Meeting documents

West of England Waste Partnership Appendix 2

Project Board

6 January 2006

WEST OF ENGLAND WASTE MANAGEMENT AND PLANNING STRATEGY

JOINT WASTE PLANNING - UPDATE REPORT

Recommendation (Revised)

1. The Project Board is requested to recommend to the four Unitary Authorities

that they:

a. Work together to prepare a Joint Waste Development Plan Document for the West of England and to amend their respective Local Development Schemes accordingly;

b. Jointly prepare a Project Plan for production of the Joint Waste Development Plan Document, to be approved by Executive Members/Chief Officers as appropriate in each Unitary Authority, to include clear project management arrangements, a detailed project timetable and breakdown of costs;

c. Clearly identify through Chief Officers, and subsequently provide, the resources required to progress the Joint Waste Development Plan Document through its statutory stages to adoption, covering internal staff costs; consultancy fees; and incidental costs including the cost of the Public Examination;

d. Appoint consultants to assist in the preparation of the Joint Waste Development Plan Document on the basis of a Specification to be approved by Unitary Authority Executive Members/Chief Officers as appropriate in each Unitary Authority.

Background

2. This report updates the Waste Planning report, under Item 3 following a meeting between Unitary Authority and Government Officers for the South West Officers on 5 January 2006.

3. The previously circulated report refers at paragraphs 8 - 14 to the informal advice from the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister on the best way forward for strategic waste planning in the West of England. This update report describes the amended recommended process and procedures for preparing a joint waste development plan document for the West of England.

West of England Joint Waste Development Plan Document

4. The proposal is that the Unitary Authorities prepare a joint waste development plan document for the West of England. Such a thematic document would include a strategic waste planning statement and would identify the key site or sites or locations for a range of strategic waste management facilities across the plan area. It could also include appropriate criteria based policies.

5. The range of strategic waste management facilities could include major new waste management capacity, including a network of composting facilities, civic amenity sites, and sites for landfill or landraise sites.

6. Government advice is that waste should not be considered in isolation from other planning concerns. The Joint Waste Development Plan Document would inform the Core Strategies of each Local Development Framework. This would enable the integration of sustainable waste management with other areas of spatial planning such as housing and transport.

7. A joint waste development plan document would also provide a framework for the development of local waste planning policies, and each Unitary Authority would decide the most appropriate way in which these may be prepared and presented.

8. The integration between a joint waste development plan document and the joint municipal waste management strategy would provide significant benefits in terms of aligning the processes at key stages. This would optimise the use of resources, would provide opportunities to share consultation arrangements and would reduce the potential for conflict between these inter-dependent delivery systems for sustainable waste management. It would also help simplify the key waste management and planning issues and help illuminate the essential waste management options for the West of England.

9. The issue of conformity with the Core Strategies of the four Unitary Authority areas can be clarified. The Joint Waste Development Plan Document would need to be in general conformity with the Regional Spatial Strategy, incorporating the Regional Waste Strategy but it would in turn inform the Core Strategies of each constituent Authority area.

Delivering New Waste Management Capacity

10. A development plan document of the nature proposed, which would focus on strategic waste management issues and the identification of key sites, has the potential of being prepared in a shorter timescale as compared with the previously recommended Joint Core Waste Strategy and separately prepared sites allocations documents. The particular advantage is that the consideration of appropriate sites / locations would be at an earlier stage than previously envisaged. This would enable more effective and realistic assessment of the waste management options identified as part of the MEL / RPS waste studies.

11. The Project Plan will need to be revised to show the timeline and key milestones for the waste management and waste planning strategies. In addition, the links to procurement will need to be identified, so as to ensure that time and resources are effectively managed.

Timeline and Reporting Procedures

12. The Indicative Project Timeline illustrated in the previously circulated Project Brief will need to be reviewed. The assumption is that the process of preparing a development plan document will take some 36 months. The Board of the West of England Partnership have indicated their strong support for joint working on waste planning and waste management, but at the same time have requested that the indicative timescale of 36 months is reviewed and all effort made to reduce the plan preparation time. This will need to be an early task for the Officers Steering Group, but much will depend on the reporting procedures within each Authority.

The Next Steps

13. Following the Officer meeting with the Government Office for the South West the recommendation to the Project Board has now been amended to reflect the proposal to prepare a joint waste development plan document.

