The Gurn has received a copy of a letter sent today to senior Highland Council Planning officers by Nairn's two Community Councils. Copies of the Letter have also been sent to MSPs and other high heid yins at Glenurquart Road.
Here is the text of the letter:
JOINT
LETTER FROM NAIRN WEST & SUBURBAN COMMUNITY COUNCIL
AND
NAIRN RIVER COMMUNITY COUNCIL
(By email)
Dafydd Jones, Acting Head of Development Management
Nicole Wallace, Head of Planning and Environment
David Mudie, Area Planning Manager (South)
Jimmy Gray, Chair, South Planning Applications Committee
Highland
Council 27th April,2020
Glenurquhart
Road
Inverness
Dear
Highland Council Officers and Councillor Gray,
Just
after 8pm on Thursday 23rd April 2020 Community Councils
received an email forwarding a notification you had issued titled
“Maintaining our planning function during Covid – 19: Guidance
for Community Councils”.
This was
circulated to both Nairn Community Councils by their respective
Secretaries and was read with varying degrees of worry and dismay by
members.
This
Saturday, 25th April we read the P&J headline which
confirmed that we were not the only people deeply concerned by the
proposed changes. The heading states “Horrifying change in
decision-making”.
The
element that causes most disquiet is that planning decisions will be
made privately between the planning official and the Chair of the
relevant planning committee. The remark made by Highland Councillor
Andrew Jarvie – himself a member of the South Planning Applications
Committee – is both disturbing and apt: he is quoted in the press
as saying, “This proposal to allow one councillor to be judge, jury
and executioner is quite horrifying.”
This
amended Scheme of Delegation may be temporary. But it is totally
undemocratic. It removes the key element of scrutiny by a
representative committee. It appears that the full planning reports
normally provided to committee will not be published or circulated.
The remarks made by another Highland Councillor suggest that no
members other than the Chair of the planning committee will receive
papers. Such an arrangement prevents proper scrutiny and is neither
transparent nor properly accountable. It places extraordinary powers
in the hands of two individuals, the case officer and the committee
Chair, who are effectively empowered to make decisions behind closed
doors. There is no indication in the details provided so far of any
review or appeal procedure. The Community Councils of Nairn find this totally unacceptable.
It is a
cardinal principle of all planning legislation that the rules, the
standards, the criteria and the procedures are consistent across the
country. If Councils are now permitted to adopt substantially
different arrangements to deal with current applications, this too is
“undemocratic and unacceptable”, as Councillor Baxter has
observed.
The area
he represents, Lochaber, is – like Nairn – a tourist destination.
Planning and development proposals are thus often particularly
sensitive. We have recently lodged representations about two very
contentious planning applications. In normal circumstances we would
have expected both to be considered by SPAC and subjected to full
public scrutiny and debate. We have pressed for them to be
deferred. For such highly contentious applications to be assessed
only by HC planning officials and decided by a single Councillor with
no connections to the town of Nairn would be absolutely intolerable.
We have
since learned that at least one of our own local Councillors, Peter
Saggers, also has serious misgivings about the new procedural
arrangements and the implications for major planning applications
affecting Nairn which are currently on the table, and that he intends
to raise the matter with the Leader of the Council.
The
notification circulated on 23 April states that the new Scheme has
been agreed by the Council and approved by the Scottish Government.
It does not however indicate how – in the absence of public
meetings and records – the Council made the decision on such a
significant reassignment of its powers. Both national legislation
and the Highland Council’s own existing Scheme of Delegation
(section2) make clear that by law, Councillors have to decide (which
implies a formal vote) on any alteration in the delegation of their
own powers. The fact that councillors
currently serving on planning committees have expressed dismay,
including even the Vice-Chair of SPAC Cllr Carolyn Caddick, raises
questions about the apparently arbitrary way in which the changes
have been introduced.
It is
also difficult to see how the Highland Council arrangements can be
regarded as compatible with the terms of the Chief Planner’s letter
of 3 April. There is no proposal for any “…. online
alternative [to public consultation events], so that local people can
still be engaged and have an opportunity to have an influence on
proposals that affect them.”
The
Chief Planner’s letter of 3 April also noted that “There are
options available to enable decisions to continue to be made on
planning matters. Local authorities already have the power to hold
meetings virtually.” Indeed, the Highland Council has already
and for some time convened and managed online or remote-linked
videoconference meetings to enable participation in meetings by
members around the region.
That
being so, the claim reportedly made by a Highland Council
spokesperson that there was “insufficient support to ensure a
stable enough IT platform for the numbers who could be participating”
is simply not credible. Highland Councillor Emma Roddick has
commented that she is “…. sick of
hearing that it's impractical or impossible to hold meetings during
COVID”. As one of our own Community Councillors wrote in an email, “The excuse of not being able to use IT for virtual meetings is unacceptable as it’s actually very simple to set up with a vast array of platforms available”.
It is noteworthy that both Moray and Aberdeenshire have thought laterally and found alternative options which are as democratic and as fair as they can set up during the pandemic. These local authorities – and indeed organisations all over thecountry –
are moving to, and able to manage, a transition
to online meetings which enables planning committees (and other such
groupings) to convene, discuss and make decisions on current matters.
There
seems no reason why Highland cannot do likewise. There is no
plausible justification for giving selected individuals the power to
deliberate and make decisions on planning matters without public
scrutiny or debate. Highland Council has IT staff who should be more
than able to set up some form of teleconferencing if it really is not possible for the committee to meet in one of the larger chambers.
Engagement and accountability are cornerstones of the planning process. It would be unfortunate if the Highland Council were to be seen to be using the opportunity of the Covid crisis to bring in measures which might be described as introducing greater "social distancing" between local citizens, elected Councillors, and planning decisions.
As the
two Community Councils representing the people of Nairn, we recognise
that the present situation is difficult. We wish to see arrangements
in place which provide for proper appraisal of planning proposals and
which enable a process of publicly accountable, open and
representative discussions and decision-making. We do not believe
the procedure adopted by Highland Council meets this objective. We
believe there are alternative, and better options for dealing with
the present exceptional circumstances. We therefore urge the Council
to reconsider their approach.
Yours
sincerely, (
Issued and signed jointly)
Sheena
Baker
Chair
Nairn West & Suburban Community Council
Tommy Hogg
Chair Nairn River
Community Council
CC: Donna
Manson
Kate
Forbes MSP
Fergus
Ewing MSP
Kate
Lackie
Margaret
Davidson
Scott
Dalgarno
William Munro
Laurie
Fraser
Tom
Heggie
Liz
MacDonald
Peter
Saggers
Andrew Baxter
Andrew Jarvie
Carolyn Caddick.
