Agenda and minutes

Jonathan Langdon – Introductions

The Town Clerk opened the meeting by introducing herself.

A roll call of Members present was undertaken.

The Town Clerk highlighted that the meeting was being recorded as well as live streamed and would be made available on the City Corporation’s YouTube page for a period of time after the meeting had concluded. It was confirmed that all personal data would be processed in accordance with the Data Protection Act 2018. The Town Clerk highlighted that, for further information on this, viewers could contact the City Corporation using the details provided on the public webpages.

The Town Clerk also reminded Members, and any members of the public observing the meeting on-line, that this was an informal meeting and that any views reached by the Committee today would therefore have to be considered by the Assistant Town Clerk or those deputising for him after the meeting in accordance with the Court of Common Council’s COVID Approval Procedure and that they would make a formal decision having considered all relevant matters. The Town Clerk highlighted that this process reflected the current position in respect of the holding of formal Local Authority meetings and the Court of Common Council’s decision of 16^th December 2021 to recommence hybrid meetings and take formal decisions through a delegation to the Town Clerk and other officers nominated by him after the informal meeting has taken place and the will of the Committee was known in open session. Details of all decisions taken under the COVID Approval Procedure would be available online via the City Corporation’s webpages.

The Deputy Chairman (in the Chair) then welcomed all in the room and online to the meeting and wished all those attending and viewing a Happy New Year.

Apologies for absence were received from Deputy Alastair

There were no declarations.

To agree the public minutes and summary of the meeting held on 14 December 2021.

The Committee considered the public minutes and summary of the meeting held on 14 December 2021 and approved them as a correct record, subject to the addition of the point below.

Mr Hayward indicated that the sole reason that he had offered his apologies for the last meeting had been the result of a specific conflict of interest on  the planning application at Holborn Viaduct. He asked that this be recorded in the minutes of the last meeting.

MATTERS ARISING

Moor Lane (page 24) – A Member noted that the minutes concluded that the Chair and Deputy Chairman of this Committee and the Chairman and Deputy Chairman of the Streets and Walkways Sub Committee would look to engage further with this issue in the first instance and questioned what progress had been made on this. The Member commented that this was a hugely important issue in the eyes of residents and expressed an enormous amount of concern at the handling of this matter to date and at the fact that the greening of Moor Lane now looked to be in jeopardy with a developer potentially securing additional land free of charge. Officers undertook to alert colleagues in the Public Realm to this question and to ask that they respond to the Member in writing on this outside of the meeting. It was confirmed that a meeting to discuss this matter further had already been arranged. The Member thanked Officers for this and asked that the Chair and Deputy Chairman give their strong support to the team negotiating this matter.

Presentation of Sustainability Information – Call for Consistency (page 15) – A Member referred back to the call from Members to have clear and consistent sustainability information reported alongside all future planning applications and the assurances from Officers that this would

Report of the Chief Planning Officer and Development Director.

The Committee considered a report of the Chief Planning Officer and Development Director regarding 15 and 16 Minories and land fronting Aldgate High Street, 62 Aldgate High Street: Deed of Variation in respect of Affordable Housing matters; planning permission 15/01067/FULL.

Officers explained that this was a request for a deed of variation to the affordable housing planning obligations for the scheme at 15 and 16 Minories. It was clarified that deeds of variation were normally dealt with by Officers under delegation and did not routinely come to this Committee for consideration. However, given the nature of this proposal, the interest that the Committee has in affordable housing matters and the fact that a change from on-site provision to off-site contributions was proposed, it was felt that, following discussions with the Chair and Deputy Chairman, it would be useful to seek the views of the wider Committee. Officers emphasise that a deed of variation was not the same as a planning application and that this had not therefore gone through the same processes of consultation. The deed of variation was seeking an amendment to a legal agreement which was attached to an implemented planning permission.

It was reported that Officers had been in discussion with applicants on this matter since 2018 and that it had taken a number of years to reach this position. Officers were keen to explore all of the opportunities for the retention of on-site affordable housing in this case and, once this had been exhausted as an option, they wanted to ensure that any commuted sum was the maximum that could be afforded and was policy compliant before presenting a report to Members. In terms of the actual proposals, the affordable housing scheme at Minories was granted in 2015 as part of a wider scheme for the

Report of the Executive Director, Environment.

The Committee received a report of the Executive Director, Environment noting the retirement of a senior officer and proposing a recruitment plan.

The Executive Director, Environment underlined that this was a very important post for the Department given the importance of the City Plan which had already been touched upon today. The Director underlined the need to press on with the recruitment process and find a top quality candidate to fill the post, join the team and help shape the future. She reported that the department were undertaken targeted recruitment and making use of all social media channels to promote the vacancy as widely as possible.

