Council and democracy

Agenda and minutes

Venue: Council Chamber, Civic Offices, New Road, Grays, Essex, RM17 6SL. View directions

Contact: Wendy Le, Democratic Services Officer  Email: Direct.Democracy@thurrock.gov.uk

Items
No. Item

52.

Minutes pdf icon PDF 68 KB

To approve as a correct record the minutes of the Planning Committee meeting held on 24 October 2019.

 

Minutes:

The minutes of the Planning Committee held on 24 October 2019 was approved as a true and correct record.

 

 

The Chair of the Committee explain that there was only to be one item heard as Application 19/01310/TBC, Sigma Studies Ltd, had been withdrawn from the agenda.

 

53.

Item of Urgent Business

To receive additional items that the Chair is of the opinion should be considered as a matter of urgency, in accordance with Section 100B (4) (b) of the Local Government Act 1972.

Minutes:

There were no items of urgent business.

54.

Declaration of Interests

Minutes:

There were no declarations of interest.

55.

Declarations of receipt of correspondence and/or any meetings/discussions held relevant to determination of any planning application or enforcement action to be resolved at this meeting

Minutes:

There were no declarations of receipt of correspondence and/or any meetings/discussions relevant to any planning application to be resolved at the meeting.

56.

Planning Appeals pdf icon PDF 79 KB

Minutes:

The Strategic Lead for Development Services, presented the report which outlined the planning appeals performance.

 

The Committee was satisfied with the report.

 

Resolved:

 

That the Planning Committee noted the report.

57.

19/00470/FUL St Cleres School, Butts Lane, Stanford-Le-Hope, Essex, SS17 0NW pdf icon PDF 545 KB

Minutes:

The Principal Planner introduced the report and in doing so, updated the plan reference list, in that reference 2000 P4 – Proposed Ground Floor Plan of the Sports hall (26 March 2019) was to be included and plan no. 104 Block Plan North West (26 March 2019) was to be removed. She continued to explain that reference P7 was to be added to the Proposed Site Plan reference 1140 (25 October 2019). It was confirmed that as a consequence Condition 2 would also require amendment to reflect the same plan reference changes.

 

Members heard how the application sought permission to provide new facilities at the school by way of a new 3 storey teaching block, which would provide new dining and kitchen areas, 4 new science labs and 6 classrooms. The proposal also sought to construct a new sports hall with 4 courts and changing facilities.  It was commented that additional changes also related to external works to provide additional car parking, footpaths and outside dining areas and covered seating at the school.

 

It was remarked that the site was located within the Green Belt where there was a presumption against new development. Members were advised the proposal did not fall within any of the exceptions allowed for development within the Greenbelt and was therefore inappropriate in principle.

 

The Committee were further advised that in order to overcome the in principle objection and thereby harm to the Green Belt it was therefore up to the applicant to demonstrate that very special circumstances existed.  The applicant had therefore put forward two arguments by way of very special circumstances, these were

 

1.         The need for secondary provision locally.

2.         The second reason put forward by the applicant related to the continued provision of good science and sports curriculum and community use. 

 

Members heard how all other matters associated with the application relating to amenity impacts, highway impacts and landscape impacts were considered acceptable and fully complied with council policies.

 

It was queried by Councillor Hague as to whether the parking around the school during peak times had been looked at by the highways department. The Principal Planner confirm that the school had a silver rated travel plan in place. She continued to explain that the application would include an additional 30 parking spaces on the site. It was further confirmed that Highways officers had no objections to the application and there would not be any loss of parking on site.

 

Councillor Byrne commented that he was happy to support the application due the need of spaces the school clearly required. 

 

Councillor Shinnick proposed the Officer’s recommendation for approval and was seconded by Councillor Byrne. The Committee moved on to the vote.

 

For: (8) Councillors Mike Fletcher, Gary Byrne, Angela Lawrence, David Potter, Gerard Rice, Sue Sammons, Sue Shinnick and Garry Hague

 

Against: (0)

 

Abstained: (0)

 

Planning application 19/00470/FUL was approved planning permission, subject to conditions and referral following Officer’s recommendations.