Fourth Annual Monitoring Report

1 Introduction

1.1 Monitoring is crucial to the successful delivery of our local development framework.  It helps us understand the main social, environmental and economic issues affecting our borough and the key drivers of spatial change.  Regular monitoring will help to show if we are achieving our objectives or if policies should be changed in response to changing circumstances.

1.2 The Planning and Compulsory Purchase Act 2004 and associated regulations require us to produce an Annual Monitoring Report, to do the following tasks:

• Review progress in preparing development plan documents, supplementary planning documents and other documents against the timetable and milestones published in our Local Development Scheme;

• Assess the extent to which our development plan document policies and supplementary planning documents are being implemented;

• If a policy is not being implemented, explain why and set out what steps we are taking to ensure that it is implemented or, alternatively, amended or replaced;

• Identify the significant effects of implementing our policies and whether they are as intended; and

• Set out whether our policies are to be amended or replaced.

1.3 Our annual monitoring report is therefore a key mechanism for assessing the performance and effects of our Local Development Framework, and for putting into practice the concept of 'plan, monitor and manage' whereby the findings of monitoring feed directly into any review of policy that may be required.

1.4 In particular, our annual monitoring report is required to consider:

• Whether the timetable and milestones for the preparation of documents set out in our Local Development Scheme have been met or progress is being made towards meeting them or, where they are not being met or are not on track, the reasons why;

• Whether policies and related targets in our development plan documents and supplementary planning documents have been met or progress is being made towards meeting them or, where they are not being met or are not on track, the reasons why;

• What impact the policies are having in respect of national and regional targets and any other targets identified in development plan documents and supplementary planning documents, that are not covered by the above;

• What significant effects implementation of the policies is having on the social, environmental and economic objectives by which we define sustainability and whether these effects are intended;

• Whether the policies in the local development document need adjusting or replacing because they are not working as intended;

• Whether our policies need changing to reflect changes in national or regional policy; or

• If our policies or proposals need changing, the actions we need to take to achieve this.

1.5 This is Wigan's fourth annual monitoring report and is required to be prepared and submitted to the Government Office for the North West by the end of December 2008.  It relates to the year from 1 April 2007 to 31 March 2008.  Where it has not been possible to provide as full a picture as possible in this monitoring report, in particular for the Core Output Indicators required by national guidance, as full an analysis as possible has been provided.  However, the problems of providing the data have been clearly set out in the report along with an explanation of progress made in providing the data since the first monitoring report.

1.6 The report format is in 4 broad sections, the first being this introduction which, in addition to dealing with the purposes and aims of the document, includes material setting out the key contextual characteristics of the Borough.  The second section deals with the implementation of the Local Development Scheme and compares the timetable and milestones set out in that document with what has been actually achieved in practice during the year.  It then goes on to consider any need to revise the Local Development Scheme in the light of that information or for other reasons.  The third section deals with planning policy implementation which is assessed against both the national core output indicators and local indicators.  In practice these other local indicators are, in the main, taken from the Unitary Development Plan.  It also includes commentary on the need for development of future monitoring systems to fill any shortfalls in data collection.  The final section pulls out the main conclusions derived from the monitoring.

Key Contextual Characteristics of the Borough

1.7 Demographics

Population size

• Wigan has an estimated resident population of 305,495, of which 151,000 are men and 155,000 are women.  31,400 are over 70 years of age and 75,200 are under 20 years of age. (Source: ONS mid-year population estimates, 2006)

Ethnicity

• 97.5% of the borough is white, which is higher than the national average of 89.1%.  The remainder of the population is made up as follows.

  • Mixed race – 0.6%
  • Asian or Asian British – 0.9%
  • Black or black British – 0.5%
  • Chinese – 0.2%
  • Other – 0.2%

  (Office of National Statistics, June 2005)

Migration

• There are estimated to be around 2,000 economic migrants currently living in the borough, largely originating from Eastern European countries such as Poland. (Source: Wigan Council, 2007) .

Deprivation

• In the indices of deprivation 2007, Wigan was ranked 67 out of 354 local authorities in England, where 1 was the most deprived.  This rank was derived from the average deprivation score of the Local Super Output Areas in the local Authority (Source: National Statistics, 2007).

  Overall Wigan has become less deprived than in 2004 when it was the 53^rd most deprived authority in England.

1.8 Housing

Household types and tenure

• 75% of the properties in the Borough are semi-detached and terraced with detached properties accounting for under a fifth of the Borough offer.  Flats and apartments account for 7.7% with the majority being purpose built.  The housing market largely caters for family housing. (Source: Census, 2001)

• Compared with the national picture Wigan has a high proportion of owner occupation (80.4%) and 19.61% socially rented stock (Source, HSSA, 2005)

House prices

• The average house price for Wigan Borough in the second quarter of 2007 rose to £134,103 (land registry).

• Wages have not increased as much as the rise in house prices, so there has been a deterioration in affordability

1.9 Health and Leisure

Life expectancy

• Although life expectancy has improved in Wigan, it still remains lower than the North West and national averages.

(Source: ONS, 2004)

Healthiness

• As of November 2007, 10.7% of the working age population were claiming incapacity benefits or severe disablement allowance. (Source: Nomis - November, 2008)

• In 2006, 111.7 people aged under 75 died from all circulatory diseases.  This is more than the North West average of 96.24 and considerably worse than the national average of 79 deaths per 100,000 people.

