examination in public - Public forum - Planning Advisory Service (PAS)

Phil, In November 2004 Cheltenham BC entered a local plan inquiry. We were fortunate to have a forward thinking Inspector who ran the inquiry along the lines of an EiP in the context of the changes of the 2004 Act. For officers and external participants this was beneficial with sessions run either as round table debates or informal hearings. Cheltenham appointed a barrister to support the council's case for a number of sessions (not all). However, given that the Inspector did not allow any formal cross examination I would question the need for this support. I would suggest that if you have a confident team (including in-house legal support) to support the EiP that barrister representation may not necessarily be required, although you may find it useful for a barrister to be involved in the drafting of EiP statements/representations. Good luck.

I wouldn't bother with a barrister. We didn't for our Core Strategy and Development Policies hearings and it is far more informal without them performing. If you say at the start you're not having legal representation then the other side are more likely to do the same. I dread to think what they would charge now, and the Inspector's bill is no small sum.

Preparing the team for EiP with the use of barristers is a good idea you will learn the techniques for responding to questions and experience a mock examination.It builds confidence in the team and mitigates any weaknesses. Professional Solutions do this type of training.

I'm concerned about this strand. The whole point of public examination is to remove barristers from the system. It's 'inquisitorial', which means, geared to getting straght answers to straight questions. If an authority is thinking of using a barrister then there's something wrong, and I suspect an Inspector would not be impressed if s/he learned that LPA representatives were being coached. Professional planners should be able to deal with this without being coached if they're competent, though it's certainly a good idea to go to an Examination to see what they're like. It also may be worthwhile to be advised by a planning lawyer to check if there are potential minefields ahead - though again, you don't need a barrister for that. (I would also suggest, whilst not of course accusing her of any subterfuge, that Janette Gulleford declare an interest if she is in fact advertising the services of Professional Solutions.)

At Plymouth we have been through 4 Examinations, 1 for the Core Strategy and 3 for AAPs. We have not needed to make much use of barristers, certainly not for the hearings. I think that when you are trying to decide whether or not to use counsel, you need to: -consider how your Inspector wishes to run the examination. Our Inspector was very much of the view that legal representation would not be the norm, and in fact would not be acceptable unless there were exceptional circumstances justified to him. This was also the approach at a 'new style' LPI I was involved in in 2004. -consider whether any issues are so contentious that you need legal representation to present/construct your case. For the Plymouth Core Strategy we employed the services of a barrister for one session, where the issues were becoming quite complex and several 3rd party interests were involved. Our barrister gave us advice on how to present our case but did not actually speak at the hearing -consider how strong your evidence base is. The basis of the LDF system is that all issues should be dealt with by evidence in the evidence base. If you have confidence in your evidence base and can defend it robustly, you may not need additional legal suppport. If you think these through in relation to your specific circumstances, it may make your decision more straightforward.. Good luck with your Examination!