East Cambridgeshire District Council has introduced a raft of changes to make it easier for residents to contact planning officers.

A telephone service has been introduced that will allow callers to get in touch with officials and the council’s website has been updated to allow browsers easier access to planning information and documents.

The authority says that a wealth of information from planning forms and guidance to information on flood risk, pre-applications, heritage statements, ecology and biodiversity have also been made available.

Jo Brooks, from East Cambridgeshire District Council, said: “We want to make our planning service as user friendly as possible. This is why we have introduced a new general enquiries service to hopefully deal with general queries straight away and also redesigned the planning pages on the council’s website.

“We hope these changes will make a real difference and help make planning open to everyone but if there is anything more you think we could do then please get in touch.”

The general enquiries service is available by calling 01353 665555 from Monday to Thursday, 8:45am-5pm, and Friday, from 8:45am-4:30pm.

The new phone service is there to provide general planning advice – should anyone require site specific advice they should go through the council’s pre-application advice service to discuss specific proposals.