A DEVON councillor has hit out at new planning reforms which he says will curtail elected members’ abilities to represent their ward and suppress local voices.

Chair of North Devon Council’s planning committee, Cllr Kevin Davies (Lib Dem, Chulmleigh) said new legislation which gives more decision making powers to officers did not fit all local authorities and “certainly not North Devon”.

The Labour government is trying to accelerate its plan to build 1.5 million homes during its current term to help solve the housing crisis and wants to streamline the planning process.

It says around 96 per cent of planning applications are delegated to local planning officers already.

It is asking councils to change their constitution ahead of the new national scheme of delegation coming into play on October 31.

Under the rules, schedule one applications which include householder developments like extensions, minor residential development up to nine homes and small scale commercial expansions will not be decided by planning committees but by officers.

Cllr Davies said the presumption was that schedule two applications, which included major developments, would also be delegated to officers but would be subject to a “gateway test” to decide if they should be escalated to committee.

Councillors will also lose their automatic power to “call in” applications to committee.

He told North Devon’s full council meeting that just 12 of the 33 schedule one and two applications determined by the committee last year fell into schedule two.

“Looking forward it is possible that very few applications will be dealt with by the committee at all,” he said. “The new legislation mandated by government clearly does not fit all and certainly not North Devon.

“The sad truth is councillors will have their ability to represent their ward curtailed, their concerns unheard in public at committee, local views suppressed and ignored.

“Instead of ensuring healthy debate at committee with other members I will be spending time reviewing gateway tests with our planning manager.”

He questioned if the changes were to “focus on significant and strategically important development proposals” or because the planning committee was seen as “another obstacle in the planning process”.

“I am proud to chair our planning committee and grateful for officer and member support and I value public input. The government is ill informed and continues to be deluded in their promise of delivering 1.5 million homes.”

He said there was no choice but to approve changes to the council’s constitution or it would result in legal challenges to the council’s planning decisions and cost the authority money.

Cllr Graham Bell (Non-Aligned, Braunton Rural) said he would be abstaining as the reforms “removed democracy and the right for people to be represented in the planning system”.

Cllr Cllr Becky Coombs (Lib Dem, Instow) said: “This is being forced on us. The Labour government has no recognition of rurality.”

Nine members abstained and two voted against making changes to the constitution but 16 voted for it and so was carried.