Page 5 - John Belsey

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Misleading Applications

Withdrawal of the Application
4. On 27 April 2018, Mr King responded to your email agreeing that “there was a
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requirement to produce a Statement of Community Involvement” and continued:
“In my view this planning application should not have been registered as a valid
application and I have advised the applicants of this. I have advised that the planning
application is invalid at present because it does not contain such a statement. I have
also said that I did not agree with their argument that the community engagement had
already been done as part of the Neighbourhood Plan process because in my view,
that is a separate process relating to planning policy rather than a planning
application.
I did suggest that as a minimum they should engage with the parish council. They
have advised that they will consider our position and get back to us.”

5. It is not clear who Mr King might blame for registering the invalid application: if not
himself as team leader. The syntax of his response implies prioritisation of form over
substance.

The critical point is not that boxes were unticked and forms unsubmitted but that AWVC and
residents had been deliberately excluded from the planning process and denied their rights.
6. AHL’s response does not appear on MSDC’s website, its “argument” was based on bad
advice (see Folio 3) from Mr Frank Taylor, its retained town planner. He had advised
AHL that a pre-application consultation in 2016 – on an entirely different project and for
a different developer – was sufficient to tick the consultation box. In the light of your
intervention, MSDC had little option other than to withdraw the application to allow
time for consultation.

Consultation
7. The consultation took place in Ashurst Wood Village Hall on 29 May 2018. Mr Peter
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Owen, Managing Director of AHL spoke to me and among other things:

• Initially gave a finessed response to my suggestion that AHL intended to develop the
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WH:LIC site. However, a few minutes later, he agreed that such plans were in
process–“although we haven’t got any legal agreements at the moment”;

• Continued: “If we don’t [develop the WH:LIC site] someone else will”;
• Was under time pressure to obtain planning approval and to finalise the option to
buy the WH:EDF site;
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• Said that the present owners – GCP Developments Ltd - were not involved in a joint
project;

Mr Owen was not comfortable discussing the development of the WH:LIC site and
subsequently avoided answering a written question from Ashbourne Park Owners’
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Association.

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