Seòmar agus comataidhean

I will open with a number of questions about culture change before we move to the other themes that have been explored in our evidence session so far.

Back in 2015, community planning was seen as being central to public service reform in tackling inequalities and aiding prevention, as you have both articulated. The committee has heard that the picture on the ground is very variable, as you have both said. I am interested in your sense of the impact that community planning has had. Perhaps the minister could answer first.

It is unfortunate that we have lost the connection. It would be good to have heard about that.

We had better move on. Have we lost everybody now? No. Good.

I thank Mark Griffin for his question. We move on to the third sector and communities, with questions from Ivan McKee.

Thank you very much for that.

I am going to pick up the theme of local outcomes improvement plans and locality plans. The 2015 act replaced single outcome agreements with the practical tool of local outcomes improvement plans. I am interested to hear your thoughts on what impact they have had. I will start with Councillor Heddle.

The next agenda item is to take evidence on the Town and Country Planning (Development Planning) (Scotland) Regulations 2023 from Joe FitzPatrick, the Minister for Local Government Empowerment and Planning. He is joined by Scottish Government officials. Kristen Anderson is principal planner, Andy Kinnaird is head of transforming planning and Carrie Thomson is head of development planning and housing. I welcome our witnesses to the meeting, and I invite the minister to make a brief opening statement.

I look forward to seeing those regulations.

I think that that is it. Thank you for your evidence; it was very helpful, and I think that we got some useful bits of information. The minister will stay with us for our next evidence session, as he said at the beginning of the meeting. I suspend for five minutes to allow for a changeover of supporting officials.

Thanks very much for that. It is good to hear about the additional clarity on the climate change agenda.

How do you expect a planning authority to go about developing an evidence report, and what opportunities will there be for communities and individuals to input to the process?

Perhaps we should see whether Councillor Heddle wants to come in on the question about demonstrating that activities are leading to improved outcomes.

Councillor Heddle, I do not know whether you picked up Marie McNair’s first question.

We will try to go back to Councillor Heddle, because it would be good to hear from COSLA on those questions. Can you remember the two questions?

We move on to questions from Marie McNair.

Good morning, and welcome to the 12th meeting in 2023 of the Local Government, Housing and Planning Committee. We have received apologies from Miles Briggs. I remind members and witnesses to ensure that their mobile devices are on silent and that all notifications are turned off during the meeting.

Our first agenda item is a decision on whether to take agenda items 4, 5 and 6 in private. Do we agree to do so?

Members indicated agreement.