National Infrastructure Planning
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Kent County Council
Barbara Cooper -
Your Ref:
Corporate Director, Growth,
Our Ref: EN010085
Environment & Transport
Date: 24 October 2018
Dear Ms Cooper
Planning Act 2008 (as amended) – Chapter 2
Application by Cleve Hill Solar Park Ltd for an Order Granting Development
Consent for the Cleve Hill Solar Park
Information about a proposed application
We refer to the above application for an order granting development consent. We
have been informed by the developer Cleve Hil Solar Park Ltd that this application is
likely to be submitted to the Planning Inspectorate during the week commencing 12
November 2018.
In advance of this submission, we thought it would be helpful to inform you of the
process where we wil be requesting a representation from your Authority on the
adequacy of the applicant’s pre-application consultation, and to confirm contact details
for future correspondence with your Authority.
Adequacy of consultation
On receipt of an application, the Planning Inspectorate has 28 days to decide whether
or not to accept the application1. In accordance with section 37 of PA2008, the
developer must submit a consultation report with the application. This consultation
report should set out the developer’s pre-application consultation processes, a
summary of the relevant responses to its consultation and how it has taken account of
responses received in developing the application. Developers must have regard to
relevant guidance on the pre-application process issued by the Secretary of State2.
As soon as we receive the application, the Planning Inspectorate wil invite you as a
host or neighbouring local authority3, to submit an ‘adequacy of consultation
1 PA2008 s37(3)(c)
2 PA2008 s50(3)
3 PA2008 s55(4) and (5) – a “local authority consultee”
https://infrastructure.planninginspectorate.gov.uk
representation’ which the Planning Inspectorate must have regard to in deciding
whether or not to accept an application4. This adequacy of consultation representation
means a representation about whether the developer has complied, in relation to the
proposed application, with its duties under sections 42, 47 and 48 of PA2008 relating
to consultation and publicity.
Given the short statutory time limit for the acceptance stage, we wil be seeking a
representation from you within 14 calendar days of the date of our invitation. In light
of this, you wil clearly wish to ensure that your Authority has appropriate internal
approval procedures in place to meet this deadline.
Contact details for future correspondence
In order to give you as much time as possible to respond, we would like to email your
invitation to submit an adequacy of consultation representation together w ith an
electronic copy of the developer’s consultation report.
To accord with section 229 of PA2008, please would you
confirm by 31 October
2018 the appropriate mail address and contact name for us to send an
electronic communication for this purpose. It would be very helpful if you could also
confirm that you wil accept email communications of other procedural notices and
correspondence from the Planning Inspectorate in connection with the examination of
this application, should it be accepted.
Local impact reports (LIRs)
We wil not consider the merits of an application unless it is accepted for examination.
The adequacy of consultation representation is not therefore a representation on the
impacts of the scheme or the merits of the case, and the submission of any such
representations prior to an acceptance would be premature.
Should the application be accepted, host authorities wil automatically be registered to
participate in the examination. Neighbouring authorities are encouraged to register on
our website at the appropriate time.
If the application is accepted for examination, the Examining Authority wil invite local
authorities to submit a LIR in which you should give details of the likely impact of the
proposed development upon your Authority’s area. The deadline for the submission of
the LIR wil be set by the Examining Authority fol owing the Preliminary Meeting,
which is likely to take place a few months after the acceptance of an application. You
are therefore encouraged to begin preparation of your LIR now, and put in place
internal approval procedures.
Further details regarding the process for applications for orders granting development
consent including relevant legislation, guidance and advice notes can be found on our
website and accessed by fol owing this link
https://infrastructure.planninginspectorate.gov.uk/
If you have any further queries, please do not hesitate to contact us.
4 PA2008 s55(4)(b)
https://infrastructure.planninginspectorate.gov.uk
Yours sincerely
Tracey Williams
Tracey Williams
Case Manager
This communication does not constitute legal advice.
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