Since July, Plota's application pages have said whether a council's planning committee or its officers decided an application, a summary of the decision, and whether the committee decided with or against the officer. It is our understanding that Plota was the first to show these on application pages. Those committee decisions are now searchable, and each has a page of its own telling the story of the meeting.
Officers decide most planning applications. The larger and contested ones go to a committee of councillors, who debate them and vote in public.
What happened at that meeting is hard to find. It is buried in minutes and officer reports, often hundreds of pages of PDF, spread across each council's own website, and some councils only send their minutes on request. Almost none set out, in one place, how and why the committee reached its decision.
We read them for you. For each decision we set out what was proposed, what officers recommended and why, who spoke, what councillors argued and how they voted, quoting the council's own words. The decision, the officers' advice, whether the committee went against it, the vote and the meeting date also come back in the Plota API, for every application decided at committee.
Search the decisions by place, outcome, the officers' advice, the vote and who spoke.
The search
Search by address, street, reference or what was proposed, and narrow it to a council or a region. The filters cover the decision, what officers recommended and whether the committee went against them, the vote (unanimous, split, or won by 2 votes or fewer), who spoke at the meeting, the type and size of the application, the meeting date and whether the meeting was recorded. Each option shows how many decisions it would leave.
The line above the results adds them up: the decisions and councils matched, the share approved, and the share that went against officer advice.
How often committees overrule their officers
9.2% of the decisions on Plota went against the planning officers' recommendation. The page ranks the councils with at least 15 decisions by that rate, and each name opens its committee's page.
A page for each committee
Each council with decisions has a committee page: how often it goes against officer advice compared with the others, what it approves and refuses month by month, the kinds of application on which it overrules its officers, and every decision it has made. The search page lists them region by region, with a box to find one by name.
The story of each decision
A decision's page covers the site, the officers' assessment, what consultees and neighbours said, who spoke, the debate and the vote, with quotes in the council's own words and a link to the minutes. On 14 September Cornwall's west sub-area planning committee refused permission in principle for up to 9 homes at Church Cove on the Lizard, by 6 votes to 2. Its officers had recommended approval.
On a phone the filters open as a sheet, and the button at its foot says how many decisions they leave.
In the API
Every application the API returns carries committee: the outcome, what the officers recommended, whether the committee went against them, the vote where the minutes record it, the meeting date, the committee and the decision's page. Add committee=1 to /v1/applications for applications with a committee decision, alongside any place, type or date filter. Both are on every plan, the free one included.
GET /v1/applications?council=cornwall&committee=1
"committee": { "outcome": "refused", "officers_recommended": "approve",
"against_officer": true, "votes": { "for": 6, "against": 2, "abstained": 0 },
"unanimous": false, "meeting_date": "2026-09-14",
"committee": "West Sub-Area Planning Committee",
"url": "https://plota.co.uk/application/2g6l79bb/committee" }Updated 10 October 2026
Plota now reads the agendas of coming committee meetings as well as the minutes of past ones. Follow an application and you hear when it is put on an agenda: the meeting's date, time and place, the committee, the item number and, where the report gives one, the officers' recommendation. You hear again if the meeting moves, or if the application is withdrawn or taken off the agenda.
The application page shows the meeting in a Going to planning committee card. Add to calendar puts it in your diary, and Remind me emails you a week, three days or a day before, or on the morning of the meeting. A reminder moves with the meeting. Following an application and setting a reminder are free.
Area alerts now list the applications in their area newly put on a committee agenda for the next four weeks. In My Areas, the applications you follow open with a month calendar of their meetings and comment deadlines.
A new page, overturn rates by council, ranks how often each committee went against its officers in the last 12 months, for councils with at least 15 decisions, and says which way it leans: stricter, more lenient or both ways. Below the table, the five strictest committees show what they refused against their officers' advice.