamshire Council. Whilst the 5.6km zone… takes in part of the western area of Buckinghamshire, the Wycombe Local Plan has its own mitigation strategy for growth in the western planning area. [Paragraph 1.2.1] It does not apply to the former Wycombe District Council area which now forms part of Buckinghamshire Council. This is because the former council agreed its own avoidance and mitigation measures with the government’s conservation advisors”. [Paragraph 2.2.6]

 

Can the Cabinet Member categorically confirm today that:

 

a)         the Burnham Beeches SAC SAMMS SPD does not apply in any way to development sites in the former Wycombe Area in accordance with recent mandatory planning training on legacy Local Plan policies?

b)         that Planning Officers have not and will not seek to apply this specific SAMMS SPD to development sites in the former Wycombe Area?

c)          that Natural England will be advised by Planning Officers to withdraw their consent immediately to the Slate Meadow 21/07006/REM application until such time this may be given or refused in accordance with the relevant Wycombe Local Plan policies and its own previously stated preferences?

d)         that the long overdue report on Little Marlow Lakes Country Park will presented to the next Cabinet meeting on July 12^th, 2022?

 

RESPONSE from Councillor Strachan (provided at the meeting by Councillor G Hall)

 

a)      Habitats Regulations Assessment needs to consider the most up to date evidence at each stage of decision making. Whilst the Burnham Beeches Supplementary Planning Document [BB SPD] expressly does not apply to the Wycombe (west) area, that does not prevent contributions towards the Burnham Beeches Strategic Access Management and Monitoring Strategy [BB SAMMS] being secured in relation to planning applications in the Wycombe (west) area.

 

All that it means is that the council cannot use the BB SPD as justification for the contribution. Nothing in the BB SPD seeks to preclude a contribution from other parts of the council’s administrative area. Instead, the BB SPD is merely making clear which areas its supplementary planning guidance applies to.

 

The council’s appropriate assessment identifies the need for mitigation and there is no reason why the council cannot (irrespective of the BB SPD) conclude that a contribution towards the BB SAMMS would constitute appropriate mitigation. In particular, the Council is obliged to take into account any change of circumstances since the BB SPD was prepared.  Given that all the funding for the BB SAMMS has not been secured (as a result of the withdrawn Chiltern and South Bucks Local Plan), it can properly be said that a contribution to the BB SAMMS from a planning permission in the Wycombe (west) area would deliver mitigation.

 

b)      The council as competent authority for the Habitats and Species Regulations has a duty to protect such designated habitats and species.  Habitats Regulations Assessment relies on the most up to date evidence. Outline permission 18/05597/OUT was granted 27 June 2019 and the BB SPD was adopted on 22 November 2020. 

 

Policy BE1g of the Wycombe Local Plan requires Slate Meadow to:

 

BE1g) Mitigate recreational impacts at Burnham Beeches SAC.

 

Fulfilling policy BE1g policy, BB SAMMS is capable of mitigating the recreational impacts of Slate Meadow and is correct do so as set out in my answer to question 1.  The weight to be attached to specific mitigation proposed for sites in the former Wycombe area will be a matter for planning committee when considering all of the evidence.

 

c)      Natural England is the government’s advisor for the natural environment and is a statutory consultee of this council as competent authority for the Habitats regulations. Its consideration of the application for Slate Meadow 21/07006/REM, is wholly at its discretion and cannot be restrained or restricted by the council.

 

d)      As has previously been indicated in earlier responses, a paper is currently being prepared for Cabinet’s consideration to explore the appropriate next steps for Little Marlow Lakes Country.  There are a number of technicalities which must be considered before presenting a report to Cabinet so whilst I am not in a position to guarantee a report in July, I can assure Cllr Wilson that all best endeavours are being used to report as soon as possible.

 

Question from Councillor Robin Stuchbury to Councillor Peter Strachan, Cabinet Member for Planning and Regeneration

 

“Buckinghamshire Local Plan

At the Council meeting on 27 April 2022, the Cabinet Member for Planning and Regeneration (Councillor G Williams at that time) informed Members that they would have the opportunity to be involved with the oversight of the Local Plan, which would include Member briefings and scrutiny and oversight from the cross party Growth, Infrastructure and Housing Select Committee.

 

Could the Cabinet Member please advise whether a separate cross party Working Group, standing Committee or Local Plan Select Committee will be established to enable the wider membership of the Buckinghamshire Council, including local Councillors, to question key and important elements of the development plan as it is being developed?”

 

RESPONSE from Councillor Strachan (provided at the meeting by Councillor G Hall)

 

“At present we have an active Local Plan Member Working Group which meets quarterly where key issues and topics are considered and discussed and appropriate direction given to officers on particular and relevant subjects. Whilst we have no intention at this stage to alter the Working Group membership, we welcome involvement in the Local Plan from the wider group of Buckinghamshire Council Members. In order to continue to allow suitable scrutiny of the progress (or preparation) of the Local Plan we will continue to bring regular papers to the Growth, Infrastructure and Housing Select Committee whereby members of that committee and other members will have the opportunity to consider and question the Local Plan progress. In addition we held ‘all-councillor’ briefings on the Local Plan in autumn 2020 and we will consider, as part of the local plan preparation, holding similar events open to all members as work on the plan progresses.“

 

Question from Councillor Penny Drayton to Councillor Gareth Williams, Deputy Leader and Cabinet Member for Planning and Regeneration

 

“New Household Waste Collection Service

Since the change of contracts for waste services at the start of May 2022 there have been a huge number of complaints from residents across the whole of the South of the County.  This includes missed collections, issues with not being able to report problems, automated responses and no follow up collections.  Some residents have reported not having had a collection since the new contract began.

