Government consults to make planning appeals procedures faster and more transparent

The paper, which the DCLG launched yesterday, aims to make the planning appeals process faster and more transparent and to improve consistency and increase certainty of decision timescales. This is intended to be done via changes to secondary legislation and guidance.

The consultation focuses on hearings and enquiries as the majority of appeals relating to "larger and more complex" development proposals are determined through these procedures.

The proposals include a requirement for the person appealing to submit their full appeal statement as part of their grounds of appeal. Currently additional comments and statements are submitted six weeks from the starting date of the appeal procedure. Local planning authorities (LPAs) should notify interested parties of the appeal within one week, rather than the current two week deadline.

The paper also proposes to require the person making an appeal to submit a table of the background to the appeal at the time the appeal is submitted and negotiate a final version with the LPA within five weeks. Currently the parties have six weeks to agree a Statement of Common Ground. "Agreeing the Statement of Common Ground earlier will lead to more focussed evidence being presented to the inquiry and avoid time being taken on matters that are not material," the paper said.

The time between the start of the appeal and the appeal event should be shortened, the paper proposes, with hearings to be held within ten weeks and inquiries by planning inspectors within 16 weeks. "This will generally improve the timeliness of decision making, while retaining sufficient flexibility for appeal parties in organising their time and for the Planning Inspectorate to deliver decisions earlier," the paper said.

The paper also proposes to establish a Commercial Appeals Service, which would function as an "expedited form of the written representations procedure". The service would be aimed at creating a faster appeal procedure for "smaller scale, less complex" appeals to promote growth. It is proposed that the deadline for making an appeal to this service should be 12 weeks, rather than the usual six months.

"In its consideration of appeal procedures, the Government has focused on the time between the start of an appeal to the issuing of the decision," the paper said. "It has considered whether there is opportunity to streamline the existing procedural rules and guidance around appeals, to speed up the sharing of documents and cases between parties, and to encourage earlier engagement between parties so appeals are run as efficiently as possible, and areas of dispute are narrowed."

The review of the appeals process was first announced by the Government in its Autumn Statement in November last year. The DCLG has asked for responses to the consultation up until 13 December.