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Application Reports to give reasons for decisions
Local Authorities
Dundee City Council: The Council prepares written reports on all the planning applications it determines. Depending on the content of secondary legislation and advice from the Executive all future decision notices may require to contain a reasoned justification for the decision in addition to the present reasons for the imposition of conditions or summary reasons for refusal.
East Dunbartonshire Council: The East Dunbartonshire Council assessment report already includes such a mechanism but clarification of the extent of reasoning which is required to be sent to interested parties would be of assistance
East Renfrewshire Council: Accepted in principle although at a practical level the proposal to include the decision notice and report in the hard copy of the register could cause practical difficulties.
Glasgow City Council: The Council supports the general principle of providing justification for its planning decisions. Full reports on delegated planning applications and summary reports on all other applications are already made publicly available by the Council. Clarification required from SE on whether these reports would have to be made available in different formats ( e.g. on the website, paper copies, etc). Clarification required from SE on whether local authorities would be expected to write to each objector to an individual application. How long would an authority have to fulfil this task? Officers will be required to provide additional justification for decision making, in some circumstances and the proposal will have staff time and cost implications.
Inverclyde Council: While this is a further burden, the reports will not require to be of the same format as committee reports, and will in the main be an adaptation of the current log sheet on each file. This is to be supported as a further check in the system.
Moray Council: The Moray Council already achieves much of this requirement, except for the inclusion of reports on the register. Reports on Committee item reports are available to the public by other means. The requirement for a full report for each application will impact on available planning officer and administrative staff time and resources. Currently full reports are not prepared on the majority of applications handled by the Council (in particular householder and minor type proposals) and instead a 'checklist' recording the officer's work is retained on file: this was cited as an element of good practice in an earlier Scottish Office 'Audit'. The required reversion to a full report for each application would mean all previous saving and efforts to improve efficiency and performance in handling applications would be lost. This element of the proposal cannot be supported.
Non Departmental Public Bodies
Health & Safety Executive: We welcome the proposal to require LPAs to produce a report on each application referencing issues raised by statutory Consultees. Presumably this would include advice contained in standing advice?
Scottish Water: We do welcome the proposal to revert the purpose of appeals to being a review of the decision made by the planning authority as this, when combined with the requirement to provide a full record of the relevant factors and reasons for decisions, would encourage an improvement in the consistency of planning authority decision-making and could reduce the number of speculative applications lodged with planning authorities which affect the efficiency of the planning system.
Other Businesses
ASDA: This could simply open up a new avenue for legal attack on planning decisions.
Professional Organisations
RTPI Scotland: With regard to reasons for decisions to grant permission, we would strongly suggest that guidance, at least, will be required to avoid authorities stating simply "the development accords with the development plan". Reasons for decisions to grant consent should cover all points of objection received to the application, including indicating where such objections were non material.
Community Councils
Broughty Ferry Community Council: As part of open and transparent decision-making it should be clearly recorded for later reference, who was responsible for making the decision. To imbue a greater sense of responsibility in those involved in the decision-making process, all planning permissions should record the name of: The Director of Planning; the Case Worker; Committee Convener and any Councillor whose intervention resulted in approval contrary to the Planning Officer's recommendations, as well as the Reporter, if one is involved.
Currie Community Council: This is welcome however the reasons should be in detail so as to avoid the temptation to use "generic" statements such as "conforms with development plan". (Page 78 appears to suggest a fuller explanation.) But it is not clear what action an individual can take if the reasons are insufficient, inadequate, wrongly based or conflict with policies. We agree that planning authorities should give reasons for their decisions. We have seen planning reports that have given several pages of cover to statutory "one interest" bodies while dismissing the objections of a great many local people in a list of 20 one-liners. We would wish to see local views given more consideration since the points made are intended to assist planning officials and the planning committee in reaching a decision on whether to approve an application. The reasons for decisions should be similarly balanced and not reduced to "generic" statements.
Edrom, Allanton & Whitsome Community Council: We are supportive of introducing a new requirement for planning authorities to give reasons for their decisions, and notify individuals who have made representations when decisions are taken. This should include bodies such as Community Councils.
Kinghorn Community Council: Whilst on the whole agree with the recommendations would request that site visits are some part of the requirement, especially by councillors, especially where they have no direct local knowledge. The local view may inject valuable information not apparent to officials.
Strathblane Community Council: The requirement for decisions to be explained will encourage greater consistency particularly when the local development plan is used to justify the decision. It will also help community councils understand how planners think.
The Royal Burgh of St Andrews Community Council: While it is helpful for local authorities to be required to give their reasons for all planning decisions, the lack of a facility to question poor decisions through a third party right of appeal does severely limit its utility. A matter of concern to us in recent years is the lack of credible independent assessment of documentation. There seems to be no mechanism to challenge biased, scientifically dubious or innumerate documentation in such as traffic impact assessments, environmental impact assessments, population projections, etc. The quality of such documentation is sometimes very poor and often lacks the references and raw data to substantiate 'facts' and conclusions. There should be more emphasis on the critical examination of documentation.
Tillicoultry Community Council: Planning authorities should give reasons for their decisions, particularly when they decide against the recommendations of their planning officers, which may well help to persuade communities that the authority was acting in the best interests of the particular community.
Voluntary Organisations
Colinton Amenity Association: We welcome the principle that people need to know that their views are taken fully into account. In this respect, planning reports by officials to Local Authority Planning Committees must report third party representations in more detail and with a clear indication of the strength of opinion expressed. Reasons for acceptance/rejection of representations should be specific to the points raised by people and not generalities. The same principles should also apply to the Scottish Executive's consultations. We support greater transparency in decision making. In this respect, the criteria used by planning officials to weight various planning issues should be clearly set out and the scoring of the different factors leading to the planning recommendation included in the report to Local Authority Planning Committees.
Inveresk Village Society: The most sophisticated consultation measures can be put in place but if councillors are only willing to pay lip service to them then they will achieve very little. The requirement to explain decisions could make a difference but what if we find the explanation lacking?
Peebles Civic Society: We agree that planning authorities should provide reasons for their decisions in respect of planning applications to parties who made representations. Presumably this would involve little extra work as it would usually be limited to providing a copy of the planning officer's report.
Scottish Consumer Council: To ensure that planning authorities can be seen to be transparent and accountable, SCC recommends that the Scottish Executive should introduce a statutory requirement that the reasons for all decisions taken should be made public and that those who have actually participated in the planning process receive direct feedback on reasons for rejection.
Scottish Wildlife Trust: This is very welcome and clear guidance must be given to local authorities on the level of detail and evidence to be presented as part of the reason underpinning a decision. Problems could occur where councillors go against their planning officers recommendations.
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