New clause 26 - Pre-application consultation
Planning and Compulsory Purchase (Re-committed) Bill
5:00 pm
Mr Matthew Green (Ludlow, Liberal Democrat)
If I may, I shall clarify my comments. Development control and planning committees are swayed by the scale and number of objections. When the Secretary of State decides to call in an application, that does not affect his decision but may carry some weight. Anecdotal evidence is that when extensive pre-consultation takes place, the scale and number of objections when the application is made are dramatically reduced because many of the difficulties and misunderstandings have been ironed out and in some cases the developer is able to make amendments to the application which satisfy many of the objections.