These pages give an overall view of how South Tyneside Council went about hiding the truth about the shed and are intended to a review of those beginning with Part I of the Shed and Corruption series 1. The process eventually led to UK Docks’ Management, telling their MP and a Cllr in 2019 that they had been given permission for their shed retrospectively, when none had been granted.
As one can see from the Commentary, I had been presented with a hobson’s choice by the Council and by the end of 2014, either to accept the lie that UK Docks had permission for their shed as it stood or refer their rewrite of my original complaint to the LGO.
I chose the latter and completed the online form on 10th December 2014, the main point being that the shed was taller than planned. When I read it back, it seems to be a fairly concise version of the Commentary with the exception of the statement:-
In all my correspondences with Mr Atkinson, the manager of the Planning Office, I do not think he said that the drawing 8296/14 was not to scale.
I was wrong, he had, after admitting that the shed was taller than planned on the 13th February with reference to 8296/14, confused the issue by adding:-
4. why did we determine the elevation on 8296/14 is the south end? The drawing was submitted in discharge of condition 4 relating to fixing details of the end panels. Those details are the 1:10 sections and elevations at the left hand side of the sheet. The engineer chose to show a gable elevation of the structure (not drawn to scale) on the same drawing. It serves no purpose in discharging the condition.
To anyone discussing plans or drawings it was utter nonsense to comment on the scale of a drawing and I had paid it no attention at the time because it was totally irrelevant.
More seriously, he asked why I had questioned his assumption that the gable end shown was its southern end: why did we determine the elevation on 8296/14 is the south end? The southern end is the landward end and one would assume it was common knowledge that boats enter a boathouse from a river or lake and not from a road, or in this case for instance, that the Shield Ferry enters the shed from the Tyne.
He should also have been aware that, Stage 3, September 2013: 8296/14 could never supersede the previously approved plans in terms of defining the dimensions of the approved development.
In her first draught of the response to my complaint that the shed was taller than planned, the Inspector for the Local Government she virtually repeated the Stage 3 Response made on behalf of the Chief Executive. In both the Stage 3 and the Ombudsmans first draft there was no mention of the height in either and in the latter’s response the extra width was dismissed by the Inspector for the Ombudsman when she said:
20. . . The Council accepts these measurements were wrong. A more senior officer checked the measurements; he found the width at ground level was just less than one metre wider than the permission allowed.
21. The Council considered this and decided not to enforce. . . .
On receipt of her response I write and tell her that there is little point in pursuing the matter if the height of the shed is not considered and sought her advice on how to continue. I got no advice but she modified paragraph 21 in her second draft on the 24th March2 to:-
Mr X says the shed is also 3 metres higher than shown in the 1996 plans. He says a scale measurement from the plans shows a total height of 12.75 metres at one end of the shed. The Council says the permitted height at this end is 15.5 metres and this is the height as built.
The height was found by simply reading that of the roof and foot from the relevant drawings, the approved drawing 8296/2 where the roof height is shown as 108.8m and the ground height, taken from drawing 8296/1A as 96.1m, giving difference of 12.7m and therefore no need for scaling at all.
One can get an overall view of how South Tyneside Council went about hiding the truth about the shed, starting with Part I of the Shed and Corruption series 1 and it eventually led to UK Docks Management, telling their MP and a Cllr in 2019 that they had been given permission for it retrospectively, when they none had been granted.
As one can see from the Commentary, I had been presented with a hobson’s choice by the Council by the end of 2014, ether to accept the lie that UK Docks had permission for their shed as it stood or refer their rewrite of my original complaint to the LGO.
I chose the latter and completed the online form on 10th December 2014, the main point being that the shed was taller than planned. When I read it back, it seems to be a fairly concise version of the Commentary with the exception of the statement:-
In all my correspondences with Mr Atkinson, the manager of the Planning Office, I do not think he said that the drawing 8296/14 was not to scale.
I was wrong, he had after admitting that the shed was taller than planned on the 13th February with reference to 8296/14, implied that the drawing was not to scale:-
4. why did we determine the elevation on 8296/14 is the south end? The drawing was submitted in discharge of condition 4 relating to fixing details of the end panels. Those details are the 1:10 sections and elevations at the left hand side of the sheet. The engineer chose to show a gable elevation of the structure (not drawn to scale) on the same drawing. It serves no purpose in discharging the condition.
