The list below is a record of advice the Planning Inspectorate has provided in respect of the Planning Act 2008 process.
There is a statutory duty under section 51 of the Planning Act 2008 to record the advice that is given in relation to an application or a potential application and to make this publicly available. Advice we have provided is recorded below together with the name of the person or organisation who asked for the advice and the project it relates to. The privacy of any other personal information will be protected in accordance with our Information Charter which you should view before sending information to the Planning Inspectorate.
Note that after a project page has been created for a particular application, any advice provided that relates to it will also be published under the ‘s51 advice’ tab on the relevant project page.
Advice given between between 1 October 2009 and 14 April 2015 has been archived. View the archived advice.
Enquiry
I have received the folllowing request to sign a petition/letter to you:
(https://www.change.org/p/andymccsma-gmail-com-add-your-signature-to-a-letter-to-the-planning-inspectorate-supporting-manston-airport-dco)
This seems to have been sent to me in error, as I do not believe that the application is capable of meeting the tests for acceptance which have been laid down by Parliament.
I am concerned at the suggestion that the Secretary of State may defer until the Examination stage any of the matters on which he is required to reach a conclusion prior to acceptance of the application. Those include, of course, not just the standard of the application (and accompaniments) but also if the scheme is, or forms part of, a nationally significant infrastructure project, requiring development consent.
If the Secretary of State has not reached a conclusion on these matters how can he lawfully accept the application for examination?
Could you kindly clarify if PINS has included items into the Acceptance stage that properly belong in the Examination stage, and if so which?
Does the wish of the applicant's supporters to give their views have any bearing on any decision that is required at this stage, please?
Advice given
The Planning Inspectorate (on behalf of the Secretary of State) cannot ‘defer’ any of the tests in s55 of the Planning Act 2008 until the Examination stage. What constitutes the Acceptance tests is a matter of fact, and it is those tests alone that were applied to the RSP’s 10 April 2018 submission.
Regarding correspondence from supporters of RSP’s proposals; the same principle applies to any comments made to the Inspectorate before an Acceptance decision is taken:
If you have sent comments about RSP’s Pre-application consultation, these can be considered in addition to the statutorily required Acceptance tests when making the decision about whether or not to accept the application. It will be for the decision maker (the Planning Inspectorate on behalf of the Secretary of State) to decide the weight to give to the views expressed based on the individual facts of the case.
If you have sent comments about the merits of the Proposed Development (eg setting out support for or objection to the principle of the Proposed Development) these cannot be considered at the Acceptance stage. If the application is accepted for examination, in order to make comments about the merits of the Proposed Development to an appointed Examining Authority, you will need to register as an Interested Party by making a Relevant Representation at the appropriate time. For more information about how and when you can have your say, please see our Advice Note 8.2: How to register to participate in an Examination: attachment 1
