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Background
8. Article 14(2) of the Town and Country Planning (General Development Procedure) (Scotland) Order 1992 requires planning authorities to determine an application for planning permission within 2 months of receipt of a valid application. This period can be extended where it is agreed in writing between the applicant and the planning authority. Where an environmental assessment is required, the period for determination is 4 months. As a matter of policy Central Government has set out a range of targets which local authorities should aim to meet in determining different categories of planning application. To monitor performance in handling planning applications, Councils submit 6-monthly returns to the Scottish Executive. The key data from these returns is summarised in Annex 2.
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Development Control Performance There is a statutory requirement for local authorities to determine all planning applications within 2 months. if necessary, an extended period may be agreed with the applicant. The Government has set the following performance targets for determining planning applications within 2 months:
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All Applications - Target 80%
9. There are signs that performance is improving with 65% of applications determined in 2 months in 1998/99 compared with 61% in 1996/97 (Figure 2). A cyclical element can be seen with performance in October - March below the figures for the previous 6 months. The best performance was achieved in April - September 1998 when almost 68% of planning applications were decided in 2 months. The most recent figures (October 1998 - March 1999) show that performance has fallen back but not to the level of comparable periods in 1996/97 and 1997/98 (Figure 3).
10. There remains a wide variation in performance between authorities. Some Councils consistently achieve or are close to achieving the Government's performance targets but others regularly fall well short. The extent of variation has, however, reduced slightly (Figure 4). The first 2 returns following local government reorganisation indicated that 3 authorities decided less than 40% of applications in different 6 month periods; in the 2 most recent returns no authority decided less than 40% of applications in the statutory period. In addition the number of authorities achieving the Government's target has increased from 2 to 5.
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