NPF4 - How have things changed? Part 3 Q&A

Nicky and Clare have done a great job preparing for the talk on MPF4 and its implications. The protection of biodiversity hotspots by local authorities is addressed in the policies, but the final decision lies with the councillors. Training for local councillors is being considered. Legal challenges are suggested to protect areas like St Fittick's Park. NPF4 supports renewable energy, but the lobbying power of the industry is significant. Retrofitting technology and ensuring new housing meets net-zero standards are supported by planning policies, but progress will take time. Biodiversity enhancements will be written into new local development plans, with emphasis on nature networks. Community councils are not obligated to create place plans, but they can be a consideration in the development plan. The importance of flood risks in relation to renewable development and climate change mitigation and adaptation is acknowledged, but the balancing of these factors is a challenging decision f Fantastic. Thank you to both Nicky and Clare for putting in a huge amount of work, not just in preparing this talk but in trying to get their heads around MPF4 and its implications. They have done an amazing job, especially for me, who is still in the very early stages. I have a whole load of questions, some of which were submitted in advance. I will bring a few of those in at the start and a couple that came in on the chat, and I will read those out. In the meantime, can you think of questions? If you put your hand up, I will try to monitor who is asking questions. You can put your hand up by going to the more button and go to reactions. If you go to reactions, there is a raise hand button. If you go to that, I should be able to see it. I will start with a question that came in. Will MPF4 really persuade local authorities to take the protection of biodiversity hotspots seriously, even if they might be currently listed as brownfields? If you read the policies, you would think that it probably would get local authorities taking protection of biodiversity hotspots seriously. Not only Biodiversity Policy 3, but Policy 9a specifically mentions the biodiversity value of brownfield land, which has naturalised and says it should be taken into account. If the hotspot is being recorded, it should be considered and the policy is there. As we can see from the Coolink's decision today, it is one thing to get a planning officer to read the policy and take a view on it, but what councillors decide is another question. That is the discretionary system that we have. The only other thing that I would add is that one of the things that is in the pipeline is training for local councillors. That is something else that we have been commenting on. From Coolink's point of view, I have heard that there are gaps in knowledge and appreciation of the policies and how they are expected to be interpreted by local councillors. I think that that is really important. Thank you. There is one question from St Fittick's Park. How can the conflict between sustainable economic development, which you mentioned, Nicky, and enhancing biodiversity and community wellbeing be resolved when there are pressures for both in the same place? I think that that is specifically about what is happening at St Fittick's. I know that there are people here who are far more familiar with the issue. You have a local development that is happening, but you have a local park or something to protect, and there is a national development in the offing. That is a bit of a David and Goliath fight. I think that the campaign for St Fittick's Park is one of the best that I know. Legal challenges. I think that that is the way to fight these things. It is expensive, but we now have the Environmental Rights Centre Scotland, which has been helping various groups take legal challenges and to fight things on a legal basis. That was not here prior to NPF4, either. Check out the Environmental Rights Centre Scotland—ERCS.scot. I think we could put a link to that in the chat. I think that it is really important that we start looking at court challenges and challenging these things more vociferously in the courts. Thank you, Clare. Something came in on the chat. RSTV and Nature Scotland frequently object to wind farms, but their concerns are ignored due to Government targets. Do you think NPF4 policy 3 is going to make any difference to this? I think Nikki was touching on wind farms and stuff. Do you want to answer that, Nikki? It might, in some circumstances, make a difference. It is there. It has to be taken into consideration. The support for renewables is pretty strong in NPF4. It is going to depend on the balance of judgment and the particular area. We must not underestimate the lobbying power of the renewables industry. We were saying that it is not all about NPF4, but about the broader drivers. We have to look at that and at the pressure that is being placed by volume house builders and the renewables industry to push their agenda. It seems unfortunate that there is no more strategic approach to renewables. It is almost like a first-come, first-served application approach. It does not even matter whether there is a grid connection—you can still have an application for wind farms or other renewables going in. It does not seem ideal, but not all of that is down to NPF4 or planning or Scotland. It goes beyond that, too. The question that came in on the chat was related to both of those. Claire Baker mentioned the importance of reducing demand and not just going with constant growth of everything. Max Murdoch talked about retrofitting renewable technology to existing housing. What moves can be made to encourage retrofitting of technology to present housing stock? In addition, what can we do to make sure that housing stock is currently being built to net zero standards? We have seen a lot of lobbying against heat pumps from the mass house builders recently in the Scottish Parliament. I do not know who feels that they could answer that. That is not all about planning. There is support for retrofitting in NPF4, so it is there in planning policy. Hopefully, that will begin to have influence. There is also the policy about lifetime and life cycle emissions for developments. That should perhaps kick in, too, but it will not happen overnight. A lot of this is down to building regs. Obviously, there will be lobbying for better environmental building regs, but there is probably lobbying going on on