f governance, including a joint committee of members and a senior management team. We are at the end of a process of our second strategic development plan as part of the new system, of the old system or the current system, but what we have recognised is that regional planning is a long-term aspiration for the west of Scotland and has been since 1947 in the Clyde Valley plan that was published then. The statutory role has been integral to the planning system in Scotland for many years and we're now at a cross-show as to where that will position itself moving forward, given the terms of the planning bill. However, as our economic land use transportation patterns have evolved, it's important that we think about delivering economic growth across city regions and even the independent panel acknowledged the value of planning at the city region scale. The Scottish Government recognises that strategic planning is an essential element of the overall planning system. Taking that in context, it's about how it is delivered and the planning bill is seeking to remove the statutory duty to prepare a strategic development plan. Our view as Clyde plan would be that that would be something that we wouldn't wish to see happen. We still think that there's a role for the statutory nature of the plan itself, however processes around it could be changed to expand and enhance its view. However, if things were going to change and the preparation of an SDP was to be removed from the system, then we firmly believe that our regional spatial strategy is critical to economic delivery. Any role as part of a regional partnership should be a statutory duty within that partnership. I thank all of you for your statements. I suspect that that's a matter that we'll look at in some detail, Mr Tate. Can we move to questions then to Monica Lennon? Thank you, convener. Good morning to the panel and I'll just remind everyone again that I am a member of the Royal Town Planning Institute. A logical place to start, perhaps, is the purpose of planning. I note from RTPI Scotland, Malcolm Fraser and Professor Haig that you've all argued in your written submissions that the planning bill should establish a clear purpose for the planning system. My question is, should a statutory purpose for the planning system be set out on the face of the bill? If so, what do you think that purpose should be? It is very clearly under the UN Sustainable Development Goals that the First Minister has committed Scotland to achieving. It says that it makes cities and human settlements safe, inclusive, resilient and sustainable. You could argue that that's a bromide if it isn't delivered further down the line, but it's a strapline to have at the top of everything that we do. It can't really be better than it clearly ties into statements that have been made on behalf of Scotland that have already been accepted. I don't see why that shouldn't start off all our considerations and everything falls from that and should refer back to that. Other comments? Yes, we absolutely think that there is a place for stating the purpose of planning on the face of the bill. I think that the reason for that is that the review has been going on for about two years now and there's been a lot of detailed conversation and we've now ended up with this primary legislation, which makes some quite procedural changes to that system. It's almost important at this stage to step back and remember what we want the planning system to achieve for Scotland. The committee's questions as part of the invitation to give written evidence actually was very telling for me because you asked, does the bill provide a balance on several issues, X, Y and Z? That was an interesting question in and of itself because we need to ask, well, is that what we want the planning system to achieve? I think that it's important for all stakeholders involved in the system that we're all absolutely clear what our end goal is. Professor Hague? What's the alternative to having a purpose? Presumably there's two possibilities. One is that there's no purpose, in which case why we're doing it, or the other is that there is a purpose but we're not prepared to say what it is. That also isn't a great piece of administration, so I think logically there has to be a purpose. If you look at what's done elsewhere, I'd absolutely agree with Malcolm. We start with SDG11. For example, target 11.4 is about conservation of the natural and cultural environment. These kind of things need to be picked up and recognised. In terms of what might go in, if you look at South Africa, South Africa Planning and Land Use Management Act 2015, talks about providing for the inclusive, developmental, equitable and efficient spatial planning. Amongst its objects are to promote social and economic inclusion. Similarly, you can look at someone like Zambia who has explicitly written in to the preamble to their act a set purpose that picks up that kind of language. It can be done. I can't see why Scotland can't do it. Any other comments on that? I would agree with my other colleagues around here. I presume that the fundamental issue is the use of land in support of any purpose. It's about ensuring that the system is created in the use of that land in support of that greater purpose. The purpose can be beyond just planning itself. It can be a government purpose or a regional purpose or a local purpose. In terms of the purpose of planning, in terms of how it actually manifests itself as in the use of land. I think Dorothy wants to come in. We made comments in our submission about potential alignment of the planning bill across with the community empowerment bill, which references the Scottish Government's national outcomes. I think that there is a case for regarding this planning activity. I was taken with Malcolm's eloquent introduction as an integral part of our public activities. The national planning framework could become the spatial expression of the Scottish Government's programme for government. At other levels of the planning system, the plans should become and be seen more fully as the spatial expression of corporate planning activities and community planning activities. I think that if we got that alignment under the community empowerment act, which references the national outcomes and the Scotland performance framework, it would bring greater alignment with community planning, which has been an integral purpose of the planning review. Just one brief supplementary before we move on. We heard in evidence from Petra Beiberbach last week from past planning aid Scotland. I pointed out to Petra that in her evidence to the 2006 bill or what became the 2000 planning act that she was basically saying that not a lot of people know what planning is and what the system is for. Would having a clear statement of purpose in the bill help to better educate the wider public about why we have a planning system and why it is something that matters to them? I think that we will say yes. Absolutely. Great. Well, happy to move on, convener. Do you want to take up the next line of questioning? Yes, if you want to skip ahead. I was going to pick up on strategic development plans. I was really to Clyde plan, not only would your jobs disappear, but strategic development planning, as we know it, is facing the chop in terms of the bill. We heard in the earlier session this morning—I do not know if you were listening to any of it. Homes for Scotland, for example, were saying that strategic development planning has not been working. I suppose to begin with, do you understand where some of that criticism is coming from, not just in terms of Clyde plan but the other SDP authorities? I think that, first and foremost, we are at the start of a new system. The SDPs are only in their second iteration. I think that the critical element is potentially around the process of joint working and building relationships and trust as part of the process of delivering those types of documents. From the west of Scotland's perspective and the Clyde plan perspective, we were, I suppose, quite fortunate. We had a long legacy of joint working and the ability to transition into the new system for us was relatively straightforward, made perhaps other areas in the country that are coming at it in a different, a newer experience, take time to develop those relationships and trust to deliver the plan. I think that the other thing to recall is that the SDPs are there to perform one function and one function only, and that is to deliver the strategic development plan and the processes in which we set up are done to do that. It was the Glasgow model that was used to roll out across the other SDPs in the city regions, so we came from a better starting point. The documents themselves, in terms of where we have come from, have been produced on time and on budget, have set a clear spatial strategy. They have involved a fair degree of consultation, examination. We have involved our local authorities, first and foremost, it is their document to submit to ministers. That whole process takes time and it takes, as I said, trust and just to get people to come on board and understand what the processes are. Criticism perhaps, yes, is expected in a new system, but the principles and what lies behind the purpose of the documents remains valid moving forward. All the process-y things just now, regional planning isn't new. In terms of outcomes, what has regional planning achieved? Outcomes? In terms of better places, communities, infrastructure, what does it achieve? First and foremost, I think that it is about setting that vision and spatial strategy across a metropolitan city region, so eight authorities coming together, working and understanding what it wants to achieve, particularly on economic development, providing locations for economic development, housing, looking at what the scale and demand for housing is and disaggregating that across the geography, so setting that context for local development plans, looking at green networks, for example, and setting a context for the delivery of green networks. In terms of transport, looking at the way the transport system operates, and looking at what is required to make it work more efficiently in support of the broader strategy. Planning framework, and there is a clear focus on delivery in local development plans, and local authority planners aren't in a constant cycle of doing a five-year plan. Does that not free people up to be more focused? Could you lose that layer in the middle that you currently occupy? My view would be that it would be unwise to lose that particular layer. My personal experience would be that you keep it as a part of the strategy development plan because it allows the local authorities to come together to consider with other state codes and other partners what is the best way to plan for their city region. We do not live and work within one small local authority area. We do work on a cross-boundary basis, so consideration of housing, infrastructure, green networks, as I mentioned before, are all things that transcend local authority boundaries and have to be considered in the appropriate geography, and the appropriate geography, as we have seen over many years, is the regional scale. The issue around delivery and the disconnect between plan and delivery is symptomatic of a system of setup because the SDPs are set up to do just that one thing. That is to deliver the SDP on behalf of the authorities to Scottish ministers. Any system that changes could still have the SDP as a statutory document but could be enhanced around delivery by providing resources in the continuity around delivery plans to try and achieve that. It could move to a 10-year cycle as well. It is probably one of the things that I have always found frustrating around the SDP is that you produce it once it is approved four years