We were very pleased to learn that Robert Jenrick, Secretary of State for Housing, has exercised his powers under Article 31 of the Town and Country Planning Act 2015 and issued a Direction preventing the Mayor from granting planning permission for the redevelopment of the Stag Brewery site whilst the Secretary of State considers whether to ‘call-in’ these planning applications for his own determination.
An Article 31 Directive does not mean that Secretary of State has decided to call in these applications. It simply prevents planning permission from being granted whilst he and the National Planning Casework Unit, which advises him, consider the matter. Nor does it prevent the Mayor from holding a public representation hearing or from making his decision whether to approve planning permission or not. (This may seem confusing but there is a difference between the planning authority (here the Mayor) resolving to approve planning permission and the issuing of the planning permission itself (sometimes referred to as the ‘grant’) which, with large developments such as this, usually happens sometime later when the important section 106 agreement, setting out the agreed financial contributions/other measures to mitigate the impact of the development, has been finalised.) The Secretary of State can call a matter in any time before planning permission is issued.
It is rare for the Secretary of State to call in a planning application for his own determination and he only does so when there are matters of national significance at stake. We believe that there is the case here and MBCG, together with a number of other organisations and individuals, wrote back in the Autumn requesting that these applications be called in. The MBCG is pursuing this further with the National Planning Casework Unit and will keep you informed of any developments.
If, the Mayor decides to approve the enlarged scheme, we will be asking local residents to write to the Secretary of State to use his powers to call in the decision and hold a planning inquiry. At this stage, we still hope that the Mayor will see sense and ask the developer to drop the current plans and work with the community to produce a revised plan.