Legal Obligation Monitoring Fee

On 1 September 2019, the Community Infrastructure Levy (Amendment) (England) (No.2) Regulations 2019 were introduced. These Regulations introduce new requirements to report and monitor on the collection of planning obligations.

The Regulations permit the Borough Council to apply a fee to planning obligations so long as it:

• Fairly and reasonably relates in scale and kind to the development
• Does not exceed the authority’s estimate of its cost of monitoring the development over the lifetime of the planning obligations

Approval was received at the meeting of Executive Committee on 29 October 2019 to include a monitoring charge within all future planning obligation agreements (Section 106 Agreements and Unilateral Undertakings), with immediate effect. Delegated powers were granted to allow the Head of Planning and Regeneration, in consultation with the Portfolio Holder for Portfolio Holder for Planning, Economic Development, Commercialism and Partnerships, to develop and implement a charging approach in line with the Regulations. The schedule below was subsequently ratified by Full Council on 20 January 2020.

The fee will fairly compensate the Council for the time and resources Officers spend on monitoring the collection of planning obligations.

Where the legal agreement contains planning obligations sought by another body who is a named signatory to the legal agreement, these obligations will also attract a monitoring fee from the Borough Council. This is because the Borough Council will still need to monitor the progress of the development, with particular regard to any trigger points.

The Borough Council monitoring fees for obligations sought directly by other parties has been set at 60% of the standard amounts (with rounding), reflecting the lower cost burden these obligations will have on the Borough Council. Monitoring tasks are anticipated to entail the recording of obligations and trigger points, site visits and liaison with the other parties on the receipt of contributions.

Where the legal agreement contains planning obligations sought by Worcestershire County Council (such as Education and Highways contributions) these obligations will attract a separate monitoring fee administered directly by Worcestershire County Council.  The process is set out here and will apply to legal agreements signed on or after 14 June 2021.

Further details on Section 106 Agreements and Unilateral Agreements are available here.

Obligations: Borough Council Recipient

Obligations: Another Signatory Recipient

Obligations: Complex Major Sites