Alan Ambrose

Next suggest write to the head of planning explaining the situation. Attach copies of the statements and asking for his/her intervention. Suggest all this on paper with recorded delivery.

One useful thing to do would be to ask the architects for a formal letter to you or (even better) a witness statement saying what they received from the LPA and when (re CIL) and what they communicated to you re CIl and when. Also ask the LPA for similar for their communications re CIL, this time as a witness statement. Also prepare a witness statement for yourself re comms with architect & LPA while it’s fresh in your memory. This s.b. purely factual and as detailed as possible and contain copies of the written comms or your detailed description of any verbal comms. This step should focus everyone’s attention. Also ask both parties for the contact details of their lawyers. Don’t offer yours up yet though.

>>> And then they emailed my architect on 2 occasions, basically reminding them that their client needs to submit the forms. I never got those emails from the local authority or my architect. That's right, the LPA should have emailed you directly and/or sent you a letter. It's not rocket surgery for the LPA to add the client themselves to the email list, is it? Because ... the architect's work might have concluded with the planning process and/or the architect might have forgotten to tell their client. If they want to hold you liable, then they should have told you. I think that's also (at least part of) a reasonable defence in law. And since email gets lost, accidentally deleted etc. then the LPA should have emailed and sent you a 'signed-for' or properly couriered letter.

The fast way is to find a nerdy but practical teenager who knows how to use ping, netstat, arp etc and the basics of router UIs and how DHCP works.

>>> Is it so fundamentally broken I think it is - the LPAs have way too much power. In particular they can delay for ever and most planning judgement is just personal opinion - which varies with the case officer, the day of the week, the weather etc. The rules need to be slashed by 50% or more for self or small housebuilders. And both the LPAs and the Inspectorate mislead the governement and the public with the way they mis-report their stats. An architect friend tells me that if the French equivalent of an LPA doesn't make up its mind by the state-imposed deadline, then the application is automatically allowed. Here, delay is routinely used as an LPA negotiating tool.

>>> CIL isn't nationwide - not all councils implement a CIL, so it is in fact a choice That's a good point - so how would a self-builder know unless the council had told you directly? And a good point about the MP etc - it might just be legal, but it's pretty nasty, immoral and unjust for the LPA to try and exact this penalty. 'Community' indeed, legalised mugging more like. Also, it's worth asking the architect to sort it out with the LPA as they both need to have an ongoing relationship. Amazing what can be done if the will is there - I once had Barclays and the HMRC agree to sort out a tax problem that Barclays had caused by being stupid. Oh and the local paper of course. Councils don't like to be seen as money grabbing bullies.

Do these reduced penalties not apply: https://www.warwickdc.gov.uk/info/20798/community_infrastructure_levy_cil/1207/cil_surcharges Yes, I appreciate this is Warwick, but the text refers to the CIL Act.

You could find out what the 'settlement boundary' looks like if it is a 'settlement' - villages are, odd clusters not so much. If it's in, that's a big help.

>>> Before you go, it might be useful to sift through the Minutes of the relevant Committee. Noted, I'm going tomorrow. A bit more info on Leeds: https://www.lgcplus.com/politics/governance-and-structure/four-planning-staff-at-met-arrested-over-suspected-bribery-offences-09-12-2024/

Oh the old 'how do I mate this with that' game. I've spent many jolly hours in DIY sheds holding two white plastic components in my hands with a quizzical look. Helps if you're good at jigsaws. Stick to one quality brand if it's you that's choosing. Otherwise good luck 😁.

We’re increasing the network capacity to cope with lower demand? 🙂

Live with it for a month or so and see? Of course you can change it but presumably with a 500 unit? We’re happy with ours so maybe it’ll grow on you?

You can only ask and it’s helpful if your previous experience was positive. Cost of planning fees is minimal compared to build cost. Get your pre-app in asap.

>>> The generation capacity (the power) at the peaks is also down So, we don't need to build out the transmission network at all?

>>> We can’t use the simplified method, as we can’t claim blow through and the patio doors blow it for one room. I must have missed than sentence before. I started using PHPP only for Part O, ‘cos standard method doesn’t allow adjustment for low G glass or external blinds. I was able to show that those elements alone would solve any overheating problem easily. So, calculations aside, maybe one or both of those factors would solve any practical overheating problem? Or brise soleil or eaves overhang of course.

