Also interviewed on the show was architecture critic Oliver Wainwright who was slightly less complimentary about the tower, describing it as a “turd on the plaza”, adding: “But it’s not only the turd, in this case it’s a whole contorted mass of entrails as if the intestines from some strange steel monster have been ripped out and stretched out and twisted into oblivion”.

You can make up you own mind with a close-up shot here.  You can listen to the interviews from 2.36 here.

Elsewhere, a piece in today’s  Guardian says the sculpture “divides those living in its shadow in east London as well as those in the artworld and beyond”.  While an article in today’s Telegraph looks at the spread of public sculptures in recent years. Its author writes: “Nothing unites the country in mutual horror more than the many hundreds of publicly funded works of art that have arisen over the past two decades in housing estates and municipal squares, parks and villages, redeveloped quaysides and decommissioned pits, roundabouts and hospital atriums. The critics loathe them. The art world ignores them. The public walks by, at best unstirred, at worst in fury”.

This Thursday, voters in ten of England’s biggest cities outside London will vote on whether to join the capital in having a directly-elected mayor. Meanwhile, those in Salford and Liverpool will be voting for the first time in mayoral elections. Under the government’s city deal proposals, cities with “strong and accountable” leadership will be granted devolved powers over regeneration, economic growth and possibly planning. It could mark the start of the biggest decentralisation project since devolution was granted to Wales, Scotland and London by the Labour government in the late 1990s. But according to a recent poll, 61 per cent of people oppose the switch to elected mayors. After more than a decade of having a high-profile mayor in London, why aren’t cities more enthusiastic about the prospect?

While many in London have complained about the quality of candidates in this year’s mayoral election, particularly the shenanigans of the ‘Boris and Ken show’, the race has certainly hogged the headlines, even in the regions. And whatever you think of the candidates, Londoners have embraced the opportunities of having an elected mayor with surveys showing most think a high-profile, accountable figure championing the capital has been good for the city.

Contrast this with the picture outside London. A surprising lack of enthusiasm has been noted in places such as Birmingham, Newcastle and even across the country. Last month, it was reported that senior Tories feared that as few as three cities could end up opting for the system. And low turnouts could damage the mandate of a ‘Yes’ vote.

Much of the resistance comes from town halls themselves unhappy about being sidelined and uneasy with too much power concentrated in the hands of one person. Some cities rightly argue that things are going well, so why tinker with a successful system? The government insists the city deals are bespoke for each city, but in some areas there is a sense that the government is enforcing localism – in the shape of elected mayors – from above rather than asking cities what they actually want.

Manchester, for example, has already been granted a city deal by the government despite not having a mayor because it already has the necessary leadership required, the Greater Manchester Combined Authority (GMCA). The GMCA, which represents the 10 councils of the city region who will share the benefits of the deal, have voiced opposition to an elected mayor. A mayor representing just Manchester, one authority among the 10, would make no sense, it contends.

These concerns about the geography of the elected mayoral system have been voiced by Sir Peter Hall in his Planning column. Sir Peter pointed out that city mayors representing just single local authorities rather than the broader city regions, could lead to potential confusion and conflict between mayors and local enterprise partnerships (LEPs) or between each other.

Another major problem is that the exact powers to be devolved will not be revealed by the government until each city actually agrees to create a mayoral system, or something similar. So voters are entering the unknown.

The Centre for Cities think tank, which champions elected mayors, has argued that the potential powers mayors will inherit are essentially those of a council leader, and not that extensive compared to major cities in other countries. Nevertheless, research by the centre shows some city mayors could have a big job on their hands. The potential future mayor of the largest authority, Birmingham, for example, would handle a £2.2 billion budget that would rival some government departments. Echoing Sir Peter, the centre calls for city region ‘metro mayors’, covering several local authority areas to reflect the natural economic area, and controlling powers like transport and planning to drive economic growth.

To be fair to the coalition, city deals would push English devolution further than the previous Labour administration had managed. And anyone in favour of stronger, more accountable local government should welcome this. But if the government’s ambitious devolution project is derailed by a plethora of no votes on Friday, what then? It would be ironic if a major part of its localism agenda was thwarted by local resistance to Whitehall’s plans.

Picture: a Bradford polling station, taken by Neil T on Flickr

Ever since the Department for Communities and Local Government (DCLG) published the final document at the end of March it’s been a hands-off approach.