later and you are submitting another document. For SDPs, that is a statutory document, it is long-term, so that cycle of replacement does not allow you to have discussions that you were referring to. However, the space is very much there for local authorities to come together and think about how they plan for their area. That is helpful. I think that it has some way to come in. With regard to the value of regional strategic planning, as Stuart pointed out, people in the natural environment do not strictly obey political boundaries if at all. I think that it is important to acknowledge that what is happening in terms of investment and development on one side of a border is going to affect what happens on the other side of that. It is perhaps instructive to note that, in England, where regional planning was dismantled in 2010, the UK Government is making available to English local authorities funding to produce joint core strategies by multi-authority arrangements. In effect, it is reintroducing an acknowledgement that some statutory regional planning is a good thing. Professor Heagley? I think that regional planning, as somebody once said, is the scale at which you try to solve the problem above the scale at which you last managed to solve it. There is an ambiguity about what a region is. However, without doubt, there is an increasing emphasis on the importance of functional city regions and the geography of that internationally. That is why UN Habitat now talks about urban and territorial planning. It is a French term originally, but we can call it regionally and get away with it. It is basically an issue of subsidiarity. Is there a scale at which problems are best addressed at the lowest feasible level? There is a strong case for saying that, within Scotland, the region is one of those and that a plan, rather than just a partnership, gives you a mechanism to do that. I wonder if I can throw in city region deals, because this committee, before I was a member, had a whole inquiry looking at city region deals, and we are increasingly seeing more of them being introduced in Scotland. At a time when we are trying to achieve inclusive growth at that city region level, does it seem an odd time to be abolishing strategic development plan authorities, or is there an alternative view? Thank you very much. Partly in response to your previous question about outcomes, we have provided a very clear context for the local development plans moving forward. We have provided additional context for development management decisions, but we have also provided a platform for collaboration. That does not sound like much, but I will expand briefly around, for example, partnership working at the level of the functional housing market area. That is important because cities cannot plan for their own housing needs and demands within the confines of their own boundaries. Finally, as another outcome, we have provided a platform and a context for the city region programme of infrastructure projects. That was there as a basis for the city region funding that came to the table on which to base key infrastructure projects. Many of the authorities used that as their first point of call to develop the projects that are part of their infrastructure bids. Malcolm Fraser? It is a larger point, but it is not sustainable that Scottish local authorities are cut off from their hinterlands, Edinburgh from the Lothians, Dundee from Angus, Aberdeen from the Shire etc. They need to be bigger to be able to plan better. They need to be about the same size as health boards or the city region deals, but they are already too distant from their citizens. It very much begs the question of the need for community councils, parish councils to be reintroduced and empowered given responsibilities. Subsidiarity should allow communities within Edinburgh, as they are doing under the community empowerment bill, but to take more responsibility for their own affairs and for local democracy to be reintroduced. I would be off for larger local authorities that can be better planned as city regions and re-empowered local community councils right the way around all our towns, villages and settlements within cities. Professor Hague? I think that the city deals strengthens the case for a regional scale of planning because the risk with city deals is because of a project-driven approach to development. You have a series of pet projects that happen that may be very valuable, but how do you integrate them? That is part of the role of the plan. I think that that is the point that I was going to make. The projects do not sit in isolation. They are a delivery mechanism for core components of a strategy for a city region. They cannot sit in isolation. They have to sit in the context of maximising investment to maximising the economic value of what comes out of them. I am done on that. Do you think that we should have a model based on the city deal model and that the authorities who are in city deals or growth deals could become planning authorities in their own right? I would suggest that I take Cliff's point that city deals are too focused on a bypass or a relief road or something like that. That would need to be relinked into proper regional planning. Part of the reason that regional planning does not work is that it is undermined by land speculation markets. We end up in a situation where all the north of Edinburgh is unbuilt whereas speculation is looking to get the green belt off Edinburgh to build on instead. I think that it needs to come the other way round. We want to encourage local authorities to work together to agree on their outcomes and that could be in a regional spatial strategy. Local authorities to choose their geographies in terms of that. When something like the city deal opportunity arises, there is therefore an agreed set of outcomes that feed into a wider corporate strategy. It is not just about spatial development, it is about economic growth, it is about health outcomes, education and so on. That funding comes available and you are able to target it at pre-decided priorities. That is a semantic point. Local authorities are the local planning authorities for the SDP purposes and they are still the local planning authorities when they work with the regional partnership city deal. It is where those things come together because there are two separate governance processes that are emerging. The planning bill would seek to remove the strategic development plan joint committee, so that would take one layer of governance out and could be potentially replaced by the city region partnership process if that was a direction that would align governance more effectively. Within that governance structure it would have to be charged to do things that support the proper planning of its area. That is where we talk about having a statutory duty on that partnership to continue regional planning, developing a spatial strategy that can shape future city deal investment or future investment as well, plus also feed into the national planning framework. The same kind of conversation, but it is two different statutory processes of governance that we are starting to look at here and it is whether you want to start to align them to coordinate planning and delivery in a way that should perhaps be missing under the current arrangements. In your case it would be the same local authorities, I think. Whether that would be the same across the whole of Scotland? Yes, but it would pick up a number of local authorities who are not in these strategic development plans at the moment, so you would actually mop up quite a lot more of the country by doing it that way. Can I ask another question? It is the flip side of the argument. I found, as a local councillor for 10 years, when we set up the city deal which I support, there was a bit of a democratic deficit in that local councillors were not really involved in any of the decision making. I can only re-speak about the Glasgow deal, which my council was part of. If we are going to have these regional partnerships, it seems to me that we need to involve councillors more rather than just having one body of officials and a council leader. What is your view on that? I see some nodding in your head. Okay, Raymond. Just before we move on, I thought that I would dig out some of the recommendations from the city region deal report. We drew attention to the fact that there was an enterprise and skills review and we name-checked another a few examples of where there is original co-operation strategies that emerge separate from the one that is seeking to be removed through the legislation. It is reasonable to contend that original strategic planning will continue, because it continues in a number of forms irrespective of the strategic plans that will be removed from the bill. Secondly, I am just wondering—Mr Tater and Ms McDonald think—that the local authorities that make up the Glasgow region would stop talking and co-operating if the bill goes through. That is effectively what the contention is. I cannot speak on behalf of all the local authorities. They have come together on the basis of the city deal funding. They have come together on the basis of the strategic development planning authority. They have come together under the auspices of Strathclyde passenger transport. They have come together on the auspices of the green network partnership. They have come together in a number of forms. The critical question for me would be under which what guides that form of development that they are all trying to seek and achieve. They are all doing different things. They are all wanting to deliver certain aspects of the growth of the city region. The thing that binds it together from a planning perspective is a strategic development plan at the moment. The removal of that could potentially undermine the broader consideration of planning issues. They can still come together on various elements but, in terms of planning, having that statutory duty to produce a plan, to think about the growth aspirations and the environmental impacts of that across the city is critical to ensure that those other pieces of the things that they come together on are joined up in a way that is meaningful. They are not thinking about transport, green networks, economic development and silos that are actually coming and where that happens. I absolutely appreciate why you would say that. We are just trying to tease out because it was the last evidence session as well about the need for a statutory duty to do that or would we expect them to do it anyway? A statutory duty in some ways is to do you want it to happen or do you wish to make it happen or hope it happens? A statutory duty gives you that ability to ensure that something happens. I think that that is very helpful. Only because I think that you are going to say something similar, Ms MacDonald can I bring in Professor Hane before we move on? I think that we all recognise the need for more integration. It seems perverse to propose a measure that will make integration powers weaker. The key bit is to try to take the strategic level of planning closer to budgets and closer to the investment priorities of the different stakeholders who are actually going to deliver the development on the ground. I would see the regional plan as a basis of negotiation for that that is followed up by the kind of partnerships, by the city deal and so forth. I see it as a dynamic process between them but I just do not see how removing it, especially as there is little evidence that it is seriously broken, if we think of the work that Kevin Murray associates did a couple of years ago. I just do not see how removing it actually helps us to deliver more development on the ground in the places where we want it. That is it. We are better move on now. There is a lot in this bill. We will move to