Section 106 Agreements
A Section 106 Agreement is effectively a set of conditions laid down by the Council when Planning Consent is granted for new developments. Under the terms of this agreement, residents are responsible for the costs of the development project, even if it is available to everyone and not just residents.
Here’s the ‘official’ description of Section 106 legislation:
Section 106 (S106) of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990 allows a local planning authority (LPA) to enter into a legally-binding agreement or planning obligation with a landowner in association with the granting of planning permission. The obligation is termed a Section 106 Agreement.
These agreements are a way of delivering or addressing matters that are necessary to make a development acceptable in planning terms. They are increasingly used to support the provision of services and infrastructure, such as highways, recreational facilities, education, health and affordable housing.
The scope of such agreements is laid out in the government’s Circular 05/2005. Matters agreed as part of a S106 must be:
- relevant to planning
- necessary to make the proposed development acceptable in planning terms
- directly related to the proposed development
- fairly and reasonably related in scale and kind to the proposed development
- reasonable in all other respects.
A council’s approach to securing benefits through the S106 process should be grounded in evidence-based policy.
Therefore, the reason for residents feeling that they are being ripped of my property management companies is because the local councils are only granting planning permission to developers on the basis that they will not be responsible for further costs.
We believe that if the property management sector is to be changed, then we need to start petitioning local councillors and MP’s to stop councils from granting planning permission with S106 Agreements.
Under the current system, local councils are paid a council tax by home-owners for services that the local council do not provide due to the appointment of the property management company.
Resulting in the property owner in-theory having to pay twice for some services.