Planning minister Greg Clark and DCLG chief planner Steve Quartermain have both said in recent weeks that it is up to councils to define the NPPF’s meaning.

Even the government helpline set up to advise local authorities on the NPPF is not intended to help them interpret the meaning of the policies contained in the document.

Now another attempt to shed some light on how the NPPF is to be applied has been stonewalled.

The DCLG this week refused to disclose the advice note given to those manning the NPPF helpline to ensure consistent handling of calls.

Responding to a Freedom of Information request by eco-campaigner Shlomo Dowen, the DCLG said the document was generated for “internal communication only”.

“The public interest in refusing to disclose this material outweighs the public interest in disclosing it,” it states, adding that there is “strong public interest in ensuring policies in the framework stand alone”.

“The policies in the framework should be interpreted and applied by decision-makers in the light of the facts and circumstances of the matter before them.

“It is important that the clarity of the policies is not reduced by material that may be misinterpreted as further statements of policy.”

Dowen, who fronts a network of campaign groups against waste incineration, says he put in the request in the hope of restoring the balance of information available to community groups that cannot afford access to lawyers and planning professionals.

He told me: “There’s no check and balance on whether people are following the advice from the helpline. We haven’t asked for that but want to know generally what should be happening so we can hold local authorities to account and ensure that questions are answered consistently and
 accurately.”

Dowen has
 immediately requested an internal review of the DCLG’s handling 
of his request, arguing that the purpose of the advice note is to be to guide external
 communications with local planning authorities.

We’ll have to wait a few weeks at least to see whether he is successful. Perhaps the frequently asked questions guide for the helpline, promised to be made available “shortly” by Quartermain, will go some way to making the situation more open and transparent.

The Audley Square carpark, pic courtesy caudwellphilanthropy

Could planners help unlock a new wave of charitable giving? A billionaire philanthropist thinks they can. John Caudwell, who made his fortune by building and selling his mobile phone business for £1.5 billion, is proposing to turn the air above a central-London car park into up to £100 million – and then give the money to charity.

Caudwell, who acquired the property in Audley Square, Mayfair, is to regenerate the building and create luxury apartments.

In the process, he proposes to generate funds “to help London’s vulnerable” through his Thin Air Foundation www.thinairfoundation.com by adding two more floors, with all profits generated from the sale of the additional apartments going to the charity.

Caudwell already has planning permission to develop the site to the maximum permitted within planning guidelines – but says “if planning committees across the country allowed projects to be expanded beyond the original approved plan, for charitable purposes, it could generate billions of pounds for community projects”.

He is proposing the introduction of special “local authority planning sub-committees, formed of experts in design, architecture and construction, as well as council planners, charities and representatives of the business community. These special committees will be given the authority and discretion to make intelligent and informed decisions to enable development projects to be expanded beyond the original approved plan, with profits from the expansion going to charity”.

Caudwell said: “The incredibly exciting thing about the idea of adding two floors to this project is that we create a massive amount of financial support for London’s underprivileged – and potentially provide a prototype for future developers and investors”.

“Many philanthropists could well be taxed out of giving, but I actually want to give more. ‘Creative philanthropy’ could become a crucial element of charitable support in challenging economic times.

“Imagine if the planners were to be allowed to flex their rules – but only where the architectural merits were undoubted, and, equally specifically, only where all of the incremental profit went to charitable causes; in London alone the extra revenue for good causes could be hundreds of millions of pounds a year. The lives of thousands of vulnerable people would be transformed.

“I’ve spoken with Boris Johnson about this plan, and how he can use his position and charisma to help deliver it – assuming he wins the London mayoral election, of course. But I would have thought any London Mayor would recognise the merits of this proposal.

“In the case of my Audley Square development, it would be a straightforward and highly cost-efficient process to add two floors to the structure, and, in the process, create beautiful apartments which could generate as much as £100 million in profit, all of which would go into a foundation designed to tackle social deprivation,” said Caudwell.

“The enhanced plans are ready to be run past the appropriate authorities; sustainability is high on the design agenda, as is the ‘grand Mayfair’ architectural look that we seek to create.

“I must stress I would make nothing from this additional floor space – I already have planning permission for the building, but I’m so passionate about the concept and how it could transform London’s ability to deal with deprivation that I’m delaying the start of construction to try to make the ‘thin-air’ idea work”.

