£280,000 upgrade of Ripon business park begins

A £280,000 upgrade of Harrogate Borough Council-owned Phoenix Business Park in Ripon has begun.

The funding will help to create more space, refurbish the three units and install new electric vehicle charging points.

The council awarded Dalebuild Limited, a Harrogate-based construction firm, the contract for the work after a tender process.

This project follows a similar £500,000 investment at the council-owned Conyngham Hall business centre in Knaresborough, which was completed in October last year.

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The council believes, even with the shift to more home working, there continue to be demand for office spaces in the Harrogate district.

Councillor Graham Swift, the council’s deputy leader and cabinet member for resources, enterprise and economic development, said:

“We want to ensure Harrogate district businesses have the space around them to grow and expand as their business does.

“This investment at Phoenix Business Park will do just that, by creating flexible spaces with leases designed around their needs. As well as providing them with modern, energy efficient accommodation with high-speed digital connectivity.”

Pinewoods tree protestor to resume vigil

A Knaresborough woman is to don her tree costume once again and resume her protest against Harrogate’s Spring Water‘s plans to expand into the Pinewoods.

Sarah Gibbs braved the cold on Fridays throughout December and January by dressing as a tree outside Harrogate Borough Council‘s civic centre at Knapping Mount.

Ms Gibbs halted her protest when the council’s planning committee voted last month to refuse Harrogate Spring Water’s plans to expand its bottling plant into Rotary Wood.

However, she has changed her mind because she believes the battle has not yet been won.

Harrogate Spring Water’s parent company Danone has still not indicated whether to appeal the refusal, submit another application or stick with the original outline planning permission it received in 2016 to remove a smaller section of trees in Rotary Wood.

If it decides to proceed with the original outline planning permission it would need to submit a full application before May, which would again be considered by the planning committee.

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Ms Gibbs said:

“I want to make sure the council knows that the public eye is still on this and that I’m not just going to go away and be quiet.

“The protest is to show the council that I’m still here. I’m not going away quietly and I don’t want this swept under the rug.”

Housing developments could have been stopped earlier

An investigation by the Stray Ferret has found discrepancies in documents used by Harrogate Council to advise the planning committee between 2017 and 2019.

The council claimed that there was a shortage of land for new housing development and delayed submission of the local development plan.

During that time, councillors say they were “forced” to approve major developments to boost housing numbers.

Yet we have found evidence that could have given councillors greater powers to reject speculative planning applications earlier.

How Harrogate went from building too few new homes to approving too many

Government planning policy directs councils to ensure it has enough land on which new homes can be built  –it must have a 5 Year Land Supply (5YLS).

This important statistic can decide the outcome of planning decisions.

Without one a legal situation is triggered which makes it’s easier for a developer to obtain planning permission.

Between January 2017 and September 2018, planning reports advised the planning committee that Harrogate didn’t have a 5-year land supply.

Our investigation uncovered evidence that Harrogate expected over 12 000 new homes to be delivered between 2019 and 2024.  That equates to a land supply of more than 9 years.

It’s more than double the number of homes required by local housing targets approved by the Secretary of State for the same period.

We wanted to know how the district went from a housing shortage in August 2018 to a housing surplus in January 2019.

Key Documents:

The council produced a series of reports containing expected housing delivery rates throughout 2017 – 2019.

The Housing Land Supply Update is a document that publishes the rolling assessment of the district’s 5YLS – it’s revised and published every three months.

Between 2017 and 2018, these documents showed a deficit 5 YLS position.

From June 2018, these reports showed a ‘marginal’ 5YLS of 5.2 – just above the threshold required.

We have studied other documents the council produces:

The Strategic Housing and Economic Land Availability Assessment 2017 (SHELAA) gathered data about ALL land that the council considers suitable for development along with information as to when homes will be delivered on each site over 5, 10 and 15 year forecasts.

A Housing Background Paper sets out the council’s progress in achieving its policy objective of ‘accelerated’ housing growth with measured targets and delivery rates.

When we examined these documents, we found evidence of a much stronger position than the planning reports suggested.

