Amendments to the Planning Bill continue to be debated and voted on. The Local Government and Communities Committee has so far had five sittings dealing with them at Stage Two of the Bill and we are likely to have at least two more.
So far 42% of amendments have been passed unopposed, along with 42% of mainly opposition amendments being passed after a split vote. The rest have been defeated, also after split votes. This means the Bill will be radically different from the one we were first presented with and it will need a lot of tidying up as we head for the final stage.
Last week, Planning Minister Kevin Stewart latched on to a new catchphrase – unintended consequences which he repeated several times in relation to opposition amendments. Telling MSPs that they haven’t thought things through properly is an interesting tactic from a minister who can’t command a majority of votes on the committee.
Some of my own amendments are not the finished article but that doesn’t make them wrong. For example, I suggested – successfully – that the government’s idea of allowing communities to prepare plans for their own areas would be better served if those same communities were informed that they could do so. It needs more work but it’s a start.
My successful amendment which would bring in a system where councils could capture some of the uplift in value which comes to land as a result of their own decisions to grant planning permission also needs more work. Opposition MSPs do not have the luxury of a government machine behind them so we have to work that bit harder. My colleague Adam Tomkins was also successful with his Agent of Change amendment – again despite the opposition of the SNP.
This week, the hotly debated topic of appeal rights should come up. Mr Stewart has waxed lyrical about having collaboration over conflict in the planning system and I agree with him. The problem is, his Bill does not achieve that and so appeal rights is the subject of a number of proposed amendments. We need a planning system that works for everyone and not just those who work in the system, or who use it.