The gritty reality of the planning committee

COMMENT I have spent countless hours sitting in planning committee meetings over a career spanning close to 30 years as a construction professional. Each committee meeting is the moment when several years’ worth of design, effort, struggle, coordination, dialogue, thinking and planning come into sharp focus. It is the point in time that the intellectual, strategic and financial investment by the many hands and organisations made in readiness for the ensuing phases of detail development and realisation hinges on obtaining a majority vote in favour, from a select group of people who have a distant relationship with each project. For those unfamiliar with their format, these meetings are typically, but not exclusively, held in a grand council chamber starting at around 7.30pm with a cut-off at around 10.30pm – well into your personal time. Centre stage, the committee and representatives of the planning and legal team, numbering around 10-15 people, huddle around a grand table. Encircling this are the assembled team members and clients of the projects that have been put forward for consideration. Alongside, objectors and interested parties gather in groups. All attention is focused on the committee and the committee chair, who often enter the chamber last, once the audience and interested parties are settled. Democratic process The “committee” itself is a democratic decision-making process conducted by elected representatives and governed by planning law, taking into account a vast array of material and evidence submitted by the applicant teams. Each application can only be considered if it has been validated, and it can only achieve validation if it meets the standards of information required for the authority to consider it. Meeting the standards of a planning application entails the culmination of many hundreds of thousands of hours invested by the applicant teams in consultation with various authorities, community groups and statutory bodies. And behind the planning officer’s report of recommendation sit hundreds of other reports comprising hundreds of thousands of pages of data, drawings, text and so on. Back to the committee meeting, and almost every person in that room not sitting around the top table has very little part to play in the meeting. They are simply there to witness the discussion of the committee, which revolves around the material submitted previously, except for a three-minute representation delivered by elected representatives of both sides of each application – those against followed by those for. As a consequence, the theatrical tension in the room is palpable, and continues to build through the particulars of each application. Ideological struggle The planning system represents an increasingly fraught tussle of ideologies, which is played out in these committee meetings like something between a courtroom drama and an amateur local theatrical production. So far, so obvious, perhaps – a cumbersome, bureaucratically lengthy and costly process with no guaranteed outcomes. However, it is worth considering that the committee chamber is also a workplace and, as such, the meeting should be governed by the same rules of engagement and respect of any workplace. It should be strictly conducted to prevent intimidation, abuse, bullying or prejudicial behaviour, which all too often these meetings experience to varying degrees. Why should the rules of engagement in the everyday simply dissipate when people come together for a committee meeting. It is also worth bearing in mind that these meetings are often attended by young, impressionable people starting out on their career. What standards are we setting, therefore? Coincidentally, I read with interest a recent article by George Monbiot on the Guardian website – entitled From the playground to politics, it’s the bullies who rule. But it doesn’t have to be this way – which posits that at every stage of our lives we are forced into destructive competition, which in turn holds the best people back. He suggests that “we don’t need aggressive people to organise our lives for us” to be able to achieve “innovation, insight or foresight”. He adds: “In fact, all can be inhibited by someone throwing their weight around.” Might this also be true of the way in which we conduct ourselves in the committee chamber? Threatening behaviour In numerous committees, I have witnessed the proceedings descend into a raucous mob rule of intimidatory jeering and catcalling, of raised voices, name-calling, angry outbursts, interruptions and techniques clearly intended to upend the meeting. In what other context would this unabated threatening behaviour be allowed to happen? And if I have found this to be a stressful and deeply unnerving experience, I am sure others have too. Chairing a planning committee meeting is a deeply challenging responsibility, but a necessary one. It falls to the chair to ensure the committee is briefed on the intricacies of the application and to guide the discussions to create space for views and opinions to be aired, while simultaneously quelling disruptive behaviour which might result in those who continuously interrupt being banished from the session. Obviously, nobody wants this outcome. The planning system has a deeply complex and continuously evolving framework, requiring all parties to be fully conversant with the policies which govern it, and which shape the way applications are brought forward. It isn’t perfect, but it is the only one we currently have. Joe Morris is founding director of Morris+Company Photo © Morris+Company