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We have to acknowledge that we need to continue to invest in building capacity, because that is never going to be a done deal. One of the ways in which the Scottish Government does that is by funding the Scottish Community Development Centre which, in turn, funds community-based groups to engage with participation requests.

You asked about community councils. They are one of many community bodies that are listed in the statutory guidance, and CPPs should engage with them constructively.

David Milne might want to add something.

It is a case of doing what is appropriate for the locality and the communities there.

That follows on from the previous question, when we talked about ensuring that we were not overly burdening all our public bodies with requirements to produce data. I wonder whether the answer to that is to ensure that we collect the correct data, whether it is quantitative or qualitative, and to share it so that we understand the progress that is being made towards improving local outcomes. That is perhaps the best answer.

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 evidence report, which has to be produced, is the key to making sure that that engagement is appropriate for the local place and the local community; that might not be the same everywhere.

It is crucial that community involvement is front-loaded—that the community is involved at the earliest opportunity.

I ask Kristen Anderson to help me.

Good morning, everyone. The previous time that I attended a meeting of a committee with a similar remit was as convener of the Local Government and Regeneration Committee in session 4. I note that Mark Griffin was a member of that committee way back in 2011. When I was preparing for this morning’s meeting, I felt that it was a little bit soon after my appointment to be facing a double committee session. That said, it is good to be back.

I thank the committee for giving me the opportunity briefly to outline the Scottish Government’s approach to the new development planning provisions, which are contained in Scottish statutory instrument 2023/101 and the associated regulations on commencement, savings and transitional arrangements.

Scotland’s plan-led system of development is widely supported. As the committee will be aware from its consideration of national planning framework 4, the Scottish Government is strengthening development planning as part of its wider planning reform programme. That includes changes to what constitutes a development plan, the interplay between policies on NPF4 and local development plans, and the process of preparing LDPs with a greater focus on delivery. Together, those changes create opportunities for LDPs to refocus on delivering place-based outcomes.

The broad framework for new-style LDPs and their preparation is set out in the primary legislation—the Planning (Scotland) Act 2019—which made strategic changes to LDPs. The new regulations provide the detail for how the act’s requirements should be fulfilled. They were informed by extensive engagement with key stakeholders, with input from the cross-sectoral development planning working group. That led to public consultation on the main regulations and draft guidance, along with the consultation on the draft NPF4 and a separate one with targeted engagement on the definition of “Gypsies and Travellers”.

Overall, respondents were generally supportive of our proposed approach of producing carefully targeted regulations. More detail will be provided in the fuller associated guidance. I assure the committee that the regulations were finalised while taking into account comments raised through the public consultation. The policy note sets out details of the consultations, including the issues raised, and the regulations now reflect that feedback. Not all the suggestions put forward have been included in the regulations, but we will address the matters raised in them in the guidance.

The connection between the regulations and the guidance is key. We have sought to strike a balance between having a clear statutory framework and clear guidance to support all stakeholders in implementing the new system while giving planning authorities flexibility to implement the statutory procedures in the ways that best suit their places, communities and organisational priorities.

We also intend to identify and share best practice as the new system beds in. I would welcome the opportunity to come back to the committee to talk through the comprehensive guidance once it has been published, if the committee would be interested in that.

The Planning (Scotland) Act 2019 (Commencement No 12 and Saving and Transitional Provisions) Regulations 2023 will commence the various provisions of the 2019 act that will be needed to support the envisaged new system of LDPs. We have also provided for savings and transitional arrangements for plans that started under the current system. From our discussions with stakeholders, we know that planning authorities are eager to get on with their new-style plans. The new regulations will provide a solid foundation for a consistent approach to plan making across the country.

I look forward to answering the committee’s questions, perhaps with a bit more support from my officials than is usual.

There are some good examples of partners aligning resources, notably staff and premises, and moving towards having a shared purpose so that they can achieve more collectively than they would when working separately. The important point about funding is that partners should use their collective resources in whatever way best enables them to deliver on local priorities, in line with their organisations’ roles and responsibilities.

I have heard the arguments that partners should allocate funds towards a pot of money that CPPs control. I am interested in learning more about the benefits and risks of that approach. That is one of the things that the committee has been looking at.

Recommendations are also coming out of the community planning improvement board, and I look forward to discussing those with the CPIB chair. I have not yet discussed them.