North Yorkshire Council

 26 March 2026

Corporate Director Resources

(sub-delegated to the Assistant Director – Resources)

 

Development Management Funding

Report of the Corporate Director, Community Development

 

1.0       PURPOSE OF REPORT

 

1.1         To seek approval from the Corporate Director Resources (sub-delegated to the Assistant Director, Resources) for the acceptance of a grant offer from MHCLG for £92,340.78 to assist in the Planning Development function.

 

 

2.0       SUMMARY

2.1       The Council was contacted by MHCLG - Planning Capacity and Capability Team to notify the Council that NYC meets the eligibility criteria for Development Management Funding. This is subject to the submission of a short Expression of Interest (EOI). This is part of a fund which totals £8million.

 2.2      An EOI form was submitted in January 2026. It included a high level summary of how the funding was likely to be spent. This highlighted that the additional funding if received would be used to increase overall capacity with a focus on helping to develop service improvements linked to speed of decision making, pre app and other measures to improve efficiency.

2.3       The Council received notification in February that the EOI has been acceptable and that £92,340.78 had been awarded (see attached Development Management Fund Grant Determination Document).

3.0       BACKGROUND

3.1       Workload pressure with DM remains high with the total number of applications, year to date, shown in table 1 below:

Table 1: Applications Received

 

 

Q1 Total

Q2 Total

Q3 Total

Year Total

Major planning applications

 

57

52

34

143

Minor planning applications

 

373

420

389

1182

Other planning applications

 

889

748

682

2319

County matter planning

 

3

9

1

13

3.2       Performance remains above government targets as demonstrated in table 2. Our aspiration is however to improve performance further with the aim to be within the top quartile of authorities in the country. To assist this process we are currently developing something similar to the Great Yarmouth Protocol which sets standards for engagement with developers and agents. The aim of this protocol will be to speed up decision making along with a strong customer focus.

Table 2: Performance Against Statutory Targets

 

Statutory Target

Q1

Q2

Q3

CD1: % Major planning applications within statutory or extension of time

60%

71.93%

80.77%

85.29%

CD 2: % Minor planning applications within statutory or extension of time

70%

78.28%

85.95%

80.21%

CD3: % Other planning applications within statutory or extension of time

70%

89.43%

88.10%

89.74%

CD4: County matter planning applications determined within 13 / 16 week timescales or within agreed extension of time (2 year rolling measure)

60%

100%

77.7%

94.3%

 

3.3       Linked to the development of the protocol a key part of transforming the service is rolling out of a comprehensive pre app service. A considerable amount of work has been done on this project. Which has identified both the financial and operational benefits. This work has however highlighted the need for additional staff resource in the short term to deliver the project (2 Principal levels FTEs).

3.4       Finally, each of the area teams also has a number of old applications on their books. These need to audited and strategy developed to dispose of them following the completion of due process.

3.5       The grant will help increase capacity to address the workload pressure highlighted.

4.0       CONTRIBUTION TO COUNCIL PRIORITIES

4.1       Will assist in maintaining housing supply, supporting economic growth and the delivery of sustainable development

5.0       ALTERNATIVE OPTIONS CONSIDERED

5.1       Do not accept the grant effectively maintaining the current level of resource.

 

 

6.0       FINANCIAL IMPLICATIONS

6.1       The grant funding totals £92,340.78 revenue funding. No match funding is required.

6.2       The grant funding requires local authorities, that are awarded funding to have proposals in place by the end of March 2026 on how the funding will be spent. This was submitted to MHCLG on 28 January 2026. It is proposed that the funding is used predominantly to support staff resource and potentially services to aid delivery and performance.

6.3       It is anticipated that we will be able to utilise this funding by March 2027 however any unspent funding will need to be returned.

7.0       LEGAL IMPLICATIONS

7.1       The Development Management Fund Grant Determiniation 2025-26 : No 31/8208 Document sets out the purpose of the grant and associated information.

8.0       EQUALITIES IMPLICATIONS

8.1       Both MHCLG and local authorities have obligations under the Equality Act 2010 aiming to ensure that any possible equality impacts have been considered. 

9.0       CLIMATE CHANGE IMPLICATIONS

9.1       Good performance by the development management service contributes to the council’s wider aims on climate change via the delivery of development schemes which meet modern day standards of energy efficiency and also via the consideration of large-scale renewable energy proposals such as solar and wind energy projects.

10.0     PERFORMANCE IMPLICATIONS

10.1     The points highlighted in section 3 would serve to improve the council’s quarterly performance on the determination of applications against national performance targets.

11.0     HUMAN RESOURCES IMPLICATIONS

11.1     The recruitment and administration of an additional member of staff.

12.0     REASONS FOR RECOMMENDATIONS

12.1     The Government has made funding available to Local Planning Authorities to seek to make improvements to the delivery of Development Management. NYC DM service is still developing post LGR and cultural and procedural differences still exists. There are considerable opportunities to improve efficiency. There are also considerable operational and financial opportunities through pre app. The grant funding would provide the capacity to allow us to make this step changes whilst also assisting with addressing high work levels.

 

 

 

13.0     RECOMMENDATION(S)

 

13.1     The Corporate Director Resources (sub-delegated to the Assistant Director – Resources) approve the acceptance of a grant offer from MHCLG of £92,340.78 to assist in the Planning Development function.

 

                       

Nic Harne

Corporate Director – Community Development

County Hall

Northallerton

25 March 2026

 

Report Author – John Worthington - Executive Officer, Development Management          

Presenter of Report – Martin Grainger, Head of Development Management