14. The substantive recommendation is that the Project Board should recommend to the Unitary Authorities that a Joint Waste Development Plan Document be prepared in accordance with a revised Project Brief. The necessary revisions to the Project Brief will need to be agreed with the appropriate Executive Members and Chief Officers.

15. Following agreement of each Unitary Authority it will be necessary to seek the agreement of the Government Office for the South West for an appropriate amendment to each Local Development Scheme. This should be on the basis of an identical specification of the scope of the joint waste development plan document. Again, this will need to be agreed with the appropriate Executive Members and Chief Officers.

16. There may be consequential changes to Local Development Schemes that the Authorities may wish to make, to reflect the intention to prepare a West of England Joint Waste Development Plan Document. That will be a matter for each Authority to resolve.

Allan Davies
5 January 2006

Annex 1 to Appendix 2 West of England

Waste Management and Planning Strategy

Project Brief

West of England Joint Waste

Development Plan Document

Bath and North East Somerset Council, Bristol City Council,

North Somerset Council and South Gloucestershire Council.

1.2 This Project Brief describes the scope and process for preparing a Joint Waste Development Plan Document. This is an important component of the West of England Waste Management and Planning Strategy. It incorporates a strategic waste planning statement and identifies the key site(s) or locations for a range of strategic waste management facilities that are essential for sustainable waste management across the West of England. It will inform the Core Strategies of each Local Development Framework and will provide spatial planning guidance for the preparation of more detailed waste policies and proposals within other appropriate development plan documents in the West of England.

2. Project Aims

2.1 The aim of the West of England Joint Waste Development Plan Document is to set out the number, type and size of facilities required in the West of England to manage municipal and other wastes over the period to 2020 and beyond within the context of the emerging Regional Spatial Strategy and the Regional Waste Strategy. Where facilities are of strategic significance, the Joint Waste Development Plan Document will either identify the site required for the specific proposed development(s) or otherwise indicate their broad location(s), leaving it to separate sites allocations development plan documents to identify the sites.

2.2 The remit of the West of England Joint Waste Development Plan Document includes the identification of:

2.3 The Project Brief identifies the key milestones (see Appendix 1) at which decisions will need to be made by the four Unitary Authorities. The resources that are estimated to be required to prepare the Joint Waste Development Plan Document are identified over the period of plan preparation so as to ensure that the planning objectives of the Strategy can be delivered on time and within budgets. The required resources will need to be kept under review.

2.4 Table 1 indicates the Regional Waste Strategy waste management capacities for Municipal Waste, Commercial and Industrial Waste and Construction and Demolition Waste. This assumes that each sub-region will be self-sufficient in waste management facilities to manage the waste produced in that sub-region.

3. Overview

3.2 Where appropriate, it is intended that the Joint Waste Development Plan Document will make specific site allocations for strategic waste management facilities, the Development Plan Document will inform the individual Core Strategies of each Unitary Authority area and will guide individual waste-related sites allocations development plan documents in their task of identifying and allocating sites for those strategic (and local) waste management facilities not allocated by the Joint Waste Development Plan Document . The Joint Waste Development Plan Document will guide development control decisions in respect of planning applications for strategic waste management facilities.

3.3 The Joint Waste Development Plan Document will provide for an integrated approach to waste planning and waste management. There is an opportunity to align the process of preparing the Joint Waste Development Plan Document and the Joint Municipal Waste Strategy (see Figure 1 above). This would optimise the use of resources, would provide opportunities to share consultation arrangements and would reduce the potential for conflict between these inter-dependent delivery systems for sustainable waste management.

3.4 The guidance in PPS10 Planning for Sustainable Waste Management is that sites should be allocated to support the pattern of waste management facilities set out in the Regional Spatial Strategy in accordance with the identified broad locations and apportionment. PPS10 expects waste planning authorities to be able to:

B7 demonstrate how capacity equivalent to at least ten years of the annual rates set out in the Regional Spatial Strategy could be provided;

B7 identify the type or types of waste management facility that would be appropriately located on the allocated site or in the allocated area, taking care to avoid stifling innovation in line with the waste hierarchy; and

B7 avoid unrealistic assumptions on the prospects for the development of waste management facilities or of particular sites or area.

3.5 The operational period of the Joint Waste Development Plan Document will run from its anticipated date of adoption in December 2008 for a period up to and including 2020. It will need to look ahead to the longer-term horizon set out in the Regional Spatial Strategy.

