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Agenda, decisions and minutes

Venue: Council Chamber, County Hall

Contact: Graham Warrington  Tel: 07393 001211; E-Mail:  graham.warrington@oxfordshire.gov.uk

Link: video link to the meeting

Items
No. Item

18/21

Declarations of Interest - see guidance note opposite

Minutes:

With regard to Items 6 and 7 Councillor Constance advised that although she had previously chaired meetings of the Minerals and Waste Cabinet Advisory Committee she had no individual knowledge of either item prior to reading the officer report and therefore intended to participate in discussion and voting on both items.

19/21

Minutes pdf icon PDF 245 KB

To approve the minutes of the meetings held on 19 April 2021 and 18 May 2021            (PN3) and to receive information arising from them.

Additional documents:

Minutes:

The minutes of the meetings held on 19 April 2021 and 18 May 2021 were approved and signed.

 

20/21

Petitions and Public Address

Currently council meetings are taking place in-person (not virtually) with social distancing operating in the venues.  However, members of the public who wish to speak at this meeting can attend the meeting ‘virtually’ through an online connection.  Places at the meeting are very limited due to the requirements of social distancing.  While you can ask to attend the meeting in person, you are strongly encouraged to attend ‘virtually’ to minimise the risk of Covid-19 infection.

 

Please also note that in line with current government guidance all attendees are strongly encouraged to take a lateral flow test in advance of the meeting.

 

Normally requests to speak at this public meeting are required by 9 am on the day preceding the published date of the meeting. However, during the current situation and to facilitate these new arrangements we are asking that requests to speak are submitted by no later than 9am four working days before the meeting i.e. 9 am on Tuesday 31 August 2021. Requests to speak should be sent to graham.warrington@oxfordshire.gov.uk.  You will be contacted by the officer regarding arrangements for speaking.

 

If you ask to attend in person, the officer will also advise you regarding Covid-19 safety at the meeting.  If you are speaking ‘virtually’, you may submit a written statement of your presentation to ensure that if the technology fails, then your views can still be taken into account. A written copy of your statement can be provided no later than 9 am 2 working days before the meeting i.e. Thursday 2 September 2021. Written submissions should be no longer than 1 A4 sheet.

 

Minutes:

 

 

Speaker

 

 

Item

 

Roger Thomas

Richard Dudding

County Councillor Bob Johnston

Nick Dunn

James Lodge

 

 

)
) 6. Serving of the Prohibition Order

) (ROMP) at Thrupp Farm and

) Thrupp Lane, Radley

)

 

Roger Thomas

Richard Dudding

County Councillor Bob Johnston

Nick Dunn

James Lodge

 

 

)

) 7. Application No. MW.0075/20 –

) Thrupp Lane, Radley

)

)

 

 

 

 

21/21

Serving of the Prohibition Order for the Review of the Mineral Planning Permission (ROMP) at Thrupp Farm and Thrupp Lane, Radley pdf icon PDF 593 KB

Report by the Assistant Director Strategic Infrastructure and Planning (PN6).

 

As resolved at the meeting of the Planning and Regulation Committee on 8th March 2021, the report provides an update on the progress with regard to the work on the application and Environmental Statement for the review of conditions for the ROMP areas DD1 and DD2.  It is recommended that the Planning and Regulation Committee’s conclusion from its meeting on 9th September 2019 (Minute 39/19) that mineral working on the Radley ROMP site has permanently ceased be updated to reflect new information demonstrating an ongoing intention to continue mineral working on the Radley ROMP site and that the unserved Prohibition Order is revoked. 

 

It is RECOMMENDED that the Planning & Regulation Committee’s previous conclusion from its meeting on 9th September 2019 (Minute 39/19) that mineral working on the Radley ROMP site has permanently ceased be rescinded and that the Prohibition Order of that date but not yet served is revoked.

 

Additional documents:

Minutes:

As resolved at the meeting of the Planning and Regulation Committee on 8th March 2021, the Committee now considered a report (PN6) providing an update on progress with regard to the work on the application and Environmental Statement for the review of conditions for the ROMP areas DD1 and DD2.  

 

Having presented the report Mr Periam confirmed that be understood a partial order could be served.

 

Speaking on behalf the Friends of Radley Lakes Roger Thomas advised that although members of the Committee had received a number of detailed papers about this item which all looked very complicated and technical it was in fact very simple. The Radley ROMP site was covered by a number of separate mineral planning permissions, granted at different times between 1954 and 1992. Those different areas had different histories with some worked out many years ago, but never restored and others, where extraction had yet to even start - such as the Nyatt site, which was the subject of Item 7 on this agenda. Radley Parish Council was asking that a Prohibition Order be served on just two of these old permissions where extraction in both areas had been completed by 1979 at the latest. One had then been filled with waste but never properly restored and so a Prohibition Order would clarify the planning position and enable the County Council to require timely restoration.