Kenneth Gibson now. Thank you very much, convener. I would say first of all that everything that Malcolm Fraser said in relation to strategic development plans is something that I have been asking for for years, absolutely. I welcome that. We move on to simplified development zones. Just to quote from Professor Hague's submission, he says in a quote that simplifying the planning system could make it more equitable and expeditious and less reliant on the time consuming appeals system. However, the SDZ proposal does not deliver much change and, again, misses the point that the role of the planning system is more multifaceted than just regulating development. Professor Hague goes on to say that we should use the planning system to promote innovation that contributes to the sustainable development goals whereas what is proposed seems just a way of making it easier to deliver mediocre development. I wonder if you can expand on that and if others on the panel can give us their views. Well, if the aim of SDZ is to deliver what we want, then why do we not have that everywhere rather than just in certain areas? It seems to me that the problem is that we do not just want more housing planning permissions. We actually want a wider array of things. That means that at some stages what we want is to conserve areas or to conserve landscapes rather than simply to develop them. I think that the difficulty is that there is this kind of fix that has been put across the bill and the review. The real issue is that planning is blocking the delivery of housing planning permissions and that that equates to housing on the ground and housing of the type that we want. There are question marks at all those points. Whether planning is the sole blocking factor clearly is not. Whether it is the housing that we want because we need to be talking as we came up in the previous session about affordable housing, about mid-market rent housing, about housing for an ageing population and all those things. We want quality of place in terms of design. The risk is that we are getting on a track that is really risk missing the main point, which is quality development, which may have a strong element of conservation as part of it because that again is a more sustainable option often than new development. Therefore, the way that the SDZ proposal is couched is risk sending us on the wrong track. The idea of having areas identified in a plan where you are going to take special action is quite logical. It goes back to long history in planning of that, dare I say it, back to the old days of comprehensive development areas. Yes, you can use a plan to identify areas where you are going to do special things, areas perhaps where you are going to particularly encourage innovation, in design, in products, in energy, whatever. However, to simply see it as a way of speeding up development is really missing the point. I very much agree with what Cliff said in terms of SDZ having the potential to focus proactive planning. You have a site allocated in the plan and the SDZ could have a valuable role in saying the challenges on the site, whether that is access, whether it is utilities, whether it is contamination, whether it is financial viability. It gives a focus around which to get that site delivered. Without proper resourcing, they will not be able to achieve that aim. What they require is a lot of upfront work from local authorities in terms of master planning, in terms of working with stakeholders. Obviously, because it does not involve a planning application, there is no planning application fee associated with an SDZ. To make sure that they deliver good development, the right development, it will be important to make sure that the resources are there to frame them properly. Any other views on that? Do you want to follow up on that, Mr Gibson? Some of the witnesses in the previous session, interestingly, gave some interesting submissions. For example, Holmes of Scotland said that, fundamentally, simplified development zones will not be an alternative to a properly functioning planning system and will only be a supplement to the functions of a proactive planning authority. Given what Kate Houghton has just said, how do you feel about that statement? I think that that almost agrees with what I just said. To be honest, what I am talking about is that SDZs could be a way to concentrate efforts on delivery of certain sites. Of course, what we want—what this bill is supposed to be achieving as a whole—is delivery full stop on all sites that are allocated in a development plan, and that has been through the proper scrutiny. I think that what SDZs offer on top of that is perhaps on particularly challenging sites. It is almost an incentive and just a kind of carry-on cry that this is a site that we want to see through. On balance, do members of the panel feel that it enhances the bill? If you can simplify the system, it needs to be simplified everywhere. To simplify it in certain places just creates a whole level of arguing over where those places are and stops you doing something sensible elsewhere. If there are good measures that can be put in place that should be across the board, we should not be drawing lines around somewhere and saying that you can make a mess of that and not make a mess of it. If we are going to make a mess, we need to make a mess everywhere. Equal opportunity. That is more like the official terminology that is contained within the legislation. Any other comments in relation to that? It depends on the policy purpose of the SDZs. If they are about giving a planning permission in principle on easy sites to develop, I am not sure that they add that much. If they are about rallying people around getting tricky sites delivered with the correct resources, they could help. You are looking for more detail, basically, from ministers about what will deliver. I think that, in a moment at Graham Simpson, it takes more a little bit more of this. I mean, this was discussed in detail at the community's conference of sterling that we had as well, and the contention was that it sounds like really good, simplified development zones have changed the name, but it sounds like really good master planning where you are really speaking to a community about what they would really like to see in that land that has not been used and doing lots of upfront work around that. I think that Kate Houghton's suggestion and Malcolm Fraser's suggestion is why would not you do that everywhere? Therefore, going back to the policy intent, I will know the more constituencies in MSPs, bits of land that were desperate to see develop because it would be that final piece in the jigsaw for place setting and we cannot get the market to bite on it. We can think of lots of reasons why the simplified development zone could really work with massive community support, I have to say. I suppose what I am saying is that I am giving what my vision might be, but if there is not a clear policy statement and clarity around the purpose of it, might the lukewarm or irrelevant feeling that I am getting from the witnesses just now, would that change if there was a greater clarity as to the purpose of it perhaps? It has to be more diverse than the way that it is presented, so it is cliffhaggered people who are recording it. I think that this comes back to one of the big issues hanging over the whole thing, which we have not yet touched upon, which is the whole issue of trust and a sense of trust between communities and the system and the development industry. The difficulty is the way that it is presented that it will primarily be about speeding development for housing without having to go through as many hoops as normally in a planning system without necessarily having the great vision that Mr Doris has. That is one of the factors that reduces public confidence in this process. More supplementaries in relation to that. Gideon Simpson, then Monica Lennon. Yes, thanks very much. I will look forward to hearing Mr Doris' vision later on. Just a very simple question on simplified development zones. Simplified planning zones, as they currently stand, cannot be set up in certain areas—conservation areas, the green belt and national scenic areas. That provision does not exist in this bill for simplified development zones. That may well have been an oversight, but do you think that these restrictions should apply? Feel free to refer to my vision at any point during your answer, Professor Hale. I think that this is exactly the kind of point that I was just making. It is the kind of thing that makes people feel suspicious, that makes people feel that the value of things like conservation areas, which are much loved within Scotland, if any systematic research was done, people would see how valued they are. It gives the feeling that that is going to be given less priority and a hands-off approach towards approving development is going to be prioritised. If, at the same time as speeding development—which we all agreed that we want to see—we also see the bill as trying to address the issue of public trust, I think that this is a bit of a known goal in that respect. Any other views, Kate Houghton? Just to add in terms of the potential roles of SDZs in what we call market making, in terms of making a site more attractive to develop, I think it is important in terms of heritage and in terms of nature conservation as well to think about how we can do development in a way that is sympathetic with those objectives as well. Again, it comes back to the policy purpose of SDZs. If they are resourced to good planning, which allows, for example, a listed building to come back into use and to be refurbished as part of a sympathetic scheme, then that would obviously be a good thing. It is important that what they are not used as is a way to get around the proper scrutiny surrounding other consents that you need. Dorothy McDonald? I will be very brief. Just a generic point about the purpose of development planning. Development planning plans, in one very real sense, deliver just one thing, which is the ability to grant planning permission to land. SDZs may be falling into similar territory. My more substantive point is that, if we, the big wee, want to fund infrastructure and achieve development delivery, we should fund it and resource it. The bill is giving third parties the right to request a simplified development zone, but it would also give ministers the power to make an SDZ and there would be no restriction on that. I wonder how appropriate that is in a plan-led system. We have talked a lot on the bill about certainty in the plan, front-loading the public having confidence that their views have been taken to account. If we do all that, sign off our local place plan and then ministers come along and zone a simplified development zone, how does that fit well with the whole package of the bill? Is that a good thing? Is that a symptom that planning is broken and ministers no better? How would that fit with, I suppose, the views of communities? Do we expect that power would be widely used? The RTPI's position is that SDZs should be linked to allocated sites and development plans, so whether that would be the local development plan or the NPF. We think that amendment to the bill could really strengthen the role of SDZs, and you are saying that it would improve the accountability of them. In our thoughts and out for witnesses, I see nodding heads, Malcolm Fraser's agreeing should take once to make a comment on it. I think that the context within this is about facilitating development, and one of the key elements of the new system is delivery programmes and setting out how the local authorities will work with others to deliver the sites within the local development plan or the strategic development plan or the national planning framework. There is a mechanism for