Change of use of agricultural land (FOI)

​Request

A

Since 2013 has the Planning Department and the Planning Committee sought to more strictly interpret and / or apply the policies of the Island Plan in order to refuse planning applications which seek to change the use of agricultural fields to domestic uses including use as a garden and / or as part of the domestic curtilage?

B

If there was such a change in the interpretation / application of the policies of the Island Plan as aforementioned, when did this occur and how was it notified to the public?

C

How many applications for development of an agricultural field to be used for domestic use or as domestic curtilage have been approved or rejected by the Planning Department / Committee in 2019 to 2020?

D

Has the planning department taken enforcement action against any landowners where an agricultural field has been used as a garden or as domestic curtilage and where the deemed use is agricultural?

Response

A and B

The current Island Plan was approved in 2011 and revised in 2014. If it appears, anecdotally, that the policy position has tightened to generally resist allowing fields or parts of fields to be turned into domestic gardens, then there is good reason. Both Policy NE6 (Coastal National Park) and NE7 (Green Zone) of the current Island Plan state, in their opening paragraphs, that there will be a general presumption against the loss of agricultural land to extend domestic curtilage.  

The fact that this has been highlighted in both of these policies suggests that, during the drafting of the current Plan, the protection of such land was regarded as a policy priority. The tightening of policy suggested in the question has therefore been in place since the current Island Plan was adopted. The Planning Department and Planning Committee must apply the policies of the Plan, taking into account all of the material considerations at play in any given application.

C

Our systems are not configured in a way that will allow us to extract the details you have requested. A manual search of our records would be required to obtain this information. We estimate that it will take us in excess of 12.5 working hours to locate and retrieve the data in reference to your request.

A scheduled public authority that has been requested to supply information may refuse to supply the information if it estimates that the cost of doing so would exceed an amount determined in the manner prescribed by Regulations. This part of your request, therefore, will not be processed further.

You are however welcome to carry out your own search for this information by reviewing application details posted on the on-line planning register:

Planning application search

D

This information is partially exempt under Article 23 of the Freedom of Information (Jersey) Law as all Enforcement Notices issued during the last five years are already available for you to view on-line at the following address:

Register of notices (Development, Land Condition and Dangerous Buildings)

A manual search of our records would be required to obtain details relating to the issuing of Enforcement Notices prior to 2015. We again estimate that this will take us in excess of the 12.5 working hours allowed under the Law to locate and retrieve the data.

Articles applied

Article 16 A scheduled public authority may refuse to supply information if cost excessive

(1) A scheduled public authority that has been requested to supply information may refuse to supply the information if it estimates that the cost of doing so would exceed an amount determined in the manner prescribed by Regulations.

Article 23 Information accessible to applicant by other means

(1) Information is absolutely exempt information if it is reasonably available to the applicant, otherwise than under this Law, whether or not free of charge.

(2) A scheduled public authority that refuses an application for information on this ground must make reasonable efforts to inform the applicant where the applicant may obtain the information.