City sewage plant decision is delayed again

The decision on whether to relocate a sewage treatment works has been delayed for a second time by a government department.

Anglian Water was asked by the government to look at relocating the plant from the existing site in the north of Cambridge, to allow the area to be used for housing, and submitted plans to build a new facility on Honey Hill, near Horningsea, on the outskirts of the city.

A Development Consent Order (DCO) application was received on 12 July 2024 and a decision was due to be made in October, but the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) had said it wanted more time to consider the issue.

The decision was expected to be made this week, but a statement issued by Environment Secretary Steve Reed said the deadline had now been further extended to 14 April.

The initial decision was delayed to this month, "to allow additional time for Defra officials to conduct further consultation on emerging planning policy and analysis of responses to the consultation", the department said last October.

However, the further delay was announced by the department in a new statement, in which it said the proposal needed to be "properly analysed with consideration given to the government's updated policies".

The statement said that the government was "committed to growth and has promised to take tough decisions to get Britain building".

It said: "One of our first actions was therefore to revise the National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF), which was formalised on the 12 December 2024. This marks the next step in radically reforming the planning system to meet the needs of the country and made major changes to the rules around the green belt.

"It is therefore right that the application is now properly analysed with consideration given to the government's updated policies."

It stated that "the DCO application for the Cambridge Waste Water Treatment Plant Relocation Project was received by the planning inspectorate under the previous government's planning system".

"The deadline for this decision is therefore to be further extended to 14 April 2025 to enable the application to be analysed in light of this key policy update.

"The decision to set the new deadline for this application is without prejudice to the decision on whether to grant or refuse development consent."

If the relocation of the treatment plant goes ahead, it would allow a new district to be built in the north-east of Cambridge.

It is expected to include 8,350 homes and create 15,000 new jobs.

Follow Cambridgeshire news on BBC Sounds, Facebook, Instagram and X.