having a discussion and a context for how things are going to be taken forward, so community engagement could happen through that discussion around the delivery programme. We heard in the previous panel about planning being a barrier. We heard a third of applications that are refused and are taking forward to appeals. I think that Homes for Scotland is talking about building by appeal. If it gets to a point where Scottish Government, whoever is in power, is starting to get fed up because they are getting it in the neck because we are not delivering the homes that we need, could you see, would it be tempting for ministers to come along and designate the simplified developments, just to make sure that development happens? Malcolm Fraser. We have to set up a system that delivers development and allows it to happen in the right places. We cannot set it up and then countermand it further down the line because we do not like the outcome. We talk a lot about getting things right upstream and then add more processes and upend things further downstream. We need to take away the later chances to upend the process in order to focus on getting things right upstream. I, as an architect, have many times been told by planners that we are going to turn this down but you will win it on appeal. That is a simply unacceptable situation to happen. It is extending the process, allowing developments to become worse, allowing lawyers and consultants to make money out of the tail end of the process and holding back development. When we say that we need to get things right upstream, we need to apply that and not undermine it. We need to tell ministers that they need to get their simplified processes in early. We need to get the right land ready for development and then not let that go further down the line. Keith Houghton, do you want to follow-up? I was going to say something similar about the fact that—sorry, Monica, can you repeat your question? I suppose that I was exploring the risk of ministers using the simplified development zone power. If it is looking like planning is not delivered and we are not getting homes that we need, is it easy for fixtures to come along and designate a simplified development zone? Is that really appropriate? Is that where we want to be? I think that it is similar to what Malcolm Brown said. It is about getting things right upstream and what we are trying to do right now is design a system that prevents us ever being in that situation. I suppose that it is also important to remember that the Government is also democratically accountable, so that their choice to use those powers would be within that context. Does the acting committee agree that ministers should have that power? Should it be in the bill? As I said, we think that SDZ should be linked to the plan-led system, so that any SDZ that is introduced by a minister is linked to a site that is allocated either in an LDP or in the NPR. I think that Professor Hague wanted to comment on our supplementary from Graham Simpson. I think that this discussion highlights the extent to which there is systematic distortion in the logic of the bill. On the one hand, it is all about front loading, community involvement and rebuilding trust. On the other hand, when the chips are down, you can still lose out at the last stage, either through an SBZ or through the appeal system. I totally support Malcolm's view. The example that he gave should not happen, and I would agree on that. In the end, 95 per cent of planning applications are approved, so more. I am correct. The real problem in the system is in the appeal system. Most of the system ticks over okay. It could be better, but we would not be having a plan in bail if there were much more problems there. The real issue is in the appeal system and the inequalities in that system, and the extent to which, after all the front loading, the real decision can come at the very final stage and not be very locally accountable. We will look at the appeal system in some more detail later on. We are not ignoring it, we are just going through a flow of evidence. Graham Simpson, do you want to add something? Yes, we are all going to come on to appeals. If you decide that we need the X number of houses across Scotland, we need X number in this area, that area, that bit of land should be green belt, that is a conservation area and that is what is in your local development plan, then you would then say, well that land has been allocated for housing, therefore you can set up a simplified development zone there, but you cannot set it up there because that is green belt. Is that the sort of system that you would see working? Exactly. If SDZs were linked to the planned system and linked to allocations in the plan, then logically that is how it would work. You would have an SDZ, whether it were for commercial development or residential development, based on the allocation in the plan. The minister cannot come along and override that because the land has already been allocated for housing and local communities already know that there is a potential for housing in that area.  The difference is that they then also tend to be much more prescriptive than just a basic zoning, so I think you would not just want to say any housing on this site is okay because there comes back to questions about placemaking, about quality, about mix and so on. If you got to a situation where you were then sort of masterplanning the site and had done it that way, that would be different. I think that we have already said this. Yes, it could work well, but it does require resourcing, it does require a mechanism probably for land assembly and to ensuring that the development will actually go ahead and not just be a set of planning permissions sitting in a house builder's account. No, that's very useful. I mean, we've obviously, as I said in the earlier session, we've got to think how can we improve this bill in certain parts if we want to, so I think your answers are very useful in that regard. Okay, then we'll move on. Sorry, Dorothy, do you want to add something? I think so. To say briefly that, following on my earlier point, the development plan allocations, including SDZs, can be a very blunt tool to achieve that delivery and focus. They can bring it if the actors are working collaboratively and if it's resourced. In terms of development delivery, just to perhaps challenge in a way the inference behind the question and behind the proposition about SDZs, social sector house building programmes are currently at amongst the most buoyant levels in the last 10 years or so because we're funding it. Private sector house building programmes are at the lowest historically, certainly in our part of the world, and that's not because we didn't allocate sites and development plans and it's not because we didn't have SDZs. It's for many complex and different reasons, which I'm sure you've taken evidence for on from other panels. Okay, thank you very much for that. That's helpful. I'm really in a questioning now, Alexander Stewart. A number of you did give us some views on the infrastructure levy in your written submissions, but I'd like to try and tease that out a little bit more here in the committee. To what extent do you believe that the infrastructure levy can raise funds to unlock the potential for developments? I think, as the RTPI said in our written submission, the research commission by the Scottish Government showed I think it was about 75 million annually in the best case scenario, which would be helpful, but that's not of a scale that we need to overcome the infrastructure challenge. Dorothy just alluded to some of the complexities that prevent development coming forward. That has nothing to do with planning allocations or permissions. Indeed, it's about getting infrastructure that can service development. I think that that's going to need a lot more than the quantum of money that we're talking about. Professor Heak, do you want to add to that? I think that the answer to your question is to a limited extent. More so in some places than others, in places where markets are strong, you're more likely to get more, in places where markets weak, it probably won't generate very much. To rely on that, to see that as a game changer that will fundamentally alter and remove the blockages in the system, I think, is being over-optimistic with the best one in the world, I think that in the end we need a way that we tie the plan more closely to budgets and to investments. That means that public sector budgets, including bodies like the health service and other significant public sector landowners, but also the investment priorities of the range of infrastructure providers that we've got. In the end, I think that we're going to have to accept that the cost of providing infrastructure for the public good should come out of the public purse primarily. However, the value that's been created by that infrastructure should also be recouped by the public purse. That seems to me a fairly equitable and potentially more efficient way of doing it. Again, I repeat the point. If you look at something like the South African system, that's what they're talking about. I think that the infrastructure levy is fiddling where radical changes are needed. I go back to my opening statement. There is massive public good to be unlocked in new development, but there is also massive financial benefits to be unlocked in new development. It was calculated in Edinburgh in the next 20 years that more than £8.6 billion is going to be released. Even in places such as the regeneration in the north-east of Glasgow, if there's public investment there, the land value goes up around that public investment. All those gains are harvested by the landowners and by consultants who work around that. We need to go to a different system where we make a positive decision that the riches that are unlocked in the built environment accrue to the people of Scotland who need houses, new communities and not to the landowners who own the land. That's how we built the new town in Edinburgh. That's how we built the post-war new towns in Scotland. That's how the most active Asian economies work. If land is designated for housing within a strategic development or a local development plan, the value of that land leaps up from £15,000 an acre to £2 million an acre. It's a massive amount of value that's released. We need to get to a situation where that value is harvested by the local authority for the benefit of the people. They can then borrow against that rise in value to invest in public infrastructure schools, health facilities and roads so that housebuilders can get on with doing their bit. We can also designate land for different sorts of housing, co-housing and different ways of managing housing, intergenerational care, collective self-build. That sort of thing would truly deliver a plan-led system that's not just plan-led in name but has the financial resources to deliver. The housebuilders would like it because it lets them get on with things without having to wait for the drip of section 75 money or infrastructure levy, which will just be a micromanaged fight all the way down the line. It would be an absolute game changer. It's a matter of regret that these discussions around planning don't recognise that these bigger discussions are on going around land reform in other places. We're sitting in a wee silo not understanding that behind planning the issue of land and who benefits from land is of enormous import. You've identified many of the issues there to try to unlock the potential and make it happen, and it has happened elsewhere in other nations and other countries. For the bill that we have here, what would you indicate that we could do that through the bill that would make an impact that would achieve that goal? I don't know whether that's