Caudwell is asking for people to sign a petition to pressure the Department for Communities and Local Government in order to “see planning guidelines re-aligned in specific cases to enable developers to generate funds to help the vulnerable”.

So what do planners think? A no-brainer or a recipe for bad planning?

So what’s wrong with this approach? Surely pushing power down from Whitehall closer to local residents is an admirable goal for policy-makers? Well it is. But sometimes it feels like government ministers use the “localism” word as an excuse when they don’t want to provide answers to difficult questions.

In the case of the NPPF, there is growing frustration that the government has failed to provide clarity on the meaning of policies in the document which planning consultants and lawyers see as potential battlegrounds. Questions have been raised about how far local plans can conflict with the NPPF during the 12-month grace period councils have to bring plans into line with national policy (the NPPF says that councils with plans adopted after 2004 may give full weight to relevant policies in the plans even if there is a “limited degree of conflict” with the framework). Another area of potential confusion is how much extra land for housing councils need to plan for on top of the required five-year supply. The NPPF says that councils with a “record of persistent underdelivery of housing” should provide an extra 20 per cent, while those with a good record can plan for only five per cent.

So far, the message emerging from the DCLG has been that now the NPPF has been published it is up to councils to define its meaning. Speaking last week at a London seminar, Greg Clark said that the NPPF is a “framework for local decision-taking” and it is for councils to make judgements on its interpretation. At a separate conference last week, chief planner Steve Quartermain described the framework as a “control shift” to local authorities. He revealed that a government helpline set up to advise local authorities on the NPPF is not intended to help them interpret the meaning of the policies contained in the document. He said: “The advice is not geared at telling you: ‘This is what the policy means’.” Quartermain said that instead the helpline would give advice about the process councils can follow to test their policies for conformity against the NPPF.

It will be a while before the full implications of this approach become clear. But there are risks. Take the issue of housing land supply and what constitutes a “record of persistent underdelivery of housing”, for example. Clark said at the seminar last week that he “did not want to appear to offer an interpretation” on what would be considered persistent underdelivery, while a DCLG spokeswoman said that it is for councils to decide, “based on evidence of performance”. But the result of the DCLG deciding against what might look like “top-down” intervention in this area could well be a spate of appeals and delays.

As Ian Tant, senior partner at consultancy Barton Willmore, has recently pointed out, a key question raised by this particular section of the NPPF is how many councils will readily accept that they are persistently failing to deliver. The last time national figures published for housing land supply were published was in November 2009. Those figures showed that, as at April 2009, 86 per cent of all local planning authorities reported to have identified sufficient sites to supply 100 per cent or more of the housing requirement for the next five years. The development industry claimed that this figure was far too high and the DCLG felt that these figures contradicted its own checks – which suggested that the figure was likely to be around 25 per cent to 30 per cent – and so commissioned the Planning Inspectorate (PINS) to investigate further. In 2010, PINS concluded in a report that of those authorities where conclusions on five-year housing land supply were identified, 61.4 per cent were found to have a five-year housing land supply. A DCLG spokesman told Planning last week that the figures were no longer published nationally, but councils still have to report their own five-year supply figures.

Given that there has clearly been a problem in the not-too-distant past with a sizeable proportion of local authorities being over-optimistic with their housing land supply figures, it would be helpful for the DCLG to spell out exactly what it means by a “record of persistent underdelivery of housing”. Localism is an admirable principle. But hiding behind the localism word when some guidance from central government could help to head off costly appeals looks like an abdication of responsibility.

jamie.carpenter@haymarket.com

‘Boris bite’ sparks s106 frenzy

First to London, where the introduction of the mayoral CIL on 1 April appears to have led to a spike in section 106 (s106) planning gain deals being agreed ahead of this date. Schemes with planning permission but where no s106 agreement was tied up before 1 April have to pay a mayoral CIL contribution on top of the s106 payment to the relevant borough. Apparently the property industry is beginning to refer to the mayoral CIL as the “Boris bite” after the capital’s mayor Boris Johnson (right), who is currently locked in a bitter election battle with Labour rival Ken Livingstone.

Figures from research firm Molior London show that March 2012 was a something of a busy month for London boroughs, developers, lawyers and planning consultants. According to the figures, 95 s106 agreements were tied up between developers of housing schemes and London boroughs in March 2012 – a sixfold increase in the number of deals usually agreed across London in a month. The last day of March even saw a lawyer dispatched in a taxi from London to Leeds to get the necessary signatures to tie up a section 106 deal. Some big regeneration schemes were among those to have their s106 deals tied up at the 11th hour, including an agreement for the Minoco site in Tower Hamlets (pictured right). For Planning’s full story, click here, and to read Planning editor Richard Garlick’s take on the news, click here.

