EAST Hampshire District Council looks set to lose nearly £100,000 of its government planning performance grant this year after being forced to admit its figures were fiddled. In April councillors were told they had been awarded a massive £650,000 in the latest round of government grants after reaching targets set nationally for the length of time taken to decide planning applications. But the news came when councillors were still carrying out investigations into the falsification of its planning performance figures. Chief executive Will Godfrey warned councillors, even before the government announced the EHDC award, that they may have to repay some of the grant in the light of the findings of the inquiries into the council's planning performance figures. He issued the warning just weeks after it had been announced that EHDC had also been forced to pay back £60,000 of the previous year's grant. An earlier investigation revealed that yet more incorrect figures had gone to the government. Now strategic manager Bill Price has told members of the overview and scrutiny planning sub-committee that he received a telephone call from the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister informing him that it was expected EHDC's grant would be cut by £98,440. He said he had been told that EHDC was not the only authority whose figures had been reviewed. He said he expected that a final decision would be made by the end of this month. But Mr Price stressed that the grant cut would not have an adverse effect on the plan to improve the planning service. During the meeting he updated members on the progress made on recommendations from the overview and scrutiny committee arising out of his planning investigation earlier in the year. In March he told councillors he had discovered that figures had been deliberately falsified to make EHDC's planning performance look better than it actually was. The inquiry revealed that start and end dates for planning applications during the decision-making process had been altered to make it look as though they had been dealt with more quickly, and to make it appear the council been meeting government set targets. And it was during these investigations that head of planning development Ian Ellis resigned from the district council. Mr Price told councillors at the last meeting that although interviews had taken place, it had been decided not to appoint a new head of planning. This had created a problem, as the new officer would need to have an input into some of the items that needed progressing . Mr Price told councillors two extra planning officers had been recruited, which would release both the planning managers to help with development. Mr Price said Acolaid (the computer system used by the planning team) was being examined in a bid to improve planning performance. The meeting heard that further use could be made of the system, but there was not sufficient expertise to address this. But access controls to prevent errors being made had been achieved. The end dates and start dates could no longer be changed, he said. Members said they felt that a more effective method of customers being able to track the progress of their planning applications would reduce the number of complaints and give a better service to customers. Mr Price was asked to provide an updated version of the action plan to improve the service for the next meeting of the committee.
