A radical proposal to cut down on the mountain of paperwork generated while deciding planning applications is not wanted in Brigg - but it seems certain to proceed.North Lincolnshire Council, the planning authority, has contacted parish and town councils throughout the district. The intention is those with internet connections should go online for all the necessary information, including maps, site drawings, supporting documents and letters of objection. Such information is already uploaded to North Lincolnshire Council’s website, where it can be viewed by those making planning applications, objectors, councillors and interested members of the public.
However, North Lincolnshire Council continues to print and post all the necessary information to town and parish councils, which is not only costly but involves a great deal of staff time.
Revealing North Lincolnshire Council's plans to remove hard copy documents, Assistant Town Clerk Allison Hannath told town councillors meeting in the Angel Suite: “I think they are trying to save money. The onus would be on Brigg Town Council to print them off. We would then be paying for them. And if you print them off at home, you would be.”
Coun Ann Eardley said what North Lincolnshire Council was proposing amounted to passing the buck to town council staff “meaning more work for them.”
Coun Penny Smith described the proposal as “a complete non-starter.”
Coun Jackie Brock pointed out people with poor eyesight would need to have everything printed “big” for them, as they would be unable to read the plans on the screen.
Town Mayor Coun Ben Nobbs said he tended to miss details when reading plans on a computer, compared to seeing them set out in printed form.
Coun Mel Oades (pictured above) concluded: “There’s a general consensus we won’t agree to this.”
However, Coun Julian Kidd said he could see some benefit to what was being proposed, although there would be a need for North Lincolnshire Council “to work with us on this.” He did not think the answer should be “a complete no.”
Brigg Town Council agreed to inform North Lincolnshire Council’s head of planning it is not in favour of a change in procedure.
However, a North Lincolnshire Council spokesman told Brigg Blog later: "From April 1, 2011 we will supply only electronic copies of planning documents to town and parish councils, except for those that do not have email.
"We have been sending both paper and electronic copies for the past year and have informed all the councils that we intend to stop sending paper copies from April 1.
"Projectors can be used to display the information at council meetings so there is no need to print everything.
"Grants are available from the National Lottery to town and parish councils to buy projection equipment and officers from the council's planning department have been giving advice and training to help councils make the transition."
DID YOU KNOW YOU CAN NOW READ MORE INTERESTING NEWS ABOUT BRIGG AND DISTRICT BY VISITING AN EXCITING NEW WEBSITE?
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1 comment:
I can see the advantages of putting applications onto NLC internet site....it would save work hours and reduce the amount of paperwork.
But not everyone is computer literate and unless a hard copy was produced such folks would not be fully aware of the application.
(as a Devil's Advocate it could be posed whether there is a correlation between folks who are computer illiterate and their ability to understand the technical details in some applications.)
However, for fairly simple applications, there may be ways to allow easy assess to NLC's site - such as a large-screen, push-button display that could be used for both public and town council use.
This would obviously need some capital investment by NLC to make medium and long-term savings.
Nevertheless, anyone who has undertaken any research will indicate the short-comings of using the internet to access information. It is very quick and convenient, but lacks the essentially ability for easy cross-referencing. For example, the Tesco application is a multi-report document containing thousands of pages.....it is extremely difficult, if not impossible, to adequately cross-reference the various drawings, reports and folios without a hard copy.........................but Tesco is an exception and does an application to build a garage require the multi-duplication of paperwork?
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