Wind turbine planning applications

Paul Sousek made this Freedom of Information request to North Cornwall District Council

The request was successful.

From: Paul Sousek

1 January 2009

Dear Sir or Madam,

I would like to know how many planning applications have been
received in the years of 2008, 2007, 2006 and 2005.

How many of these were for 1 wind turbine, 2 turbines, 3 turbines
and more than 3 turbines?

For each category, how many were granted and how many were
rejected?

What were the reasons for rejecting these applications?

Yours faithfully,

Paul Sousek
Cottage Farm
Cornwall

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From: Malcolm Price
North Cornwall District Council

5 January 2009

Dear Mr Sousek

Thank you for your email of 1st January 2009 regarding the above which I
am dealing with under the terms of the Freedom of Information Act 2000.

Under Section 21 of the Act, we are not required to provide information in
response to a request if it is already accessible to you. The information
you have requested is already in the public domain and can be obtained
from the Council's website and/or by viewing the Public Register and the
relevant planning files that are held at our offices at 3/5 Barn Lane,
Bodmin. Therefore I am unable provide the information you have requested.

If you are unhappy with the service you have received in relation to your
request and wish to make a complaint or request a review of our decision,
you should write to Sara Gwilliams, Personal Assistant to Director of
Finance, North Cornwall District Council, Higher Trenant Road, Wadebridge,
Cornwall, PL27 7TW.

Yours sincerely

Malcolm Price
Head of Planning
NCDC - Community Services
3/5 Barn Lane, Bodmin, Cornwall PL31 1LZ.
Tel No: 01208 265649
Fax No: 01208 265655
"An excellent Council" Audit Commission
North Cornwall District Council - Ranked 4th overall in The Times 20 Best
Councils To Work For in 2007

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From: Paul Sousek

5 January 2009

Dear Malcolm Price,

Thank you for bothering to inform me that you are not required to
provide information in response to a request if it is already
accessible to me.

As the 'excellent council' you badge yourself to be, kindly provide
me with the requested information anyway, even if you are not
specifically obliged to do so under the law. And 'excellent
council' would certainly do that.

The information I am after is statistical in nature. I just need to
know HOW MANY cases occurred in each category. As an 'excellent
council' you will no doubt have some such statistical information
available and you will not insist that I laboriously locate each
relevant planning application in an effort to compile such
statistics.

Yours sincerely,

Paul Sousek

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David Hansen left an annotation ( 7 January 2009)

The council are quite right. FOI is about obtaining information which is not already easily available to the public. I could add a rant here about lazyness, take it as read.

I don't know about this council, but with my council I would put the word "wind" into their planning web site, which would give me a list of every project. I would then work through them to produce the figures. I imagine a council official would do this or something similar to answer this enquiry. No need to get a council official to do this, they might well get it wrong anyway.

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From: Malcolm Price
North Cornwall District Council

8 January 2009

Attachment Wind turbine applications 2005 onwards.xls
29K Download View as HTML

Dear Mr Sousek

Thank you for your reply to my email. Whilst we may be an 'excellent
Council' there has to be a line drawn with regard to what information a
Council can provided as part of its service and what an interested party
should and could provide for themselves especially when it is in the
public domain. Your request falls within the latter category. However,
on a point of goodwill I have asked one of my staff to see what
information can be provided without taking up too much time and as a
result please find attached a spreadsheet which provides answers to all
your questions with the exception of the final one asking for the
reasons for rejecting an application. If you want this information you
will have to research this yourself. However, I hope you find the
information we have provided useful.

Yours sincerely

Malcolm Price
Head of Planning
NCDC - Community Services
3/5 Barn Lane, Bodmin, Cornwall PL31 1LZ.
Tel No: 01208 265649
Fax No: 01208 265655
"An excellent Council" Audit Commission
North Cornwall District Council - Ranked 4th overall in The Times 20
Best Councils To Work For in 2007

show quoted sections

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From: Paul Sousek

12 January 2009

Dear Sir or Madam,

Please pass this on to the person who conducts Freedom of
Information reviews.

I am writing to request an internal review of North Cornwall
District Council's handling of my FOI request 'Wind turbine
planning applications'.

A full history of my FOI request and all correspondence is
available on the Internet at this address:
http://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/wi...

Yours sincerely,

Paul Sousek

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From: Paul Sousek

12 January 2009

Dear Sir or Madam,

Thank you for providing the excel spreadsheet of wind turbine
applications.

Please disregard my earlier request for an internal review of North
Cornwall District Council's handling of my FOI request 'Wind
turbine planning applications'.

Yours sincerely,

Paul Sousek

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Things to do with this request

Anyone:
North Cornwall District Council only: