Member Article

Consultation to begin on Brighton's City Plan

Brighton and Hove City Council has announced that public consultation on further changes to one policy in the City Plan will open on Monday 28 September.

Requested by the government appointed Planning Inspector, the changes will take the Plan, which sets out a blueprint to provide homes and jobs for the city, closer to adoption.

The Inspector has asked the council to further modify its Sustainable Buildings Policy (CP8) to remove references to the proposed 2016 zero carbon standard, the increase in on-site energy efficiency standards, and the Allowable Solutions carbon offsetting scheme as the government has indicated recently that it no longer intends to pursue them.

The Inspector has also asked the council to remove the technical requirement for a ‘sustainable buildings’ standard on residential conversions as these will be covered by building regulations.

Councillor Gill Mitchell, chair of the city’s environment, transport and sustainability committee, said: “We need to follow the Planning Inspector’s advice and amend the City Plan to reflect national changes in planning policy before we take it on to the next stage. Nevertheless we will still seek the highest standards of sustainability in new developments and support developers that want to go beyond the building regulation standards.

“We have therefore retained our proposed energy performance target to ensure there is no drop in standards in line with the government’s March Written Ministerial Statement.

“We are also still pursuing the new optional standard for increased water efficiency as we are in a ‘water stress’ area and this allows us to have a local policy to ensure water is used efficiently in new developments.”

Closing date for comments is 5.00pm Monday 9 November. All comments will be collated and sent to the Planning Inspector for review. If agreed, the City Plan will proceed to final draft for possible adoption in early 2016.

The City Plan will be the council’s key planning document and will provide the overall strategic vision for the future of Brighton & Hove to 2030. It will set out how the council will respond to local priorities, meet the challenges of the future and identify the broad locations, scale and types of development needed together with the supporting infrastructure.

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Ellen Forster .