Are Examinations in Public getting the right answers?

I recall a cartoon in Planning Magazine many years ago where the chief planner is preening himself in front of his secretary

“I like to think of us planners combining the best of all the landed professions.” 

“Yes, the modesty of an architect, the imagination of a highway engineer, the dress sense of a quantity surveyor and the ethics of an estate agent.”

All very amusing, but by no means typical.  I have always thought of planners as being bright, well-meaning and hard-working - if somewhat bureaucratic.  However, I have just been forced to reconsider.

I recently made representations to an Examination in Public of our local core strategy.  My point was quite simple.  The core strategy said our local town needed 900m² of new retail space by 2025.  This was predicated on a 2009 retail study, which erroneously showed the existing supermarket as being 600m² net rather than the 1,250m² claimed by the operators and evidenced by a floorplan and my inspection.  So there was a prima facie case for reducing the amount of new floorspace needed to 250m² – quite a reduction on the 900m² shown in the strategy.

I tried to persuade the planner responsible to amend the strategy before the hearing – but she refused point blank – their consultants must be right.  So off I went to the EIP.  There in front of me was the chief planning officer.  I expected him to put his hand up and say “Sorry, mistake, our fault, we’ll put it right.”  But no. 

At no stage did he challenge my evidence on floor area.  He claimed that we were not far apart.  “In fact, in the Retail Study of 2003 the existing supermarket area was shown as 1,300m².” 

“Fine” I said, “but the core strategy figures are taken from the 2009 study.  You now say you agree with my existing floor area, but the relevant study is based on a much lower figure.  Can we not just put the right number into the calculations and re-run the arithmetic?”

“Oh no!  My figure was gross, not net.”

By this time, I was becoming exasperated; my legendary patience was being tested.  He had no answer to the floorspace evidence and refused to do anything about it – even say he would investigate.

At this stage the inspector pointed out that we were going round in circles and wisely called a halt to proceedings.

Now you might think that these differences in floor areas are trivial.  But any new operator wishing to come to the town will use them as a starting figure.  And if you are the local, butcher, greengrocer, deli or florist, in such a small town, a 1,000m² Tesco is a frightening prospect.

My experience has raised three issues.

First, the plan appears to be based on a manifest error and, if adopted as it stands, could be vulnerable to judicial review, as would any determination relying on it - whatever the government does to try and limit the use of JR. 

Secondly, I have always been in favour of the less adversarial approach of an EIP.  But on leaving the building, I was mulling, if my experience were typical, was I right?  It remains to be seen what the inspector makes of things, but I wonder if we went back to the good old-fashioned inquiry, with the prospect of cross-examination by a ruthless QC, the planning officer might have had to provide some answers?

And thirdly, I am left thinking that if I can pick up such an obvious error (although only a very few sad people examine capacity studies in any detail) how many more undetected errors are lurking there?  As Donald Rumsfeld said “…… as we know, there are known knowns; there are things we know we know. We also know there are known unknowns; that is to say we know there are some things we do not know.  But there are also unknown unknowns - the ones we don't know we don't know.” 

It is the unknown unknowns that worry me.