possible within what you have in front of you, but I think that at least this discussion needs to recognise that without the immediate planning discussion or planning silo, there are bigger undercurrents in issues going on in Scotland with the Land Reform Commission and that there are alternatives to infrastructure levy and section 75s. I don't know on an idea where all this bill could introduce that, but maybe what it needs to do is acknowledge that there are other methods of doing this and also talk about the potential and value of doing that. I'm thinking, for instance, about if Edinburgh invests in putting the tram down to New Haven, which it should do, then the value of all that land around New Haven will leap and again we'll be unable to build on it and there'll be cries for public subsidy or give us more green belt because we can't deliver houses around the tram stops, et cetera. The market is a wonderful machine for extracting all value out of all public subsidy that goes into it, as Churchill established and said very eloquently earlier on. We need to use the market but find a way to adjust the market so it delivers for people in communities and not just for landowners and market speculation. I totally agree with what Malcolm has said. I think that we need to recognise that this issue goes to the heart of the idea of inclusive growth or exclusive growth. The situation where somebody can make an absolutely staggering fortune by the standards of teachers, nurses, firemen, police officers is a major driver of exclusive growth. One of the challenges that we face, we know now, is how we actually make the pattern of growth more inclusive, more fair. If we disregard this issue, we're not being neutral on it, we're actually reinforcing the pattern that drives inequality. I think that we could do some substantive things. Going back to the purpose, we need to have a sideways reference to land reform and to the aims of the land reform programme and say that the planning bill aims to support and facilitate and integrate with that. In the end, we have to look at the Land Compensation Act of 1963, which gives the landowner the hope value on any transition to public ownership. Those are the kind of changes that could be made. I'll take you in a second, Andy. Can I check something? Obviously, the bill before us will take the power to introduce infrastructure levy, but the Government said that it's not intending to do it as yet. I think that it's the Scottish Land Commission that's looking at innovative ways of using land, including land value capture. Would it be helpful for this bill to at least consider taking the power over some of those things in the same section where we talk about infrastructure levy? We don't know what the end point will be for the Scottish Land Commission, so would it be appropriate to at least make sure that whatever the Land Commission is doing and whatever is in this bill, it talks to each other and it dovetails just in case those conclusions are of a similar nature to what the witnesses here are suggesting? Would that be a reasonable thing to do in the drafting of the bill? It could be, if that would be the definition of joined-up thinking. I'm sorry for the appalling viewer, Andy Wightman. It's just a brief full-up on the land value thing. The bill is a bill about planning, and it follows a long tradition of 70 years of town-country planning. In section 48 of the 1947 act, there is a provision for public authorities to acquire land at its current use value. That was a provision put in in order to enable Britain to rebuild after the war. It was also a provision that was built into German basic law for the same purpose, but it was repealed in the United Kingdom in 1959. If we were to amend this bill to reintroduce that provision, that is something that is at the heart of planning legislation. Would that help? One of the problems of that, of course, is that it would devalue the land on the balance sheets of landowners and developers all across the country. There may be an argument, for example, for restricting that to simplified development zones. Cliff Hague talked about public-led assembly at a fair price, master planning and then passing on development to those who want to procure. I think that that could be your way of trialling it. You could say, let's see what happens within some simplified zones and special action zones and see what happens. Clearly, the proposal that we have been floating would be controversial. There is no doubt about that. It would have the impact that you have said in terms of the asset value of various house builders and the investors behind them. In the end, we are talking about a system that is to deliver quality places for the Scottish people. We are not necessarily talking about a system that exists to protect and enhance the asset value of companies. Clearly, it is not quite such a divide, as I have said, because we depend on those companies investing to provide a significant part of the built environment to accept that. That is why I say that there is a transitional arrangement that you could come to. I think that going back to the convener's question that we should at least hold out the option in this legislation that things are going to be done differently. I go back to where I started. What we have got is a rerun of what has happened in England over the last 15-20 years, and it has not worked. It has not delivered the type of places and houses and access to housing that people rightly aspire to. Why repeat that model if we know that it does not work? I think that, in terms of joined-up thinking, it is important to make the link to the Scottish Land Commission. On the record, I would say that their approach has recognised the importance of land for development and part of their strategic plan. It is very important that, as we look at the issue and how we come up with a long-term solution to the problem, we work with the Scottish Land Commission to model and to carry out more research into how that would impact Scotland more broadly and how it could be implemented successfully. That research is on-going. To answer Mr Wightman's question directly, I suspect that repealing that particular part of the act would not be a complete game changer, but I would at least demonstrate to the Land Commission and others that, if other laws were altered or changed, planning has already thought ahead to take cognisance of that and planning was aligned with that potential. I think that that would be a very worthwhile thing to do. We are going to have to move on. Andy, could you maybe develop the question? Moving on to the national planning framework. I think that most people welcome the fact that there is a national planning framework. We are on NPF 3. We are going to start NPF 4 soon. It was introduced as a spatial expression of ministers' economic strategy and as a light touch spatial expression of that. The proposal on the bill is quite radical in the sense that it makes that part of the development plan. It also raises questions in my mind anyway about process. In March 2014, the Parliament signed off NPF 3 by a motion in Parliament that merely noted three committee reports as being the response of Parliament to ministers' national planning framework. That remains the property of the executive in Government. I raised the speculation in the earlier session to which no one had a response, but the Conservatives won the next election for my minority administration here. They used the national planning framework to reintroduce fracking. Parliament disapproves of that, but nevertheless fracking is in the national planning framework because it belongs to Government, not Parliament. It becomes part of the development plan and we frack all over Scotland. Two questions, really. Do you approve that the national planning framework should be part of the development plan? If it should be or if it should have a strengthened role, how would you think that we should sign that off? It is not signed off in the kind of way that the local development plan is signed off, which is a lot of participation and ultimately democratic sanction by elected members of the local planning authority. I should point out that Mr Whiteman has now raised the spectacle or spectre of a Conservative Government in this place twice. It is merely an illustration of the fact that planning legislation lasts a long time. It is worth noting that that is not even something that the Conservatives are speculating on at the moment, but I do not know who would like to answer that question first. Kate Houghton. Simple answer to your questions. Yes, we welcome the enhanced status of the MPF on the understanding that the scrutiny will be improved. I know that in the bill the scrutiny is extended from 60 to 90 parliamentary days, and we think that the scrutiny should go further than that. In particular, we are exploring the possibility that the MPF could be subject to parliamentary approval, and an alternative or perhaps additional form of scrutiny as well would be requiring the minister to report on the MPF and its implementation perhaps on an annual or bi-annual basis. Any other thoughts on that? I concur with what Kate Houghton was saying there about an requirement for a different process involved in ownership by members like yourself, because it does become a different document altogether being part of the national development plan. The ability of that document to raise the value of land is a critical element, which I am sure you all want to consider. I suppose that the question for ourselves in terms of the regional dimension is how that document relates to that regional dimension and what the ask of the MPF would be of the regional partnerships if they were being created or the relationship between a strategic development plan and the national planning framework. What are the rules of engagement between the two documents at the national and regional scale? At the moment that those rules of engagement are unclear, for example, if they are taking housing with the national planning framework set out, how would housing numbers be disaggregated to the relevant geographies below and what would be the role of the strategic development plan in that particular purpose or the regional partnerships if strategic development plans are to be removed? The document itself is going to be such a radically different document that the processes around scrutiny and approval and ownership of it are something that this committee should really have a strong think about. The other element in terms of the national planning framework becoming a statutory document is the wish of the executive to how it is going to deliver Scotland. How does that document influence budgetary spend? How do you align elements of government spend to support what is in the national development plan because that status has now changed? If I go back to an example of the strategic development plan, when it is approved by Scottish ministers, you get a letter that says that no part of this plan is guaranteed grant funding or expenditure. The implementation of that is such that you are working in different ways of doing that, that there is nothing that commits the minister to funding the strategic development plan even though it is signed off by Scottish ministers. There is a similar type of debate here around the role and function of MPF. Is it something that drives ministerial spend and supporting the delivery of it or is it something that is nice to have and will worry about it later? There are a couple of things in there for the committee to get their head around because of the enhanced status that it is going to have in the development plan hierarchy. Is there a client from witnesses in relation to that? Professor Hague, do you want to? I'm watching the time and I know there are other things that