Planning Policy was not robust

The Maidstone Borough Council, Cabinet Member for Regeneration has publicly admitted that the planning policy document, known as the “Planning Policy - Maidstone Borough-Wide Local Plan Adopted, Dec 2000” as put in place by the previous LibDem administration had not been robust enough. The Cabinet Member sort to blame, what he called a ‘rouge inspector’ but admitted that they [the previous LibDem administration] should have pushed harder. In other words they had been weak when standing up for the borough.

A salient feature here is not having put in place Supplementary Planning Guidance which specifically looked at defining and understanding the context and character of areas. Supplementary Planning Guidance provides planning guidance which amplifies the policies and proposals of the Local Plan. These are essential documents that enable a local interpretation of nationally imposed Planning Guidance, the term guidance is some what a misnomer here as they are a legal framework and hence not so much guidance as centrally imposed government control.

The Local Plan states in Policy ENV2;
Planning permission will not be granted for development in the defined urban area and village settlements unless: 1) proposals relate sympathetically to the context provided by their setting.

However if the local context is not defined in a systematic and consistent way, decisions are open to legal challenge.

How would Maidstone have looked today if such documents had been in place?

Has irreparable damage been done already?

How much back garden development would have been refused?

The good news is that Character Assessments are now underway as put in place last year by the previous administration (Con). We are assured that these documents will be developed for the whole of the borough, to be included in the future planning policy for the borough.