 

Could the Cabinet Member please advise what is being done to resolve these issues and ensure they do not continue?  I would be grateful if the answer could include: an explanation of why bin collections are being missed, what assurances can we offer residents, and how they can raise the issue if their collection is missed to ensure that the data received is correct?  There needs to be accountability.”

 

RESPONSE from Councillor Williams

 

The contract with Veolia commenced in September 2020 in the former Chiltern and Wycombe area, then, in November 2021 the former South Bucks area joined to create a contract covering the entire South of Buckinghamshire. 

 

Veolia, inherited from the previous contractors, unbalanced and long rounds that made it difficult to rectify misses and blocked roads leading to higher than expected missed bins over the last year and a half. The current changes to bin collection rounds in the former Chiltern, Wycombe and South Bucks district areas are vital to rebalance and make the rounds more efficient and sustainable going forward, they are also contractually required.

 

During May 2022, the introduction of the new rounds have seen a day change for 90% of residents.  We knew that these bin collection changes would and are causing some disruption as residents and crews get used to the new bin collection days. However, the benefits that the new collection rounds will bring to the service far out way the short-term issues and pain that we are unfortunately seeing.

 

To mitigate the forecast impacts of the round reorganisation Veolia are currently operating with 30% more drivers and loaders than business as usual, building extra resilience to support crews if required. This 30% figure includes 6 additional vehicles and crews dedicated to supporting the new rounds and collecting any outstanding work and reported missed collections.

 

We also knew that there would be more calls coming into the customer contact centre so have deployed a further six additional call handlers taking Southern Waste calls in the Customer Service Centre and a further four in the Waste team for escalated cases. However due to the high volume of calls and their complexity the wait times are in excess of what we expected, which is due to the failure from Veolia to rectify multiple missed misses.

 

CSC teams are doing a sterling job under some extremely challenging circumstances trying to resolve increasingly very frustrated customers, which is impacting on their morale.

 

However, to mitigate against the huge volume of calls coming into the CSC we have:

• Senior Management and back-office teams assisting with call taking to deal with spikes in call volumes.
• Improvements to the Interactive Voice Response (IVR) to play position in queue for customers.
• Improved call insight - The progress chasing data is now provided monthly by Service/Topic to all Customer Service Account Managers and service areas reps, and this helps to drive improvements.
• Targeted messages on IVR to manage demand and expectation.
• CSC staff has been offered toil and overtime to assist out of hours with Contact us Forms
• Call back facility offered in queue
• Webchat deployed on waste pages to assist customers online

 

For a change of this scale, we knew that over the first 2 to 3 weeks there would be a large number of missed bins due to new crews servicing unfamiliar rounds, especially unrural and semi-rural settings, where collection points are not as straight forward as urban areas. The missed bin numbers set out below show that happened, but improvements are now starting to happen with fewer missed bins and I expect these improvement to continue week on week. 

 

Unfortunately, there are still several examples where Veolia crews are not learning from their previous errors and there are pockets of significant disruption leading to residents having more than one missed bin and no waste collected for a couple of weeks.  This is not acceptable, and we are working closely with Veolia on a daily basis to strongly contract manage the situation and ensure that they continue to drive improved performance from their crews. To mitigate these very unfortunate cases the additional support vehicles are being deployed to clear these missed misses and our Waste Team are doing an excellent job of coordinating the reports that are coming in directly from residents via the website, call centre and councillors. I apologise to those residents that have and are experiencing multiple missed bins and I can assure them that we are doing everything we can to ensure that Veolia don’t let these happen again.

 

Missed Bin Statistics

• Pre-Round re-org - 436
• Week 1 Re-org - 2198
• Week 2 Re-org - 3611
• Week 3 Re-org - 1680
• Week 4 Re-org – 1105 (projected – update prior to submission) only 3 days

 

The preferred way for residents to report a missed bin is via the Council website, which needs to be done within 24 hours, as the missed bin reports directly link into the Veolia collection system. The rounds have been designed so that the next day’s work is geographically adjacent to the previous day’s work, which allows for greater efficiency and for the crew that missed any bins to rectify and then ‘learn’ the miss for the next week.

 

So, when a report is completed within the 24 hour period, over 50% of missed bins are corrected on the same day or by the next day and the majority of the other reported misses collected within 2 days.  It is very much “the earlier the better” in terms of reporting missed collections. 

 

Although the level of missed bins is higher than we would expect under BAU conditions, we are assured by Veolia that they are working hard to continue to improve the collection rounds so that missed bins dramatically reduce and residents can experience excellent  service standards.