How to respond
Planning Applications and the Planning System
Anyone who wants to build or substantially alter a property has to apply for planning permission from their Local Planning Authority (LPA), which for us is Spelthorne Borough Council. The LPA is obliged to consider every valid application which it receives.
About 90% of cases are decided by officers as ‘delegated decisions’. The Planning Committee consists of 15 councillors and meets monthly to consider major applications and any which have been ‘called in’ by ward councillors alerted by worried neighbours. At the meeting an officer describes the proposal, then a member of the public may speak for 3 minutes, and then the councillors debate the application and decide whether to grant planning permission or refuse it.
Grounds for refusal
Unfortunately they cannot refuse a proposal merely because they don’t like it. Reasons for refusal are strictly limited to breaches of the policies in the Local Plan. The Local Plan is agreed by the Council, approved or amended by a Planning Inspector, and finally signed off by the Secretary of State, and it then has the status of local planning law.
The present Spelthorne Local Plan dates from 2009, and the planners have been working on the next Plan for some years, treading a fine line between what would benefit the borough and what the Government has imposed on us, e.g. the requirement to fit in 590 new houses or flats per year.
The purpose of planning used to be to strike a fair balance between the wishes of developers and the interests of residents. But the new National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF), issued in 2012 and revised in 2018, states that the purpose of planning is ‘to contribute to the achievement of sustainable development’, which in practice seems to mean any development. This is a most unfortunate change, and reduces the powers of Local Authorities to control development.
If the LPA refuses planning permission, the developer may appeal to the Planning Inspectorate. If the council loses an appeal, it may have to pay the developer’s legal costs; and if it loses too many appeals it may be deemed underperforming and stripped of planning powers. This is a strong incentive to grant permission in doubtful cases.
Accessing the Spelthorne Borough Council website
To look at a planning application on Spelthorne BC website, click on the button below. This will open the planning portal in a new window in your browser.
The page has several guides on it which you can explore including how to interpret the information presented with the planning application.
The top guide is called Planning – Search by application number of property address is one method of locating a planning application. You can also view weekly lists, view decisions, detailed drawings.
Click on the button below to visit the page on the Spelthorne Borough Council website.
The page has several tabs which will reveal different forms and levels of detail. At the hightest level you can enter anything from a postal code, street address or planning reference.
Only a planning reference number will return the specific result you are looking for. Other searches will provide a list. The list will contain matches for the search criteria you put in.
Advanced Search
The second tab is an advanced search which will allow you to refine the search criteria against date, ward, address, type and some other fields.
Planning Map
There is also a planning map search you can use to highlight a location. However this will show all planning application references, so you will need to be selective to find the one of interest.
Search Criteria
You can enter the full or partial planning reference in here to see what results are returned. They will be listed in date order with the most recent being at the top. You can also search by street address For example enter “Woodthorpe Road” in the search box. You will see a list of results. However this will cover all applications on Woodthorpe road, many may not be relevant, so you need to be more specific.
Postal Code
If you use a postal code, then this will return a smaller list, as postal codes generally refer to around 20 locations or less. Again these are listed in date order, and you will be most likely interested in the ones at the top of the list being the most recent.
Neighbour Notification
If you have been notified as a neighbour, the application number will be at the top right of the letter.
This should produce the application address. Click on this for all the details, including the line inviting you to comment. Important Dates will tell you the deadline for commenting. Documents leads you to a list of forms, plans and elevations. The most helpful document is usually the Design & Access Statement, which summarises the application, and then the plans & elevations will show the details.
The letters in an application number define the type of application. FUL is a full detailed application, while OUT seeks outline permission with some matters to be decided later. ADV refers to applications for advertising signs. HOU is a householder application, for which the process is a little simpler. In recent years the Government has expanded the definition of Permitted Development to include large extensions of houses, and changes of use from offices to residential. Prior Approval is still needed, but only to establish there are no problems of specific types such as flooding or contaminated land. These applications will be labelled CPD or PDR or PDH.
Local Plan
To see the current Local Plan on Spelthorne BC website, go to Planning, then Planning Publications, then Local Plan Documents. After the list of documents preparing for the new Plan, you will find Current Local Plan, Core Strategy and Policies. You don’t need to buy it – just click on it to read the Plan. Policies you may find useful include
- LO1, flooding
- HO3, affordable housing
- HO5, density of housing
- CO3, open space in new development
- EN1 design of new development
- EN2, extensions in the Green Belt
- EN6, Conservation Areas
- CC3, parking.
The main Green Belt policy GB1 was carried over from the previous Plan and is in a separate document called Saved Policies.
Staines Town Society normally writes objections in the form ‘we object to this scheme because it breaches Policies ABC of the Local Plan’. Individual objectors may not wish to be so formal, but it is still useful to know which objections are likely to carry weight.
Click on the button below to visit the Local Plan page on the Spelthorne Borough Council website. (opens in a new window or tab).
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