the other side as well. We have one here. How will biodiversity enhancements be written into new local development plan policies and then implemented via development management? That is a good question. It is all new. As we mentioned, there is lots of guidance being developed. Slightly ironically, given the Coolink's decision today, Highland Council is apparently about to publish some biodiversity guidance for consultation, so it will be interesting to see what that says. I think more generally that there will be an emphasis on nature networks in every local authority area. I know that the City of Edinburgh Council has done quite a lot of work on that already, and I think that that is a pilot for how that could begin to work and be built on, finding out what you have already, how you can better connect it and then enhancing it. As Clare mentioned earlier, the Scottish biodiversity strategy and strategic framework that are coming should put more oomph behind that as well. That is fine. I was just going to also add that there is a new environment bill coming up next year as well, which includes targets for biodiversity enhancements. A lot of that is fairly new stuff still, but I think that the targets might help. Watch the space on the new environment bill as well. What are the obligations on community councils in relation to the need for place plans, and how will that be supported by local government? Yes, I would say there is no obligation on a community council to do a local place plan. I think you need to think very carefully about why you are doing your local place plan. We have done a blog on local place plans. I don't know if Barry has got the link to that, but we can send that to you. In that, that includes a link to a talk that was done by Paz, and it was very useful for getting people to think about why they would be doing a local place plan. I think either you want to think very locally, super locally, and do your local place plans, or perhaps you would want to think a little bit broader and to engage in your local development plan process instead. Doing both might be quite challenging for community councils, I think. There are no resources behind doing a local development plan. The only thing that a local authority is required to do is to tell you that they have set out an invitation for you to do a local place plan. There are no allocated resources to these. You can fundraise for them, of course, but it is not particularly well thought through policy in terms of how people are actually going to deliver it. Of course, they do not form part of the statutory development plan, so they will be a material consideration, but they will not necessarily be such a weighty document. They might be able to inform your local development plan, or not. Again, the jury is out. A lot of this stuff is difficult to say how much they are going to be influenced, because we just do not know at this stage. Thank you, Clare. Rachael Hamilton has a hand up. Do you want to introduce yourself and tell us where you are from, and then ask your question? Thanks, Rachael. Okay. If you have a renewable development, which is obviously an application that is, in theory, going to get a lot of support because of meeting climate change targets, but that development is also a significant risk in terms of increasing flooding, which is under policy 2—and 22, actually—how does that work in terms of importance? Obviously, a lot of the climate change issues at the moment probably ought to be directed towards mitigation, because we know they are happening. Storm Bebek caused immense suffering and damage, so whatever is going to go on in terms of renewable development is not going to have an immediate effect, whereas mitigation—climate change, such as protecting peat trees and that kind of thing—and not building things that are going to increase flood risks will have a more immediate effect. How does that work in terms of planning policy? As you say, that is covered by a lot of the policies in MPF 4. Policy 2, which covers climate mitigation and adaptation, would probably come in as well. I think that you are right that there needs to be a lot of focus on carbon sequestration, if we can, and using nature-based technologies—well, not technologies, but systems. It is going to be up to the decision makers to balance out all those things. There is no getting away from them being difficult decisions, but that is how it is all going to play out. We will probably get a clearer steer on particular sorts of decisions as more cases go through MPF 4. I was just thinking that, if SEPA is involved—SEPA is one of the statutory consultees that object to the application on the grounds of flooding—perhaps there will be added weight to that, but there is no guarantee. Of course, NatureScot is not known for commenting on planning applications in terms of biodiversity too often, either, largely due to resources. It is not a perfect system, is it, Rachael? I think that one of the frustrating things for people is that there is so much uncertainty in it. It is so much about balancing decisions and political decisions as well. You have to enter into the mix, so it is an absolute minefield. There is not a lot that we can do about that at the moment. We have had a couple of questions in about supplementary guidance, both in the chat and sent in beforehand. Why does the national planning framework not enable councils to adjust to local matters via supplementary guidance? There were variations on that in the chat as well. It is the Planning Act 2019 that got rid of supplementary guidance, rather than NPS4 specifically. Existing guidance still matters and will be taken into consideration, but, going forward into the future, the thinking is that the LDPs will not have to repeat the national planning policies that are in NPS4. They are taken as already existing as part of the development plan, so local development plans should be able to absorb what previously was supplementary guidance. It is supposed to be about streamlining. Whether it will mean that there will be a bit of loss of detail remains to be seen, because it has not happened yet. Obviously, there is a risk that that will happen. The thinking is that everything will slightly move up. Claire Baker, do you have anything to add about supplementary guidance? If you want that supplementary planning guidance in your local development plan, get involved in responding to it and put that forward at the early evidence-gathering stages to say that that is