we need to get on to. I suspect that we are drifting to 1 o'clock. I did say that 12.45 would be an ambitious time to end. We will get to other things. I promise you. If we can have a moment, I think that the MPF has worked pretty well. I didn't really think much about Mr Whiteman's question, to be honest. That seems to me quite a parliamentary kind of question. However, one concern of God is that if we tie the MPF into the development plan system, will it actually restrict the capacity of the MPF to range quite wide and address some things that may fall out with the scope of the statutory system at the moment, especially if we don't have a declared purpose of planning that's taking on the kind of things that we've been talking about earlier this morning? One of the things that we certainly want to look at are local place plans. However, in early evidence sessions, there are concerns about the need to be resourced properly. We have to make sure that there is an equivalency of capacity across the country and across communities to do that. Can we start off by asking witnesses that said—I absolutely make reference to that if you wish to answer that question—are there opportunities in relation to local place plans in terms of front-loading community engagement with the planning process right at the start? I'm certain that it might or might not link to local development plans, which I'm sure we will come in to look at as well. I think that there is an issue that was touched on in the previous session about the timing and the relationship to the 10-year review. Did those things come before the review as an input? Did they come concurrent with the review, or did they come after the review, in which case do they have to wait another 10 years before they get adopted, or is there another review of the plan because we've now got a place plan? The resourcing and the timing issues are connected. The timing, and I apologise, because I justise other MSPs for cutting off witnesses, but in terms of the timing, my understanding is that whenever communities are ready to have them is when they can be delivered, would you have a preference for timing, or do you think that is right when communities are ready that they should be delivered at that point? Development plans, even if they are then set 9 years, 11 months and 30 days still to run, they should then still take cognisance of those local place plans? I'm slightly making this up as I go along because I not really thought it fully through, but what might work, what I float as an idea, is that after the announcement that there will be an LDP or an LDP review, there's an opportunity for communities to sort of bid in that they would like an LPP in their area, that if then the process of the LDP reviews these, considers its own priorities and where it sees particular action as being appropriate, and then identifies those areas that will be taken forward as LPPs in the subsequent bit. I wonder whether that would get over some of the problems of resourcing and prioritising and integrating the process, but I'm happy to be shot down on that because I haven't really fully thought that through. That's very helpful. I think that as a committee we're just trying to wrestle ourselves in relation to what local place plans will look like and what that dynamic will be with development plans, so that's a helpful suggestion, Kate Houghton. I certainly think that local place plans could be helpful. Subject to, as you've already said, resourcing, they all need resourcing for capacity building in communities for technical expertise as relevant, and to make sure that they're tied into other local authority corporate strategy. Subject to what Professor Hague said as well in terms of making sure that the timing is right in terms of the LDP, which will remain the strategic plan, small p, for the local authority area. Another condition that's extremely important is making sure that local place plans are properly tied in with other measures that are coming through, for example community empowerment. We know that, as part of community planning, local authorities are out there right now as part of locality boards consulting on locality plans and that conversations are already happening with communities. We need to make sure that local place plans strengthen the ability to take outcomes from those consultations and turn them into statutory spatial planning rather than adding another layer, which might be quite confusing, if that makes sense. We need to be very clear that when we go out and talk to people about their places and ask what they want to say, what outcome it is that we're looking to, and that people might be talking about a whole host of issues, some of which won't necessarily be to do with statutory spatial planning. What local place plans offer is the ability potentially to take those things that are relevant and to pull them into the planning system, but I think how all that is aligned, particularly with regard to community planning, isn't quite clear yet. That's helpful. Malcolm Fraser, did you want to come in? Having led several towns' charrettes, which is a form of local planning, at the sharp end of communities, there's great frustration in that the outcomes are almost universally set aside in terms of planning applications. Applications come in at variance with the output of the charrettes, and there seems to be no appetite within the planning department to apply the outcome of the charrettes to an incoming application. It might be a question for Kate as to how that should be strengthened at the moment. I understand that the local planners have regard for local place planning and charrettes. If they are told that it has to be material, or is there a form of words that will make planners listen, because at the moment they are not. They are taking the imperative of sustainable development that is called any application that comes in that they will say yes to, without applying processes that have been paid for, with public money, have involved local people, they have put time and effort into it and just seem to be set aside. That would be very helpful if you could answer that. Just for clarity, the legislation that is proposed will ask local development plans and planning authorities to have regard for local place plans, but it doesn't really say what have regard should mean. I'm just wondering if there should be a clear set process by which local authorities must consider local place plans and demonstrably able to have an evidence base to say why they've incorporated some of it into their development plan and perhaps why not others, or should it just dovetail it should be part of it? What do you think is the best way for resolving that? I think that that highlights once again the point about alignment and timing. For me, perhaps even more important than local place plans in terms of front-loading community involvement in planning decisions is the proposed evidence report that is part of LDPs. A lot of that will rest on making sure that that evidence report is transparent and that it is truly participatory. At that point, community inputs are heard, and there will be. There already are community action plans. There are already things such as urban regeneration forums, and all of the outcomes from those processes should be feeding in at that evidence report stage. Again, forgive me for saying the same as Professor Hague, I've been trying to synthesise this in my own mind. I wonder if a way of doing it is to use that evidence report to highlight the big strategic issues for all stakeholders, including communities, and they feed into the development of the LDP, which covers a bigger area as a more strategic document, and then perhaps feeding out of that local place plans, looking into some of the finer-grained detail at a neighbourhood level? It would be helpful if any of the witnesses had any views on what that evidence report should look like and be as meaningful as possible, because it's not really something that we've both particularly asked questions on as a committee getting relation to this bill. If front-loading of the system is getting that right, any thoughts in relation to that? Professor Hague? Again, I think that evidence-informed policy making is really important. We all recognise that. The bit that worries me is that the motif running through a lot, particularly the technical paper that supports the bill, is that it's all about saving costs. Evidence, again, costs money. We need to have a solid evidence base, which is one of the things that particularly used to apply in the old days of regional structure plans and research and intelligence teams that the old regional councils had. We need to respect that kind of evidence, but there needs to be qualitative evidence. It shouldn't just be a debate about the modelling of housing numbers. We need to take in community views about identity, about qualities of place and so on. Potentially, I really like the idea of an evidence report, but it needs to be inclusive in the way that it's done. One thing that worries me with the LPPs is that, again, if you read the technical paper, there's a lot of distrust that comes over as the message that these communities will be unrepresentative individuals who are going to go off and demand unrealistic things, so we need to hold them back. The only place that I've seen the word inclusive used in relation to the whole bill is in that technical paper. It puts a duty on the community to prepare in the LPP to demonstrate that it's inclusive. The balance has to be right in this, and it means going much more towards a crowdsourcing approach, tapping into local knowledge but also respecting that local knowledge. Malcolm Fraser, I'll take you in next, but we might not have time to cover it otherwise when you're answering those questions in relation to the relationship between the local place plans and development plans. The evidence report, but also the gateway check, is another safe guard of the system. If you have any reflections on that as you're answering this section of questioning, that would be helpful. We would have to answer that, Mr Fraser, but I'll just leave it out there. I was going to see convener that instead of the words have regard, the bill should say that it's not strong enough, it should say something like must regard local place plans or surets as significant material considerations. That would be a way to strengthen it so that communities don't feel duped by processes that aren't listened to. Any sympathy with other witnesses in relation to that, Kate Houghton? Certainly partial sympathy, and I think that if local place plans are prepared, they should certainly be taken seriously. I think that it also highlights again the point that local authorities will need to be a stakeholder in the production of them. I do believe that they should be community led, because I think that that is an important way of improving community trust in the system, but the local authority will also be preparing the LDP, which will be the statutory development plan. I think that it's really important therefore that throughout the preparation of an LPP, there is a conversation going on with the local authority about the constraints and about the context, so that what a community puts down in that LPP is deliverable. Can I just ask in term of alignment? We're going to move on in a second, and I think that I'm simply just giving you a heads up with the next line of questioning, but clearly we'd all like to see local place plans have a substantial role within the process. We've looked at issues around resource season, issues around capacity, and now we're talking about issues about whether that will dovetail or not with the local development plan. In the last evidence session, there was a strong focus on housing. I know that planning is not