Mixed performance for housing planning decisions

Newly published planning performance figures for 2016/17 revealed that the average decision time for major housing developments was 44.9 weeks for 2016/17, more than four weeks slower than the previous year (40.6 weeks).

Conversely, the average decision time for local housing developments was 12.7 weeks for 2016/17, one week quicker than the previous year (13.7 weeks).

The average decision time for all categories of major developments (246 applications) was 37 weeks, six weeks slower than the average of 31 weeks in the previous year and the slowest annual figure since the start of this data collection in 2012/13.

Decisions for most categories were slower apart from minerals and waste management applications.

Almost 69% of major applications in 2016/17 were decided in a time quicker than the average of 37.0 weeks.

The average decision time for all local developments (26,986 applications) in 2016/17 was 9.2 weeks, four days quicker than the average of 9.7 weeks in the previous year and the quickest annual figure in five years.

Improvements were seen in average decision times for most categories of local developments apart from electricity generation, AMSCs (Approval of Matters Specified in Conditions), waste management and telecommunications.

A total of 22 out of 34 planning authorities have reported improvements in their average decision times for local developments in 2016/17 compared to 2015/16.

For the year 2016/17 the overall rate of approvals for all types of application was 94.2% and the delegation rate was 95.3%. These are the highest rates over the past seven years.

The statistics also revealed a reduction in planning applications decided in 2016/17 compared with previous four years.

The number of local development decisions in 2016/17 totalled 26,986, a decrease of 6% (1,778 applications) from the previous year. This drop was largely due to fewer decisions for housing, electricity generation, householder, business & industry and other developments.

The number of major development decisions in 2016/17 totalled 246, a decrease of 8% (22 applications) from 2015/16. There were decreases across all categories of development apart from those for housing and business & industry.

In contrast, the number of applications that were subject to processing agreements increased by 121% from 680 in 2015/16 to 1,503 in 2016/17. There were 1,194 local applications (4% of all local applications) and 95 major applications (28% of all major applications) that were subject to processing agreements in 2016/17.

Scottish Labour deputy leader Alex Rowley MSP said the figures are “deeply concerning”.

He added: “People across Scotland are crying out for affordable housing and this slowdown should be a wake-up call for the SNP.

“That it comes just days after it emerged growth in the construction sector has slowed only compounds the issue.

“The SNP should urgently review these figures and find out what are the main causes for such delays.”