Sir – I was interested to read Adam Carew's letter in last week's Herald, headed "Stop plans to redistribute developers' contributions", which described a proposal by the EHDC Conservative cabinet to aggregate developers' contributions into a central fund which it could then allocate to "strategic projects".
"Developers' contributions" sound like well-meaning donations from benevolent building companies, but are in fact "planning gain", permitted under section 106 of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990.
Planning gain means that, as a condition for granting planning permission, the developer agrees – in cash or kind – to build a traffic roundabout, widen a footpath, or finance a piece of public art, as required by the planning authority. In other words they do a deal. As Adam Carew says, this traditionally benefits local people affected by the development and is often on the site, or allied to the development itself.
His concern is to prevent this benefit from being pooled into a central fund which the EHDC cabinet can apply as it wishes, anywhere in the district. I agree with Mr Carew. However, I am also concerned to ask – why? Why would the EHDC cabinet want to do that?
Encouraged to speculate by Tony Thorn's letter on the same page titled "Has eco-Titanic project struck an iceberg?", I am driven to the conclusion that that strategic project EHDC has in mind for all this funding is none other than the Whitehill Bordon eco-town.
How else could their much vaunted "new facilities" ever be financed?
In the latest government eco-town document issued this month titled "Financial viability study of the eco-towns programme", available on http://www.communities.gov.uk/">http://www.communities.gov.uk/ housing/housingsupply/ecotowns/ is an intriguing sentence under the heading Whitehill Bordon: "This is an unusual scheme, at least in terms of the consideration of section 106 packages, because the promoter is also the local planning authority."
So, instead of a building development company taking the initiative to build all those houses and negotiating a section 106 agreement with the local authority to build – say – a nice new town square as a condition for planning permission, the procedure will presumably need to be reversed. Will EHDC – as the developer – have to seek builders willing to undertake the work, based on a tender with the 106 details already attached? More difficult I suspect than bringing in all that developers' contribution from other projects in the district.
Peter Parkinson, Shortheath Common,
Oakhanger, Bordon