Agenda item

Outline application for up to 300 dwellings, including site access, public open space, landscaping and associated infrastructure works.

The Committee considered a report of the Senior Planning Officer regarding an outline application for up to 300 dwellings, including site access, public open space, landscaping and associated infrastructure works on land to the north of Durham Road, Middlestone Moor, Spennymoor (for copy see file of minutes).

Colin Harding, Senior Planning Officer provided the Committee with a detailed presentation which included photographs of the site and a plan of the proposed layout.  He informed the Committee that paragraph 33 of the report relating to the requirement for dwellings should refer to South Durham with 2150 identified specifically for Spennymoor.

Councillor K Thompson, local Member, addressed the Committee to object to the application.  He informed the Committee that the most recent strategic land availability survey for Durham had identified that there was a sufficient number of sites allocated for housing, with an over-supply of some 3,000 houses.  While levels of repossession in the Spennymoor area had fallen recently, there remained over 1,000 empty properties in the Spennymoor area.  The proposed development would have a wider impact on the housing market in Spennymoor and would cause it to be weaker.  There was currently in excess of a 15 year supply of housing identified for the Spennymoor area from sites already granted planning permission.

Carol Clark of Gladman Developments, the applicant, addressed the Committee.  The applicant had worked with both planning officers and consultees on this proposal and there was no technical reason for its refusal.  The site was highly sustainable and a natural continuation to the development of Spennymoor.  The applicant’s critique of the Authority’s five year deliverable housing land supply concluded that the Authority could only demonstrate a supply for 4.3 years.  The assertions by the Authority that permission on this site would undermine the delivery of other schemes in the Spennymoor area were not backed by any demonstrable evidence.  As well as being a sustainable development, the proposal would bring economic benefits of a £33.1m investment in construction, 123 full time construction jobs, including apprenticeships, and a new homes bonus in the region of £2.7m.  The development would expand the local housing market area and accorded with policy on affordable homes and life time homes.  It would involve new tree panting in the area and provide open play areas and accorded strongly with the NPPF for sustainable development.

The Senior Planning Officer informed the Committee that while all of the benefits of the proposal carried significant weight, these may be to the detriment of other sites which had already been granted planning permission and had better credentials than this site.  It was unclear whether the economic benefits attached to this site were additional to the area or diverted from other sites.

Councillor Dixon moved refusal of the application in accordance with officers’ recommendations.  The application would lead to market dilution and was a development into the countryside.

Councillor Shield, in seconding refusal of the application, informed the Committee that the development was outside the curtilage of existing development and into the countryside.  Planning approval for up to 1800 in the area had already been granted and approval of further developments may lead to the stagnation of construction.

Councillor Taylor agreed that this was a development in the countryside and that other brownfield sites were available for development and considered that the application should be refused.

Resolved:

That the application be refused for the reasons contained in the report.