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Chamber and committees

Transport and the Environment Committee,

Meeting date: Wednesday, May 10, 2000


Contents


Subordinate Legislation

The Convener:

The first item is consideration of an affirmative statutory instrument, the Town and Country Planning (Fees for Applications and Deemed Applications) (Scotland) Amendment Regulations 2000. The instrument is accompanied in the committee papers by the usual Executive note and a covering note from the clerks. We will follow our standard procedure for handling affirmative statutory instruments. Members may wish to note that the Subordinate Legislation Committee considered the regulations at its meeting on 25 April and requested information from the Executive on the consultation process preceding the laying of the instrument. The Subordinate Legislation Committee considered the Executive's response at its meeting on 2 May; relevant extracts from the Official Report of that meeting were circulated with members' papers.

We will allow time for questions about the regulations and for general discussion. The minister will then move the motion, which may be debated before a decision is taken, no later than 90 minutes after the motion is moved. First, the minister may wish to make a short opening statement.

The Minister for Transport and the Environment (Sarah Boyack):

I will speak briefly about the background to this issue, which I hope will be helpful to members. The regulations introduce new levels of planning fees, which—if they are approved by the committee—will come into effect on 1 June. Since fees were introduced in 1981, they have represented an increasing proportion of the recovery of the costs to local authorities of determining planning applications. They are charged in accordance with the size and nature of development proposals. In line with the United Kingdom Government's policy objective, which was announced in 1990, fee levels are designed to recover fully the costs that are associated with processing planning applications from formal registration to the issue of a decision. The amending regulations demonstrate that we intend to continue that policy commitment. The increase that I am proposing today, which is the first since October 1997, should realise the target recovery rate.

The fees are not intended to recover the full costs of development control, as those include pre-application discussions, appeals and other activities, but are designed to recover the costs only of processing planning applications. The Executive considers that the increase strikes the right balance between full recovery and the likely impact on potential developers. Fees remain a small part of developers' costs—considerably less than 1 per cent—and there is no evidence that they act as deterrence to development. At the domestic property end of the scale, few householders pay fees, because most minor development does not require a planning application.

I will give you some indicative figures to give you a sense of the sums that are involved. The minimum fee for a factory or office development will rise from £190 to £210 on 1 June, and the maximum in those categories will increase by £1,000 from £10,500 for a building of 3,750 sq m. An application to build a new house will attract a fee of £210, whereas an application for substantial alterations to a domestic property will be charged at £105.

We believe that users and potential beneficiaries of the development control system should meet the costs that are incurred in determining planning applications, which would otherwise have to be met by council tax and business rate payers generally. Even when the proposed increases are taken into account, planning application fee levels continue to be modest and to represent a small proportion of developers' overall costs.

I commend the regulations to the committee. My officials and I will be happy to take questions. Jim Mackinnon is from the planning side of the development department, and Duncan Gray is from the local government finance section.

Mr Murray Tosh (South of Scotland) (Con):

I wish to raise a minor matter. The Executive note advises that the regulations propose an increase of approximately 10 per cent since 1997. For future reference, it would be useful to have the rate of inflation since the previous increase, so that we could see whether the increase was broadly in line with rising costs—I assume that it is.

We have had low inflation for quite a few years. Presumably, if the rate of inflation ever rose, there would be pressure on councils if fees did not rise annually. Is it intended to upgrade the scale of fees annually?

That is a relevant point. I will ask Duncan Gray to clarify the position over the past few years and talk about future proposals.

Duncan Gray (Scottish Executive Development Department):

I can say something about the change in costs to local authority planning departments, as we gather information from those departments about the costs of dealing with applications. Between 1997-98 and 1998-99—the last two years for which we have information—reported costs rose by about 12 per cent. In the same period, the fees that local authorities received from planning applications did not change, because the underlying fee rate had not changed. Those costs are rising a little bit faster than inflation—I do not have overall inflation figures, but I think that in the past two years, general price inflation has been about 6 per cent. The fee increase is broadly in line with the sort of cost increases that local authorities have faced.

Mr Tosh:

Is there any intention to review fees more regularly? A three-year gap seems quite a long period, especially as the major component will be staffing costs. Given the ratios that you have just covered, councils could have difficulties if their costs rose more quickly than their income.

Sarah Boyack:

That is a fair point. Our best estimate of the recovery rate for 1998-99 was 91 per cent, so we have not yet achieved full recovery of costs. Ten local authorities are achieving somewhere in the region of 100 per cent recovery, but we want to review that annually to get on to a steady programme, so that local authorities and developers know that it is coming. In a sense, we are catching up this year. We had hoped to bring the matter to the committee annually, so that members could consider the issues formally every year and I could come to a meeting to identify how costs have changed over the previous year. That would enable appropriate scrutiny.

Is there a pattern in the recovery rate that is achieved by local authorities, in terms of the type and size of authority?

Sarah Boyack:

There is. Ten authorities have achieved full recovery, but others have not. The issue needs to be taken up through best value in local authorities. We must examine their costs and consider how each authority processes planning applications. We are considering an average across Scotland; we are not looking at individual local authorities and setting the rates for their full cost recovery. That would require a more hands-on approach. It is an encouragement to local authorities to think about their processes and how they handle planning applications. The indicative set of costs does not include pre-application discussions, which we all regard as being important for the quality of the output from the planning system.

Are city authorities closer to full recovery than urban authorities or small authorities? Does the size and location of an authority have any implications for the costs of projected development in relation to the planning application?

Jim Mackinnon (Scottish Executive Development Department):

I do not have those figures at my fingertips at the moment. As the minister said, we are talking about overall recovery costs, and much depends on the structure of the planning applications that are received. Householder developments are at one end of the spectrum; major retail and industrial development is at the other end. About 40 per cent of all planning applications in Scotland are for householder development, but in authorities such as East Renfrewshire the figure is 64 or 65 per cent. For major housing developments, the average for Scotland as a whole is 10 per cent, but in Glasgow it is 20 per cent. Underlying those statistics is much detail about how individual planning departments are resourced and structured.

There are no more questions. I thank you for those comments, and ask the minister to move the motion formally.

I move,

That the Transport and the Environment Committee, in consideration of The Town and Country Planning (Fees for Applications and Deemed Applications) (Scotland) Amendment Regulations 2000 recommends that the Order be approved.

Is that agreed?

Members indicated agreement.