 

The County Council’s was that a Prohibition Order could not be served on only part of a ROMP site whereas Government guidance said exactly the opposite and indeed went on to say that in some circumstances, probably including this one, there was a statutory duty on the authority to serve an order covering only part of a ROMP site. Obviously there had been some kind of misunderstanding over the legal position and he had hoped to have been able to discuss this with county officers before this meeting, but that hadn’t been possible. The Committee obviously would not want to ask officers to do anything which wasn’t supportable in law, so in his opinion there were two possible ways forward. One to amend its resolution so that the Council’s intention to serve a Prohibition Order on areas where future extraction was planned was revoked, while maintaining that intention to serve on the two areas where extraction had definitely ceased. The other approach would be to defer a decision to allow time for discussion between officers and interested parties in order to resolve apparently conflicting views of the legal position. This all mattered because if a Prohibition Order was not served on the land which he had referred to above then restoration of those areas might not take place until 2043 -   around 65 years after the completion of extraction and that quite simply was not how mineral planning was supposed to work.

 

Councillor Constance asked Mr Thomas to clarify the emphasis he had made regarding the cessation of work in those 2 areas in 1979 and that  ...  view the full minutes text for item 21/21

22/21

Use of the existing processing plant site to process sand and gravel from the nearby 94 acre Review of Old Mineral Permission (ROMP) site (Ref: DD1 and DD2), the installation of a field conveyor system to the site boundary and ancillary facilities for the transportation, storage and processing of the sand and gravel and the use of an existing haul road - Thrupp Lane, Radley, Abingdon, Oxon, OX14 3NG.- Applicant: H Tuckwell And Sons Ltd - Application no: MW.0075/20 pdf icon PDF 756 KB

Report by the Assistant Director of Strategic Infrastructure and Planning (PN7).

 

The report sets out the proposed development for which planning permission has been applied under application no. MW.0075/20. Having considered the application against the development plan and other material considerations including consultation responses and representations received the officer recommendation is that subject to the completion of a section 106 Agreement for the provision of a permissive path and to conditions to be determined by the Assistant Director of Strategic Infrastructure and Planning it be approved.

 

It is RECOMMENDED that subject to the applicant first entering into a section 106 agreement for the provision of a permissive path to provide a link between Thrupp Lane and the disused railway line as part of the restoration of the site that planning application no. MW.0075/20 be APPROVED subject to conditions to be determined by the Assistant Director for Strategic Infrastructure and Planning to include those set out in Annex 1 to the report PN7.

 

Additional documents:

Minutes:

The Committee considered an application (PN7) setting out proposed use of the existing processing plant site to process sand and gravel from the nearby 94 acre Review of Old Mineral Permission (ROMP) site along with installation of a field conveyor system to the site boundary and ancillary facilities for the transportation, storage and processing of the sand and gravel and the use of the existing haul road.

 

Mr Periam presented the report.

 

Roger Thomas accepted that, if the Nyatt mineral was going to be extracted, then it would need to be processed but there were, though, some big unanswered questions about this application. Firstly, why was this permission needed now? Extraction wasn’t planned to start until perhaps 2025 so why was this permission needed so far in advance? To an onlooker, it didn’t make sense and the officer report did not help much in that regard. In due course, the Committee would be considering a ROMP application for modern planning conditions to cover the Nyatt extraction. That application had to be accompanied by an Environmental Statement covering all the environmental impacts of the Nyatt quarrying, including processing but, because the processing arrangements were being dealt with separately, they wouldn’tt be covered by the Statement which again made no sense. Oxfordshire County Council had requested an Environmental Statement for the present application, but as Tuckwell had successfully appealed that the environmental impacts of this application hadn’t been fully assessed. Arrangements for extraction and processing were, in effect, a single operation so why were they being considered in isolation from each other? This was bound to cause problems as the conveyor only ran to the edge of Tuckwell’s land so how would material be moved from the quarry to the start of the conveyor, a distance of around a kilometre? All this meant that it was impossible to see things in the round so how could the public be assured that, in terms of the environment and the community, this was the best option for processing? An Environmental Statement would have looked at alternatives but this application did not do that. If the decision was to grant permission then it should be made very clear that the permission was entirely without prejudice to future decisions on the best processing arrangements and all options for processing needed to be reviewed, once the full ROMP application for the quarrying and its Environmental Statement were available.

 

Speaking for Radley Parish Council Richard Dudding advised that if minerals were to be extracted in the ROMP area the Parish Council’s view had always been that the Tuckwells yard would be the most suitable location for servicing the operations and processing the minerals once extracted. Nevertheless. They had concerns about the application and a year ago had registered an objection to it. Since then there had been developments namely that it had become clearer that Tuckwells had a genuine intention to extract minerals at Nyatt. Secondly county officers have said that this application for processing should be  ...  view the full minutes text for item 22/21

23/21

Progress Report on Minerals and Waste Site Monitoring and Enforcement pdf icon PDF 217 KB

Report by Assistant Director for Strategic Infrastructure and Planning (PN8)

 

This report updates members on the regular monitoring of minerals and waste planning permissions for the financial year 1st April 2020 to 31st March 2021 and on the progress of enforcement cases.

 

It is RECOMMENDED that the Schedule of Compliance Monitoring Visits at Annex 1 to the report (PN8) and the Schedule of Enforcement Cases at Annex 2 to the report (PN8) be noted.

 

Additional documents:

Minutes:

The Committee considered a report (PN8) on the regular monitoring of minerals and waste planning permissions for the financial year 1st April 2020 to 31st March 2021 and on progress with regard to enforcement cases.

 

Neal Richmond presented the report together with a detailed résumé of the work of the enforcement team.

 

RESOLVED: that the Schedule of Compliance Monitoring Visits set out at Annex 1 to the report PN8 and the Schedule of Enforcement Cases at Annex 2 also to PN8 be noted