 Self-builders fire CIL instalments warning

Yesterday saw Downing Street host a bash to announce a new package of support for the self-build industry, where housing minister Grant Shapps was joined by a “glittering cast list of TV house-building experts” (for more of my views on celebrities and DCLG, click here). But could CIL poop the government’s self-build party? Today’s issue of Planning reports on a warning that the government’s drive to increase self-building could by hit by the introduction of CIL tariffs. Self-builders say that some emerging CIL payment policies do not distinguish between the size of residential schemes and so may cause cash flow problems for smaller projects. Property consultant Ahmed Zghari told Planning that various councils that have already adopted CIL charges have so far only allowed payment by instalments for CIL levels above minimum thresholds, disadvantaging self-builders who typically face smaller CIL charges. Full story here.

Huntingdonshire eyes 1 May for CIL introduction

Huntingdonshire District Council is set to introduce its CIL on 1 May after an independent examiner endorsed its plans. In a report issued last week, examiner Nigel Payne said that he considered Huntingdonshire District Council’s proposed Community Infrastructure Levy (CIL) charging schedule to provide an “appropriate basis for the collection of the levy in the district”.

Colchester re-examines viability of proposed levy

Colchester Borough Council is undertaking a re-examination of the viability of its proposed CIL charges following concerns raised in response to the consultation into its draft charging schedule, which finished in December. If the new study finds the figures are solid, the draft schedule will proceed to examination. If not, and the figures are changes, a new round of consultation will be held in the autumn.

Exeter amends proposed CIL charges

Exeter City Council’s draft charging schedule, currently being consulted on by the council, includes lower CIL rates for a range of development types than were first proposed. The preliminary document had proposed to charge £100 per sq metre on residential development, but that figure has now become £80. The charge for student accommodation has dropped from £50 to £40 per sq metre. And a proposed charge on large retail stores and warehouses of £300 per sq metre has been replaced with a zero charge for all retail/warehouse development in the city centre, with such development outside the city centre facing a charge of £240 per sq metre.

Bath unveils CIL plans

Congratulations to Bath and North East Somerset Council, which has become the latest local authority to publish a preliminary draft charging schedule. Residential charges proposed are £100 per square metre in a zone including Bath city centre (pictured, right), and £200 per square metre in a Bath Rural. Bathavon zone. Further details can be viewed on our CIL live table, here (£).

CIL TOTALISER..

According to our latest count, there are now 38 CIL charging authorities in England that have published CIL charging plans. Of those, five are already charging the levy (Newark and Sherwood, Shropshire, Redbridge, London mayoral CIL) and one (Huntingdonshire) is set to start charging on 1 May 2012. Two authorities (Wandsworth and Poole) are currently at the examination stage. A further nine have begun consulting on draft charging schedules, while 21 are at the preliminary draft charging schedule stage.

A complete table of the CIL charges that have been published to date can be viewed here (£).

To tell us your CIL news, contact jamie.carpenter@haymarket.com. For CIL updates, follow Jamie on Twitter at @J_J_Carpenter. Additional reporting by Colin Marrs. Top picture by Garry Knight.

pic courtesy MarkHillary on Flickr

So there we have it. The government is not going to perform a U-turn on a third runway at Heathrow Airport. At least not any time soon.

Press reports around the time of last month’s Budget suggested that chancellor George Osborne was warming to the idea following increasing pressure from the aviation industry and business leaders. They argued that a looming capacity crisis at Heathrow was damaging the UK economy because airlines were increasingly relocating to more spacious continental rivals.

But transport minster Theresa Villiers’ speech at yesterday’s Transport Times aviation conference left no room for doubt: “The coalition has always been clear that it does not support a third runway at Heathrow.

“The quality of life impact of a third runway, with up to 220,000 more flights over London every year, would be massive and there is no technological solution in sight to ensure planes become quiet enough quickly enough to make this burden in any way tolerable.

“So we need another solution.”

Cynics might suggest the move was made with half an eye on the London mayoral elections – the last thing Tory candidate Boris Johnson needs is an inflamed debate about Heathrow’s expansion harming his re-election chances.

