Planning: Growing costs of departments must not be plugged by fees increase

Audit Scotland has issued a report, Modernising the planning system, which highlights the growing gap between income received by planning departments and the costs of running them.

It also reveals that the number of planning applications is falling, and that the cost to a household of submitting an application has increased by 40% over the last six years, whilst the cost to the council of administrating each application has effectively doubled.

Ruth Davidson MSP, Scottish Conservative Local Government Spokesperson, said:

"It is worrying that Audit Scotland can't explain such a massive increase in cost – nearly 90% in just six years. Taxpayers want to know when they submit a planning application, that it will be processed in a consistent, fair and cost-effective manner.

"Households across Scotland will fear that planning fees are set to soar again. This could be bad news for them, and bad news for all local jobs with tradesmen and suppliers in the home improvements market."

Total cost of processing planning applications in 2004/05 amounted to £31.4 million and increased to £41.5 million in 2009/10.

Total number of planning applications in 2004/05 was 56.720 and in 2009/10 was 40.119. Combined with the figures above this means an average cost per application to the council of ca. £553 in 2004/05 and ca. £1034 in 2009/10.

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