A Timeline of Development in Harrogate:

December 2016:

Two years after it failed to adopt a Local Plan in 2014 The Planning Inspectorate rules that Harrogate still cannot evidence a 5YLS.

Harrogate was inundated with major development applications.

Even applications that had previously been refused were re-presented and approved.

For nearly two years, the planning committee made decisions based on the belief that they had to approve applications to boost housing numbers.

Yet documents reveal that in 2016 Harrogate identified new sites which the council believed would deliver over 1000 new homes within five years. Only a percentage though were included in the calculation of the 5YLS.

January 2018   Documents show that Harrogate was on track to deliver a whopping 9.7-year land supply by April 2019 – when the local development plan was due to be adopted.

But planning reports from the same month advised the councillors that the 5-year land supply had reached an all-time low of just 4.2 years.

Councillors continued to accept recommendations to approve applications to boost housing numbers.

June 2018 Housing Land Supply Update showed that that Harrogate had achieved a 5.02-year land supply.

However, the advice to councillors didn’t change.

Throughout July and August 2018, the planning reports were based on the earlier deficit position.

August 2018  The Housing Background Paper continued to state that the supply would increase to 9.7 years by April 2019.

The council submitted its local development plan for approval.

September 2018  The Planning Reports state that the council now has a ‘marginal’ 5-year land supply of 5.02 years.

Councillors are advised that approvals are still necessary to ensure that the fragile land supply is maintained.

January 2019 The Planning Inspectorate held hearings to determine if the council’s Local Development Plan was sound.

The Planning Inspectorate insisted that Harrogate cut its housing targets and drop 24 developments from the local development plan.

After the cuts, the planning inspectorate agreed that Harrogate retained a 6.87-year land supply.

The Planning Committee was now in a stronger position to take difficult decisions to refuse speculative and undesirable planning applications even against the advice of planning officers.

The Stray Ferret offered to discuss our findings with Rebecca Burnett, former Cabinet Member for planning and Richard Cooper, Leader of Harrogate Borough Council before we published.  Neither agreed to be interviewed.

In a statement issued by the press office, the council said:

“Our approach to calculating housing land supply has been tested on a number of occasions at planning appeals and at the local plan examination. It was found to be in line with national policy and guidance.

“During the period where we did not have an adopted local plan, the housing supply position was kept under constant review and councillors were routinely briefed.

“It is absolutely ridiculous to suggest that councillors were misled in relation to the housing land supply. We have seen no credible evidence whatsoever to back-up this claim.”

We have been told by councillors of all parties how concerned they are at the council’s performance record on planning.

We also put a series of questions to Andrew Jones MP regarding planning within the district.

We have not yet received an acknowledgement to our email.

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Harrogate council backs council tax hike

Councillors on Harrogate Borough Council have backed a £5 increase in council tax for this coming year.

The hike will see the council’s share of council tax rise to £250.92.

It means taxpayers in the district could see their overall bill, which includes rates for county council and police and fire services, increase to more than £2,000 in 2021/22.

Councillors voted for the increase at a full council meeting tonight as part of the authority’s budget plans.

Cllr Graham Swift, cabinet member for resources on the borough council, said the budget was put together despite coronavirus impacting on the council’s finances.

Cllr Swift said:

“There is no doubt for all people, whether you are a council member or a council staff officer or a member of the public, that 2020 and 2021 are time periods of incredible change caused predominantly by the coronavirus.

“It is because of the coronavirus that Harrogate Borough Council have had significant impact to our budget and significant changes to way in which we are financing the budget.”

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It comes as council has forecast a cost of £5.9 million this year due to the coronavirus pandemic.

Officials said the authority had lost income in car parking, sport and leisure and the Harrogate Convention Centre.

Meanwhile, councillors also voted for an amendment to the budget to increase pay for the lowest employees to £9.50 per hour.

A breakdown of the potential council tax bill for Harrogate district in 2021/22.

A breakdown of the potential council tax bill for Harrogate district in 2021/22.

Elsewhere, North Yorkshire County Council is set to decide on a 3.49% increase in their share of council tax next week.

