Agenda item

(Director of Neighbourhoods) to consider the attached report.

The Projects Officer, Planning Policy, Ian White introduced the consultation document on the replacement Waste Local Plan, revised preferred approach. He noted that Essex County Council (ECC) and Southend Borough Council are Waste Planning Authorities (WPAs) and were required to prepare a Replacement Waste Local Plan (RWLP) under the Planning and Compulsory Purchase Act (2004) and the revised EU Waste Framework Directive (2010). The RWLP (programmed for adoption in December 2016) would replace the Essex Waste Plan 2001, and would cover the period up to 31 March 2032.

The current consultation included 3 main documents – (i) the Revised Preferred Approach, (ii) Areas of Search Assessment and Methodology, and (iii) Sites Assessment and Methodology Report (much of this work was carried out by Land Use Consultants). The consultation ran from 18 June to 30 July 2015 – a period of six weeks, but the lead-in time for this Committee has meant that officers have had only one week to familiarise themselves with lengthy and quite difficult  documentation to prepare this report.

Officers believed that this was a wholly unreasonable approach by the WPAs, unfair to all consultees because of completely inadequate time to get to grips with a very important, but very complex, issue. The formal response by this Council to the consultation should emphasise the dissatisfaction that was shared by officers and Members. With future consultations, and with issues of this complexity, the Waste Planning Authorities must make full allowance for the lead-in period required by local authorities to prepare and publicise Committee reports.

At this Council’s request, a meeting had been held on 1^st June involving officers from this and Harlow Councils and officers from the County representing the Waste Planning Authorities. EFDC and Harlow officers stated that the WPAs had failed to comply with the Duty to Co-operate, but even at this meeting the WPAs were unwilling to share any details of their proposals, site assessments and other options which had been considered – all the detail would only become publicly available on the first day of the consultation period.

The WPAs have indicated that there would be another round of “formal public consultation in October/November 2015” on the Pre-Submission version of the Plan, but this stage was not normally an opportunity for further comments, as it tended to be restricted to representations concerning soundness, i.e. the Planning Inspectorate should not be expecting further changes or challenges to the content of the Plan at this late stage of preparation.

The Committee noted that the draft responses to the questions posed by the consultation document were in the appendix to the report. Only two sites had been identified within our district, one at the Hastingwood roundabout and one at Langston Road neither of which were found to be suitable and officers had suggested that both be objected to.

Councillor Wixley had a lot of sympathy with the officer’s comments about the short time to reply and said that he supported the recommendations made.  He was surprised about the addition of junction 7 (Hastingwood site) as they were told some time ago about plans for a junction 7a to be put in and that junction 7 was to be remodelled, so it would not make a good site. There was also no reference to the size of the Langston Road site, which was very unsatisfactory. Mr White agreed the inclusion of the Hastingwood site was perplexing as this would involve a lot of HGV movements and junction 7 was grid locked several time a day. For the reasons given this was a non-starter.

Councillor Sartin added that she had recently been to an exhibition about the roundabout which said that the amount of the traffic would not be reduced when junction 7a came into service. There was not much done under the duty to co-operate, and the Inspectorate would probably not pass these plans because of this. Also could the word ‘strong’ be added to the answer to question 5 on waste consultation zones to read “…but strong reservations about the Hastingwood site remain.” This was agreed.

Councillor Sartin then asked about the glasshouses and the use of energy produced by the waste facilities. Would other glasshouses have these facilities offered to them? Mr White said that he had raised this point, and he did not think that the Lea Valley Growers had been consulted about this. Councillor Sartin asked if this idea about the energy producing industry for our area was put to Essex County Council. Mr White said that this was something to look at in detail. Undeniably the growers would like access to cheap energy.

Councillor Mohindra asked if we could get the Chairman to write to ECC expressing our dissatisfaction with the inadequate time allowed for this consultation and also ask the Leader to do the same thing to formally express our dissatisfaction.

Councillor Whitbread said that he was displeased with the county council about this consultation process, there was nothing there about the duty to co-operate and they had not listened to us. This was unacceptable and disappointing. He would be happy to write to the county expressing our dissatisfaction.

Councillor Bassett said that he had met recently with some Essex officers and had to ask them about this consultation as they were not prepared to tell us; even their own members had not found out about this until about two days before it came out.

Councillor Grigg noted that she lived close to junction 7 and that it was always at a standstill. It was at full capacity now and the proposed J7a would not help. So it was amazing that the county had suggested it as a site. The same with Langston Road.

Councillor Murray wanted to echo Councillor Wixley’s point. He thanked Ian White for the work he had put in; and was happy to support Councillor Mohindra’s suggestion. He added that we should not be surprised at county about this; they did not know that we existed. Our partnership was not working with the county. Could we use our county councillors to act as a force at county level?

Councillor Surtees noted that the short consultation period was not only inappropriate but risky as they would not receive a proper response and note our strong concerns about the two sites proposed.

Councillor Rolfe asked the Leader of the Council if he had any feedback from our county councillors. Councillor Whitbread said that County Councillor Jackson had been actively involved in getting some answers for us and putting the case for Epping Forest. Speaking for our conservative councillors we have been actively involved. We were on the edges of Essex and Essex CC needed to engage more with us to make sure we get a fair deal for Epping Forest residents.

Councillor Rolfe said that he had not seen any evidence that our county councillors were doing anything about this. Councillor Whitbread replied that he wanted to make it clear that County Councillor Jackson was on this as soon as he knew about it, making representations to the county about the consultation.

Councillor Philip asked that both the Chairman and the Leader in expressing our dissatisfaction to explicitly mention the failure in their duty to co-operate. This was a key part in examinations now and we should draw the line here noting that the county council had failed in their duty to us.

Councillor Wixley asked that these letters be reproduced in the bulletin as well as any response.

RESOLVED:

(1)          That the Overview and Scrutiny Committee considered the responses to the consultation set out in the report; and

(2)          Resolved to express in the strongest possible terms this Council’s deep dissatisfaction about the wholly inadequate time allowed for this consultation, particularly given the almost total lack of communication leading up to the consultation period. This is to be achieved by strongly worded letters sent to county by both the Chairman of Overview and Scrutiny and the Leader of the Council;

(3)          The Committee also resolved:

(a)  To object to the allocation of the Hastingwood site (W19) for open-air inert waste recycling on the grounds of (a) being contrary to one of the purposes of the Green Belt – preventing countryside encroachment, and (b) concerns about traffic capacity on and around Junction 7 of the M11; and

(b)  To object to the identification of the Langston Road/Oakland (sic) Industrial Estate as an Area of Search, because this Council was promoting and supporting the development of a high-class retail park on part of the site, and waste management facilities are considered to be a wholly inappropriate neighbour for this development.