Seòmar agus comataidhean

Maybe we are better to write.

Thanks very much, convener. I am grateful to the committee for the opportunity to discuss community planning as part of its on-going post-legislative scrutiny of the Community Empowerment (Scotland) Act 2015. As you are aware, part 2 of the act introduces reforms to community planning and provides a statutory purpose for public sector bodies to work together and with communities to improve outcomes and reduce inequalities.

The Government is committed to community planning. It enables genuine partnership working and provides an ideal platform through which to address the deep-rooted and complex social, economic and environmental challenges that affect communities across Scotland. As a result, the place-based actions that community planning partnerships take on local priorities also support important public service reform ambitions for the Scottish Government nationally, such as the eradication of child poverty, economic transformation, a just transition to net zero and tackling health inequalities.

The Scottish Government is conducting an informal review of part 2 of the Community Empowerment (Scotland) Act 2015, which covers community planning. The review builds on practical learning and engagement with partners, including the community planning improvement board, to ensure that community planning is as effective as it can be.

I know that the committee has heard evidence from a range of witnesses, all of whom have valuable experience of community planning. I note that there have been successful examples of community planning in practice since the act was passed and that there is also potential for continued improvement in how community planning operates in practice. The committee’s findings and recommendations will inform our review and help us to further improve community planning so that it supports our ambition to enhance partnership working and to improve outcomes for communities across Scotland.

I look forward to receiving the committee’s report and engaging with members on how to ensure that community planning continues helping to improve outcomes for communities across Scotland.

Obviously, Audit Scotland and the Accounts Commission have a particular role in looking at the landscape. Audit Scotland in particular has been able to highlight, in a way that others maybe could not do with confidence, that there has been a shift in the focus. For council chief executives, for instance, it is no longer just about leading their own organisation. They now universally see wider partnership and collaborative leadership as being part of their role.

We need to be careful to ensure that we do not create bureaucracy that becomes a block to delivering outcomes and benefits for our communities. That is really important. We do that through collaboration and by having a shared understanding across all the partners of what outcomes we are trying to achieve. Councillor Heddle suggested that those should be slimmed down. Although, as I think he said, having only one outcome might be going further than we would want to go, that is probably a sensible thing to do.

We are having discussions with COSLA about what the most important outcomes are that we are trying to achieve. If we have a shared understanding of that across all the partners, it becomes much easier for the public to see what is happening. The public are not really concerned about whether a measure has been produced by Audit Scotland or the Accounts Commission. The public want to see a difference on the ground in the services in their communities.

The key agencies are the same key agencies that were in the 2008 regulations. There are some changes, because some of the organisations have changed their names; for instance, Scottish Natural Heritage is now NatureScot. There are also a couple of new agencies; for instance, South of Scotland Enterprise effectively has the same role as Highlands and Islands Enterprise, although they have different geographies. Those are the main changes but, largely, the list is based on the list in the 2008 regulations.

With regard to which agencies are key and which are not, some of the agencies that might make sense as key agencies, such as Transport Scotland and Marine Scotland, are agencies of the Scottish Government, so the legislation does not allow them to be key agencies—although it is absolutely important that they are engaged. Guidance will make it clear that some of those big organisations should still be connected.

You mentioned Network Rail and VisitScotland. Obviously, Network Rail is part of the UK Government, but the regional transport partnerships are in the list. I think that VisitScotland is probably in a similar place to the other groups that I mentioned.

Community planning will continue to have an important role in supporting a range of priorities, such as Covid recovery, promoting population health and tackling health inequalities. However, as has been mentioned, there will increasingly be a role for community wealth building, particularly in relation to economic development in our communities. That work is being led by the Minister for Community Wealth and Public Finance, so I will ask David Milne to comment on that and indulge your passion.

There is also an increasing role for climate action to support community-led place-based approaches. That is an exciting opportunity and, if we get that right, there will be huge benefits.

We are continuing our discussions with COSLA, the community planning improvement board and other partners to support improvements to community planning in the context of the new deal for local government and the local governance review.

David Milne, do you want to indulge the convener?

Obviously, there was extensive work at the start. The cross-sectoral development planning working group was involved from the outset—virtually before we even put pen to paper. Three sub-groups looked at procedures, evidence reports and the gate check, and the scope and content. Each of those produced outputs in February 2021, offering information on their ideas to support the development of the regulations.

The public consultation on the proposed LDP regulations and guidance ran for more than 14 weeks—between December 2021 and the end of March 2022—alongside the consultation on the draft NPF4, which allowed people to have a joined-up understanding. Eighty-seven responses were received from planning authorities, key agencies, and development, property and land management bodies.

Importantly, a separate consultation on the definition of “Gypsies and Travellers” ran between December 2022 and February 2023. That enabled targeted involvement of that community and offered an opportunity to explain the specific matters that were associated with the definition and the specific context in which it was used. There were four in-person consultation events with travelling community members, and 41 responses. That is probably a good example of best practice in how we engage with communities that, sometimes, appear to be more difficult to engage with when it comes to consultation.

You asked about the issues that were raised. Generally, there was broad agreement, I think, with the majority of the proposals. Overall, there seemed to be agreement that the regulations should be kept to a minimum, to support flexibility and the ability to address potential problems that might arise.

We were able to make some changes on a few areas in the draft regulations, but, on balance, many of the issues that were raised will be dealt with in the guidance rather than in the regulations, in accordance with the principle of keeping regulations to a minimum in order to ensure that the legal framework is clear. Most of the other points from the consultation were to do with the guidance, which can be updated in line with best practice.

I ask Kristen Anderson to fill in any bits that I may have missed.

The statutory guidance is clear in relation to third sector organisations and third sector interfaces. The third sector has an important role to play in community planning—not only at strategic level, around the board table, but in the engagement that we talked about earlier. Sometimes it will be a third sector organisation that can engage with the particular communities for which we are trying to make change, so it is really important that the third sector is part of the picture and is helping to build capacity, skills and confidence within communities, and supporting general community empowerment activity.

There are a lot of reasons why the third sector should be involved. I guess your question is about whether there is something in the current structures that is preventing that. I argue that that is not the case, because there are some really good examples in which the third sector has been able to be engaged. Examples that I have in front of me include Perth and Kinross Association of Voluntary Services co-chairing the CPP—it is not a statutory member, but is, however, co-chair; Engage Renfrewshire chairing the CPP Renfrewshire forum for empowering communities; and the strong involvement of Largo Communities Together as the anchor organisation in the Fife LOIP.

I do not think that that there are any structural issues. There are places where third sector involvement is not happening, and I think that there are strong arguments for why it should be happening. If the only reason to do it was to reach the communities that we are trying to support in relation to inequalities and deprivation, that would be reason enough.

David Milne wants to add something.

Most of the significant changes were brought in by the 2019 act rather than being brought in through these regulations, and that is why work is on-going.

NPF4 sits alongside LDPs, and the 2019 act sets out the requirement for planning authorities to take into account NPF4 when preparing their LDPs. It is a bit different from how it was in the past, when you would expect the national planning framework to virtually be replicated in local plans. However, that is no longer necessary because they sit alongside each other, which is a more sensible way of working.

You are right: the guidance is crucial. Andy, do we have an expectation for when it will be published?

The previous question was about examples since the 2015 act was passed, so I gave three examples. However, it is absolutely appropriate that we look at that. It is why the previous minister asked for a review, and why I welcome the work of the committee. The fact is that the more local engagement we have and the more communities are involved in decision making, the better will be the decisions that we will make. We absolutely recognise that, which is why I welcome the work that the committee is doing.