PLANNING (SCOTLAND) BILL

George Allan

The Planning Bill, currently before the Scottish Parliament, aims to support economic development by streamlining the system. Unfortunately this laudable objective in the Bill is not balanced by anything about protecting the environment. NEMT attended a discussion session in Stonehaven hosted by the MSP chairing the Holyrood committee scrutinising the Bill; we also wrote to all North East list MSPs and local constituency MSPs about the following which are absent from the Bill and which should be included:

• Statutory protection for Wild Land Areas. Scottish Planning Policy states that windfarms should not be approved in National Parks or National Scenic Areas. NEMT thinks that the same should apply to areas covered by SNH's Map. The easiest way of doing this would be for the Bill to include a clause prohibiting windfarms in National Parks, National Scenic Areas and the areas cover by SNH's Wild Land Map. The Creag Riabhach windfarm in the far north already breaches a Wild Land Area and, if similar decisions are made in the future, the area covered by the map will decrease incrementally.
  
  
• Equal right of appeal. At present, an applicant can appeal a planning decision which goes against them but objectors cannot. This weights the process heavily in favour of developers. The only recourse for individuals, communities and voluntaries organisations who object to a decision is via judicial review, which can be prohibitively expensive.
  
  
• Contracting experts. A variety of assessments can be required when plans are submitted for developments in environmentally sensitive places. These include Environmental Impact Assessments, Landscape and Visual Impact Assessments, Wild Land Assessments and specialist ecological reports. The contracting of professionals to undertake such assessments, and the ecological clerks of works sometimes needed, falls to the applicant. This could lead to conflicts of interest- independence is needed to give the system credibility. The solution is for the planning authority to contract professions assessors or ecological clerks of works and to charge the applicant.

MSPs Bill Bowman, Jenny Marra, Mark McDonald and Tom Mason didn't bother to reply to the letter, which, despite being some distance away, means that they need to check their job descriptions.

Replies which were received were generally along party lines with SNP politicians wanting to see development at almost any cost. They were clear that 'wild land status should not impose a blanket ban on development', which translates as 'wild land is good for the tourist brochures but wind farms are better'. There was no need to worry about using independent contractors as the planning application reviewers, i.e. our over-stretched local authority planning officers, would make sure that the evidence was presented impartially. In the vein of seeing more development, equal right of appeal was seen as disruptive and unhelpful. Lewis Macdonald, our lonely Labour MSP, largely agreed with this view. The Conservative MSPs were more helpful, with Alexander Burnett supporting statutory protection for Wild Land Areas, urging us to submit our views to the Planning Committee. They were less clear about requirements to use independent contractors but supported re-examining some form of limited equal right of appeal. Finally, Mike Rumbles, our Liberal MSP, who has been very helpful in the past, was generally positive but not committing to anything other than support for some form of limited equal right of appeal.

There's nothing too surprising in these replies. However, the main purpose of these letters is to 'sensitise' politicians to the fact that the conservation groups, representing quite a few voters, have strong views which need to be considered. Although the Government is set against equal right of appeal, the Holyrood Committee is giving this particular attention.

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