Woodburn drill: Ex-DoE manager slams '˜systemic failure' over planning

The plan to hunt for oil reserves outside Carrickfergus in east Antrim has been the subject of escalating protests in recent months, and Dean Blackwood accused the current planning authorities of backing the plan “at the expense of common sense”.

A number of protestors have cited fears around possible pollution of the nearby water reservoirs from the project, which is being carried out on land belonging to NI Water.

Both NI Water and the firm behind the work – InfraStrata – have strongly denied that there is any risk.

However, the workings of the planning system itself have come under the spotlight as a result of the case.

InfraStrata had sought to carry out the drilling work late in 2013 on the grounds that it was “permitted development” – something which is typically a minor or uncontroversial project which does not require a planning application.

Permission was then granted automatically because the DoE failed to respond in time once it was notified of the plans.

Mr Blackwood – who headed the DoE’s “Compliance, Improvement and Review team” from 2006 until leaving in 2013 – told the News Letter the way the department had dealt with the case had led to “a real loss of public confidence in the planning system”.

The 53-year-old wrote his master’s degree thesis about failings in his former department, and is now studying for a PhD at Queen’s University Belfast. Two years ago he joined the Green Party.

“The planning failures presided over by the department in the Woodburn case are symptomatic of wider systemic failure which has pervaded and still haunts the planning system,” he said.

Among these are what he alleges is a failure to properly decide whether Environmental Impact Assessments (EIAs) are needed or not.

In the case of Woodburn, the DoE had missed a deadline for making such a decision.

It later ruled that no EIA was needed – although this is something which Mr Blackwood believes should in fact have been carried out.

“Planning exists to serve the public interest,” said Mr Blackwood. “As a professional planner I am concerned that this case marks a further erosion of the public interest to the extent that the planning system is now defending, in the case of Woodburn, narrow private property rights at the expense of common sense and the common good.”

Since spring 2014, planning powers have been transferred from officials in the DoE to the hands of local councillors – meaning Mid and East Antrim Borough Council has essentially inherited the case.

He also said that many of the alleged bad practices he has identified in the planning system have now been learned by the local councils which have taken over planning powers.

He said: “With the transfer of planning functions, staff, skills and knowledge to the 11 new councils following local government reform, went the transfer of institutional bad planning practice.”

NI Water and InfraStrata have tried to allay fears over the work.

NI Water said this month that the drill site “does not drain naturally” into the reservoirs, and that the portion of the Woodburn North River which falls in the catchment area of the drilling site is not currently flowing into any reservoir.

It said a detailed risk assessment shows the project “represents no threat to the water supply”, adding it has also increased monitoring of its reservoir water.

InfraStrata has likewise stated that the project “poses no threat to local drinking water”.

It said the well site will be lined and surrounded by bunds (a type of embankment), while the well itself will be surrounded by steel and cement.

While the DoE has now ceased to exist following a shake-up of the Stormont departments, strategic planning issues have moved to the new Department of Infastructure.