In July 2019, the Planning (Scotland) Act gained Royal Assent, bringing in a range of reforms to the planning system. Notably, the new Act introduces mediation into the planning system for the first time, stating that Scottish Ministers may issue guidance in relation to the promotion and use of mediation’ (Planning (Scotland) Act 2019, Section 40) for a range of planning situations. Work is now ongoing to determine the appropriate means of taking mediation forward within the planning system and considering how this could work in practice. The ideas we put forward are designed to trigger discussion and are in no way set in stone. We would really appreciate it if you could listen to the short audio clips and then fill out the survey questions to tell us what you think about our ideas, and more generally any other thoughts you have about how mediation could be embedded into the Scottish Planning System effectively.
The survey focuses on the practicalities of introducing mediation to the planning system, as well as exploring its potential within Development Planning, Development Management and Local Place Plans. We’d welcome your contributions to any or all of these sections within the survey.
Once we have all of your responses, we will prepare a report (including all comments made) which will outline some proposals and submit this to the Scottish Government. All comments will be anonymous. This will assist in the development of a consultation paper to be published later this year.