Week 12 - Wolborough Planning deferred

Last week the Teignbridge Planning Committee chose to defer the final decision for details of the road through the planning area called NA3 an area around the Wolborough Fen SSI.  

This doesn’t mean that the development will stop.  It means that planning committee members from all sides of the chamber wanted to see more details in their quest to do as much as possible to set conditions to protect the environment and eco-system of the area.  

The Wolborough site has a long history, and has been in the Local Plan since 2013/14.

Typically, large developments are only permitted if they are in the Local Plan.  This plan looks up to 20 years ahead and allocates sites for development.  And then, once in that plan these sites will almost always get planning permission, but the council can set conditions.  

The new neighbourhood of Wolborough was put into the Teignbridge Local Plan of 2013/14 and was allocated for development.

In 2013 the then Conservative administration chose to increase the number of houses to be allocated in their Local Plan for Teignbridge.  This is the large areas of development including in Dawlish, Newton Abbot Bradley and Wolborough (NA3) that we see being built today.  This scale of development has set the subsequent target levels imposed on Teignbridge by central government.

The following year the Conservatives held on to control of the council in the 2015 election, having proudly made the scale of development an election issue. However, in May 2019 the Lib Dems won control of the council and started a review of the Local Plan. They considered removing Wolborough from the local plan, but to do so would have meant finding other areas to take the number of houses allocated, and to risk legal challenge from the landowners.  It didn’t prove practical and so Wolborough remained in the Local Plan.

Since then, the main planning application for 1,210 houses was submitted in June 2017 and was subject to a lot of discussion between the Council planning department and the developer.  Rather than come to agreement the developer decided to take it to appeal on the grounds of non-determination in 2018.  

Following a public enquiry from March to July 2019 where Teignbridge defended the appeal, a decision was made in June 2020 by the Conservative Secretary of State Robert Jenrick to approve the planning application.

To quote the TDC website “Outline planning permission has been granted by the Secretary of State for 1,210 homes, two care homes and a link road, along with a local centre that will offer vital community facilities and social spaces. These include a primary school, a community facility and open space in the form of play areas, allotments, multi-use games area and employment space.”

This whole story tells a tale of how government targets have overridden local choices. Setting national targets for building but still not meeting local housing needs.

I am disappointed that the Labour government is continuing this process and increasing the target development numbers for Teignbridge.  What we really need is a new planning policy that allows local authorities to determine the numbers of homes that are needed locally, as well as setting conditions to protect local areas such as Wolborough Fen…