It would see the authority’s share rise to £1,411.05.

Cllr Carl Les, leader of the county council, said the move is one of the most difficult decisions for the council in recent years.

He said:

“I don’t think there has ever been a more difficult time for us to do this exercise.

“Never have our services been more needed, but equally never has the economy and society been under such pressure.

“So we really need to get the balance right between what we need to deliver in services and what the community of North Yorkshire can afford to pay for those services.”

Strayside Sunday: Let’s get Jackie Weaver in to sort out Harrogate Borough Council

Strayside Sunday is our weekly political opinion column. It is written by Paul Baverstock, former Director of Communications for the Conservative Party. 

This week, I thought I would share something from my small but active Stray Ferret postbag. While working away at my kitchen table, my email pinged with a missive from a reader who, to spare blushes, shall remain nameless.

Attached to the email was a photograph of what turned out to be an article from 31st January’s Sunday Times (“The furlough firms that gave money to the Tories”). It turns out that several companies, both major and minor, availed themselves of shedloads of Dishy Rishi’s furlough scheme cash and, during the same period of time donated large sums of money to the Conservative Party.

As I scanned the list a familiar name stood out; The Fat Badger has never been at the top of my list of favoured watering holes, although I understand it is popular with the punters. It seems that the company that own’s Harrogate’s Fat Badger Pub had gifted £18,000 to the party of power all the while participating in the furlough scheme. In the subject heading of my reader’s email it said simply, “Is this right?”

Although The Times piece made clear that no laws have been broken (both individual and company donations to political parties are entirely legal), the answer, of course, in my view is no. All hospitality businesses are going through a torrid time and the furlough scheme is vitally important for their survival. But the issue here is that furlough money is intended to plug the gap in company finances created by the Covid-19 economic downturn. If companies in receipt of furlough monies still have the discretionary funds required to make political contributions, they are in danger of creating the perception that they are accepting furlough funds in bad faith. To avoid such bad ‘optics,’ business owners could and should make political donations in a personal capacity from personal funds, if so minded.

I for one don’t believe in political donations; in my view they should be banned and parties funded by the state to an agreed and equitable formula. I believe that state funding for political parties would be a simple and transparent way to reduce the undue and unwanted influence of those interests with the power and inclination to pay for it.

With the end of the Covid-19 crisis perhaps mercifully in sight, we are hurtling towards an inevitable reckoning for the government. It will be hoping that its success in testing and vaccinations (the latter of which has been nothing short of spectacular) will mask its howlers. Stories of wholesale furlough scheme and government emergency loans frauds are starting to surface. In its rush to do the right thing; to get money to where it was needed when it was needed, the government played fast and loose with the usual rules of engagement. Advantage has been taken.

My vote is that we should send in Jackie Weaver (from the Cheshire Association of Local Councils) to sort it all out. Clearly not a woman to be messed with, Ms. Weaver shot to internet stardom this week for her brilliant handling of a Handforth Parish Council Zoom meeting. More specifically, for her handling of a group of swearing, raging, cackling and spluttering (mostly) men. This Iron Lady for our generation retained an icy calm and was ruthless in her use of the cursor, dispatching several misbehavers to that modern purgatory, the Zoom waiting room. Never has a row over standing orders been more compelling. My favourite line in proceedings was from Aled’s iPad, “she’s kicked Barry out, so I’m leaving.” Who needs Emmerdale?

Ms. Weaver’s matter of fact and straightforward response to the viral storm has been priceless. She can’t see what the fuss is all about. The impression one has is of a group of silly and frustrated men, egos inflated by their minor office holding, attempting to throw their weight about. Our Jackie simply sorted them out and got proceedings firmly on track. It strikes me that if councils were like football teams I would agitate for Jackie Weaver to be transferred to Harrogate. I’m not sure Richard Cooper and his merry bunch at the Borough Council would respond well to Ms. Weaver’s hard-tackling style. She would strike the fear of God in them. And I for one, would pay really good money to see it.

