Issue - meetings

To give consideration to the future housing provisions in Cheshire East

The Committee gave consideration to a report which:

·        considered the requirement for the Council to maintain a five year supply of deliverable housing land and the position at 1 April 2010 in Cheshire East;

·        considered the appropriate figure for the housing requirement for Cheshire East following the revocation of the Regional Spatial Strategy,  in the interim pending the adoption of the Local Development Framework;

·        proposed the introduction of an Interim Planning Policy to manage the release of land for housing development pending the allocation of land within the Local Development Framework and that consultation should be carried out on the draft policy.

With regard to paragraph 2 of the justification for the release of housing land, Councillor Thorley strongly objected to Shavington being excluded from the settlement boundary of Crewe.

Members questioned how many planning permissions had been granted but were still to be built. It was agreed that this information would be circulated to the Committee.

Members discussed the use of ‘brownfield’ sites and agreed that these should be utilised as a priority before any further ‘greenfield’ land being released for housing.

RESOLVED

That Environment and Prosperity Scrutiny Committee endorses the Cabinet recommendation to:

1.             Approve the housing requirement figure for a minimum of 1150 net additional dwellings to be delivered annually, to be used pending the adoption of the Local Development Framework Core Strategy;

2.             Note the Council’s five year land supply at 1 April 2010;

3.             Approve the Interim Planning Policy on the Release of Housing Land for consultation purposes and agree that it be used in the determination of planning applications pending its adoption subject to the addition of suitable previously developed sites in paragraph 3 of the policy.

Councillor Barton left the meeting following consideration of the above item