Councillors concerned plans will be undermined by Sedlescombe decision

Permission for 16 homes in Sedlescombe was granted on a field the village’s neighbourhood plan had safeguarded against development.

Parish councillors are worried their plans may be undermined if Rother District Council’s planning committee is happy to ignore them.

Battle Town Council planning committee chairman Richard Jessop said the committee members can make up their own minds but said the decision makes a mockery of the system.

“For the members of Rother to apparently disregard it I find surprising when the Government ministers say we should pay a lot of emphasis towards emerging neighbourhood plans so I understand Sedlescombe’s disappointment,” he said.

The planning committee members approved MJH Homes’ application on October 13, as it satisfied housing needs.

Four parish councils – Battle, Etchingham, Fairlight and Crowhurst – sent objections to Rother saying if granted, it would throw doubt on its support for the whole neighbourhood plan process.

Even Rother’s planning officer recommended refusing the application on the grounds of the neighbourhood plan.

Sedlescombe responded in outrage with the parish council describing it as ‘deplorable’ and 363 people signed a petition calling for it to be reviewed by the Secretary of State.

Cllr Jessop, who is also part of the Battle neighbourhood plan steering group, supports the petition and hopes Rother gives greater consideration to the plans for future proposals.

Fairlight Parish Council planning committee chairman Stephen Leadbetter lamented the fact that Sedlescombe’s plan has found space for its housing allocation to be met, so there was no need to go against it.

“It takes a lot of time and effort to develop a neighbourhood plan and it’s supposed to have local support but on this occasion the Rother councillors seemed to think they knew better than the local people where housing should go,” said Cllr Leadbetter, who also leads Fairlight’s neighbourhood plan.

“It must make them wonder why they have been putting so much in to it only to see their wishes overwritten.”

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