just about housing, but we were talking about building the right numbers of homes in the right places, in the right tenure type, for the right demographic, and getting all of that right. The housing needs assessments, for example, that local authorities go through, and that the SHIP plans to go through to inform all of that process. I'm not one to constrain local place plans, but what's the balance between flexibility for local place plans and saying to communities whoever they are that there are other things that you must take into consideration, such as wider strategic interests, such as the need for housing in an area, if those local place plans are to be taken as a material consideration in relation to planning? How much flexibility should they have in certain areas where perhaps that local place plan might go off in one direction, but the strategic needs might go off in another direction? That's not very succinct, but hopefully you're getting to what I'm trying to point out. If it's going to be a material consideration in terms of the planning process, how much flexibility should local place plans have in some of those issues? I think that it's seen as complementary processes. Obviously, you can see a situation where a local place plan says, not in my backyard, whereas there is clearly a strategic requirement to strengthen that, fortify that community. You just have to rely on planners in the planning process as being able to balance those two as both as material considerations. I'm not saying that Mrs McGullumface is saying that not in my backyard should trump regional and national requirements, but that they need to be able to be weighed by professional planning profession. Of course, Mrs McGullumface is allowed to say that, as long as there's a mechanism by which that can be dealt with within the planning process. Professor Higg? I think that you put really dilemma there very well. The more I think about it, the more I think what I said about five minutes ago, that it's actually kind of quite robust in this respect. If you actually had a process whereby the propositions for the local place plan would be, if you like, almost tender, pitched in there, this is what we want to do. There'd then be a process of negotiation perhaps, and then the local place plan is prepared, the negotiation with the local planning authority, and then the local place plan is prepared. That should avoid the situation that Malcolm's hypothesising, which you don't in the any of us wants to see, you know, wants an inclusive system. But thereafter, I think the closer the process is tied in to the development plan, the more crucial it is that it is respected as it goes through the latter stages of the system. What we absolutely must not get is a situation where community organisation has committed a lot of time and effort with the support of the council in preparing the local place plan, and then, two years down the line, there's a permission granted at appeal that contradicts that, and which basically they've had no saying. I think in that situation people will be scunnered, basically, and we mustn't get into that. So the more it's integrated, the more strength it must have in terms of being robust going through the system. Okay, that's helpful. We're going to move on in a second. Keith Noll, go take in for this, Keith Houghton, but this is your last opportunity specifically local place plans, and then we'll move on, Keith Houghton. It's very briefly, but I think it is worth saying again that statistics show that, since 2009, local authorities have lost 23 per cent of their planners. For local place plans to succeed, to be influential, and for people to be properly involved in preparing them, they will have to be resourced, and I think it's impossible to understate the importance of that. Okay. Thank you. I mean, it's just another point about the new relationship in terms of the national planning framework and its position in the development plan hierarchy now. Will the communities who are involved in the production of local place plans have an understanding of potentially something that's set up through the national planning framework, kind of a direct influence on their particular local place plan, and will they engage as part of that national development planning, national planning framework process sufficiently to understand the implications as it flows down through the regional, local, to their specific area, particularly around housing numbers, I would suggest, but there may be a real disconnect between the two. That's very helpful. We will now move on to the next letter of questioning, Graham Simpson MSP. Thank you. We're going to look at the system of appeals. If we can have a whistle stop to her through that, that would be appreciated. I think that you've all got different views on this, so this should be interesting. The question is, should we have a system of appeals? If so, what should it be? I would like to go first. Malcolm Fraser. The system is clearly iniquitous. On the other hand, long attritional processes are a public disaster. I've never seen a development get better during appeal. I've only seen lawyers and planning consultants win out of it. The application is usually built, but with much of the value taken out of it and worse than it started off as. The simple solution is to allow nobody appeals. That would have the very radical consequence of making sure that we got things right upstream of taking away the planners who say to me, we're turning it down but you'll win it on appeal, that's fine. Making sure that the right decisions are made upstream, getting development happening quicker, reducing the processes and the admin around it and focusing on what we really do and think about getting planning right and making sure that local communities are involved earlier on, strengthening the democratic processes by making planning committee members have to consider economic impact and impact on communities at the same time. To me, it's a win-win situation. I think that we've talked about an awful lot of things today, which are really quite significant in scope. We've talked about the purpose of the planning system. We've talked about local place plans, which is for the first time offering the public the opportunity to write their own plans. We've talked about public infrastructure. I think that what we have on the table here is the opportunity to make some quite transformative changes to the planning system. As I said at the beginning, to make it proactive and to make it deliver for everybody. I think that it's more important to focus on that rather than tinkering around the edges with appeals. We want to make sure that we've got a positive system upfront that is working properly. Professor Heak? I was at the end of the previous session and I heard the discussion there. One thing that struck me was the assumption that was being made by Scottish Renewables and the Homes for Scotland and the other industry representatives that if you had something like an equal right of appeal, it would mean that less permissions were granted on appeal. If you have faith in the rightness of your development application, the fact that it was subjected to an appeal by objectives for the third party shouldn't actually reduce the possibility of that application being upheld. The appeals part is the Achilles heel in the system. It's the point where there's maximum distrust. It's the point where there's maximum delay. It's the point where it's most inequitable in terms of the costs that can be incurred and the investment that can be put in. Again, if you look at other systems internationally, many of them have a system whereby the appeal is either back to the authority that took the original decision or that there's a tribunal that takes the decision but then the appeal is back to the executive of the authority. In that way, if you can increase the certainty, everybody agrees that by increasing the certainty, we're probably going to speed up the decisions and the amount of development that we can get delivered. The need to simplify it is a matter of efficiency and of equity. There's a strong case for looking at some of the models in which Mr Whiteman's questioning was opening up earlier on this morning. Doris McDonnell, do you take anything that you want to say? Just briefly, from previous experience, when collaborative working is working well within planning authorities and authorities, development proposals usually have a very happy and smooth journey. That's very evident in the case of applications for housing developments from registered social landlords, who tend to work very collaboratively with local authorities. Sometimes that's not the case with other private sector development and there's something about upstreaming the collaboration with developers and development proposals with working more collaboratively upstream with planning authorities. Malcolm Fraser, you suggest having no right of appeal, which is clearly equal, but people like homes for Scotland would argue that, if you remove our right of appeal, that's going to scare people away and scare developers away from Scotland. How would you answer that point? I think that you would have to answer it by saying that it's focusing on the process upstream and getting better results out upstream. It shouldn't mean that applications are turned down that would win an appeal. The point of it would have to be that those that win an appeal should have won originally. It would require a bit more professionalism from planning committees, I admit, but a bit more realism about the importance of development. I would hope that it could be advertised to those who were investing in Scotland as a measure Scotland was taking to make sure that its planning process was more robust and clear and open and would produce good results for good development quicker. I think that for telling people that the right development in line with development plans in the right place that delivers people what they want is going to get planning permission quicker and more simply without the agony of appeals, that that should be regarded as an attractive thing and not as something that would hold investment back. Can I put something to all of you and just see what you think about this? The current system of appeals goes all the way up to a Government minister, ultimately. Should we remove the right of a Government minister to have any say in local planning applications? Should it just be dealt with locally? I think that even though it might be a local planning application, that does not necessarily mean, as we have talked about today, that geography is complex and that does not necessarily mean that it does not have matters of national significance involved in it. Recourse to the minister is a longstanding feature of the system and the minister is democratically accountable. Who is he democratically accountable to? Well, the minister is elected as part of the Government. A local councillor is definitely democratically accountable for local decisions, but if a minister who is a member for, let's say, Inverness takes a decision on a planning application in Glasgow, he is not accountable to the people in Glasgow. With relation to the minister, it will only be likely to use that power when there are issues of national significance involved. That's just not true. The minister is using those powers left, right and centre, and it's not just on major applications. We are absolutely allowed to disagree with each other. That's the point of having these evidence sessions. Do you have any more follow-up questions, Mr Simpson? No, because I know where those will want to. I'm going to be having a member's debate next week, but I think it's been shoved around with parliamentary business looking at the issue of incinerators and planning and public health. I'm