Local Development Plan - the process

Submission and examination

Caerphilly County Borough Council submitted the Caerphilly Local Development Plan (LDP) to the Welsh Assembly Government on 7 October 2009.

Planning Inspector Mr Alwyn B Nixon BSc MRTPI has been appointed to conduct the Examination to determine whether the LDP is sound. His role will be to consider all the evidence and to produce a report for the Council giving his recommendations for action. His report will be binding on the council.

The Programme Officer

The examination process is to be administered by the Programme Officer, Barbara Prosser, who is independent of the council and will work directly with the inspector.

The Programme Officer will be working 2 days a week initially (Wednesday and Thursday), and her contact details are as follows:

Barbara Prosser
Programme Officer
Ty Penallta
Tredomen Park
Ystrad Mynach
Hengoed, CF82 7PG
Tel: 01443 866761
Email: LDPprogrammeofficer@caerphilly.gov.uk

Exploratory Meeting

An Exploratory Meeting was called by the inspector and took place on Tuesday 8 December 2009 at the council's headquarters, Ty Penallta. The Exploratory Meeting was called to discuss the five issues of concern to the Inspector:

the implications of certain of the Council's proposed Focussed Changes, for which no planning rationale has been put forward and which may have implications for the soundness of the plan

matters concerning the target for delivery of affordable housing by the Plan and how the Plan seeks to achieve this

site availability and cross-border matters concerning delivery of Plan proposal WM1.1 Cwmbargoed Washery - possible site for waste management facility serving more than one local authority

The extent to which the 2006-based Household Projections produced by the Welsh Assembly Government have been taken into account by the Council in its submission for Examination, and whether the submitted evidence base, including Supplementary Paper 1 (September 2009) to Background Paper 6, considers sufficiently thoroughly the implications of the new projections for the Plan;

The steps needed to assess the implications of the Areas Susceptible to Surface Water Flooding Maps issued by the Environment Agency on 3 November 2009 for sites allocated for development in the submitted Plan.

Pre-Hearing Meeting (PHM)

The Inspector has held a Pre-Hearing Meeting prior to the examination hearings. This was held at Ty Penallta, Caerphilly County Borough Council's main headquarters in Ystrad Mynach. The PHM took place on Thursday 4 March at 10am.

The purpose of the Pre-Hearing Meeting was to explain and discuss procedural and administrative matters relating to the management of the examination, including the matters and issues to be examined, the programme for the hearings and the participants, the methods of dealing with representations and other relevant matters. The content and merits of the LDP and the representations were not discussed at the pre-hearing meeting.