One Planet Development scheme in Cresselly Big Wood approved

The One Planet Development scheme application for a smallholding at Cresselly Big Wood, Cresselly, submitted by local award-winning design business owner by Marcus Beck.

It includes the construction of one dwelling, a workshop, barn, compost toilet, garden room, greenhouse, reed bed, pond and attenuation ponds with a parking area and internal tracks, within a five-year phased timescale.

It is intended to be the home to two adults and two children.

Planning permission was previously granted on March 1 of last year for a forestry building on the site, work on which has begun, which would form a wood storage building proposed as part of this application.

The scheme, recommended for conditional approval at the February 14 meeting of Pembrokeshire county council’s planning committee, was approved by nine votes to five.

In addition to producing bespoke garden rooms and ‘pods,’ the site would also be used to grow organic mushrooms and eventually offer educational courses, committee members were told.

Supporting images for the 'Big Wood' One Planet Development. (Image: Pembrokeshire County Council)

Speaking on behalf of her husband’s application, former BBC Wales reporter Abigail Beck – now a communications officer for Marine Energy Wales – said she had hoped the One Planet Development scheme and associated TAN6 [Technical Advice Note] legislation would have led to a “ripple effect” of many more applications.

Raising the issue of objections, which included the application being out of character and a claimed impracticality of the proposal, she told the committee there was a misunderstanding of One Planet Developments at both local authority and local level.

She told planners the application made by her husband, who grew up “just a stone’s throw” from the One Planet site, had the full support of local community councils Carew and Jeffreyston; with letters of support also received.

Councillor Brian Hall, who moved approval, compared the application favourably with previous One Planet schemes considered, saying he expected the site would be self-sufficient well before the allowed five-year period, adding: “I wish them well on this.”

A different view was taken by Councillor Michael Williams, who just one day before had called for a Wales-wide moratorium on One Planet Development applications at Pembrokeshire County Council’s Cabinet meeting.

“I’m sorry to say I can’t support this application; TAN6 is probably the worst legislation that’s come from the Senedd. The application is in open countryside, it’s contrary to all planning ethics in every way.

“How are we going to enforce the conditions we impose? It is destroying a unique area of the county.”

He was joined by Councillor Jamie Adams – a former council leader – who said: “I struggle with this element of the TAN policy and the ability of planning authorities to police it; I’m afraid I find myself not being able to support this application.”

The application is to be delegated to the head of planning to approve, subject to a string of conditions including a Section 106 agreement ensuring that the dwelling is tied to the land and that the applicants are the occupants of the site.

One Planet Developments

To date, 63 One Planet Development applications had been submitted across Wales to date, 19 of them in Pembrokeshire; of which nine were approved, eight refused, three allowed on appeal, and two withdrawn.

Yesterday, February 13, members of Pembrokeshire County Council’s Cabinet agreed to write to Welsh Government calling for an independent review of the One Planet policy and to call for suspension of the One Planet policy Wales-wide while it takes place.