Half of councils do not have the capacity to monitor compliance with conditions after taking enforcement action, according to new research.#planning #planningenforcementhttps://t.co/yXsYmZsM6O pic.twitter.com/cf3Ati4o4A
— Planning Magazine (@PlanningMag) November 29, 2022
The finding comes from a Royal Town Planning Institute (RTPI) survey into the scale and nature of resourcing challenges faced by council enforcement teams.The RTPI collected responses from 133 enforcement officers representing approximately one third of local authorities in England.It reported that, “while 50 per cent of survey respondents answered their local authority did monitor compliance of conditions, almost all of the interviewees reported difficulties in doing this”.It concluded: ”[Authorities] are now largely reactive, relying on members of the public to alert them to non-compliance”.“Many councils experience people repeatedly carrying out serious unauthorised development, but these cases are dissimilar and warrant different responses. Lack of resourcing inhibits local authorities from taking direct action, unless there is a political will, and a central government pot of money is widely supported as a means to resolve this”.The RTPI survey found that funding and staffing were two of the biggest issues facing councils. The RTPI found 80 per cent of respondents reported not having enough enforcement officers to carry out their workload, 89 per cent said their councils currently experienced a backlog of enforcement cases, and 70 per cent that their authority struggled to recruit enforcement officers in the past five years.The results chime with data Planning collected as part of our research into the 50 biggest planning authorities, when we found a 12.2 per cent median drop in the number of enforcement notices issued in the two years to March 2022 compared to the two previous years.This problem came to a head in Gloucester this week with reports that the city council has 38 ongoing cases and no dedicated enforcement officers.The report’s author, Madeleine Bauer, said: “Long term under-resourcing combined with the accumulation of cases during the pandemic has resulted in backlogs and low staff morale. “Moreover, the lack of resources both within enforcement teams as well as in the appeals system and the courts systems is responsible for large delays within the system.“The service provided to the public has significantly deteriorated”.Bauer added: “This undermines the planning system as a whole and negatively affects members of the public who rely on its integrity.”
