10.2

ice accepted that there was an element of duplication between these two proposals, and I agree.

75 I recommend that Employment Proposals 1 and 2 be merged to read as follows (after paragraph 8.10.2 of the draft Area Plan):

The development of existing industrial land, including the following sites, will be supported for the following uses only: manufacturing; warehousing and distribution; office accommodation (subject to compliance with Strategic Plan Business Policy 7); or retail outlets (subject to compliance with Strategic Plan Business Policy 5) …

76 If this recommendation is accepted, consequential amendments to the numbering of the Employment Proposals will be necessary. However, for the purposes of this report I will continue to refer to the numbers used in the draft Area Plan of May 2018.

The Need for Employment Land

The Employment Land Review

77 The Area Plan's provision of additional land for employment development is based on an Employment Land Review (ELR) commissioned by the Government. The ELR was undertaken by Peter Brett Associates (PBA) in 2015 and updated in 2017. On the basis of certain assumptions, the updated Review suggested that the total requirement for employment land in the East, between 2014 and 2026, would be 8.43ha - made up of 6.4ha of land for manufacturing; 1.34ha of land for warehousing and distribution; and 0.64ha for out-of-town offices. (It anticipated that future office requirements would largely be met in central Douglas, in accordance with Business Policy 7 of the Strategic Plan). This requirement for 8.43ha of employment land forms the basis for the employment land allocations proposed in the draft Area Plan for the East. However, the Cabinet Office has increased the base requirement by 50% to make allowance for 'choice and churn' (which had not been taken into account in the ELR) to give a revised target of 12.65ha. As 2.88ha of employment land has been developed since 2014, the outstanding requirement is for sufficient land to be available to meet a residual target of 9.77ha by 2026.

78 Employment Proposal 2 of the draft Area Plan indicates that the development of designated industrial land within existing settlement boundaries could contribute about 7.1ha toward meeting this target. In addition, Employment Proposal 3 of the draft Area Plan provides for the allocation of Site BE002a (south of Cooil Road) for employment development. This undeveloped site, which lies outside the existing settlement boundary, has a gross area of more than 9ha, and could contribute about 5.2ha net to meeting the residual employment land target. Furthermore, Employment Proposal 4 of the draft Area Plan, would designate Sites BE002b and BE006 as a Strategic Reserve for employment development. This undeveloped land, to the south of Cooil Road and north of New Castletown Road, has a gross area of almost 29ha.

79 The ELR also recommended that provision should be made for the development of a new Technology Park, which would be additional to the base requirement for employment land. The draft Area Plan allocates a site of 5.31ha for this purpose on Site DE004, at Sangster's Field, Douglas.

The Case for Eden Park Developments Ltd

80 Eden Park Developments Ltd challenged the adequacy of the employment land provision in the draft Area Plan. They owned existing employment land to the south of Cooil Road, together with the whole of Site BE002. They had received firm enquiries from a variety of prospective users of their land, who would jointly require some 9ha gross. These proposed developments would include a second phase of Jackson's existing multi-franchise car dealership (1.32ha); a second phase of the existing Eden Park light industrial units (1.71ha); an additional warehouse for Robinson's fruit and vegetable packaging business (0.69ha); a high quality manufacturing facility (1.2ha); a new HQ for Hartford Homes/Eden Park Developments Ltd (0.53ha); a private medical cluster (1.33ha); and a corporate office facility (1.35ha).

81 In 2018, Eden Park Developments commissioned GL Hearn to reassess the Island's employment land requirement. GL Hearn concluded that the ELR had significantly underestimated the need for additional employment land for several reasons. First, it had covered too short a period. A span of 15 to 20 years was generally considered to be an appropriate timeframe for planning purposes. Therefore, ideally the ELR should have covered a longer period, up to 2034.

82 Second, in estimating the future number of office jobs, the ELR had adopted the 'realistic scenario' used in the Government's Vision 2020 forecast, which postulated annual growth of 0.7% to 1.0%. However, the long term annual growth rate in the number of jobs in the Isle of Man had been 1.1% averaged over the 65 years between 1951 and 2016. Between 1991 and 2011, jobs had increased by an average of 1.5% per annum. It appeared that the growth rate used in the ELR had focussed too strongly on short-term trends in the wake of the global financial crisis of 2008.