a bit of supplementary guidance that we want included in the local development plan. I am Jeane Charles-Lee from Glasgow Hillhead Community Council, and I deal with most of the planning and licensing affairs that come to the council. It seems to me that NPS4 is applicable to all areas, regardless of the needs of particular areas. It is not suitable in its form for areas such as mine, for example, which are urban areas. Strategic guidance was the only thing that protected us in several cases. Glasgow City Council has said that it will try to incorporate it, but it was a huge, detailed document. You cannot put in so much detail if it is going to be in the local plan. Is there any opportunity to persuade NPS4 that they need to do more to enable local circumstances to be taken into effect? There are two questions. One is that NPS4 is a blockbuster to everybody, regardless of their circumstances. What can be done about that? The second question is how to enable full adaptation to local circumstances to protect local areas of concern. It is not just about biodiversity. When you come to a city, there are other things that you need to look at. I think that is a good point. NPS4 is about national policies. I think they are quite keen not to steal the thunder and to be seen as dictating to local authorities about what should happen locally. I have heard the Scottish Government say that, so I think it will be up to local authorities to incorporate those. If you do not feel that they are, then again I would suggest that you get some legal advice. You are good with lawyers. You have taken Glasgow to court, as you say. I think that might be the best thing to be doing. It is seeking some legal advice about how to get that detail in, but trying to press for it initially through the development plan process. I cannot think of anything more to suggest. I suppose that you could write to the Scottish Government planning department. They seem to be at least attempting to listen to people at the moment. If that is a worry coming from community councils, you could give it a go and see whether you get a response. However, I am not sure how well that has been thought through. The Convener—We will take one last question from Alice. We will need to finish after that, because we are running out of time. Alice, please unmute and let us know where you are from. Alice Morton is from Stetson District Community Council. I have a question for Clare Adamson and Nicola Sturgeon. Do you have any observations or comments on the infrastructure first approach? Recently, North Lanarkshire Council produced supplementary guidance on education in terms of infrastructure. As Clare well knows, the pace of house building across the northern corridor of North Lanarkshire has outstripped the provision or delivery of educational infrastructure. That is a very brief answer, but I know that you are running out of time. Do you have any comments on what the infrastructure first approach might deliver? Infrastructure first should be a consideration, particularly as you are talking about large volumes of housing going in somewhere. The whole infrastructure first and the local living policies in MPF4 should mean that you are not just getting large numbers of houses with no facilities, infrastructure or services. It is all about producing better communities, not just numbers of housing. We are waiting to see how that is going to play out. It is the intention, particularly with the housing policies, that the allocations are there so that they can do the infrastructure first approach. There are more exceptions to that and more exceptional releases of unallocated land. That is going to go contrary to that, as you found, Alice, in the northern corridor. We can talk more about infrastructure first, but I think we might have to do a little bit more reading up on it. It is going to come down to enforcement and conditions and how much that is going to be followed up and whether councils have the resources to do that. There is a lot of talk about needing more resources for planners to do all those things. I mean, it sounds really wonderful, does it not? This is it. The dream has arrived—infrastructure before houses or house building—and it is just not happening. It is not there. Thanks, Nicky. Thanks, Clare. Thank you very much, Alice. That last question also emphasises the importance of Clare Adamson's thoughts on how we monitor the effectiveness of NPF4, not just in relation to planning authorities and how quickly they do things, but in relation to how they are delivering to all the things that they say they are going to do. First, it is my pleasure to say thank you so much to Clare and Nicky for doing such a good talk. I will also tell you about our next talks. We have one on 17 January, which is called green belts and NPF4. A lot of you are worth green belt areas. We will have a couple of groups giving a bit of an idea of how they have organised and what has been effective in their organising for that, which will be really informative, alongside some more specific chat about the guidance around green belts and what we are expecting might come of the NPF4 and what challenges and opportunities there might be. On 31 January, we are doing something about local development plans. We heard quite a bit from Alasdair Edwards about local development plans and that this would be much more of a chance for us to share experiences and talk about how we think we can make the best impact on local development plans. If it is not through local place planning, what is it? It is very important things are happening now for the next decade, so how do we input those? We are going to be sending out an email to everybody with a link to the talk, with also all the different links that you saw there. We will put another link in for the questionnaires. There is an awful lot to do here, I am sorry. It is a big long list of things to do just before Christmas. Also, the links to where you can donate if you have not already, or join. Thank you so much to all of you for coming along, for Barry, for dealing with all the questions, for Nina, for doing all the admin and getting everybody here, and for Sarah for doing the slides and keeping us on track. I will say goodbye on behalf of everybody at Planning, Democracy and APRS. We will see you in January. Have a very happy Christmas when it comes. I realise that it is still a few weeks away, even though I have my Christmassy hat on, which I will put back on again. Thank you very much, all.