Mid Devon District Council has been accused of ‘staggering incompetence’ in allowing a huge backlog of planning enforcement issues to build up.
Parliamentary candidate for Tiverton and Minehead Ian Liddell-Grainger says the situation sends a dangerous message to the community, with those minded to carry out breaches of planning rules likely to be encouraged to push their luck.
And, he says, council tax payers now face paying a heavy price as the council hires extra help to catch up with the outstanding cases.
Mid Devon has been left with a daunting list of ‘300’ live enforcement issues. The last officer dealing with them has now quit the council after the enforcement department had been running at half strength most of last year.
Councillors now have no option but to recruit temporary and expensive agency staff.
But Mr Liddell-Grainger, who will be standing on a Conservative ticket in the new constituency, said the situation was shameful and demonstrated clearly how ineptly the council was being run.
“Deciding to do something to redress the situation only now has the sound of a very large stable door being slammed,” he said.
“This situation hasn’t built up overnight: the staff deficiency has existed for a year but all councillors appear to have done is sit and watch the backlog of enforcement cases grow.
“Those developers and individuals who tend to operate in the twilight zone and don’t really pay much attention to details such as planning conditions are likely to conclude from this that they can build what they like, because there is no chance that the council will do anything about it for a very long time - if ever.
“I feel very sorry for the council tax payers. Not only have they been saddled with the £20 million bill for the 3 Rivers Developments fiasco they are now going to have to fund huge extra costs as a result of the authority having totally lost its grip on development control.
“If anyone were seeking an example of how not to run a local authority they need look no further than Mid Devon and its staggeringly incompetent leadership.”
