Decision details

Urgency, Special Urgency and Suspension of call-in procedures have been invoked in relation to this decision, as set out in the Council’s constitution at Part 4, Section 7(6), Section 7 (7), and Section 8 (10.22) respectively. This is with the agreement of the Chairman of the Growth, Environment and Resources Scrutiny Committee and the Monitoring Officer. The decision is urgent due to the deadlines provided to the Council by central government. The suspension of call-in has been granted as a delay in the implementation would mean the Council was no longer eligible to opt in to the 20% increase in planning application fees.

The Cabinet Member agreed to the opt in 20% increase in planning application fees that has been offered to the City Council.

The City Council is required to indicate to DCLG if it wishes to opt in (or out) to the proposed planning application fee increase. 2012 was last time that the Government increased planning fees and in the recently published Housing White Paper it is recognised that in order to improve the delivery of much needed housing, resourcing in council planning services needs to be improved. Whilst the planning service within Peterborough City Council is high performing and a well respected operation amongst development professionals it is tightly resourced with modest resilience capability notwithstanding the establishment of a shared service with Fenland Council a year ago. The adoption of the proposed fee increase is not anticipated to have a dampening effect on the submission of  applications as the planning fee makes up a very small element of the overall cost of facilitating development. The increased revenue income will be used to help improve the robustness of the service and  the delivery of growth.           

Instead of opting in to the fee increase the Council could decide to keep fees at their existing level.

None.

DCLG letter to Chief Executives  - 21 February 2017

Planning application records (1 April 2016 to 31 Jan 2017) – planning fee paid.