Development plan amendment regulations: consultation response summary

Question 10

Question 10A)

To what extent do you agree that the full updated version of the amended NPF, incorporating the amendment, should be published as soon as practicable after it has been adopted by Scottish Ministers?

There were 45 responses to Question 10A, which have been set out by respondent type in Table 10 below.

Almost all of the respondents (a combined 95.6%) were supportive of the full version of the amended NPF being published as soon as practicable following adoption by Scottish Ministers. All respondents from the development, property and land management sector, planning authorities, professional representative bodies and third sector were supportive. There was one neutral response and one that strongly disagreed.

Question 10B)

Where applicable, please give reasons for your answer.

30 respondents provided further comment at Question 10B.

Summary /Themes

Of the 30 responses to Question 10B, almost all were supportive with one response that opposed the proposal.

There was support for this across all groups and broad consensus that, similar to Question 9, this was a reasonable proposition. Themes that were reflected strongly in these responses were transparency and clarity. Several respondents stated that the timeous publication of the full amended version of the NPF would ensure there was clarity on the correct version of the NPF to use.

One planning authority commented that the updated NPF should proactively clarify any potential incompatibility between the NPF and LDPs. They suggested that exactly what has been updated in the NPF should be listed with a clear statement on whether the NPF or only the updated part of the NPF now takes precedence over an LDP that was adopted at an earlier date.

Related to this, a professional representative body raised questions around what effect an amendment to the NPF (and LDP) would have on the interpretation of Section 24(3) of the 1997 Act relating to incompatibility between a provision of the NPF and a provision of a LDP.

The single respondent who seemed to oppose the proposal, whilst answering "strongly disagree" at Question 10A, seemed to indicate support at 10B, indicating that they felt the full updated version of the NPF must be available to the public at the point of adoption by Ministers.