Developers face big rise in planning advice fees
DEVELOPERS will have to pay out up to £4,000 for Solihull Council advice at the start of the planning process, after it was agreed to significantly increase fees.
The planning department can already charge for support provided prior to a formal application being submitted.
This week a new regime was approved, after officers argued that the current sums didn’t reflect the amount of work required and were well below what many neighbouring councils were charging.
Rates are determined by the size of the development and the larger the scheme, the more that they will have to hand over.
According to figures, plans for more than 100 homes will see the charge more than triple from £1,271 to £4,000, while at the bottom end of the scale five homes or less will now cost £600, up from £196 at present.
For commercial developments, charges will now range from £800, for up to 1,000 sqm, to £3,000 for 10,000 sqm or more.
Kim Allen, from the planning department, said: “Advice over time is becoming more in-depth, there’s more issues to consider and it’s quite clear today that the pre-application charges that we currently have don’t cover our costs in terms of officer time.”
Cllr Max McLoughlin (Green, Shirley South) said: “The reality is that currently the way we’re operating we’re technically subsidising developers by offering them expertise and the time, that is being paid for by the local authority.
“The true cost should be picked up by (them). We all benefit from better development but the biggest beneficiary is the one who should be making that contribution.”
Cllr Glenis Slater, leader of the Liberal Democrat group and a member of the planning committee, backed the change.
She said that judging by what other councils had been asking for, Solihull had been “under-charging for quite some time.”
Unlike planning application fees – which are set at national level – councils do have leeway to fix their own charges at the pre-application stage, although these should only be appropriate to cover costs.
The current regime has been in place in Solihull since 2010 and up until now the fees have risen each year in line with inflation.