Latest news with #planningdecisions


BBC News
22-07-2025
- General
- BBC News
Views sought in Dormansland on new plan to influence development
People living in a Surrey village have been offered the chance to give their views on a document that will influence future planning Dormansland Neighbourhood Plan is being put together by the village's parish council and Tandridge District Council.A public consultation opened on 18 July and will run until 26 plan will be part of the criteria by which future planning applications are judged. The parish council said it wants the village to retain its distinctive character, with new homes built to meet local needs, such as for young families or older people who wish to also wants to encourage cycling and walking, and support and increase local draft plan can be seen here.


BBC News
09-07-2025
- Politics
- BBC News
DUP councillor Linda Clarke suspended over planning conflicts
A Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) councillor has been suspended for three months by a standards watchdog over her involvement in planning decisions lobbied on by her Clarke, of Antrim and Newtownabbey Borough Council, was investigated by the Northern Ireland Local Government Commissioner for found she failed to declare her interests for council planning decisions on which her husband, DUP assembly member Trevor Clarke, was making Clarke is a DUP councillor for the Dunsilly area and works in her husband's constituency office in South Antrim. The watchdog began investigating in 2019 following a series of newspaper reports.A hearing on Wednesday was told Mrs Clarke sat on the council's planning committee in May 2017 when her husband made representations on two was noted in council records as representing the Clarke had received guidance from the council's lawyer earlier that month advising of a possible conflict of advice said that Mr Clarke was understood at the time to be "connected with a planning consultancy business".Assistant commissioner Ian Gordon found Mrs Clarke had breached three sections of the councillors' code of conduct relating to declaring hearing was told the councillor had apologised in submissions to the expressed "regret" that she did not declare her "dual conflict of interest" in the planning applications and withdraw from the council Gordon said the councillor "did not display insight into her actions" and did not accept her conflict of interest "until very recently".He said the councillor had a "significant private and personal non-pecuniary interest"."The area of planning is a matter of substantial public interest," he commissioner said Mrs Clarke had "no previous history" of breaching the code and had self-referred to the watchdog following media reports. Controversies The watchdog probe was among a number of controversies which emerged in 2019 surrounding the the time, the couple insisted they "made all the relevant declarations and adhered to all rules".In 2023, another DUP councillor who worked in Mr Clarke's constituency office was suspended from the council's planning committee for three watchdog found John Smyth breached the code of conduct by not declaring an interest when Mr Clarke made representations to the 2021, the assembly member apologised for not declaring to a constituent who was opposing a planning application that he was lobbying for the plans through a side-line consultancy apology followed a complaint made to the Northern Ireland Assembly's standards had faced questions in 2019 after it emerged he was running the consultancy business, which represented applicants in the council planning denied it was a conflict of interest that breached assembly rules, but later ceased its also emerged Mid and East Antrim Borough Council had launched a planning enforcement investigation into a triple garage built at the Clarkes' home without Clarke, at the time, insisted it did not require planning he later submitted a retrospective application, which was DUP has been approached for comment.