Save the Fellgate Green Belt campaign hits out at ‘flawed’ Local Plan Consultation procedure

Campaigners aiming to save green belt land in South Tyneside have branded a consultation relating to the Council’s draft Local Plan as “flawed”.

The ‘Save the Fellgate Green Belt’ campaign was formed by concerned residents after proposals were included in South Tyneside Council’s draft Local Plan to build up to 1,200 new homes on green belt land in the area.

The final document will provide a framework for where new homes, businesses and leisure facilities will be built up until 2040, and a draft plan has been through two rounds of public consultation to date.

A second consultation period was held earlier this year, something which Dave Green from the campaign group has described as “flawed” due to a fault in the borough’s library hubs meaning that residents couldn’t give their responses electronically.

Dave has told the Shields Gazette that a fault was highlighted to South Tyneside Council on February 28 and March 3; however, the local authority said on March 26 and March 28 that there was no issue with ‘have your say link’.

He then stated that he was informed by the Council on May 4 that they had identified a problem back on March 4 - a day after it was highlight to them for a second time.

He said: “Passionate supporters who are campaigning to save the Fellgate green belt have had to overcome many obstacles during the consultation on the draft Local Plan and continue to do so.

“One of the main issues raised was their inability to give their responses electronically via the 'have your say' link in any of the South Tyneside Library Hubs.

“When the issue was raised in one of the hubs, the systems were rebooted but the fault remained.

“When they residents concerned returned from holiday on March 3, which was the last day of the consultation period, they found that the link was still not accessible and they reported it again.

“The fault was denied by officials until it was reported in the Gazette that ‘an issue was rectified’ the day after it was identified by a resident.

“We launched a complaint with the Council, who still denied there had been problem during Stage 1 but on Stage 2 of the complaints procedure, it was confirmed that there had been a fault.

“However, it is a bit of a coincidence that it was identified on March 4, which was the day after the Consultation period ended.

“This meant that an unknown amount of residents who have no access to IT facilities other than those in the Library Hubs, were unable to submit their responses electronically.

“In effect, the consultation procedure was flawed.”

Dave has also flagged concerns at missing documents from the Council’s website which relate to previous reports from as far back as 2016.

In particular, one report in 2018 stated that Fellgate was “unsuitable for development” but Dave states that this has been removed and replaced with a document that states that Fellgate “is suitable for development”.

Click here to get the Gazette’s headlines delivered to your inbox with our free email newsletters

He added: “We’ve recently decided to take a fresh look at previous reports from 2016 onwards.

“These highlighted the reasons why Fellgate back in 2018 was unsuitable for development in relation to traffic, flooding, bio-diversity, etc. but these reports have all disappeared from South Tyneside Council’s website and replaced by new reports related to the Local Plan, showing why Fellgate is now suitable for development.

“We don’t see how things have changed because traffic congestion has worsened, flooding continues, there is a climate emergency and air quality has gotten poorer.

”Sadly, the pledges and commitments that South Tyneside Council have signed up to over the past few years mean nothing to many hypocritical councillors who appear to be focused on bringing all these issues on a green belt that is cherished by many of the residents they represent.

“Despite numerous emails, the Council have refused to reinstate the reports as they say that it 'caused confusion amongst residents'.

“We are still continuing to source additional documents and reports which have been removed and despite the obstacles faced, the Save the Fellgate Green Belt campaign continues to gather momentum.”

South Tyneside Council has said that during the Regulation 19 Consultation residents were made aware of other ways to submit their views.

The local authority also stated that the missing documents have been unpublished due to them now being “out of date”.

A spokesperson for South Tyneside Council said: “During the Regulation 19 Consultation, which was extended by an additional week, there was a configuration issue with public library computers in which the ‘Have your say’ link could not be accessed.

“However, we widely publicised that written representation to the Local Plan could be made in a number of formats in addition to the online consultation portal, including by email and written letter.

“Documents that were produced in 2016 were removed from the website in summer 2022, ahead of the Regulation 18 consultation.

“They will not be republished as they are out of date and do not form part of the current Local Plan evidence base.”

The Save Fellgate Green Belt campaign handed in their petition at the last authority-wide Council meeting on Thursday, July 25.

The meeting heard the online petition had 2,248 signatories in total, although this number has now increased to 2,423.

You can view the “Save the Fellgate Green Belt” petition by visiting: https://www.change.org/p/save-the-greenbelt-south-fellgate-housing-development and find out more at: https://savethefellgategreenbelt.co.uk/.