The proposed date for the Cheshire East Northern Planning Committee to discuss the application for the gypsy site on Moor Lane has been altered. It was to have been Wednesday 23rd May.
Paul Wakefield, the Case Officer for this application. said "The application is now on the agenda for the Northern Planning Committee on 13 June 2012. Further time was needed to consider all the information received relating to the application, particularly from third parties."
This morning I also received a letter from George Osborne, he wrote "I have been contacted by a number of constituents about this application. I share your concerns and believe there should be a balance of development in Wilmslow.
As your MP, I have no influence over planning decisions in Cheshire East as these are made by the Council. However, I will make sure that it is aware of the strength of local feeling about this issue."
I have also been contacted by a resident of the Pickmere area who has pointed out that they are involved in their own "Dale Farm" situation and wishes us to be totally aware of the potential problems.
He says, "As you may already be aware, we have a similar situation here in Pickmere that has been going on 3 ½ years. We are now facing the 4th planning application from the same families who bought agricultural land in the village and moved onto it under cover of darkness on a Friday night in October 2008. They simultaneously lodged a (retrospective) planning application with the then Macclesfield Borough Council knowing it would not be seen or acted upon until the following week, by which time in a military style operation they cut down ancient hedgerows and two 300 year old oak trees and dumped hundreds of tons of hardcore over a green lane and their land to force access. They have remained in unlawful and now illegal occupation ever since.
"They were unanimously refused planning permission, appealed that decision which was dismissed by a Planning Inspector who varied the terms of the Enforcement Notice to allow them to stay for 9 months (taking into account the welfare needs of their children).
"The families ignored this and were criminally convicted at Chester Crown Court last October and were fined 2 x £3,000, yet Cheshire East have not taken any initiative before or since to seize the moral or legal high ground to raise an injunction, put a charge on the land or to attempt to evict them.
"Instead, through their inertia, we now have a new planning application, materially almost identical to the first, likely to be heard at the same meeting as yours....... we would hope that both are refused, but that is only likely to provoke appeals and further costs, delays, anxieties and responsibilities."
Thought provoking, isn't it?
This is a member post by Terry Sleigh.
Comments
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I contacted Paul Wakefield yesterday regarding the deadline for the public to comment on the planning application. This was in light of the fact that additional information (special circumstances) had been supplied some time after the initial planning application. Here is his response:
'The deadline has not been formally extended, however, any letters received before the Committee date will be taken into account'.
So for anyone who still wants to lodge their opinion - you have until 13th June.