To anyone discussing plans or drawings it was utter nonsense and I had paid it no attention at the time because it was totally irrelevant.
More seriously, he asked why I had questioned his assumption that the gable end shown was its southern end: why did we determine the elevation on 8296/14 is the south end? The southern end is the landward end and one would assume it was common knowledge that boats enter a boat from a river or lake. He should also have been aware, as was I and the author of 1the so called Stage 3 Response presented to the Ombudsman who said: that 8296/14 could never supersede the previously approved plans in terms of defining the dimensions of the approved development.
In her first draught of the response to my complaint that the shed was taller than planned the Inspector for the Local Government she virtually repeated the Stage 3 Response made on behalf of the Chief Executive. In both, the author of the stage 3 paper and the Ombudsman’s first draft there was no mention of the height and in the latter’s the extra width was dismissed when she said:
20. . . The Council accepts these measurements were wrong. A more senior officer checked the measurements; he found the width at ground level was just less than one metre wider than the permission allowed.
21. The Council considered this and decided not to enforce. . . .
On receipt of her response I write and tell her that there is little point in pursuing the matter if the height of the shed is not considered and sought her advice on how to continue. I got no advice on how to continue but she modified paragraph 21 in her second draft on the 24th March2 to:-
Mr X says the shed is also 3 metres higher than shown in the 1996 plans. He says a scale measurement from the plans shows a total height of 12.75 metres at one end of the shed. The Council says the permitted height at this end is 15.5 metres and this is the height as built.
The approved height was found by simply reading the heights of the shed above a datum on the relevant drawings, the approved drawing 8296/2 for a roof height of 108.8m and the ground height from drawing 8296/1A of 96.1m giving a difference 12.7m. The later drawing 8296/14, gave a river end of 15.6 and therefore an inland end as slightly less than 13m, not the 15.5m, as reported by a Senior Planning Officer.
In both drafts the Inspector for the Ombudsman says she has considered the Council’s response to Mr X’s complaint and she has discussed its response with a Senior Planning Officer in the Council and it appears that he was happy to repeat what by March 2015, must be considered a fraudulent misrepresentation, when he said that the height of the shed at 15.5m had been permitted.
She had concluded her 2nd draft with:-
I have seen no evidence of fault, either by delay or otherwise, in the way the Council dealt with this acknowledged breach of planning control. It has provided a sound justification for its decision not to take enforcement action. The Ombudsman cannot question the merits of that decision. Throughout the decision- making process it kept residents properly informed.
From Mr Cunningham in November 2013 to Mr Mansbridge in May, South Tyneside Council kept the residents misinformed for five months and by the 24th March 2015 one can justly blame a Senior Planning Officer for extending the period to 16 months.
I attempted to put a stop to this by sending her an explanation of how, I along with others, decided the approved height of the shed was 15.5m at the rivers edge and sent her a package of fifteen documents on the 6th of April 2015. One of those showed in some detail how I had come to the conclusion that the drawing 8296/1A which had not been approved could be used to determine that approval for the height of river end had been given in 1966 as 15.5m making the other end 12.8m and, not the 15.5m proposed by the Senior Planning Officer.
She stuck to her guns and concluded in her final draft on April 15th 3:-
Summary: This complaint is not upheld. In 2013 a developer resumed building a boat shed for which he had planning permission and had started building in 2001. Local residents complained but the Council found the developer could still build the shed. However, the developer built it almost a metre wider than he should have done. There is no evidence of fault in the way the Council dealt with the breach of planning control and its decision not to take enforcement action. It kept residents informed throughout the process. The complainant says the shed is also 3 metres higher than it should be. The Council says it is not. There is no fault in how the Council decided the shed is the permitted height.
All through this process they:the Planners, the Senior Management and even the Chief Executive, have been asked repeatedly to provide any documents to back their claim that structure is compliant with respect to height but they have failed to produce any.
They cannot produce any because they do not exist.
They either use an unauthorised drawing or one that was not produced for the planning application. If one tries to dig deeper they say that Ombudsman’s ‘Final Decision’ cannot be revisited. Why one might ask, and the answer is deceptively simple:-
They wish to hide the fact that they knew that the shed did not have approval from day 1.
Day 1 is the day in September 2013 when we were passed the doctored copy of 8296/2 by the Principal Planning Officer of South Tyneside Council.
