The future of Harlow's town centre came under the spotlight at Harlow Council's Environment & Community Committee, chaired by Cllr Eleanor Macy, with a presentation about the council's draft town centre strategy. The draft strategy will now be put out for public consultation.

The committee also proposed to change the way in which objections to planning applications are considered. At present, if two or more written objections are received that cannot be resolved, a planning application is automatically referred to the Planning Committee. Under the new proposals, which the committee is recommending to the Full Council, this will no longer happen. Officers had also proposed that councillors would be able to refer an application to the Planning Committee only if they had "reasonable cause"; instead, Cllr Lorna Spenceley successfully proposed an amendment to change this so that any councillor "who considers it appropriate" can require an application to go before the Planning Committee for determination.

Proposals to limit and license the distribution of free literature in the town centre were withdrawn, and will return to the 30 January 2007 meeting of the Committee, in view of the issues and objections raised.

Cllr Linda Pailing joined the meeting to answer councillors' questions about the progress of the recent Scrutiny review on flooding. Councillors generally agreed that this had been an extremely valuable piece of work, and had had a noticeable effect on joint working between the various agencies involved, with practical action already evident in a number of estates. The committee unanimously agreed the proposed action plan on flooding - including, as Lorna pointed out, the agreement to publish gulley cleaning schedules, so that the community will be able to monitor what is being done, and how effectively!