4. Preparation Process

4.1 A Joint Waste Development Plan Document, like other Development Plan Documents will need to be prepared in accordance with the Planning and Compulsory Purchase Act 2004 and associated statutory regulations. All Development Plan Documents must be subject to rigorous procedures of community involvement, consultation and independent examination so as to test the "soundness" of the document and ensure that the necessary legal requirements for its preparation have been undertaken. There is also the need for ongoing Sustainability Appraisal, from the outset. This will require, in the first instance the preparation of a scoping report.

4.2 The 2004 Act requires each authority to produce a Local Development Framework comprising a Core Strategy and a number of other Development Plan Documents including site-specific allocations and policies, and area action plans. They are subject to independent examination and have the status of development plans as defined by section 38(6) of the Act. Local planning authorities will be producing Development Plan Documents over the next few years to meet their statutory requirements. Under the Act two or more authorities may produce joint Development Plan Documents. These could include core strategies for their combined areas or area action plans covering areas that fall across their boundaries or a joint waste development plan document.

4.3 As with other similar statutory documents, there are four main stages in the preparation of a Joint Waste Development Plan Document. These are:

4.4

The following diagram is produced by the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister. It illustrates the process that the Joint Waste Development Plan Document will need to follow.

4.5 The timetable for the production of Development Plan Documents is set out in Local Development Schemes. An agreement to prepare a West of England Joint Waste Development Plan Document will need to be set out in the Local Development Schemes of each Unitary Authority. An amendment to Local Development Schemes will require with the agreement of the Secretary of State (Government Office for the South West). The Planning Inspectorate will also need to be consulted.

5.1 Without resource, procedural and administrative constraints, it should be possible to achieve adoption of a Joint Waste Development Plan Document within 24 months, with adoption by early 2008. A more likely minimum preparation period is three years, with adoption by December 2008, at the earliest taking account of the time required for "milestone" decisions to be made by each Authority. An indicative Timeline Project Plan for the preparation of a West of England Joint Waste Development Plan Document is set out at Appendix 1. This timetable will need to be kept under review, and all efforts made to reduce the document preparation times, without reducing the opportunities for public consultation and participation.

5.2 In order to achieve adoption by the end of 2008, the Joint Waste Development Plan Document will need to be project managed. The role of the Project Manager will reflect the amount of involvement of consultants in the Project. In the absence of consultants there would need to be a full time Project Manager. If consultants were appointed to undertake all the technical work, the role of the Project Manager would be to facilitate appropriate liaison between the Project Partners, the Consultants and Stakeholders, which would allow for the appointment of a part-time Project Manager.

5.3 In order to ensure that the Project proceeds as speedily as possible, some of the constituent Authorities may need to amend standing orders to allow decisions to be made in accordance with the appropriate statutory regulations concerning decision-making. The process of preparing a Development Plan Document (DPD) is the task of the Executive of each Unitary Authority, except in the case of the following, where decisions would need to be made in Full Council:

c) amending, modifying, revising, withdrawing or revoking a DPD unless

i) it is required by the Secretary of State; or

5.4 Effectively, the process of preparing a Joint Waste Development Plan Document will commence with the agreement of the Project Board to recommend to the Unitary Authorities a Project Brief for the preparation of a Joint Waste Development Plan Document. When all Authorities agree, each Local Development Framework will need to be amended. This will require the agreement of the Government Office of the South West.

5.5 The Indicative Timeline at Appendix 1 assumes that the Waste Studies on Technologies and Waste Planning prepared by Consultants MEL and RPS will form an important part of the initial evidence gathering. These studies, together with the technical evaluation of the Scenarios identified by the Consultants will inform the preparation of the Joint Waste Development Plan Document, at least as far as Municipal Waste is concerned.

5.7 Public consultation on a consultation Preferred Options document commencing December 2006 will follow at least six months of preparation, including the holding of stakeholder events and briefings with Members in each Unitary Authority and the Project Board before being agreed by each Authority. Consultation will need to reflect the approaches set out in each Statement of Community Involvement. For the avoidance of doubt, and in order to assist project management, there would be advantages in preparing a statement about the way in which consultation on the Preferred Options Report and the Submission Document will take place.

5.8 The Indicative Timeline assumes that the West of England Joint Waste Development Plan Document will be submitted to the Secretary of State in August 2007. This will be a most important milestone, and will lead to a Public Examination into the "soundness" of the Plan during May 2008. Finally, the Joint Waste Development Plan Document could be adopted by December 2008. It is assumed that formal work on the submission of planning applications (including any required Environmental Impact Assessments) would be submitted by at least the receipt of the Inspector's binding report, if not earlier.

