I was most surprised by councillor Robert Nemeth’s claim in his column in last Saturday’s Argus.

He said his maiden speech at the council meeting of October 22, 2015 triggered recent changes and improvements to the council’s planning service.

In fact, and as Cllr Mitchell pointed out at the same meeting, improvement measures had already been put in place by the Labour administration, including the commissioning of a Peer Review by the Local Government Association’s Planning Advisory Service (PAS) and the prioritisation of the introduction of a new IT system.

The Peer Review took place in March 2016 and some of the suggested measures were implemented immediately.

Other, more long term measures recommended by PAS were set out in a report that was agreed by the economic development and culture committee in September 2016.

I spoke with some passion at that meeting about my aspirations for the planning service that I committed to on day one of the Labour administration, supported wholeheartedly by Cllr Warren Morgan.

Interestingly, Cllr Nemeth and his Conservative colleagues on the committee voted against this report, a matter that he omitted to mention in his column.

Fortunately, other members of the committee voted in favour and the programme of improvements is continuing apace.

I’m very proud of the hard work and dedication shown by the planning staff in handling the challenges of organisational and cultural change, hitting a crucial work target in September and the move to Hove Town Hall.

There is still work to be done but based on the success so far I’m confident that the planning service will be amongst the best in the South East before too long.

  • Councillor Julie Cattell is chairwoman of the city council's planning committee