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Other Measures
Promoting Inclusive Design
Local Authorities
Dundee City Council: The Council welcomes this initiative to encourage architects and designers to consider the adequacy of access arrangements to buildings and land for all sections of the community.
East Dunbartonshire Council: Whilst this is welcomed the imposition of a further responsibility on the Planning Authority to confirm compliance will have workload consequences.
Moray Council: Support in principle welcome further guidance in terms of design and accessibility to buildings.
Non Departmental Public Bodies
Disability Rights Commission ( DRC): The DRC considers an inclusive built environment as central to achieving our overall vision of a "society in which all disabled people can participate fully as equal citizens." It is important to state from the outset that this goal does not run counter to the principles of sustainable development: rather, an inclusive built environment leads to a more sustainable built environment in which everyone can participate. The DRC therefore welcomes the proposals outlined in the White Paper, but believes more needs to be done to define sustainable development and ensure the rights of disabled people are mainstreamed throughout the planning system. To this end, we recommend that the White Paper's proposal to require evidence of the access principles considered by applicants bring forward a development proposal is very welcome and could play an important role in mainstreaming accessibility principles into the planning process. To achieve this however, the White Paper's proposals will require more detail. The upcoming Planning (Scotland) Bill must better reflect the social element to sustainable development, in line with the priorities identified in the UK Government's Strategic Framework for Sustainable Development. The DRC warmly welcomes the proposal to require developers to submit access principles with their proposals. However, there is a lack of detail as to the circumstances under which developers would be required to do so. Currently, disabled people's access to the built environment is only addressed at the Building Control stage. Thus decisions relating to the location, orientation and transport provision can already have been taken. The result is that developers may incur additional costs to adapt both the interior and exterior of the building and the surroundings by employing more expensive design and planning gain solutions. However, this would have not been the case if the developer considered principles of access from the outset. In addition, given the incoming Disability Equality Duty ( DED) mentioned above, it would clearly be helpful for planning authorities and developers if accessibility principles could be mainstreamed in the planning process from the outset. The DRC would therefore encourage further development of the thinking behind this proposal. It may be useful to compare the provisions of recent legislation in England and Wales in this regard. The Planning and Compulsory Purchase Act 2004 contains provisions requiring design and access statements to accompany planning applications. The DRC believes that it would be useful if similar measures were introduced in Scotland. As well as helping ensure that access considerations have been mainstreamed into development proposals from the outset, such a requirement would assist planning authorities in meeting their duties under the DED, while also placing a responsibility on developers themselves to consider access issues in more depth. It would also help ensure greater consistency across authority boundaries.
Planning Consultants, Architects and Lawyers
Collar, Neil: Is this not an issue that should be dealt with by the building control regime?
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