Cllr’s anger over lack of notice for Danehill meet

THE COUNCIL has refuted claims by a borough councillor that residents have been treated shoddily over a planning application in Earley.

Hawkedon Liberal Democrat Clive Jones said that he felt that Wokingham Borough Council had slipped the development of the former AutoTrader building at Danehill onto the agenda of Wednesday’s planning committee meeting without informing residents, denying them the chance to speak.

The meeting is due to take place at Shute End in Wokingham from 7pm and affected residents can air their concerns or support as part of the deliberation process.

However, the council said that due process had been carried out and everyone who had contacted the council at the application stage was notified of the date of the meeting.

The proposals are for 76 flats. It is the third time that plans for the site have been considered by the committee – it had been previously turned down for being too large a development as more than 120 flats had been mooted.

Cllr Jones told The Wokingham Paper: “The original application was for 126 flat and that was rejected. An appeal was rejected. This new proposal is for 76 flats. Fifty residents wrote to the council to say, ‘We don’t want this’.

“We told people how to object to the proposals via our Focus leaflets. We told planning officers to check the water table as there is a stream nearby and the flats will have an underground car park. They’ve taken no notice of that. None whatsoever.”

He added that residents had had only a week’s notice of the planning meeting, something he felt was “appalling”.

“They’re not giving residents any notice. I think it’s a shabby way to treat residents. They know exactly what they are doing, it’s just not on.”

But Wokingham Borough Council defended its position.

Marcia Head, service manager, said: “The application at Auto Trader House Danehill has been treated no differently to any other application. When a planning application is submitted to the council, under our statutory obligations we have to notify neighbours, which we have done for this application.

“If an application is due to be considered by the Planning Committee everyone who made representations on it is notified of the date of the meeting. They are also informed of the recommendation within the report, for example recommended for approval or refusal. They can register to speak at the committee meeting should they wish to do so.

“The Planning Committee agenda is finalised and published the week before the meeting. Only a small proportion of applications are considered by the Planning Committee and the council always aims to report these applications to the first available meeting. The invitation to speak at the meeting to those who made representation on the application is sent out at the earliest opportunity following publication of the agenda – this is the normal statutory process. This application at Auto Trader House Danehill has followed this usual statutory process.”

The Wokingham Paper will report from the meeting in our issue of May 17.