Agenda item

To determine the application.

Danielle Brooke presented the report to members.

The committee had regard to its inspection of the site (as agreed in accordance with the Site Inspection Policy and Procedure (minute P19/04 refers)) during its deliberations.

Members received a presentation, in accordance with the public participation procedure, from Matthew Hall, the agent. Mr Hall stated that all consultees support this application and there has been no objections. He made the point that the applicant’s have lived at this site for 36 years and are attached to this area of Chatteris, with Mr Dixon being a school teacher in various areas of Cambridgeshire for over 25 years and has now retired, Mrs Dixon previously worked at Doddington School for 15 years and is currently a volunteer for Chatteris Community Car Scheme and has been for 6 years.

Mr Hall showed on the presentation screen a map of the area and since 2013 there have been 8 dwellings approved in this area and a refurbished garden centre and of those dwellings approved, since 2019 five dwellings were approved by Planning Committee. He referred to the officer’s report which considers this site to be an elsewhere location and not part of Chatteris but given the planning history, the map on the screen and 5 dwellings approved since 2019 under this Local Plan, the committee have consistently taken the view that this area is part of Chatteris.

Mr Hall expressed the view that all the landscaping can be agreed with officers if the application is approved as part of a condition including garden areas and the site is within the curtilage of the existing building, being single-storey and small scale. He made the point that Chatteris Town Council support the proposal and there is no objection from Cambridgeshire County Council Highways, the site lies within Flood Zone 1, there is no neighbouring objections and it is in area where there have been previous other approvals.

Members asked questions of Mr Hall as follows:

·       Councillor Benney referred to reason 4 of the refusal reasons in that it has not provided private amenity space and asked how far short is it and is there anything that can be undertaken to amend this? Mr Hall responded that on the site plan shown by officers the private amenity space is shown to the rear but there is also space to the front that can be used as private amenity space, with 30% private amenity space having been shown and the requirement is 33%.

Members made comments, asked questions and received responses as follows:

·       Councillor Murphy referred to it being in an unsustainable position and made the point that looking at the map there are so many properties in this area and if they are all unsustainable why are they there and flourishing. He does not consider this proposal as back land development as it is no farther down Sutton Gault than the road where the car place is and is does not protrude into the countryside, with the opposite side of the road being developed all the while and, in his view, there is no reason why this side of the road should not be developed as well as it is in a prime position, it is not an unsustainable site, people live there and enjoy living there.

·       Councillor Benney agreed with the comments of Councillor Murphy, so much development has been approved in this area and the committee needs to be consistent in what it does. He stated that the big building is the garden centre and it has brought people to this area, there is a footpath that runs all the way along London Road right to this house and one has just been approved in Newton-in-the-Isle under LP3, LP12 and LP16 so committee needs to be consistent for the same reasons.

·       Councillor Sutton expressed the view that he is not sure whether he can support it or not at this time because the officers are consistent in their recommendation, with all those dwellings pointed out by Mr Hall being recommended for refusal and were overturned by committee but the one difference between those and this proposal is that all those other dwellings were sitting on London Road and this one is not and is, in his view, back land development.

·       Councillor Meekins expressed the opinion that this proposal seems very similar to the one committee just approved in Newton-in-the-Isle, there was a map with all the development around this site and as Councillor Sutton said those developments were recommended for refusal initially but came to committee who approved them and he thinks this should happen in this instance.

·       Councillor Skoulding expressed the view that it is on a corner and down Stocking Drove so it is not back land as you can enter it through a different access.

·       David Rowen stated that he is not sure it is quite as similar to the one in Newton-in-the-Isle that the committee granted earlier just in terms of its character, its nature and the size of the application site, which is one of the reasons for refusal. He made the point that whilst there have been permissions granted by the committee in this area they have been fronting London Road and the danger here is that a precedent is being set for development going down Stocking Drove and you end up in a position where you are going to risk having this kind of ‘development poker’ taking place, which has happened in Wype Road, Eastrea. David Rowen stated that the officer’s recommendation is absolutely sound, with the previous permissions on London Road not necessarily setting a precedent for this case and neither does the permission that members granted in Newton-in-the-Isle earlier.    

Proposed by Councillor Sutton to support officer’s recommendation to refuse the application, but no seconder was forthcoming.

Proposed by Councillor Benney, seconded by Councillor Murphy and agreed that the application be APPROVED against officer’s recommendation, with delegation given to officers to formulate conditions.

Members do not support officer’s recommendation of refusal of planning permission as they feel that the proposal complies with LP3 as the site does lie within Chatteris, they feel LP12 and LP16 are both subjective and do not feel that the proposal would cause harm to character of the countryside and whilst they acknowledge the shortfall of private amenity space they feel this is negligible and would not be detrimental.

(Councillors Benney and Murphy registered, in accordance with Paragraph 14 of the Code of Conduct on Planning Committee, that they were members of Chatteris Town Council but take no part in planning matters)

(Councillor Benney declared that he knows the agent for this application and he has undertaken work for him but he is not pre-determined and will approach the application with an open mind)

(Councillor Murphy declared that he knows the agent for this application but he was not pre-determined and would approach the application with an open mind)