For the 1st two graphs - does that mean that usage has gone down but become more peaky? Are we not expecting usage to go up, or is that the effect of home PV?

Yeah suggest normal calc should work fine for you. >>> Our BCO has agreed that we can use PHPP to demonstrate that our design won’t overheat and thus is ok with part O. Assume that’s not LA BC? Possible to tell us who? BTW walked past your plot the other day, great location.

It’s possible the materials were ones in the builder’s inventory anyway, so they wouldn’t have an actual receipt - at least not for this job. There are, of course, a lot of overages from jobs, good materials removed from old refurb jobs etc which end up as a bonus for the builder.

If I remember rightly, SAP is mostly a nonsense calc anyway with a black box algorithm and the ‘assessors’ are allowed to ‘assume’ significant details about construction. It would be much better if we used PHPP calcs which are, at least, open and transparent (well as long as you’re happy to trawl through German-language research papers). So you have a couple of options: + do as they say. + ask them to use the fallback default value first and see what the result is and whether you (and BC) are happy with that. Both of you may well be if the build is to a good spec and you’re not worried about boasting about your great EPC rating. + you can also do the psi calcs yourself using Therm or similar - at least to see how different the results are from the default numbers. Not trivial, but not hard either. BC may not accept your values in the official calcs (as you’re not an accredited ‘expert’) but at least it gives you some control over the situation (and you may learn something useful things about your construction also). Standing back, this often seems to be how these new rules get introduced: (a) industry organisations / academics steer government to introduce new ‘rules’, (b) a new little industry is minted to milk housebuilders by creating or supporting a new monopoly industry organisation that promptly develops a new accreditation scheme to fleece new wannabe ‘experts’, (c) often accompanied by an actual or virtual or contractural monopoly - often for a private equity company, Capita etc. At least this rule-making process and economic milking process need to be made a lot more transparent.

>>> to avoid the revenue being visible in his accounts for some reason Of course, one reason that small operators like customers to buy materials direct rather than have that ‘revenue’ going through the accounts is to stay below the VAT threshold of £90K. Perfectly legal and it gives them a price advantage in not having to charge customers VAT. Could that be true in this case? A lot of one man bands get a bit confused about VAT also.

@dpmiller >>> how/ why? Considering very few have an earth wire... Now that is a good question and I had to think for a sec. It revolves around this: (a) RCDs, RCBOs & most earth leakage testers measure the current imbalance between line & neutral, the balance is assumed to be from line to earth. This might be due to some leaky electronics, a damp or badly insulated line conductor or … a human touching something that’s at 230V and also earth. That’s why the RCD is there in the first place. (b) LED assemblies generate a lot less heat than filament bulbs, but they often still get quite hot and need to have heat sinks. Now materials that conduct heat really well but don’t conduct electricity hardly at all are fairly unusual and they’re not cheap. So, as we’re talking about cheap consumer items, there are compromises and the insulators are not perfect and they leak a little electricity from line to ground. Similarly, LED ‘transformers’ are usually cheap capacitative droppers, having to cope with spiky ‘dimmed’ waveforms (which puts the cheap pcb insulator under dV/dt ‘pressure’j. So, they leak a little current from line to actual ground. Similar argument a lot of electronics having to deal with mains voltages. This tiny leakage isn’t much of a problem … except that the cumulative effect can cause RCDs to trigger. (c) So, the small leakage currents bridge from line to actual ground (not the earth wire unless we have an earthed chassis).

I’m intending to visit the next couple. From the ones I’ve seen online, they seem mostly as dull as ditchwater. ‘Point of order chairman….’ etc.

@SteamyTea Do you have to waste so much digital paper? Think of the expense.

Should the focus be on the spike? Allowing for local haze, clouds etc could account for the rest, I think. Software glitch maybe? I can’t think that any physical conditions would account for a spike like that unless it was full summer but with 9/10ths heavy cloud.

I think that’s its very possible my dinner companion had read the Times article based on Transparency International’s report. I was amused to find that Southwark, which I know, was singled out by TI as being particularly dodgy. Most of the suggested questionable behaviour seems to be related to councillors who also work as property advisors and lobbyists.