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1. Sunday Herald article, 21st March 2004:
Planning system 'lets developers break
environmental promises'
By Rob Edwards, Environment Editor
Developers across Scotland are getting away with breaking planning promises
because local authorities are failing to check up on them.
Trees and plants are being killed, wildlife endangered and landscapes wrecked
because planning conditions accepted by developers are not being monitored or
enforced by council officials.
These are the conclusions of a detailed new investigation of the planning system
for Scottish Natural Heritage (SNH), the government's conservation agency. The
report by consultants ERM also criticises SNH for underestimating the
environmental impact of proposed developments.
SNH is ineffective in influencing half of the 2000 developments a year on which
it is consulted, the report says. "By far the most significant reason for
this was the lack of efficient monitoring and enforcement of conditions on the
ground by local authorities," it concludes.
The report describes this as "a procedural weakness with the wider British
planning system". Local authorities devoted very few resources to
monitoring and enforcement, and their officials sometimes had little
environmental expertise.
As an example, the report reveals damage to a woodland by Bedlam paintball war
games played on the Dundas Estate in South Queensferry. Planning approval was
conditional on areas of wild flowers being protected by wooden fences.
But all that was found on a visit by ERM researchers was some red and white
plastic tape flapping in the wind. "It was apparent that there had been
considerable incursion into the zoned-off areas and inevitable damage to the
vegetation," the report says.
In another instance, a developer failed to plant trees and bushes to screen
industrial buildings from a new footbridge over the Water of Leith in Edinburgh.
Near Ardgowan Estate in Inverclyde, trees were damaged by machinery.
Local authorities accepted that they lacked sufficient resources. "The onus
is on developers to comply with conditions imposed on them," said a
spokesman for the Scottish Society of Directors of Planning. "It is
unrealistic to expect local authorities to monitor every condition
applied."
Councils said they had to rely on SNH's expertise. But the agency was accused of
"not pulling its weight", often leaving local authority planning
officers to defend environmental conditions.
SNH is also criticised in the ERM report for being too kindly disposed towards
developers. "Commonly, SNH wanted to assume that developers would have a
greater understanding or concern for the environment than was actually the
case," the report observes.
"On the whole, SNH had unrealistically assumed an optimistic outcome. This
resulted in developments which, although constructed in accordance with the
proposals, had negative impacts on the environment which could have been
predicted and possibly averted."
In one case, SNH recommended hiding a telecommunications mast at Smithton,
Inverness by filling gaps in a hedge. But if officials had visited the site,
they would have seen there was no hedge there.
In another instance, a visit by SNH would have shown trees being damaged by the
construction of an office block. And if SNH had insisted on controlling access
to another telecommunications mast, a whole slope wouldn't have been churned up
by tracked vehicles.
SNH said it was pleased that the report points to only "minor"
shortcomings in its procedures. "But those that have been highlighted will
be looked at," said spokesman George Anderson.
Staff have already put forward a suggested plan of action to senior managers,
who will be asked for their thoughts over the next few weeks. "We then aim
to address the deficiencies which have been identified and begin to work with
local authorities to improve their follow-up on planning cases," added
Anderson.
The ERM report is echoed by environmental groups working within the planning
system. "SNH's advice is often ignored and has even led to environmental
damage. It is high time SNH pulled their collective socks up," said Duncan
McLaren, chief executive of Friends of the Earth Scotland.
He argued that the failures of the system were illustrated by the fiercely
disputed new landfill dump planned at Dalmacoulter, near Greengairs in Airdrie.
The Scottish Executive Reporter for the plan, Karen Heywood, expressed
"considerable sympathy" with local people who had "lost
faith" in the ability of public authorities to enforce planning conditions.
She went on to recommend a series of planning conditions on the landfill, which
were strongly backed by the Executive when it gave the development the go-ahead
last month. "If environmental justice is to be delivered for communities,
when conditions are applied they must be robust and then they must be
enforced," McLaren urged.
"The failure to allow third parties who are affected to help formulate
planning conditions means they are effectively disenfranchised from the system.
These deficiencies will only be resolved when we have third-party right of
appeal providing equality in the planning system."
21 March 2004
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2. Letter in response from BSCG vice-convener,
Roy Turnbull: Sunday Herald, 28th March:
Eagle has landed
THE conclusion of ERM consultants
that Scottish Natural Heritage (SNH) is often "ineffective" at
preventing environmental damage because of local authorities' failure to uphold
planning conditions, is bad enough (News, March 21). But as the Friends Of The
Earth, Scotland spokesman stated, the situation is worse than that as even the
minimalist advice offered by SNH "is often ignored" in the first
place, so that woefully inadequate conditions are imposed.
For example, when the insurance company Eagle Star applied to build houses on an
ancient woodland site in Nethy Bridge, SNH did not object, but did at least
recommend that Eagle Star be required to enter into a legal agreement to
safeguard the remainder of its woodlands in the area. The planning authority,
Highland Council, disregarded this advice in its official report. SNH failed to
insist on this condition at the planning hearing in September 2002, and no legal
agreement was enforced.
This occurred one year after the Scottish Executive had pledged itself to the
"restoration, protection and expansion" of its native woodlands at the
World Summit in Johannesburg.
It gets worse. When SNH fails to object or give environmentally friendly advice,
this lack of guidance can then be taken as gospel by planning authorities. For
example, when SNH failed in 2003 to object to a holiday lodge close to an
isolated lochan with an osprey nest, the Cairngorms National Park Authority
stated: "There would seem to be no doubt that the development has the
potential … to lead to disturbance to important species. However, SNH have not
raised any objections … therefore I feel it is not possible to maintain an
objection … in relation to nature conservation."
[SNH: often ignored if it does act to protect the environment, deferred to if it
doesn't.] No wonder our environment is degrading.
Roy Turnbull
Nethy Bridge
Inverness-shire
[words in square brackets not printed in Sunday Herald]
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