Advice to Bircham Dyson Bell
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- From
- Bircham Dyson Bell
- Date advice given
- 8 March 2017
- Enquiry type
Bircham Dyson Bell, on behalf of the Applicant, invited comments from the Planning Inspectorate about the draft Statement of Community Consultation (dSoCC).
Advice given
• Re. the document cover and para 3.1 (etc), I note that the name of the Applicant is different to the name on the Planning Inspectorate’s website. Should the details on our website be updated to reflect the dSoCC? Is RiverOak Strategic Partners the same legal entity as RiverOak Investment Corp. LLC? The Applicant will have noted from our website that this point has generated requests for advice from members of the local community. In the interests of transparency, it may be useful to provide a short explanation in the dSoCC explaining the change to the Applicant’s name. • In para 1.2, and again in para 11.5, it may assist the reader to distinguish the roles of the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government (SoSCLG) and the Secretary of State for Transport (SoST) ie the application will be made to the Planning Inspectorate and decided through functions delegated from the SoSCLG, and SoST is the decision maker. This could help to establish the separate functions within government. • Re. para 2.5 and para 4.4, the statements separating the Development Consent Order consultation from the Civil Aviation Authority licence application/ draft Airports National Policy Statement consultation (and consultation on the airspace change process?) could usefully appear under a separate subheading explaining what the SoCC ‘isn’t’. • In para 4.1 the Applicant may wish to reiterate that s47 consultation constitutes consultation with the local community. • In para 4.5, the Applicant may wish to state explicitly that the Nationally Significant Infrastructure Project is ‘EIA development’. • In the final bullet at para 6.1, the Applicant may wish to reiterate that the ‘first stage’ of consultation was non-statutory. • Re. para 7.2, in the interest of consistency with the notice under s48 of the Planning Act 2008 (PA2008), it would be advisable for the Applicant to make clear whether or not a charge will apply to hard copies of the Preliminary Environmental Information Report, and the amount of any charge. • Re. the text after the table in para 8.1, how would residents know that these ‘individual presentations’ were taking place? • Re. para 9.2, what is the exceptional circumstances test? The Applicant may wish to give examples, or consider deleting this caveat. • In para 11.1, the Applicant may wish to insert ‘legal’ before ‘interest’. The Planning Inspectorate is regularly tasked with explaining to members of the public the distinction between persons with an interest in the proposed development and those with a legal interest in the Order lands. • Re. para 11.3, what are the consultation principles set out in the dSoCC? Which specific principles would apply to any further consultation? • Re. Appendix 1, is the Applicant confident that none of the parish/ town councils listed here are statutory consultees? • Re. Appendix 2, the Applicant may wish to consider whether the map provides sufficient detail to enable members of local community to ascertain whether they should expect to receive notification of the consultation by post. • As you will be aware from the published advice on our website, one of the key concerns expressed by members of the public about the non-statutory consultation was the perceived handling of consultation responses by non-RiverOak staff. Whilst not technically required by the PA2008, it might be useful for the Applicant to include a sentence about the handling of representations/ The Data Protection Act and to clarify, if applicable, that the statutory consultation events will be organised and managed solely by the Applicant’s appointed persons.