Scheme of delegation

The suggestions made in the committee report are listed below. They were of course only meant to generate debate on the issue rather than be definite recommendations

Of the above I consider that the only one likely to have any significant impact on the length of a meeting is to allow delegation where there is only one objection or letter of support. The scheme would have disadvantages - an applicant or objector seeking a friend/family member to support their case could relatively easily bypass it but would still I believe mean a significant number of applications which currently go to committee could be delegated. In the interests of fairness to the applicant/objector my own preference would be for these to be agreed with the Chair or vice chair of the relevant committee at a meeting to be set up shortly before the preparation of the agenda. I appreciate that this would mean a further meeting but they should be relatively brief and would give a degree of scrutiny to the officer's decision. If the Chairman were not in agreement the application would be referred to the committee.

The view of the Parish/Town Council is often the reason for an application being referred to Committee. However the current scheme of delegation does require a valid reason for their comment to given and in the circumstances I feel that in the interests of local democracy we should not pursue this further.

Very few objections are totally unreasonable but we do receive some that are clearly not capable of being supported. The difficulty with this suggestion is in drawing up guidelines as to where to draw the line.

We rarely recommend against technical consultees advice and this would have little impact on the scheme of delegation.

Timing of meetings

Changing the timings of meetings would be unpopular with agents/applicants and objectors although I suspect that anyone really interested in a proposal would be there regardless of the time it is held. One advantage from the council's viewpoint is that it would reduce the amount of time claimed as 'time off in lieu' as they will be attending meetings during the normal working day rather than outside of it.

Special meetings

Obviously these should be the exception rather than the rule and not all major applications are contentious or attract much outside interest. For this reason I would not wish to suggest for example that all schemes over a particular number of houses should be the subject of a special meeting. Special meetings should only be held where it is anticipated that the interest generated by the proposal is such that its inclusion on a normal agenda is likely to disrupt the normal meeting either by the time likely to be taken in determining that application (extension of public speaking times etc) or the number of people likely to attend for that particular item would be difficult to accommodate or possibly to control. While I would have liked to have some clear guidelines on this I think that ultimately it has to be a judgement call between officers and members.

Membership of Committees

I think this is a matter for members and would not wish to comment