Gladman housing appeal dismissed by inspector citing importance of farmland

‘Decision should embolden councillors in taking a firmer stance against opportunistic operators’

Some good news!

With Thanet almost sinking under eyewatering levels of housing development, some respite has come through a planning inspector’s dismissal of a bid to build on farmland at Minster.

Land agent Gladman had seen its application for 115 new properties off Foxborough Lane rejected by both Minster Parish Council and Thanet District Council. Loss of agricultural land, together with traffic and pedestrian safety issues, were cited among the grounds for refusal.

Predictably, Gladman appealed against the decisions to the Planning Inspectorate, but inspector David Wallis has dismissed that appeal.

CPRE Kent had submitted two sets of comments on the proposal and made a representation to the inspector in response to the Gladman appeal. Those representations were reflected strongly in Mr Wallis’s conclusions.

We argued throughout that the proposed development was unacceptable, primarily on the following grounds:

• The proposal is contrary to the development plan as is not allocated for housing development
• Loss of best and most versatile agricultural land
• Transport impact, including highway safety
• Impact on air quality
• Impact on heritage assets
• Lack of infrastructure

The inspector’s findings have validated our concerns. Encouragingly, he agreed with our issues over landscape, but crucially, having accepted that the proposed development would lead to the loss of best and most versatile (BMV) agricultural land – 80 per cent of the site was assessed as being BMV – he agreed that the applicant should be looking to avoid BMV despite Thanet not having a sufficient housing-land supply.

Despite that lack of supply (and, driving around Thanet, many will find that in itself surprising), the inspector concluded the relevant BMV policy in the Local Plan should still be applied.

He wrote: “… the appellant openly admits to not undertaking the sequential assessment approach advocated. The Inquiry was told this was because the [Local Plan] states that approximately 91% of all land within Thanet is classified as BMV land and, as a result, the Council would have to seek housing development on BMV in order to achieve the housing targets by default.

“I consider that whilst the LP does indicate that BMV would be encountered across the district, this is a generalisation and does not substitute for investigating site-specific circumstances to guide development.

“Policy E16 of the LP seeks to investigate those site specifics with a view to protecting BMV against unjustified loss. The appellant’s own survey has indicated there may be pockets of non-BMV land around Minster. There is a clear and accepted failure to justify the loss of BMV by not undertaking the sequential search required of policy E16.”

His final conclusion was that “the harms of the proposed development would significantly and demonstrably outweigh the benefits”.

This is an extremely important decision in the argument against other speculative development on BMV land in Thanet and indeed elsewhere in the county, especially in districts with protective BMV policies in their Local Plans but without sufficient housing supply.

CPRE Kent planner Richard Thompson said: “It shows that developers can’t just pay lip-service to the notion of protecting our best farmland – or, in other words, they can’t simply ignore policies such as E16.

“Housing needs have to be considered alongside those protective policies, especially when there are so many existing permissions already granted but just sitting there not being built. The question needs to be asked: ‘Why aren’t these sites being brought forward?’.

“Thanet’s Local Plan has already allocated a large amount of greenfield land, predominantly BMV, for housing that has yet to be developed.

“Indeed, the latest figures show there are more than 9,500 unbuilt housing units in Thanet among the strategic housing allocations alone. The Local Plan already makes more than adequate provision for the strategic release of BMV land.

“Developers and housebuilders should be working with landowners of housing allocations to get these sites unlocked and built out.

“Instead, as with Gladman here, we see site promoters seeking to exploit the impossible land-supply situation faced by so many councils to get even more land allocated to housing for a quick profit, with the destruction of yet more of our precious countryside.

“The inspector’s decision should embolden councillors in taking a firmer stance against such opportunistic operators.

“As for those people who feel overwhelmed by the seemingly relentless tide of development, this is why we at CPRE Kent do what we do. Sometimes there is a glimmer of light at the end of the tunnel!”