going to use an example to illustrate my question of energy from waste plants in Lanarkshire where I'm based. That goes back to 2013. There was lots of front-loading, lots of up-front engagement before a planning application came forward. The communities in the widest sense were heavily involved across different council ward boundaries and so on, because that's the kind of application that has an environmental impact that kind of doesn't respect very local boundaries. That was refused by the local council, the planning committee on a cross-party basis. The developer used their right to appeal that, irrespective of a Scottish planning policy, because there were guidelines in the SPP that said that this development wasn't acceptable and it got approved on appeal anyway. That was 12 months after the appeal was lodged, so that created a lot of uncertainty and tension. The developer was entitled to have that appeal violated the local development plan. It wasn't consistent with the Scottish planning policy and what's happened is that the developer's gone back in and now they want a bigger and bolder facility. That has been a route for the developer to get more out of the system and communities feel really let down. They acted in good faith and engaged in that process. When we talk about equalising the system in my head, I keep thinking about that example, because that is an example of where the community did get involved. They gave up their Saturdays, they gave up their evenings, but at the end of the day, the people who got afforded the planning consultants and lawyers were able to make the appeal and win. What does that say for democracy? Is that the kind of planning system that we want to have? We're trying to make the system work better. Aren't we defending the status quo if we say, leave appeals as they are? Let's hope that what's proposed in the bill is going to be transformative, even though we've got no evidence that there's going to be resources put into planning to make sure that it's transformative. There seems to be a lot of, let's leave appeals aside, Petra Beiberback said last week it's a conversation that we could have but not in the sense of the bill. Why are we putting it aside to deal with later? I think that the example that you're giving in that situation more generally obviously took place in the existing system. What we're talking about here is trying to bring a new system in with a new focus, which has things like local place plans involved. Crucially, it's more collaborative, not just about local authority planning and communities but all of the stakeholders involved so that there should be more certainty about proposals in a development plan being the proposals that will come forward because you've upstreamed decision making from the outset. That is quite a radically different approach. As I said, achieving that approach and committing to it is actually an awful lot more radical than tinkering with appeal rights. What would a community need to do? If you have a development plan, which owns a piece of land for something that isn't incineration, for example, and you've got certainty in your plan, you've got a Scottish plan in policy, you've got criteria about proximity between people's homes and incinerators, are we saying then that the route to try and make sure that the community is heard is they'll have to come up with a local place plan, which tries to argue something else should happen in that area other than incineration? We're not changing the plan-led system, we're still going to have a plan-led system, we're still going to have national guidance. What is it in this bill that would give constituents a different experience from what we have under the present system? Just before you answer that, others would like to reflect on that line of questioning as well if they could come in as well. I want to make sure that Mr White has time to ask. I know that he's got a question, so I apologise, Monica. I think that the answer to that one is that local place plans are important, but I think that, for me, even more important is getting the engagement right in the local development plan and making sure that a priority in the early stages of the local development plan is getting collaboration from all stakeholders, including communities of place and communities of interest. We're settling on that there should still be an appeal that could overturn all that at the end. In an ideal world, there wouldn't be a need to use it because you have had collaborative decision-making up front, and I think that we want to focus on getting that part of the system right. I think that there's that divergence of views here, which has absolutely allowed some reflections on that before Mr White meant to ask a final question, Professor Hague. Can I diverge from Kate? I'd like to believe it. I'd really like to hope that it could all work like that, but, unfortunately, I think that the real world probably isn't going to. If we see what's in the bill and, again, looking at the technical paper, what's offered in terms of the up front bit is the local place plans, which none of us are quite sure, as we've seen, just what they're going to be or how they're going to work. That's a little bit of a wing and a prayer without being disparaging. It may be great, but we're not really rock-solid on that yet. In terms of the pre-application consultations, I think it says that it might go from one public meeting to two. That's how the scale goes on that side. The other side is that we know from Ms Lannan's example that the scales are very heavily weighted, so I just don't see how this accounts to balance. In the end, again, a lot of this is a dance of subsidiarity. Mr Stewart made the extent to which ministerial decisions are taken on the basis that this is a matter of national significance, stretches the definition of what really is national significance. It's just too easy at the moment for local views to be overridden. Mr Fraser, I'm taking in the second. I'm just going to cheat a little bit here, because we have to close this evidence session imminently. Mr Whiteman, if you've got any final considerations that you want the witnesses to give before we close the evidence session, could you roll together your question as well? Very briefly, just on appeals and a specific question to Clydeplan. My understanding, and indeed Petra Beiberbach said this the other week, that when the 1947 act was passed, it nationalised development control. Prior to that, landowners could build a house on the land without the consent of anybody else. It's not strictly true, there were some planning before that. However, it nationalised it, and it made it applicable everywhere. Naturally, many landowners were concerned about whether competent decisions would be made by people who hadn't made those decisions before. It was conceded that they would have a right of appeal on the merits of decisions, but that was to be a temporary, temporary 10 years, was what Petra Beiberbach said, while the system bedded down. I just observe that the fact that this is a part of the system, it need not be a part of the system, and it was not a part of the system, as I understand it, it was ever intended to be permanent. What was intended to be permanent was good plan-led development, so that people knew what was appropriate and what wasn't appropriate, and applications would follow. The question for Clyde plan is just a technical thing. In 8.2, the level of human resources available to the four strategic development planning authorities significantly reduces the commencement of the planning review from 15 professional planners to resources today of seven. Can you just clarify that seven people are responsible for the production of all strategic development plans in Scotland? That's the core resource within each of the strategic planning authorities, but they rely on joint working with their local authorities to supplement that resource to deliver the plan working with wider stakeholders. The core resource in terms of those who are employed by the strategic planning authority to do the task is those numbers, but we work on a joint working basis, so our reach is within to our local authorities to pull in expertise as we require it. Mr Fraser did not get the opportunity to come back in there. Please do continue the relationship with the committee and write to us if there are additional observations, but there is so much to discuss in this bill that we could have done equal right of appeal for the entire two hours or place planning for the entire two hours, and this is just how it works, unfortunately. Can I thank you for your patience and your participation here, what is now this afternoon no longer this morning? I'm afraid. We thank you for your time. We now move to agenda item 2, which has previously been agreed to take in private.


It was about under-satisfaction in our country and under-satisfaction and hence the clean revolution came about and hence we started eating vegetables. Today it's not about under-satisfaction. We need to be proud that we have a very long way, but what we have today for banking is under-satisfaction.


There's a difference between a model and a role model, and we need more role models. This is Miokang for Up Rocks. I am a model and a Muay Thai fighter. Some of the biggest things that I learned from Muay Thai was a distinction between ego and self-confidence. So I have a job that's extremely egocentric, extremely narcissistic. I get my photograph taken for a living. When you do martial arts, you have to leave your ego at the door.  If you're 99%, you're going to lose that fight. In early 2016, I was living in New York. I was a very successful model. I was in Sports Illustrated. I was in guest campaign. From the outside it seemed like I kind of had it all. I know what it feels like to be that 14-year-old girl that's looking through magazines wondering, why don't I look like that? Oh my gosh, my thighs should be skinnier, my collarbones should, you know. And I was the girl in the magazine.  There was always something.  It blows my mind. It's unbearable. I was being asked to go on like 10-day liquid-only diets before shoots. I reached a very low point and then I asked for a vacation. A 10-day vacation turned into nine months of me moving into a Thai camp, falling in love with Muay Thai, devoting my whole, every waking breath to it and becoming a fighter. My whole body just changed and I watched it change and I loved it because I was seeing strength in myself that I never, ever thought I could possibly have. I've been like doing a push-up. I've never done a push-up in my whole life or I had a six-pack at one point. Never in my life would I ever think that I had a six-pack. I felt like a lethal weapon, you know, and I was loving these changes that were happening and I was embracing it. Like I remember the day when I looked in the mirror and I was happy with what I saw because I felt secure with myself and confident for the first time in my life. All I can do is try to be the role model that I wish that I had.


The study assesses the cost-effectiveness of introducing universal childhood rotavirus vaccination with Rotovac vaccine in Bangladesh's national expanded program of immunization, finding it highly cost-effective and would offer substantial future benefits for young population if vaccinated today. The cost per daily averted is approximately $740.27 from the health system perspective and $728.67 from societal perspective, which is very cost-effective using GDP threshold level according to World Health Organization definition. The results contribute to an evidence-based recommendation about the introduction of universal rotavirus vaccination in national EPI in Bangladesh. This article was authored by Abdul Razzaq Saka, Marifa Sultana, Rashid Al Alam Maheemid and others.