Chichester District Council
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Enabling the Delivery of Crooked Lane Birdham Exception Site

Meeting: 10/04/2018 - Cabinet (Item 509)

509 Enabling the Delivery of Affordable Housing on the Crooked Lane Birdham Exception Site pdf icon PDF 83 KB

The Cabinet is requested to consider the agenda reportand its five appendices, the fourth of which is Part II restricted* for the information of members and relevant officers only (printed on salmon paper), and to make the following resolutions:

 

1)          That the carrying out of a land referencing exercise in respect of the small area of land (identified in appendix 3), to be funded by Hyde group, be approved.

 

2)          That, on completion of the land referencing exercise, it be approved that a further report to the Council be prepared by officers as to whether the acquisition of the land and interests or rights in respect of that land is justified on the grounds that it is in the public interest and considering the relevant statutory compulsory purchase powers.

 

3)          That the authorisation of officers to undertake the next steps as set out in section 6 of the report be approved in order that any decision by the Council can be carried through promptly.

 

4)          That officers be authorised to spend up to £27,000, on the basis that this will be reimbursed by Hyde pursuant to a deed of indemnity as to costs in respect of the legal, land referencing and other costs related to the steps set out in section 6 of the report.

 

[*Note Paragraph 5 (information in respect of which a claim to legal professional privilege could be maintained in legal proceedings) of Part I of Schedule 12A to the Local Government Act 1972]

Additional documents:

Decision:

RESOLVED BY THE CABINET

 

(1)  That the carrying out of a land referencing exercise in respect of the  small area of land (identified in appendix 3) to be funded by Hyde group be approved.

 

(2)  That on completion of the land referencing exercise a further report to the Council be prepared by officers as to whether the acquisition of the land and interests or rights in respect of that land is justified on the grounds that it is in the public interest and considering the relevant statutory compulsory purchase powers.

 

(3)  That officers be authorised to undertake the next steps as set out in section 6 of the agenda report in order that any decision by the Council can be carried through promptly.

 

(4)  That officers be authorised to spend up to £27,000, on the basis that this will be reimbursed by Hyde pursuant to a deed of indemnity as to costs in respect of the legal, land referencing and other costs related to the steps set out in section 6 of the agenda report.

Minutes:

The Cabinet received and considered the agenda report and its five appendices, the fourth of which was confidential exempt Part II information and was circulated to members and relevant officers only.  

 

This item was introduced by Mrs Taylor in the absence of Mrs Kilby.

 

Miss Nicol, Mrs Grange and Mr Bennett were in attendance for this matter.

 

Mrs Taylor said that the recommendations in section 2 of the report were intended to facilitate the delivery of the affordable housing scheme for 15 new affordable dwellings (the mix was listed in para 4.2 of the report) on the subject site (brought forward through the Chichester Rural Partnership) via compulsory purchase of the site access, the issues in respect of which were explained in section 4 of the report. In view of the uncertainty over legal ownership of the access, Hyde had formally requested that CDC deploy its compulsory purchase (CP) powers. The intention was that, if approved by the Cabinet, officers would investigate the merits of pursuing CP in this case.

 

Mrs Grange summarised the current local housing need position, which the delivery of this scheme would help to address.

 

Miss Nicol advised that there was a correction to the indicative timetable in para 6.10 of the report: for Q1 2020 (last entry) the words ‘Target start on site’ should be replaced with ‘Recommencement of development work’. The Cabinet noted this textual amendment.

 

Mr Connor queried the correct construction to be placed upon the second sentence in para 8.4 of the report as he wished to be reassured that the cost of the CP process would not be borne by CDC.     

 

In reply, Mr Bennett confirmed that Hyde would be responsible for underwriting the costs of pursuing a CP order (para 6.2 of the report) in order to achieve the very important social purpose of providing affordable housing within the local community. He conceded that the second sentence in para 8.4 required clarification. He said that the concluding words ‘, subject to the Council being satisfied that the acquisition of each interest or right to be acquired is justifiable in the public interest’ ought to form part of the preceding sentence. The opening words ‘This [ie the costs incurred] would then be reimbursed by Hyde’ should constitute a separate and final sentence in their own right.

 

In response to a question by Mr Barrow, Mrs Taylor said that the opportunity for local residents to make representations about the development of this site for housing was not now but had been prior to the grant of planning permission in 2013 (para 4.2 of the report). She summarised the relevant planning history as set out in section 4 of the report.                   

 

Decision

 

The Cabinet voted unanimously on a show of hands to make the resolutions set out below. 

 

RESOLVED BY THE CABINET

 

(1)  That the carrying out of a land referencing exercise in respect of the  small area of land (identified in appendix 3) to be funded by Hyde group be approved.

 

(2)  ...  view the full minutes text for item 509


 

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