Maria Caulfield, Member of Parliament for Lewes, has welcomed the news that the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities has intervened against Lewes District Council’s planning department.
On 09:00 on 8th May 2024 Lewes District Council were designated under S62A of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990. The result of this is that applications for major development (typically defined as more than 10 houses) can be made directly to the planning inspectorate rather than applying through Lewes District Council’s planning department.
This decision has been made as the Minister of State for Housing is not satisfied with the performance of Lewes District Council in relation to the quality of decision making on planning applications for major development.
Lewes District Council is now required to prepare on action plan for approval by the Department identifying actions that address the areas of weakness that led to the Council being designated.
Commenting, Maria Caulfield MP said:
“It is extremely disappointing that the Lib Dems, Greens and Labour on LDC’s planning committee have failed in their duty to the residents of Lewes District. There lack of a local plan means housing development across Seaford, Newhaven and Lewes is being dictated by developers and not building the housing we need locally.
With developers now able to go direct to the planning inspector, this will only exacerbate the problem but it is clear that the council has no functioning planning department and that the coalition of chaos of the Greens, Lib Dem's and Labour are failing the people of the Lewes District. They need to get their Local Plan in place so we can protect our green spaces from development once and for all . I hope that they will now work with the government on their action plan so that the planning department can be improved as quickly as possible.”