So the Department for Transport’s (DfT) impending consultation on aviation strategy and the lack of airport capacity in the South East, postponed from this spring to the summer, will look at all the options apart from expansion of the UK’s biggest airport – something aviation industry leaders find rather odd.

Two big guns from the sector who spoke at yesterday’s conference after Villiers – Colin Matthews, the chief executive of Heathrow operators BAA and Julie Southern, chief commercial officer of Virgin Atlantic – were diplomatic in their response to the government’s position. But both made it clear why they think that a third Heathrow runway expansion is the only real option on the table if the UK wants to maintain its status as an international aviation hub.

Matthews mentioned a study by the Board of Airline Representatives in the UK which found that 53 per cent of airlines surveyed are increasing flights in other countries at the expense of the UK because of capacity constraints at Heathrow.  Southern pointed out that Virgin Atlantic faces massive constraints at Heathrow but would not be able to grow at Birmingham or Manchester because the volume of traffic, and hence the business, is simply not there.  Matthews said the same about airlines moving to Stansted. Their argument is that the market dictates that Heathrow – as the UK’s only hub airport with the greatest passenger volume – is where the money is. And there’s not much the government can do about it short of closing it down. Southern said: “We should be able to grow where our passengers want us to grow, not where it’s politically expedient.”

As I said in my last blog, having ruled out a third Heathrow runway, the government will need to be imaginative in solutions it comes up with. Yesterday, Villiers firstly made a distinction between connectivity and capacity, saying that increased space does not necessarily always mean more flights. She also mentioned a few ideas around maximising Heathrow’s capacity, including a trial on more operational freedom at the airport and increased European integration on air space. She also spoke about improving access to the airport through HS2 and links to other airports. And the continued refusal to rule out second runways at Gatwick and Stansted – opposition to which were also coalition pledges – suggested they will be options in the upcoming consultation alongside a Thames estuary airport.

However, none of this appears likely to solve the immediate problem of Heathrow bursting at the seams.  Having backed itself into a corner, the government needs to get thinking if it wants to find answers. A statement I’ve seen today from by BAA appeared to threaten a judicial review if a third Heathrow runway is not considered in the consultation. “It is important that major decisions by government follow due process and the option to seek a judicial review if they do not, is always available,” the statement said.

Though the government may want to kick it into the long grass, this is one issue that’s not going away.

Last week, deputy prime minister Nick Clegg declared that Britain was “turning the page on a culture of reckless consumption”.

“We are undergoing a profound transformation within our economy”, he said, “and for the first time ever our economic and environmental mantras are exactly the same: waste not, want not. Whether it’s waste of energy, waste of money, waste of our potential, we are focused on conserving our precious resources. Responsibility and sustainability are the watchwords of the day”.

Britain, he suggested, was winning the battle to rein in CO2 emissions and a new green future was just round the corner. It was heartening stuff for a gloomy cynic such as myself.

That view has now been challenged though by a report from the Energy and Climate Change Committee. The document claims that the UK’s record on cutting greenhouse gases is not as good as DECC figures suggest. It says DECC’s official CO2 figures – that count territorial emissions from power stations and transport, etc, within UK borders – show nearly  20 per cent reduction between 1990–2009. But research commissioned by the Department for the Environment Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA) reveals that CO2 emissions were 20 per cent higher in 2009 if consumption based emissions -  from imported goods – are included.

The report concludes that the fall in the UK’s territorial emissions “was not entirely or even mostly a consequence of the Government’s climate policy. Rather, it was mainly a result of the switch from coal to gas-fired electricity generation that began in the early 1990s, and the shift in manufacturing industries away from the UK in response to the pressures of globalised markets”.

It added: “The 9 per cent fall in the UK’s consumption-based emissions between 2008 and 2009 was primarily a result of the economic downturn, rather than of the UK’s policies to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Discounting the effects of the recession, the UK’s consumption-based emissions have been on an upward trend since 1990.”

And this is the problem. No matter what, if anything, is being achieved in terms of low carbon energy production, in getting homes more energy efficient and lowering transport emissions, the real challenge lies in a more inconvenient truth, that people are still buying too much stuff they don’t really need.

This makes a mockery of any attempt to reduce domestic CO2 emissions and is effectively outsourcing emissions and environmental damage to other countries.

As Friends of the Earth said in response to the report: “One of the main reasons why nations such as China have soaring carbon emissions is because they are making goods to sell to rich Western countries – this report highlights the UK’s role in creating this pollution”.

