Issue - meetings

HPR20223/055

It was noted that the Part 2 (confidential) appendix could have been published in the main public agenda as the information contained therein was already in the public domain.

The Head of Planning and Development Support outlined the reasons that the report was being presented to the Committee.

The Chairman referred to Section 3.6 of the report which outlined the process for ‘Direct Action.’ It was noted that Direct Action could often result in considerable financial cost to the Council. The report stated that ‘A charge on the property/land CAN be considered by the Council.’ The Chairman expressed the view that the wording should be changed so that ‘CAN’ be replaced with ‘MUST’. It was noted that the invoice from the Council could be paid before further action was taken to seek a charge on the property.

The Chairman drew attention to what appeared to be duplicate cases. It was explained that the cases were not duplicate. In certain cases, both a husband and wife would be prosecuted at the same address, so what looked like a duplicate was in fact connected with the same prosecution but for two offenders.

A Member asked how many times the Council was forced to adopt Direct Action as this was not detailed in the report. The Head of Planning and Development Support agreed that this detail was missing and could be added to future reports. He stated that there was an increase in the number of residents not complying with notices, and so Direct Action was increasing. Generally speaking, the matter would be referred to Court first, before Direct Action was taken. He was aware of one case of Direct Action where the matter did not go to Court first because the Council was dealing with a vulnerable person who was unable to deal with the matter themselves.

RESOLVED that the Planning Enforcement Progress and Monitoring Report be noted.