• 22 % of the population of the borough have a limiting long-term illness

•  Residents living in more deprived areas are more likely to report poorer health (including dental health). (Source: Wigan Health Survey, 2006).

Physical activity and leisure

• 60% of the population report low levels of physical activity (source: Wigan Health Survey, 2006)

• In a Wigan Council survey conducted in November 2007, 76% of people said they had visited a park or country park within the last 12 months.

1.10 Economy and Employment

Employment

• As of July 2008, 2.8% of the working age population were claiming Jobseekers Allowance.  This compares with a national average of 2.3% and a North West figure of 2.7%.  More males (3.9) are claiming this allowance than females (1.5%).  Unemployment is not evenly distributed, with deprived areas making up a greater proportion of the total. (Source: Nomis, July 2008)

• A higher proportion of working age people claim out of work benefits in the worst performing neighbourhoods.  In quarter 2, 2007 there were 32.4% of claimants in Wigan’s most deprived areas.  This is similar to the North West and National averages.

Wages

• The weekly average wage for Wigan from Jan - December 2007 was £431.70, this is only £1 lower than the North West average and £28.30 lower than the national average.  This is an improvement on the previous year when there was a gap of £19 between Wigan and the North West and £45.30 between Wigan and the national average.

• 75.7% of the working age population is economically active.  Of the 46,300 who are economically inactive 38,600 do not want a job.  This is 20% of the total population of working age.

1.11 Community Safety

• Throughout 2007/08, overall crime continued to fall by a further 2%, continuing the consistent crime reduction trend from 2003/04.  When comparing 07/08's overall crime rate of 89 per 1,000 population with 03/04's 107 per 1,000 population, a total percentage reduction of 17% is noted.

• However, despite these trends, and the fact that Wigan has the lowest rate of crime in Greater Manchester, residents in the borough are more worried about being a victim of crime than is the reality.

             (Source: Wigan Council, 2008)

1.12 Community Development

• In 2006/07, 69% of residents believed that people from different backgrounds get on well together in their local area.  This is fewer than the North West (76%) and national (78%) averages.
• In 2006/07, 28% of people felt they can influence decisions in their locality.  This is fewer than the North West (32%) and national (32%) averages.
• In a Health and Lifestyle survey completed in 2006, an average of about 25% of people did not strongly feel that they belonged to their immediate neighbourhood.

1.13 Education, skills and learning

Qualifications

• At December 2007, 17.3% of the economically active population had no qualifications.  This compared to a northwest average of 15% and a national average of 13.1%.
• 41% of Wigan’s working age population are qualified to at least Level 3 or higher.  This is worse than the North West (46.5%) and national averages (47.8%).

1.14 Environment

River water quality

• The chemical quality of rivers in Wigan remains high and is currently better than the Northwest and national averages.
• Only 59.1% of Wigan's rivers are classified as being of "fair" or "good" biological quality. This is significantly worse than the northwest (89.3%) and national (95%) averages

             (Source: Environment Agency, 2006).

Condition of SSSIs

• Due to an ongoing programme of improvement and management, 100% of the Wigan flashes SSSI (176 hectares) is now in favourable condition.
• Natural England survey data from 2001 reveals that some of the other SSSIs in the Borough are not in very good condition, but we understand these have improved too.

             (Source: Wigan Council, 2007)

Woodland cover

• The last comprehensive survey of woodland cover in the borough undertaken in 2001 recorded 4.1%. This compared to a national figure of 8.4% and northwest average of 6.8% (Source: Forestry Commission, 2001).

Amount of derelict land

• The amount of derelict land in the Borough has reduced from 563 ha to 442 ha between 1998 and 2005.

             (Source: Wigan Council 2006)

1.15 Transport

Car usage

• A high percentage (82%) of those in employment travel to work by car (Citizens Panel 2007). This is higher than the average for Greater Manchester.
• Encouragingly, more people are travelling to work by public transport, cycle and on foot than in previous years. (17% on cycle or foot in 2007 survey compared to 11% in 2002). But levels still remain much lower than car usage.
• The amount of people who would travel by car for a journey of less than 2 miles is 61% (Citizens panel 2005), which is an increase on previous years. There is a need to reverse this negative trend, particularly as car use is often not necessary at such distances.

1.16 Other issues

Resource use and climate change

• Wigan has an estimated ecological footprint of 5.35 global hectares per person, which is similar to the national average. At this level of resource use and waste production we would need three earths to sustain our way of life.

             (Source: Stockholm Institute, 2005).

• Residents emitted an average of 5.8 tonnes of carbon dioxide per year in 2006; this includes industry/commerce, road transport and domestic emissions.   Although this is lower than the North West average of 7.1 tonnes per person, we need to reduce these levels significantly if we are to help to contribute to the Governments target of a 60% cut in emissions by 2050.

• Given these ambitious targets, there has been no positive change from 2005 when residents emitted an average of 5.7 tonnes of carbon dioxide per year.  (Source: Defra: 2008 – National Indicator 186 data)

1.17 Waste

• 197,000 tonnes of municipal waste was produced in the Borough during 2007-08 which is starting to show a reduction in the amount produced in previous years.

• 26.3% of household waste was recycled or composted during 2007-08, which is an improvement on the 2005-06 figure of 18.1%. The national average between January and December 2007 was 33.9%.

• Of the Municipal waste arisings during 2007-08 over 37,000 tonnes was construction and demolition waste.

             (Source: Wigan Council, 2008)