SIR,

The Labour Parliamentary Candidate called on me last week to "support his request" to call in the cattle market application on the basis of the conflict of interest which arises when a local authority determines a planning application on land which it owns.

 I actually made this request to the Assembly Environment Minister on 6th December, 2007, and once again on 13th February. I had previously made the same request on 15th June, 2007, a matter which was reported in the press at the time.

 I have been making the general point about the unfairness of councils determining applications in which they have a direct interest since 2002, when I was the Conservative Assembly spokesman for Planning.

As a result the planning section of the 2003 manifesto, which I personally wrote, contained a pledge that a Conservative run Welsh Assembly would "refer any planning decision in which a local authority has an interest to the National Assembly..."  It is good to know that six years after I first made the point this idea is starting to gain cross party support.

David Davies

(MP for Monmouth)