Agricultural Pollution in UK Law

One is looking for something which does not simply define the project, or describe its merits, but which sets the criteria by which it is to be determined by the authority responsible for approving it. The purpose is to ensure that the decision on development consent is not constrained by earlier plans which have not themselves been assessed for likely significant environmental effects.

In relation to an ordinary planning proposal, the development plan is an obvious example of such a plan or programme. Even if as in the UK it is not prescriptive, it nonetheless defines the criteria by which the application is to be determined, and thus sets the framework for the grant of consent. However, no one would for that reason regard the application as a plan or programme falling within the definition.

If, instead of "required", one must read the word "regulated", the question arises what it means. Is it sufficient that legislative, regulatory or administrative provisions grant powers to some authority wide enough to permit a plan or programme to be prepared? Or must such provisions actually refer to a possibility that such a plan or programme will be prepared? Or must they specify points and/or conditions that such a plan or programme, if prepared, must address and/or fulfil?

The very concept of a framework, rules, criteria or policy, which guide the outcome of an application for development consent, as a plan which requires SEA even before development project EIA, presupposes that the plan will have an effect on the approach which has to be considered at the development consent stage, and that that effect will be more than merely persuasive by its quality and detail, but guiding and telling because of its stated role in the hierarchy of relevant considerations.

The sifting process whereby a plan is arrived at does not require public consultation at each sift. This whole process has been set out in considerable detail in the many published documents for those who wished to pursue it, but it did not all have to be in an SEA.

I am writing to you today to highlight our commitment in the coalition agreements where we very clearly set out our intention to rapidly abolish Regional Strategies and return decision making powers on housing and planning to local councils. Consequently, decisions on housing supply (including the provision of travellers’ sites) will rest with Local Planning Authorities without the framework of regional numbers and plans.

Thus I accept that the test under paragraph 55 of NPPF is different from the test under Annex A, paragraph 12(iii) of PPS7. In particular I do not accept Mr Harwood QC's submission that the NPPF requires that the proposal is economically viable. As Mr White QC points out this is a temporary permission lasting for only 3 years. The NPPF test simply requires a judgment of whether the proposed agricultural enterprise has an essential need for a worker to be there or near there.