Maybe it was ever thus, that we are governed by ordinary people, doing their best. Mostly decent people who share our flaws, who have some good days and some bad. That’s why we need transparency about how decisions are made in government, especially when it comes
to spending vast amounts of taxpayer money. And it’s why we have rules, because people, human beings, left to their own devices, get things wrong. From the government in Westminster, to Harrogate Borough Council to the Parish Council in Handforth, politicians rise to their relative level of incompetence. We have to keep an eye on them or they will misbehave. Time to send in Jackie!

That’s my Strayside Sunday.

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Do you have a view on this column or is there a political issue you’d like Paul to write about? Get in touch on paul@thestrayferret.co.uk

Harrogate coalition seeking views on tackling climate change

The Harrogate District Climate Change Coalition (HDCCC) has launched a residents’ survey that asks for views on reducing carbon emissions and tackling climate change.

The survey, which is available here until March 28, asks questions about people’s lifestyles to learn more about how actions impact on the local environment.

HDCCC was set up by Harrogate Borough Council over a year ago with the aim of bringing together local government, green groups and business.

‘All of mankind’

Conservative councillor and HDCCC committee chair Paul Haslam told the Stray Ferret that “it’s vital that people make their voice heard” on climate change.

He said:

“It’s a serious issue facing all of mankind. This is about making a difference locally to our environment, quality of air, reduction in carbon emissions and contributing to the global situation.”

HDCCC chair of communications Kirsty Hallett said a high number of responses to the survey will help inform local action on climate change.

She added:

“This will help the Harrogate District Climate Change Coalition to provide information which will be genuinely useful. It will also help local residents and businesses to understand the choices we all need to make in order to rapidly reduce greenhouse gas emissions to net-zero.”

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Concern over the environment is arguably at its highest point ever in Harrogate following Harrogate Spring Water’s controversial application for its bottling plant into Rotary Wood, which was rejected by councillors last month.

HDCCC issued a “neutral” response to the proposals, whilst highlighting the importance of trees in mitigating climate change locally.

Since HDCCC was formed it has not been without criticism. HBC called it a “great leap forward” for the environment but members have criticised it for being little more than a “talking shop”.

HDCCC has four subgroups, which meet several times a year to discuss issues such as sustainable transport, tree planting, renewable energy, recycling and communications.

‘Stop dumping waste in recycling bins’, says Pateley Bridge mayor

Pateley Bridge Town Council is urging people to stop dumping domestic rubbish in recycling bins.

Town Mayor, Councillor Mike Holt, told the Stray Ferret that Pateley’s recycling site was being used for fly-tipping, which is a criminal offence.

He said:

“I am asking everyone to help us in trying to stop this abuse so that we can retain and enjoy this facility, for which we all pay for through our rates.”

At a virtual meeting on Tuesday, the council discussed correspondence from a parishioner about the untidy state of the recycling area on Southlands, at the bottom of High Street.

It’s a complaint received by the council several times and from many different sources.

The recycling bins in Southlands are provided by Harrogate Borough Council for domestic use only (Photograph: Councillor Stanley Lumley)

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Cllr Holt said:

“Pateley Bridge retains this facility because we have some residents who do not receive the benefit of a street-side recycling collection service. The recycling facility is expensive, and Harrogate Borough Council have closed many similar centres throughout the district.

“We do not want to lose this benefit to our town, but it will happen if it continues to be abused.

“Residents can report fly tipping by calling 01423 500600, or by email to customerservices@harrogate.gov.uk. More information is available on the HBC website and I urge everyone to try and help reduce the abuse of this area in our town.”

Housing developers pay £1.2m to fund Harrogate projects

Harrogate Borough Council charged housing developers £1.2m in 2019/20 to fund infrastructure projects, such as children’s play equipment and village halls.

The figure is revealed in the council’s first infrastructure funding statement.

The statement includes details of section 106 payments, which developers pay as part of the planning process to fund infrastructure that residents will use. 

A report to councillors revealed that of the £1.2 million generated, the council has so far collected £550,000.

