Summary
Mr C raised a number of concerns about the council's handling of a planning application. In particular that they failed to ensure a public consultation was carried out to a certain standard, they failed to describe the development appropriately, there was a flaw in a report, they had breached a condition of planning permission and that they failed to act when notified of wilful destruction of wildlife. Mr C also complained that the council inaccurately described their internal complaints procedure as independent.
We took independent advice from a planning adviser. In all instances, we considered that the council had acted reasonably and appropriately. We did not uphold any of Mr C's complaints. However, we did note that in reference to the public consultation, there were inconsistencies in the terminology used to describe the proposed development and the pre-application advert could have been clearer. We made a recommendation to the council in light of this finding.
Recommendations
What we said should change to put things right in future: Pre-application descriptions and materials should be clear and materials used at consultation events should be obtained by the council to ensure the consultation is appropriate.
Related reading
View Decision Report 201702609 as a PDF (12.15 KB) Updated: December 2, 2018