A Member recognised that recruitment to this post could take a number of months and questioned whether this meant that the organisation would not be in a position to refresh the Local Plan until such time as the post had been filled. The Executive Director assured Members that this was not the case and that the Team were fully focused on updating the Plan to ensure that it was innovative and leading the way in London and that this remained one of their top priorities.

The Town Clerk confirmed that a Local Plans Sub Committee had already been scheduled to take place later this month to begin to re-examine the Plan.

RESOLVED – That Members note the report.

Report of the Town Clerk.

The Committee received a report of the Town Clerk setting out its list of Outstanding Actions.

A Member requested that the call for a special, informal meeting to discuss housing specifically be added to the list of outstanding actions. She also questioned whether the Sustainability SPD could feature here.

The Chief Planning Officer and Development Director reiterated that he would be liaising with his sustainability officers to provide a more targeted timeline around the production of the Sustainability SPD and agreed to include this information in the list of outstanding actions. With regard to the housing issue, he stated that whilst he was not opposed to this, he had some concerns as to singling out certain issues that would be discussed with the Local Plans Sub-Committee when they came to review the Plan as a whole. He stressed that he felt that this Sub-Committee was the most appropriate forum for this detailed discussion to take place. The Deputy Chairman agreed that this was how the matter should be progressed. It was underlined that those who were not members of the Sub Committee were still able to attend these meetings as observers.

Another Member commented that a wider, informal discussion on social housing would be of use in terms of ensuring that everyone was better informed and should include members of this Committee, the Community and Children’s Services Committee and the Housing Sub-Committee. This could then feed into the Local Plans Sub-Committee’s discussions on this particular point. She asked that Officers consider taking this forward.

Another Member focused on the Daylight/Sunlight – Alternative Guidelines action stating that there had been a proposal from a previous member of this Committee to take a unique approach on this and questioned progress on this. The Chief Planning Officer and Development Director reported that Officers

Report of the Chief Planning Officer and Development Director.

The Committee received a report of the Chief Planning Officer and Development Director detailing development and advertisement applications determined by the Chief Planning Officer and Development Director or those so authorised under their delegated powers since the report to the last meeting.

RESOLVED – That the report be noted.

Report of the Chief Planning Officer and Development Director.

The Committee received a report of the Chief Planning Officer and Development Director detailing development applications received by the Department of the Built Environment since the report to the last meeting.

RESOLVED – That the report be noted.

Cost of the Tulip Inquiry

A Member noted that she had questioned the costs of the inquiry to the City Corporation at the end of last year and requested a response to this from the Chief Planning Officer. The Chief Planning Officer stated that, as the Committee would recall, on 2 April 2019, Members voted 18 to 6 in favour of granting The Tulip planning application. However, the Mayor of London then directed the City to refuse this. On 18 February 2020, this Committee were advised by Officers that the estimated cost to the City in contesting the public inquiry would be upwards of £200,000. The Chief Planning Officer went on to confirm that the cost was actually significantly below this at £158,000 with savings achieved as the result of very competitive legal fees but, critically, as a lot of the work on design and heritage which were both key issues had been undertaken in-house by himself and other colleagues in addition to their normal duties.

Built Environment Users Panel

A Member noted that she had questioned the composition and the objectives of the Built Environment User Panel at the last meeting of this Committee and had also asked if there were any other similar groups that the Committee should be aware of. She remarked that she was yet to receive a response to either of these points. The Chief Planning Office apologised for this oversight and undertook to assemble the relevant information and respond directly to the Member as soon as possible.

Public Conveniences

A Member reported that the number of public conveniences had fallen by 20% in the last six years across councils and questioned the City’s position on this. She added that she was very conscious that many residents were seeing issues with urination. Officers reported that

There were no additional, urgent items of business for consideration.

MOTION – That under Section 100(A) of the Local Government Act 1972, the public be excluded from the meeting for the following items on the grounds that they involve the likely disclosure of exempt information as defined in Part I of the Schedule 12A of the Local Government Act.

MOTION – That under Section 100(A) of the Local Government Act 1972, the public be excluded from the meeting for the following items on the grounds that they involve the likely disclosure of exempt information as defined in Part I of the Schedule 12A of the Local Government Act.

            Item No                                                                       Paragraph No(s)

                12                                                                                        3         

             13-14                                                                                      -

To agree the non-public minutes of the meeting held on 14 December 2021.

The Committee considered the non-public minutes of the last meeting held on 14 December 2021 and approved them as a correct record.

There were no questions in the non-public session.

There were no additional, urgent items of business for consideration in the non-public session.