Consultation on SPDs - Public forum - Planning Advisory Service (PAS)
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Started - July 2012
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Consultation on SPDs
The Local Planning Regulations 2012 seem to be contradictory regarding consultation procedures for preparing SPDs. Regulation 12 effectively says that, before an SPD is adopted, a draft SPD has to be published for public participation for a minimum of four weeks. It also says that a statement has to be prepared setting out who was consulted, summarising the comments received and explaining how they were taken into account. But the regulation then says that this statement has to be published at the same time as the draft SPD. So it seems to require the consultation statement to be written before the consultation is carried out! I assume that this is a drafting error in the legislation, but can anyone make sense of it or suggest how the requirement can be complied with?
I have just seen this problem as we are about to adopt an SPD. It appears that when the new Regs were drafted only some parts of the previous Regs were carried across but without being checked for internal consistency. In preparing a SPD there is normally a mechanism of reporting comments made and the Council's response, be it a Committee Report or report to an Executive. This is prepared before adoption and will normally be made publicly available before adoption. I see this as meeting Regulation 12 (a) - this can then be published (with a suitable title of Consultation Statement) on your web site after adoption. However this still does not deal with the nonsense that is Regulation 12 (b).
We have interpreted this as meaning that as part of the consultation on the draft SPD, you must also publish a statement showing how you consulted / involved others in drafting the SPD. So it means you essentially need to do two consultations - although the first can be more informal. This was also a requirement under the previous regulations. Hope this helps.
I am glad others have picked up this issue of contradiction. In the absence of any clear steer and also to meet one of the commitments of our adopted SCI, I have prepared an 'interim' public participation statement describing earlier consultation we carried out ahead of preparing the draft SPD. I plan to update this document following the close of consultation and publish it again alongside the adopted SPD. Linked to this, does anyone consider the 2012 regulations to completely replace the 2004 and 2008 regulations or any of these still valid?
Thanks Andrea. To be clear, without the previous regs I presume there is now no need to prepare a local advert or notice of SPD matters? Laura - I plan to consult with neighbouring LPAs just to be on the safe side.
Daniel Hudson, modified 11 Years ago.
Re: Consultation on SPDs
Advocate Posts: 121 Join Date: 25/04/12 Recent Posts
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David Even if there is no regulatory requirement for press ads etc, check what the SCI says about SPD consultation. You may still be committed to doing them and challengeable if you don't.
I've had a look at this recently, and my conclusion was also that the effect of the 2012 Regs was to now require informal discussions - analagous to pre publication engagement for a DPD? - followed by formal consultation on the draft SPD together with a record of the previous informal discussions
Thank you to everyone for your helpful responses to my original question about SPD procedure. We've decided to follow the prodeure suggested by David Hayward of Lancaster and others, i.e. to comply with the letter of the legislation by issung a consultation statement at the same time as the draft SPD, and to follow its spirit by issuing a final statement with the adopted SPD. We usually do some pre-draft consultation, so we can report on this, even if it's quite limited. However, there clearly seems to be a drafting error with the regulations, so I've written to Steve Quartermain at DCLG pointing this out and asking that the problem could be addressed next time the regs come up for amendment. I'll let you know if I get a reply. Derek Read, City of London Corporation.
Derek, did you ever get a reply from Steve Quartermain about this? I tried to contact them today but had no luck in getting through to anyone who knew anything about SPD's. I also contacted PINs but as they do not deal with SPD's they were unable to help either! I have been advised to get legal advice but didn't want to do that if you had had any luck from CLG. Thanks