Almost £200,000 of this has already been spent on schemes such as children’s play equipment, allotments, cemeteries, open spaces, village hall improvements and outdoor sports repairs around the district.

Examples of specific projects include: improving the toilets at Killinghall village hall, improving a multi-use games area in Kirkby Malzeard, installing planters in Darley and erecting village signs in Little Ouseburn

Harrogate Borough Council’s section 106 payments relate only to open space, village halls and affordable housing.

Developers also pay section 106 payments to improve education, roads and public transport but these are collected and monitored by North Yorkshire County Council.

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The report also reveals the council has collected £2.4 million in section 106 payments from previous years, which it has not yet spent.

The document says section 106 payments can only be spent when the final payment from a development has been received.

It also says it keeps the money to “avoid the risks associated with developers going out of business”.

The report is expected to be rubber-stamped by the council’s cabinet member for planning, councillor Tim Myatt, on Tuesday.

Ripon residents ‘scared to go out’ as crime fears grow

Ripon residents have said they are too scared to go out at night because of teenage gangs.

Fear of crime and anti-social behaviour in the city has escalated in recent months.

Matters came to a head on Sunday evening when police responded to five incidents in three hours.

They included reports of a man with a machete, a robbery, thefts and gang activity.

It is getting too much for some locals, prompting councillors to call for urgent police action.

North Yorkshire Police has said it will increase patrols following the latest incidents. But some believe there are not enough officers on the streets to cope.

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Pauline McHardy, a councillor on Ripon City Council and Harrogate Borough Council, told the Stray Ferret:

“This has got much worse. I have lived in Ripon all my life and we have never had this level of trouble before. They should be ashamed of themselves.

“Many residents are frightened to leave their homes. These people are terrorising the city, there is no other word for it.”

Stephen Craggs, owner of electrical firm G Craggs, which is based opposite the bus station where some of the young people gather, said:

“This is not like they are just scaring little old ladies. I had just parked at the shops when there was a group of teenagers drinking.

“They just brushed passed me but it was quite intimidating. You don’t know if they have a weapon or what they are going to do.”

Sid Hawke, who also sits on Ripon City Council and Harrogate Borough Council, echoed concerns, and said lockdown had exacerbated the problem:

“Ripon used to be a really quiet and lovely place to live. This is just not on. It is getting really violent now. I think the lockdown has made it worse.

“They are terrorising people. We have a lot of elderly people who live here and they are petrified to leave their homes.”

Ripon City Council is set to have a meeting with North Yorkshire’s police, fire and crime commissioner Julia Mulligan to discuss concerns and respond to pleas for more police.

Harrogate council staff could be offered electric cars

Staff at Harrogate Borough Council could soon be able to sacrifice some of their salary for an electric car.

Senior councillors on the authority’s cabinet are set to vote today on a scheme which would see employees offered the chance to lease ultra low emission vehicles.

It comes as councillors passed a motion in April 2019 to support measures to address the climate emergency as outlined by the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.

However, a Liberal Democrat motion calling on the authority to declare a climate emergency has twice been rejected by councillors.

Further calls for a citizens’ assembly on the climate have also been rejected.

The motion in 2019 put forward by council leader, Richard Cooper, and Cllr Graham Swift included a proposal for a salary sacrifice scheme for low emission vehicles.

Council officials said the move would help to reduce the authority’s carbon footprint and make savings on national insurance and pension contributions.

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As part of the scheme outlined by officers, staff would lease a car from the council in exchange for part of their salary.

Staff would need to pass eligibility criteria as well as a driving licence check.

The authority currently employs more than 1,000 people, however it has proposed to set the minimum threshold for the scheme at £19,000.

Meanwhile, council bosses will investigate the need further further electric vehicle charging points at sites it owns.

The authority would also need to procure a supplier for the electric vehicles.

A report due before councillors said:

“The current time is perfect for implementation of an electric vehicle salary sacrifice scheme due to benefit in kind conditions introduced by government. 

“Currently it is more advantageous for a member of staff to lease an electric vehicle through salary sacrifice and this helps to bridge the cost gap between electric and petrol/diesel.”