Decision Maker: Officer Delegated Decision
Decision status: Recommendations Approved
Is Key decision?: No
Is subject to call in?: No
Decision: That the Colehill Parish area be designated a
neighbourhood area.
Scheme of delegation
Under the Officer Scheme of Delegation (April 2019), the
Executive Director of Place has the power to ‘make a final determination as to
whether to designate a neighbourhood plan area and/or make such an area a business
area’.
The Local Scheme of Nomination sets out which functions have
been nominated by the Executive Director of Place and any conditions or
limitations. This includes the power ‘to designate neighbourhood plan areas
(where the Council must exercise its powers to designate the specified area
applied for as a neighbourhood plan area) and neighbourhood forums’. The only
condition/limitation is that the ‘Ward members and the relevant Portfolio
Holder being informed’.
Neighbourhood
Area designation
Dorset Council has
received a neighbourhood area application from Colehill Parish Council.
The Neighbourhood
Planning (General) Regulations 2012 (as amended) state under regulation 5A
that:
(1) …where─
(a) a
local planning authority receives an area application from a parish council;
(b) the
area specified in the application consists of the whole of the parish council’s
area; and
(c) if
any part of the specified area is part of a neighbourhood area, none of that
neighbourhood area extends outside the parish council’s area.
(2) The local planning authority must
exercise their powers under section 61G of the 1990 Act to designate the
specified area as a neighbourhood area.
At the same time
regulation 5A paragraph (3) outlines that under the circumstances set out in
paragraph (1), above, there is no requirement for a local planning authority to
consult on the proposed neighbourhood area.
These provisions
are summarised in Paragraph 032 (Reference ID: 41-032-20170728) of the
neighbourhood planning section of the national Planning Practice Guidance
(PPG). This states:
‘Where a parish
council applies for the whole of the area of the parish to be designated as a
neighbourhood area, the local planning authority must designate the whole of
the area applied for. This includes where a parish applies to extend its
existing neighbourhood area to its parish boundary. Exceptions to this are
where the area applied for:
· has already been designated as a
neighbourhood area which extends beyond the parish boundary; or
· forms part of another application
that has not yet been determined.
Colehill Parish
Council have applied to have the whole of its parish area designated as a
neighbourhood area. The area specified in the application does not extend
beyond Colehill parish boundaries and does not overlap with other neighbourhood
areas already designated or applied for and awaiting determination.
Regulation 5A of
the Neighbourhood Planning (General) Regulations 2012 (as amended) therefore
applies to the application received from Colehill Parish Council. To this end
there is no requirement to consult on the application and Dorset Council must
exercise its powers under section 61G of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990
to designate the Colehill Parish area as a neighbourhood area.
Business Area
Section 61H of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990, as
amended by the Localism Act 2011, requires that when designating a
neighbourhood area, a local planning authority should consider whether the area
concerned should be designated as a ‘business area’. If a business area is
designated, local businesses would have the opportunity to be more involved in
the formation of the neighbourhood plan and would get an opportunity to vote
(alongside registered electors) in the later referendum on whether the neighbourhood
plan should come into force. However, this section of the Act also makes it
clear that a neighbourhood area should only be designated as a business area if
it is ‘wholly or predominantly business in nature’.
Since the built-up areas of the Colehill parish area are
predominantly residential in nature, it is not considered appropriate to
designate the proposed neighbourhood area as a business area.
N/A
Publication date: 08/06/2021
Date of decision: 01/06/2021