Medicinal cannabis proposed changes to the law (FOI)

Request

In the FOI request/response -

General Development Order proposed amendments FOI (gov.je) 

The Environment Minister stated there has been work that has taken place that steps outside the scope of the current exemption (GDO). And that he wants the law changed to bring it all within the scope of the requirement to make an application.

In the response it stated that a Ministerial Decision (MD) regarding proposed changes to the General Development (Jersey) Order was approved in March 2022, and that these changes were exempt from being released under Article 35.

Amendments to GDO cannot be made retrospectively, therefore what action is being taken to rectify this unauthorised development or are our Senior Ministers and the Planning Department condoning these breaches of the law?

The Minster for Environment stated six months ago that he wanted the law changed and I refer to the oral question below asked in the States Assembly.

23.11.21 OQ.242/2021 Deputy M.R. Higgins of the Minister for the Environment regarding Northern Leaf and Tamba Park applications (statesassembly.gov.je)

Deputy J.H. Young: The new industry has presented challenges to the planning team as to where there has been ambiguity about the scope of the General Development (Jersey) Order. These elements were identified as being part of the work that has taken place. It was deemed that they step outside the scope of the current exemption. The advice that I just gave, that I want to have the law changed to bring it all within the scope of requirement to make an application, will address that.

Can you provide details of the proposed law changes and if not why not?

And when are these law changes expected to be made?

Response to previous FOI

General Development Order proposed amendments FOI (gov.je) 

A Ministerial Decision (MD) regarding proposed changes to the General Development (Jersey) Order was approved in March 2022. However, this MD has been marked as being exempt from release under Article 35 (Formulation and development of policies) of the Freedom of Information (Jersey) Law 2011.

Article 35 is a qualified exemption and requires a public interest test to be carried out. This is located at the end of the response.

It is expected that any changes will be made after the General Election in June 2022 and the subsequent appointment of Ministers by the States Assembly in July 2022. 

Response 

Following various site visits, the Planning and Building Regulations sections do not consider that there are currently any unauthorised developments within the requested area, other than those matters which have already been the subject of retrospective planning applications.