Portal account manager Robin Vaissiere recently attended an event for parish councils who have made – or are thinking of making – the move to paperless working. These are his thoughts from the event.
Persuading town and parish councils to work electronically is still one of the main barriers to LPAs going paperless.
While many LPAs have managed to reduce printing of planning applications submitted online via the Planning Portal down to a minimum of one copy for internal reference, many are still having to print more copies to send to their parishes for consultation.
Recently, the Portal was invited to present at an event organised by Bath & North East Somerset Council Development Management Team (BATHNES) to encourage other local town and parish councils to engage in online consultation. Read more…
The Planning Portal is pleased to welcome Chiltern District Council to the community of local planning authorities accepting online applications.
Chiltern District Council has been working hard to improve its business processes to facilitate online working. The authority has been joint working with South Bucks to ensure cost effectiveness between the two authorities and a new approach to service provision.
Peter Beckford, head of sustainable development for Chiltern & South Bucks, said: “As a result of joint working and a reinvigorated approach we have reorganised and improved our back-office systems to deliver a more customer-focussed and streamlined service.
“We have listened to our customers and by demonstrating our commitment to the Planning Portal we hope they will submit applications online as the preferred method.”
A total of 50 LPAs have now achieved Smarter Planning Champion status.
The most recent is Bolton Council, which reached the milestone last Friday.
Bolton has demonstrated it is actively applying best practice in the processing of online planning applications and has engaged with customers electronically to save time and resources as well as money and carbon.
This has been achieved in part due to the planning department using electronic case files and only printing plans when absolutely necessary. Officers use tablets on site to view plans and documentation, which allows for a more efficient use of their time.
Bolton endorses online application submission via the Planning Portal as their preferred method and offer online and telephone fee payment for quicker registration and validation. Their website also provides links to key planning guidance and services for ease of use.
A key part of the Smarter Planning scheme is working closely with local authorities to streamline their processes and introduce new electronic ways of working.
A map of LPA ‘Champions’ can be accessed here, and if you want to learn more about becoming a Smarter Planning Champion you can find more information on the Portal and register your interest.
New pages aimed at improving access to statutory consultee information went live on the Portal last week.
The new section includes info from:
- English Heritage
- Environment Agency
- Health and Safety Executive
- Highways Agency
- Environment Agency
- Natural England
There are also pages on the Common Service Commitment and Statutory Consultee Engagement Network.
It’s been almost a year since we last talked about BIM – building information modelling – and at that point the jury was very much still out on its importance to planning.
However, the latest annual report from the NBS, BIM is now ‘almost universal’, with 54% of those surveyed having used it in the last year, but a huge 93% of the respondents expecting to use it in the next 3 years.
You can download the free report from the NBS website but in the meantime I’d welcome your thoughts on whether anything has changed in relation to BIM and planning over the last 12 months.
In the last few weeks four local planning authorities have achieved Smarter Planning Champion status. They are Newcastle City Council, Northumberland County Council, Thurrock Council and most recently Southwark Council.
As part of the Smarter Planning scheme we work with local authorities to streamline their processes and introduce new electronic ways of working. These include:
- Updating website content to encourage a channel shift towards online self-service for the submission of applications. To ensure your local authority is using the correct Portal links see our best practice guide here.
- Signposting the council’s online planning application register as the authoritative source for engaging in the planning application process for citizens, consultees and applicants
- Endorsing the Planning Portal online application service as their preferred method of submission via a communication campaign to planning professionals, agents and citizens
- Promoting best practice guidance for application submission and local requirements
- Communicating electronically both internally and externally throughout the determination of applications
- Offering online fee payment or alternatives options for quicker application registration and validation
- Working towards a paperless office
We currently have 47 LPAs that have achieved ‘Champion’ status and are keen to get 50!
A map of the ‘Champion’ LPAs can be accessed here.
If you want to learn more about becoming a Smarter Planning Champion you can find more information on the Portal and register your interest.
Here are the four forms launched on Monday 7th April by DCLG.
As with all PDF forms our technical teams advises that you download the forms to your PC and open them with dedicated PDF software rather than try to edit them in your web browser.
Certificate of Lawfulness of Proposed Works to a Listed Building
The Planning Portal account management team visits many LPAs each week to improve their understanding of how online planning services are operating and evolving.
A common topic for many visits is the use of the free measuring tools that LPAs use to help them work electronically.
This subject came up again during a trip to a south London authority and I thought the blog might be a good forum to canvas other LPAs on the solutions they use.
We know PDF X-change and Foxit are two free solutions being used by LPAs. I’d be interested in understanding what software other LPAs are using and the benefits being realised for their authority.
Please share your thoughts below.
On Monday 7 April the Department for Communities and Local Government will be introducing new application forms for;
- Certificate of Lawfulness of Proposed Works to a Listed Building
- Prior Approval of proposed Change of Use of a building from a Retail (Use Class A1 or A2) Use or a Mixed Retail and Residential Use to a use falling within Use Class C3 (Dwellinghouse), and for Associated Operational Development
- Prior Approval of proposed Change of Use of Agricultural Building to a State-Funded School* or Registered Nursery
- Prior Approval of proposed Change of Use of Agricultural Building to a Dwellinghouse (Use Class C3), and for Associated Operational Development
The existing Prior Approval of Proposed Change of Use to State Funded School will also be amended to include Registered Nurseries.
These forms will be introduced in England only and will be published as ‘fillable PDFs’.
2013 was another bumper year for the Portal with the standout figure being that it looks like we are nudging close to 80 per cent of all planning applications being submitted online.
That’s our target for March next year!
We’re waiting for the LPA figures from Government to validate this but our upper range estimate looks like we might have handled as many as 79.5% of applications online over the three months October-December 2013.
And our data for February 2014 shows the most applications submitted online ever in one month – despite it having only 20 working days. If this trend continues it looks like we have every chance of hitting the 80 per cent threshold by the end of the financial year.
The good news doesn’t stop there. 2013 saw increases across the board for the Portal, a 27 per cent increase in website visits, a 16 per cent increase in applications and a 22 per cent increase in Building Regulations documents downloads.
The value of applications (the associated fees) submitted via the Portal rose from £112,839,181 in 2012 to £169,476,151 in 2013, an increase of 50 per cent.
Hopefully this reflects better times in the market as well as for the Portal. We’d be interested to hear whether February felt like a big month for business.
Planning Portal Blog 