Issue - meetings

The Director of Regeneration and Place updated the Committee on the findings of the Planning Review, which begun in February 2017 and concluded in June 2017.

It was highlighted to the Committee that:

·  The Council had commissioned iESE to undertake a review of the planning service and they undertook the following:

o  Shadowing of some planning staff

o  Interviews with all planning staff

o  Interviews with local authority stakeholders, such as Kent County Council and Swale Borough Council

o  Interviews with developers and service users

o  Member workshop

o  Parish Councillor interviews

·  iESE presented their findings to the Corporate Leadership Team (CLT) on 9 May 2017 and following that to the Chairmen of this Committee and Planning Committee on 19 June 2017 and the Vice-Chairmen of these committees on 22 June 2017. Planning staff were then presented the findings and recommendations from iESE’s draft report on 5 July 2017.

·  iESE had suggested improvements could be made to three key areas: staffing structures, systems and processes, and culture and behaviour.

·  Based on the evidence from iESE, especially the feedback from housebuilders and developers, there was a need to separate the high value/low volume work from that of the low value/high volume work. This would give more expert and experienced staffing resource to the former to effectively focus upon the delivery of the Maidstone Borough Local Plan. A new team structure was fully implemented in Development Management in the week commencing 16 October 2017.

·  iESE were clear that the staffing resource within the planning department was adequate for the work. However, productivity was lower than it should have been because of weak systems and processes in the main areas of Development Management, which resulted in higher than necessary levels of failure demand and associated levels of dissatisfaction from customers and staff alike.

·  A specialist change management consultant was commissioned to help design and imbed the proposed improvements for a three month period, which commenced on 2 October 2017.

The Director of Regeneration and Place informed the Committee of the positive progress that had already been made since the review was completed.

Councillor Round addressed the Committee on this item.

The Committee were concerned that:

·  The Planning Committee met far too regularly;

·  Planning Committee agendas had too many items which often meant that the meeting had to be adjourned;

·  The backlog of planning applications would not be cleared by the end of March 2018;

·  12 out of the 27 staff who were interviewed were either unlikely to recommend or would not recommend the Council as a place to work;

·  There would not be enough detail contained in a 10 page planning report for the Planning Committee to make a considered decision;

·  There was huge pressure on staff in the Planning Service which could have an impact on their work; and that

·  Technology needed to be improved within the Planning Service to reduce the amount of unnecessary enquiries.

In response to questions from the Committee, the Director of Regeneration and Place advised that:

·  The  ...  view the full minutes text for item 92