Scottish Parliament e-Brief
Issue 211, 19th July 2004

 

SECTION 1 - BUSINESS THIS WEEK

Parliament is in recess.

 

SECTION 2 – NEWS

Planning leaves room for improvement
Most Scottish councils are not meeting planning performance targets and need to speed up their decision making processes to retain the confidence of the public.

Minister for Communities Margaret Curran said the results of the 2003 Sixth Annual Report of the Planning Audit Unit showed that, while some planning authorities had improved their performance over the past year, others were failing to meet Executive targets. Improvement is vital, she said, if businesses and communities are to have faith in the planning service.

Only three local authorities achieved the target of deciding on 80% of applications within two months - Clackmannanshire, East Renfrewshire and West Lothian.

The Planning Audit Unit report contains figures showing local authority performance for development control, development planning, listed building consents and telecommunications applications. The Audit further shows how many residential and business applications each council handled. The Planning Audit Unit was set up within the Scottish Executive Development Department to work with local authorities, looking at their practices and providing advice on their planning services. This is the 6th report covering the period October 2002 to September 2003.

The consultation on development plans, Making Development Plans Deliver, runs until 31st July, 2004.

Full story

Antisocial Behaviour Bill
The implementation phase of the Antisocial Behaviour (Scotland) Bill began in earnest last week as Communities Minister, Margaret Curran, told a seminar: "We listened, we acted and we are now delivering".

The Communities Minister was addressing the first in a series of seminars and workshops aimed at gearing up local authorities, police and their partners for the introduction of new antisocial behaviour (ASB) measures and strategies.

The Minister also said that the Bill was far from the sum total of the Executive's efforts on ASB, but part of a bigger picture which included funding arrangements, the spread of best practice, the piloting of innovative schemes and the extension of successful ones.  She stressed that local ASB strategies - as provided for in Part 1 of the Bill - reflected the need for local agencies to tackle ASB effectively at local level.

The Antisocial Behaviour etc (Scotland) Bill was passed by the Scottish Parliament on 17th June. It is expected to receive Royal Assent shortly.

Most of the provisions in the Bill are expected to come into force in October.

Full story

 

SECTION 3 - NOTES ON THIS WEEK’S CHAMBER BUSINESS

Parliament is in recess.

 

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