Gladman wastes time

Those that read the Independent Examiner's comments on Audlem's Neighbourhood Plan will have noticed his views on the huge amount of comment opposing the plan from developers. The Examiner said:

"Of those 204 pages, 164 consisted of representations from Gladman Developments Ltd. These have added substantially to the cost of this examination and the time it has taken to complete it through prolixity and repetitiveness, including repeatedly raising an argument that the High Court has previously rejected without drawing attention to the court decisions involved. The last point is regrettable since many examiners are not legally qualified and most parish councils lack legal support.

"The repetitiveness is also of concern, particularly where it is coupled with a lack of particulars. This adds substantially and unnecessarily to the cost of a process that is intended to be relatively straightforward for bodies whose members are volunteers seeking to work for the benefit of their communities."

There is an offence relating to wasting police time. As a Chatbox suggestion said yesterday, maybe there should be a similar offence for wasting other official organisations' time. At the very least, Gladman should shoulder the cost of wasting the Examiner's time and the additional legal costs this caused.

Anyone who sat through all seven days of Gladman's appeal in May 2014 re their Little Heath development will know how this organisation works to force through their planning applications. They put up a large number of so-called expert witnesses, many of whom turned out to be Gladman employees.

Why the Inspector chose to give them days of spouting figures they had made up to show why Cheshire East should have way more houses than any other professional body thought appropriate so they would win their appeals is almost incomprehensible. After all, they are hardly going to be objective experts when their monthly salary cheque is paid by Mr Gladman.

Interestingly, however, it seems their dastardly plan to build all over rural England may not be working quite as planned. We have heard of examples of land they have permission to build on not reaching anything like the value expected, hence no building activity. In effect, having put in so many applications, and winning so many appeals, they may well have flooded the market allowing the builders they have to sell on to to pick and choose and lower their offers.

Nothing, we suspect, would give planning departments, rural communities, independent examiners of neighbourhood plans and anybody interested in an orderly democratic planning process more pleasure than seeing this particular organisation, Gladman Developments, coming unstuck. We can only keep our fingers crossed.

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