Issue - meetings

Erection of rural enterprise dwelling and associated work

LOCAL MEMBER: Councillor Arwyn Herald Roberts

Link to relevant background documents

DECISION: To approve the application contrary to the recommendation. Consequently, the application will be referred to a cooling-off period before being returned to the Committee for a final decision.

Construction of a rural enterprise house and associated work.

a)    The Planning Manager highlighted that this was a full application to construct a rural enterprise house and ancillary works. The house would be in the form of a dormer bungalow and would measure 115 square metres and would include a porch, office, toilet, multi-purpose room, sitting room, dining room and kitchen on the ground floor and three bedrooms and a bathroom on the first floor.

The farm was described as one that extends to 84ha; the applicant owns 59ha and rents 24.3ha on a long-term tenancy, with 84ha being used as grazing land, 20ha for silage (one cut) and 8ha for silage (two cuts) and used as grazing land. The farm includes 118 cows with calves, 120 sheep, and 4 sows and 12 boars and 27 piglets. The applicant is also in partnership with Natural Resources Wales for grazing 1,618ha of common land.

A Design Statement and the business' accounts were submitted as a part of the application.

The application was submitted to the Planning Committee at the request of the local member.

It was highlighted that the site would be beyond the farmyard and outside any development boundary as defined by the Local Development Plan (LDP) with Policy PCYFF 1 stating, outside development boundaries, that proposals will be refused unless they are in accordance with other policies in the local development plan, national policies or if the proposal shows that their location in the countryside is essential. It was reiterated, as a result of the need to maintain and protect the countryside, that very special justification was required to approve the construction of new houses there, and therefore, new houses in the countryside were only approved in very exceptional circumstances. The exceptional circumstances under which new houses in the countryside could be approved are included in Technical Advice Note 6: Planning for Sustainable Rural Communities - July 2010 (TAN6) prepared by the Welsh Assembly Government, and the associated Technical Guidance document.

Reference was made to paragraph 4.3.1 of TAN6, which notes that one of the few circumstances in which a new isolated residential development in the open countryside can be justified is when accommodation is required to enable a rural enterprise worker to live at, or close to, his workplace. Whether this is essential in any particular case will depend on the needs of the rural enterprise concerned and not on the personal preference or circumstances of any of the individuals involved. TAN 6 also notes that Local Planning Authorities should carefully assess applications for planning permission for new rural enterprise dwellings to ensure that a departure from the usual policy of restricting development in the open countryside can be fully justified by reference to robust supporting evidence.

The applicant states that the business has existed for over 3 years. Business accounts for the previous three years were submitted to show that the business has made a profit in 3 of the last 4 years. Nevertheless, it appeared that  ...  view the full minutes text for item 12