Milton Keynes warehouse: Dorfman review 'unfit for purpose'

The warehouse is 3,000 sq m (32,291 sq ft) bigger and at least 6.5m (21ft) taller than the John Lewis unit it replaced, but has sat empty since being completed

A former planning committee chairman has called a review into how a large warehouse was granted planning permission "unfit for purpose".

The report said the decision to approve the building in Blakelands, Milton Keynes, which neighbours say dwarfs their homes, had been "bona fide".

John Bint said Milton Keynes Council faced "a major credibility problem" if it accepted the Dorfman review.

The report's author declined to comment.

The 20,522-sq-metre (24,544-sq-yd), 18m-high (59ft) warehouse was granted planning permission in 2017, when Labour was in charge of the council as its largest party.

• Milton Keynes warehouse planning decision 'bona fide'

• Milton Keynes: Living in the shadow of a 'huge, horrible' warehouse

Residents living close to the Yeomans Drive warehouse expressed concerns about the planning process, including questions about how a number of conditions, relating to noise barriers and trees, were not included in the final documents.

Richard and Davina Scholefield live in the shadow of the warehouse and fear what the noise will be like when it is eventually rented out

The council, which now has no single party in control but has a Labour leader, commissioned external planning expert Marc Dorfman to write a report in July 2019.

Following several delays it was published on Monday, but only in preliminary form.

It concluded the decision of the planning committee was "bona fide [made in good faith] and proper".

Mr Dorfman said it was "perfectly reasonable" to reallocate the case away from a planning officer who had recommended permission be refused.

The Local Democracy Reporting Service said that, on Tuesday, opposition councillors asked for the audit committee meeting to discuss the report to be cancelled, but that request was rejected.

One opposition councillor, Liberal Democrat Jane Carr, said: "The report is inadequate. Residents do not feel heard and understood."

Marc Dorfman's report is set to be discussed by Milton Keynes Council's audit committee on 1 December

Conservative Mr Bint, currently vice chairman of the council's development control committee, said: "The council has a major credibility problem if it treats the Dorfman Report as an acceptable result of 20 months of time gone by."

He said a lack of recommendations within it "seems so fundamental as to render the document unfit for purpose".

Pete Marland, the Labour council leader, said the report makes it seem "very clear the decision on Blakelands warehouse was legal".

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