Ribble Valley planning committee warned about threat of govt intervention
Having lost two appeals recently, the council’s director of planning has reminded members about the potential consequences of rejecting more proposals.
The warning will be put to members at next week’s committee meeting when two housing projects totalling 165 homes are up for determination – one with a recommendation for approval and another that is in line for rejection.
In recent months, Ribble Valley has had decisions to refuse two major schemes overturned by the Planning Inspectorate – Oakmere’s 74-home Whalley project and Hallam Land’s 300-dwelling scheme in Langho.
The quality of a council’s decision-making is judged on its performance at appeal; too many defeats can result in the government stripping local authorities of planning autonomy.
This happened recently when nine council’s, including Rossendale in Lancashire, were put on the government’s planning naughty step for poor-quality decision making.
Local planning authorities are at risk of losing the ability to make their own decisions if more than 10% of decisions are allowed by appeal over a two-year period, Rossendale’s was 15.4%, the highest of the nine councils to be disciplined.
Due to the ‘designation’, developers looking to build in Rossendale can now, in theory, bypass the local council and go straight to the secretary of state for a decision.
Ribble Valley is wary that the same fate could await it if has any more unsuccessful trips before the Planning Inspectorate and director of planning Nicola Hopkins has laid out the situation to members in a report.
“[For] small local authorities, who do not get a lot of major applications, it only takes a couple of appeal overturns to result in the authority not meeting the 10% target. This comes then with the threat of possible designation,” the report states.
Despite concerns about future appeals, the council’s officer team has recommended the committee refuse another application next week.
Applicant Specialist Diesel wants to build 85 homes on 10 acres off Longsight Road east of Mellor Brook.
Among the seven proposed reasons for refusal are that the scheme “would result in large scale residential development in an unsustainable location which would fail to provide satisfactory opportunities for walking, cycling and public transport leading to a dependence upon private motor vehicles” and that it would appear “incongruous, unsympathetic, and discordant”.
To learn more about the project, search for reference number 3/2026/0078 on Ribble Valley Council’s planning portal. PWA Planning and Urban Design Group are advising the applicant.
Another development, Persimmon’s 80-home scheme in Wilpshire, is up for consent.
The housebuilder wants to build a mix of three- and four-bed homes on a 12.3-acre site east of Salesbury View. Thirty percent of the homes would be affordable.
The reference number for this scheme is 3/2025/0801. The project team includes IDPartnership Northern, WSP, SCP, ERAP Consultant Ecologists, Ascerta, and Geol Consultants.
Planning inspectors allow nearly two thirds in Inquiries. Who inspects them?
By Anon
The overturned decisions may not necessarily be “poor quality”. The Planning Inspectorate makes its decisions according to the national framework and Local Plan, but I am not convinced their site visits are sufficient to understand the local context in which those policies are being applied. It would seem there are times when the removal of a planning decision from the local council leads to a worse decision. But it is then left to the local council to somehow make it work.
By John Wilson
Ribble Valley have a long standing record of trying to oppose anti significant development, preferring to keep the area preserved in aspic . The authority is a vast rural area so has plenty of land for development. Much of the council area can be developed without harm to the rural character of the council. Thus is true especially in relation to the areas related to in these applications, they are small additions to already established nieghbours and close to the urban core of Blackburn, which by the way also makes the decision to split Ribble Valley from the rest of Pennine Lancashire even more a nonsense
By George
Surrounded on four sides by open countryside. What’s the problem?
By Anonymous