But how is this to be tackled? The report recommends “eco-labelling” of products in order to encourage more sustainable consumption.

It says: “Government should do more to make people aware of the consumption-based emissions data gathered by DEFRA. We recommend that DECC recognise the limitations of territorial emissions in trying to communicate to consumers how they can change their behaviour in order to reduce emissions globally. Even if an increased emphasis on consumption-based emissions has no impact on the UK’s local territorial emissions, the UK has to address its consumption if it is to make an effective contribution to a global reduction in greenhouse gas emissions.”

But will the government be willing to address the real forces that drive this consumption? Labelling goods with their carbon impact sounds a bit like tacking a symptom rather than a cause. Would any government, particularly one that’s desperately trying to kick-start economic growth, dare try and address the real drivers of consumerism – the proliferation of advertising, the spread of easily accessible bargain retailers, the magazines and TV programmes pressurising us to buy the latest fashions and gadgets? It seems unlikely.

So, in an economic system that relies so heavily on consumer spending to boost growth, how can consumption ever be decoupled from carbon emissions? Answers on a sustainably-sourced postcard please (or just leave a message below).

Archers character Brian Aldridge, chair of Borchester Land, wants to invest in a high-tech intensive unit on the Estate (similar, albeit smaller, than the Nocton Dairies “mega dairy” plan which sparked huge opposition in Lincolnshire last year). But the plans have proved unpopular with Ambridge residents, who question whether planning committee chair Kevin Townsend is impartial. He became “very matey” with Brian Aldridge during the planning states of the new market development, they point out.

Before the meeting, Townsend tells Aldridge not to worry should protestors become vocal. “Any trouble, I’ll clear the public gallery,” he says, menacingly.

At the meeting, Hattie Marshall – described on the BBC’s Archers page as the “combat-trousered, nose-ringed chair of Borsetshire Against Factory Farming” – is first to speak. She says that “units like this … will force conventional dairy farms out of business”. “We face the real prospect of cows in the fields disappearing from our countryside,” she warns. “They’ll all be in vast industrial complexes like the one proposed here.”

Marshall also warns of the prospect of “potentially catastrophic” pollution given the “prodigious quantities of slurry being produced by the plant”. The claim prompts an objection from Aldridge, who says it represents “scaremongering based on pure speculation”. Marshall concludes her comments by calling on the committee to consider “not simply the short-term supposed economic benefits of this scheme, but to think about the future of our countryside, the future of our countryside, and indeed the future of the planet”.

Next up to speak is chief planning officer John Bagshaw, who reminds the committee that his report recommends that the plan be approved. The meeting is then addressed by councillor Esther Sutton, who says that, despite her previous reservations, she now supports the scheme. “This plan represents a huge investment in the local economy,” she states. “It will create jobs, both in its construction and operation.” Her comments do not go down well in the public gallery. More popular with super dairy opponents is councillor Martin Sykes, who delivers a rollicking speech, stating that if councillor Sutton “can’t see that this would be a grotesque blot on the landscape, she needs her eyes testing”.

At the conclusion of the meeting, committee chair Townsend reminds the committee that the chief planning officer has recommended approval. “There are no valid planning reasons to refuse this application,” he says. “If the committee rejects it, Borchester Land will have every right to appeal and would in all probability win, which would cost the council a considerable sum of money.”

To the dismay of the super dairy opponents, the committee voted narrowly in favour of delegating the final decision to the chief planning officer. It seems that the only thing that can now stop the project in its tracks is a report from the Environment Agency, which has yet to be received, and which will be considered by the chief planning officer when making his decision. Ruth and Pat Archer are keeping their fingers crossed that the report’s conclusions will prevent permission from being granted.

The BBC is asking people to vote on “if you were on the planning committee, would you approve the mega-dairy?” (click here to take part). Currently, four-fifths of respondents say they would reject the plan.

Some Twitter commentators have criticised the show for its inaccurate portrayal of the planning process. Alister Scott tweeted yesterday: “Why did they have to pervert proper planning protocols for drama?” George Owers, meanwhile, said: “Planning meeting episode of @BBCTheArchers very inaccurate. Objector allowed to speak without a time limit before planning officer intro?”

But does this matter if the programme is raising the profile of planning? It is entertainment, after all. Let us know what you think by commenting below.

jamie.carpenter@haymarket.com