Council shifts it's position

The City Council is signaling a shift in it's position on Sefton Park Meadows.

Campaigners have today received emails from Councillor Malcolm Kennedy Cabinet Member - Regeneration which indicate a shift the council's position over Sefton Park Meadows. Previously Mayor Anderson and Councillor Kennedy have insisted that this land would was not green land within the Conservation Area of Sefton Park, and that the Unitary Development Plan of 2002 did not apply.

Councillor Kennedy has today with this new email (copied below in full) admitted that the land does in fact fall under the Unitary Development Plan. He also goes on to say that Liverpool is not obliged under national government policy to build more houses than it is already planning to build on brownfield sites. There is no need to build on this green field site.

There are some however issues of concern emerging from this email:-

1. Councillor Kennedy seems to imply that they need to sell this capital asset to cover revenue funds - I think that this would be illegal. 
2. Councillor Kennedy writes "Neither the decision to dispose nor the sale of the land constitutes the granting of a planning permission." and yet at the Cabinet meeting on Friday he was clearly saying that the land would be sold subject to planning permission.

There are issues that we still need to raise with Councillor Kennedy and Mayor Anderson..

1. We need confirmation from them that Sefton Park Meadows is part of the Sefton Park Conservation area and that they would respect the rules about development in a conservation area.
2. We need some clarification about how they would plan to use the money from the sale.
3. We need to them to confirm that they would not sell the land if planning permission was unlikely to be forthcoming.


What follows is the email that several campaigners have today received from Councillor Malcolm Kennedy


Thank you for providing me with this opportunity to explain the context to the news concerning the Park Avenue site that has appeared in the media and which was the subject of a Mayoral recommendation report to Cabinet on Friday 22nd March.

The City Council is as you will be aware facing enormous financial challenges which will make it increasingly difficult and in some instances impossible to maintain the services and facilities, especially the non-statutory assets, that many people enjoy such as Parks and recreational areas.

At the same time The City Council is required by the Government’s National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF) to prepare a new Local Plan which will replace the UDP.  The Local Plan must meet Liverpool's objectively assessed needs for new development and bring forward viable sites on which development can be delivered.

Moreover there is an express requirement in the NPPF to deliver more housing and in order to ensure we comply with this, the Government require that we have a minimum of a five year supply of deliverable housing sites. 

This week we have published a draft of the 2012 Update of the Liverpool Strategic Housing Land Availability Assessment (SHLAA).  As it currently stands, the draft SHLAA update shows that Liverpool only just meets the minimum 5 year supply measure.  This is unfortunately the case because while the City does possess a lot of brownfield sites which could physically accommodate development, far too many are not sufficiently viable to meet the 5 year supply criteria.

Through no fault of its own Liverpool is both a victim of recession and government policies which will force us to make difficult choices.  It is important to me, the Mayor, and the City to keep these to a minimum.

To this end in the summer the City Council will begin the preparation of a new Local Plan. The new Local Plan must be based upon a new comprehensive City wide review of all sites and policies, including new and emerging ideas for development like land at Park Avenue, which are capable of delivering development. It will also need to take account of the best information we have on matters such as what potential sites we have, as is set out in the SHLAA.

The Council will be embarking on an extensive and inclusive engagement and consultation process on the new Local Plan later this year. In the meantime, any potential planning application submitted for development at Park Avenue in advance of this process would be determined in the light of existing Unitary Development Plan Policies, our emerging Core Strategy/Local Plan Policy and the Government’s National Planning Policy Framework.

These policies allow for material harm, or loss, of open space to be considered and weighed against benefits secured, together with other issues such as the function and use of the open space.

With this in mind any particulars for the sale of the Park Avenue site will make it very clear that the any future owner seeking planning permission to develop the site would need to satisfy Policy OE11 and others from the UDP.  Neither the decision to dispose nor the sale of the land constitutes the granting of a planning permission.

With relation to the Mayor's Pledges you must take into consideration more than this site I. Isolation but the plans for Everton Park, North Liverpool's Greenprint for Growth, and the £6 million we are already investing in the roads around Sefton Park.

As for my views being extraordinary given I am a local resident all I can say is that it is not unusual for people to differ in their views. As a Cabinet Member I have to take a longer term view in the interests of the city as a whole than simply the area around where I live.

Regards

Malcolm Kennedy