Annual Monitoring Report 2008/09

1 Executive Summary

1.1 This is the fifth Annual Monitoring Report (AMR) to be prepared by Calderdale Council under the requirements of the Planning & Compulsory Purchase Act 2004 (the Act) and it covers the year between April 2008 and the end of March 2009. It contains information on the implementation of the Local Development Scheme (LDS) and the extent to which the aims and objectives of Policies within the Replacement Calderdale Unitary Development Plan (Adopted August 2006) were being met during the year under examination. It also contains the annual report on Core Indicators that the Government requires Local Authorities to monitor.

Key Aspects of the LDS during 2008/9

1.2 This AMR reports against the provisions of the LDS which was brought into effect in February 2008 and is viewable on the Calderdale Council website. However, due to the  new 2008 and 2009 Regulations, and progress to date on the LDF, significant changes are now required to the LDS to reflect the new milestones for the Core Strategy and Land Use Allocations Development Plan Documents (DPDs), and additional Supplementary Planning Documents (SPDs). 

1.3 In summary, the progress on documents to date is: -

  • Statement of Community Involvement: - this was formally Adopted by the Council in February 2008;

  • Core Strategy: - work commenced on the Core Strategy in January 2008. Issues and options Consultation was undertaken during November/January 2008/09; further significant evidence base work has been undertaken since this date;

  • Land allocations & Designations DPD: - work on this commenced in January 2008 at the same time as the Core Strategy. A "Call for Sites" was undertaken around Easter 2008, and submissions are still being accepted;

1.4 In addition, the Council are in the process of preparing two Supplementary Planning Documents (SPDs)

  • Halifax Town Centre and Piece Hall SPD: - a draft SPD has been prepared and is being consulted on during December 2009;

  • Holmes Road, Sowerby Bridge SPD:  - a draft SPD was prepared and consulted on April/June 2009;

1.5 Further details on progress to date and the milestones of each of these LDF documents (except the Holmes Road SPD which is not included in the current LDS) is provided in 4 ‘Delivery of Documents within the Local Development Scheme’.

What is happening outside the LDS?

REPLACEMENT CALDERDALE UNITARY DEVELOPMENT PLAN (2006)

1.6 The RCUDP came into effect on 25 August 2006. The Council received a Direction from the Secretary of State "saving" policies within the RCUDP for an indefinite period in August 2009. A full schedule detailing the "saved" policies is provided in 5 ‘Saved Plan ’.

Core Indicators

1.7 This AMR represents the 2nd annual report to collect and publish information against the revised set of national Core Output Indicators published by the government in 2008 (Regional Spatial Strategy & Local Development Framework - Core Output Indicators - Update 2/2008 (Communities and Local Government, July 2008)).

1.8 The main findings from the set of revised Core Indicators are: -

  • Housing completions (gross) fell significantly from the high levels of new housing recorded in preceding years. There were 596 new dwellings built in 2008/09, compared to 1,349 in 2007/08 and 1,424 in 2006/07. Despite being significantly lower however, this year's completions are still 146 dwellings above the average completion target of 450 per annum set out in the RCUDP.

  • Housing completions (net) ran below the RSS 2008 annual requirement of 670, achieving 537 net additions to the housing stock between 1st April 2008 and 31st March 2009;

  • The overall Housing requirement in the RCUDP to 2016 has already been exceeded during the period 2001-2009 (see Figure 3.1 ‘Housing Trajectory 2001 to 2016 based on RCUDP’). The overall requirement in RSS to 2026 is anticipated to be met by around 2021/22 (see Figure 3.2 ‘Housing Trajectory 2001 to 2026 based on RSS (2008)’);

  • Fewer affordable homes were built in 2008/09 with only 92 recorded properties in comparison to 183 in 2007/08. However with the significant fall in total new dwellings these figures highlight a relative increase of affordable units in comparison with the total new stock of housing built (15.4% in 2008/09 compared to 13.6% in 2007/08);

  • The proportion of housing completions on brownfield sites continues to exceed the RCUDP target of 80% and RSS 2008 target of 65%. In 2008/09 96.5% of new housing completions were on previously developed land. This high figure includes various sites previously in employment use, therefore the loss of land previously in employment use to residential continues;

  • Employment land development achieved 9,659 sq.m of new net B1a (office) floorspace, 250 sq.m of B1b (business) and 5,179 sq.m of B8 (storage and distribution). There was a net loss of 6,373 sq.m of B2 (general industry) floorspace due to demolitions;

  • There have been no significant retail developments in the district with only 294 sq.m of new net A1 (shops) floorspace built;

  • Waste sent to landfill has fallen to 55,590 tonnes in 2008/09, compared to 65,880 tonnes in 2007/08. This is partly down to an increase in incineration and recycling/composting, however the total waste arising has also fallen marginally from 88,311 tonnes in 2007/08 to 86,742 in this period.

  • There are still some improvements and new practices to be introduced to the monitoring process to provide further monitoring information for both the core output indicators and regional monitoring requirements;

1.9 Full details of all the core indicators, together with locally specific contextual indicators, are provided in 6 ‘Monitoring Indicators’.