6. Resources

6.2 The availability of appropriate and skilled staff resources will be critical to the preparation of the Joint Waste Development Plan Document. An Officer Steering Group will need to be established to oversee and, where necessary undertake necessary technical work, including consultation. The Steering Group will be representative of all four Unitary Authorities at both planning management and technical levels and assisted by officers from the Joint Strategic Planning and Transportation Unit, who will provide technical and project management support.

6.3 Because there is not sufficient staff resource currently available to the Unitary Authorities, the need to progress other development plan documents, including other waste development plan documents, and the specialist nature of the work, it will be necessary for a number of essential tasks to be undertaken by consultants.

6.4 A broad estimate of costs has been undertaken. The main cost headings are described as follows. Tables 2 and 3 set out a broad comparison between the two options of employing waste planning consultants and undertaking most tasks "in-house". The cost of engaging waste planning consultants to prepare the key documents of the Joint Waste Development Plan Document and holding four half-day seminars is estimated to cost £55,000, with a further £10,000 required for the preparation of a Sustainability Appraisal (not including the cost of designing and printing documents).

6.5 Document production and printing the three sets of documents would be about a further £10,000. The cost of other consultation activities, facilitated stakeholder events, e-government and advertisements could be in the order of £40,000.

6.6 The estimate is based on the Joint Waste Development Plan Document being a focussed document that will not require further survey work. However, as noted above further work of a technical nature will be required and this will include preparing an up-to-date understanding of the location and function of waste management facilities that are currently operational and the wastes arising from non-municipal sources. The estimate also assumes that existing information sources and analyses, including the Entec, MEL and RPS waste studies and strategic waste management assessments prepared by the Environment Agency would form part of the Evidence Base of the Joint Waste Development Plan Document.

6.7 Additional costs include preparing for the Public Examination and commissioning expert waste planning and legal representation of say £60,000. The indication from the Planning Inspectorate is that a "small scale" Public Examination of around 10 sitting days could cost in the order of £50,000. The cost of logistics associated with the Examination (hire of accommodation, including appointment of a Programme Officer, printing and advertisement costs) could be of the order of £50,000. Unitary Authority staff costs associated with steering consultants, supporting and possible appearance at the public examination, liaison etc will need to be taken into account. Costs under this heading could be in the order of £75,000.

6.8 The above costs are indicative, at around £400,000 (or £100,000 per Authority), based on preparing a Joint Core Waste Strategy over a period of three years.

6.9 In the absence of consultants it is assumed that the Project Manager would need to be engaged full time for at least a two-year period (rather than a three year plan preparation period). This may need to be extended, as Unitary Authority officers would need to undertake additional technical work and administrative tasks. It is also assumed that additional staff resources would be required.

6.10 No allowance has been made for the initial collection of data from Unitary Authorities on, for example, existing waste management facilities and their capacities. Depending on the number of Officers involved in each of the four Unitary Authorities, undertaking this survey work, including the GIS (electronic mapping) and other data handling costs, this work is assumed to cost about £70,000.

6.11 Given the estimated nature of the above exercise, the cost of preparing a Joint Waste Core Strategy could be in the range of £400,000 to £500,000. These costs are indicative, and will need to be subject to further detailed assessment.

7. Next Steps

7.1 The next step is for the Project Board to recommend a course of action to each Unitary Authority on the basis of the recommendations set out in the covering report on the Way Forward for Waste Planning in the West of England.

7.2 A detailed Project Plan will need to be prepared for the stages leading to each "milestone", and this will initially require updating the Project Brief and the detailed assessment of the resource requirements of reaching each key stage. The Project Plan will need to identify the linkages with the separate task of preparing a Joint Municipal Waste Strategy in order to reduce costs.

7.3 The principal purposes of the Joint Waste Development Plan Document are to provide a sustainable waste planning framework for the West of England and the identification of key sites for strategic waste management capacity. The constituent Local Development Schemes will need to be amended.

7.4 There will be a need to review the identified three year programme so as to bring forward the required planning guidance in time to progress the procurement / development of the strategic waste management facilities. This will require a number of tasks identified under Appendix 1 to be re-scheduled. This may require additional resource, including Officer time to be identified.