The Environmental Impact Assessment (Agriculture) (Wales) Regulations 2007

Determination of appeals by hearing or local inquiry

33.—(1) This regulation applies where an appeal is to be determined by hearing or by local inquiry.

(2) Within 6 weeks of receiving notice that the appeal is to be so determined, the appellant must serve on the Welsh Ministers a statement containing full particulars of his or her case and copies of any documents he or she wishes to rely on at the hearing or local inquiry.

(3) After receiving the statements and documents in paragraph (2), the Welsh Ministers must send copies of them to the other participants in the appeal.

(4) The Welsh Ministers must—

(a) give the participants in the appeal 6 weeks' notice of the date, time and place fixed for the hearing or local inquiry and the name of the person appointed to conduct the hearing or local inquiry (or, as applicable, to determine the appeal); and

(b) give such notice as they think fit to inform the public not less than 21 days before the date fixed for the hearing or local inquiry.

(5) The Welsh Ministers may vary the time or place for the hearing or local inquiry and must give such notice of the variation as they think fit.

(6) If an interested party wishes to be heard at the hearing or local inquiry he or she must notify the Welsh Ministers within 28 days of being sent the appellant’s statements under paragraph (3).

(7) Where a person has so notified the Welsh Ministers, the Welsh Ministers may require him or her to submit a statement containing the particulars of his or her case and copies of any documents he or she wishes to refer to (except documents which the appellant served under paragraph (2)).

(8) The Welsh Ministers must send copies of any statements and documents received under paragraph (7) to the appellant.

(9) The Welsh Ministers may require any person who has provided them with a statement under paragraph (2) or (7) to provide them with any further information they specify in relation to the statement, and must send a copy of the further information to each of the other participants in the appeal.

(10) Before a hearing or local inquiry takes place the Welsh Ministers must make all of the documents submitted available for inspection by any person who so requests.

(11) The participants in the appeal are entitled to be heard at a hearing or local inquiry.

(12) Any participant in the appeal who proposes to give evidence at an inquiry by reading a witness statement must send a copy of the witness statement, and a written summary of it, to the Welsh Ministers not less than 3 weeks before the date fixed for the inquiry, and the Welsh Ministers must send copies of the witness statement and summary to the other participants in the appeal.

(13) After the conclusion of the hearing or local inquiry, the person appointed to conduct the hearing or local inquiry must, unless he or she has been appointed to determine the appeal, make a report to the Welsh Ministers which must include—

(a) his or her conclusions; and

(b) his or her recommendations or his or her reasons for not making any recommendations.

(14) If the Welsh Ministers are minded to disagree with the recommendation made in the report because they—

(a) differ from the person making the report on any matter of fact mentioned in, or appearing to them to be material to, a conclusion reached by that person; or

(b) takes into consideration new evidence or a new matter of fact,

they must not come to a decision without first giving every person who appeared at the hearing or local inquiry an opportunity to make representations within a reasonable time specified by them.

(15) The Welsh Ministers or the person appointed to determine the appeal must notify the decision and the reasons for it, and send a copy of the report made under paragraph (13), to the participants in the appeal.