You can write to or e-mail the Planning Officer dealing with the case, or write to the Assistant Director-Regeneration with your comments. Comments may be made by anyone, regardless of whether they were notified individually. We will consider all representations, providing they relate to relevant planning issues, what we call ‘material considerations’. We cannot consider issues such as loss of property value, private disputes between neighbours, matters covered by leases or covenants, the impact of construction work and competition between firms. We acknowledge comments by post and they are available for the public to read at Roman House.

Taking your views into account
The Planning Officer dealing with the application will form a professional view on the acceptability or otherwise of the proposal. This may involve assessing responses from other people consulted as well as comments from local residents. Many decisions are taken by officers, but if the application is to be decided by the Planning Control Committee, a full report is made to the committee before it makes a decision.

Planning Control Committee
The meetings are held in public, every three weeks on a Thursday evening starting at 6pm in the Council Chamber, The Council House, Corporation Street. We publish the Committee's agenda five clear working days in advance.
To further enhance our online services, the Planning Control Committee meetings are now broadcast live over the internet - Webcast - It is also possible to view the webcasts of previous meetings, the first Planning Control Committee to be webcast was on 29/9/05
If you comment on a planning application which then goes before the committee, there may be an opportunity to speak at the meeting, our acknowledgement letter to your comments gives further details.

Public speaking at Planning Control Committee 
The Council now allows two objectors to speak in public about any application being reported to the meeting. If more than two have expressed a wish to speak, they must get together to choose a spokesperson because of the limit on the numbers of speakers. Any speech must be limited to three minutes and is timed by a Committee Clerk. The applicant or their representative may also speak in support when someone speaks in objection, or if their application is being recommended for refusal.

All comments must be limited to planning issues and must directly relate to the application under consideration.

If you would like to speak at the meeting, please notify Co-ordination Services within two days of receiving the acknowledgement letter. If the item eventually goes before the Planning Control Committee, we will inform you of the date of the meeting, but, because circumstances can change at short notice, we strongly advise you to ring a week before the proposed date.
We cannot accept notification of a wish to speak later than one week before the meeting because of the requirement to notify the applicant. In this way, they can then choose if they wish to reply to any objections.
Please contact Co-ordination Services if you would like more information.

Notifying you about the decision
It is not possible to respond individually to comments, but, if you have commented on an application, we will inform you about the Council’s decision.

If you are not happy with the decision, unfortunately as an objector you do not have a right of appeal. If however an appeal is made by the applicant, who does have that right, we will notify you and give you the opportunity to make further representations to the Government Planning Inspector dealing with the appeal.

Not happy with our service?
The Council has a complaints procedure; this examines our process for dealing with an application, not the decision itself. We will use the information from complaint outcomes to continually improve our services. If you wish to make a complaint, contact
Co-ordination Services who will send you the necessary form and accompanying notes.

back to top


Return to Planning Services Homepage