LYME Regis Town Council has hit out at Dorset Council’s planning team with one councillor stating –“their chaos shouldn’t become our crisis”.

The town council’s planning meeting was given a number of applications which required a response from the council before the date of the meeting, so they were dealt with under the chairman and vice chairman’s delegated authority.

However, town councillors criticised Dorset Council saying they were given less than 24 hours to make a decision on some ‘contentious’ applications.

Cllr Michaela Ellis said: “When you think about the time it takes to register these things, now some of these I was looking at were sent in December and they register them on the 8th or 9th of March and expect us to comment within 24 hours, it isn’t right.”

Mayor of Lyme Regis, Cllr Brian Larcombe said: “I think we ought to comment back to Dorset, it hasn’t gone unnoticed and their chaos shouldn’t become our crisis.

“And it is chaotic up there, it feels like that.”

Deputy clerk Mark Green agreed and said: “Particularly when several of these applications are potentially quite contentious, and we’re asked to turn them around without time for normal debate or discussion.”

Cllr Larcombe added: “There’s something wrong here.”

Dorset Council has responded to the comments made by the town council.

Mike Garrity, Head of Planning at Dorset Council, said: “Dorset Council is in the process of transforming its planning service which will see additional staff resources, including planners and support staff, combined with a review of its software systems to bring about more efficient and effective ways of working.

“This is a significant undertaking, harmonising six former local authorities into one, that will deliver better experiences for applicants and other customers of the planning service, but we appreciate that it will take time to implement fully.

“As regards the role of parish councils, they have an important role to play in commenting on planning applications and are given three weeks from the point of an application being publicised. However, if comments are received after this time they will still normally be considered as long as the application has not been decided.

“This is consistent with our approach to all consultees. Our work on the transformation programme should have no bearing on the ability of parish councils to comment on planning applications in the normal way.”