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There is always a process to be gone through to get an MCA approved, and the local authority absolutely has the scope to alter it throughout the process on the basis of any input that it might receive. The MCA process is designed to be a proactive one, in which the planning authority identifies the needs and works with partners collaboratively to take forward something that it thinks will meet those needs. On the specific question, hearings would be required in circumstances where the scheme covered a national development as identified in NPF4.

Again, I will ask my officials to clarify the specific details on that. The MCA process would broadly follow the existing process for planning applications. There would be an opportunity for members of the public to comment, and there would be consultation, depending on the scope and scale of the proposal. Ruairidh, will you clarify that point?

Yes: that is exactly one of the situations where an LDP could be amended in the light of new evidence coming forward. If a local place plan that a community produces misses the initial deadline, the planning authority might want to take that on board, and the regulations give it the scope to do that and make provision for it.

Planning authorities have clearly been involved in the consultation on introducing the proposed scope for making amendments under the relevant SSI. However, they are at various stages of pulling together their initial LDPs, so we are not yet at the stage when they would be thinking about amendments.

Thank you, convener, and good morning to you and to the committee.

I thank the committee for the opportunity to briefly outline the aim and purpose of these new planning provisions. The provisions are contained across four Scottish statutory instruments. They are technical procedural regulations that deliver principles that are already established in the Planning (Scotland) Act 2019.

Scotland’s plan-led system of development is widely supported. The regulations are an integral part of the Scottish Government’s wider planning reform programme, with which the committee will be familiar. The regulations provide further procedural information regarding amending the development plan and developing masterplan consent areas.

The powers for making amendments to the development plan are set out in primary legislation by changes made to the Town and Country Planning (Scotland) Act 1997 by the Planning (Scotland) Act 2019. The amendment regulations that are being laid regarding the national planning framework and local development plans provide the details of how the primary legislation’s requirements should be fulfilled. We have sought proportionality across both sets of amendment regulations while incorporating appropriate checks and balances to ensure transparency and fairness.

The 2019 act introduced powers to establish masterplan consent areas, and further regulations are required to set out the detailed procedures for their preparation and adoption. Masterplan consent areas are an up-front planning consent that provides certainty and makes places more attractive to investors.

We envisage that MCAs could enable development on a range of scales and in different parts of Scotland. For example, they could be used to help deliver national developments on green ports and new homes in urban and rural areas. Our 2024-25 programme for government commits us to support early adopters through the roll-out of MCAs, and officials are already engaging with several planning authorities to help them move forward.

Each of the sets of regulations that are being discussed today was informed by engagement with key stakeholders and a public consultation. Overall, respondents were generally supportive of the proposed approach in the regulations and I assure the committee that the regulations that are being considered today have taken account of the comments raised through the public consultations. We have published a report with a summary of responses to the consultations.

For the amendment regulations, there was strong agreement with the proportionate approach and the flexibility given to planning authorities in it. Similarly, for the MCA regulations, there was broad agreement that regulations should be kept to the minimum necessary in order to provide for maximum flexibility. Much of the detail of our expectations for MCAs will be set out in guidance that we will publish when the regulations come into force.

The draft Masterplan Consent Area Scheme (Environmental Impact Assessment) (Scotland) Regulations 2024 mirror the provisions in the Town and Country Planning (Environmental Impact Assessment) (Scotland) Regulations 2017 and ensure that MCA schemes are compatible with wider EIA requirements. Respondents to the consultation welcomed that approach.

I welcome the opportunity to answer any questions that the committee might have regarding the details contained in the regulations.

Clearly, it will be up to local authorities—the planning authorities—to introduce such amendments. As you are aware, each planning authority is now going through the process of putting their initial local development plans in place under NPF4.

We would not expect alterations to local developments for individual units, for example, or to take account of individual smaller applications. They would be made when the authorities wish to make a change to what they have identified as areas for some types of development within their plans. That could be triggered by a range of requirements.

I would not say that we have an expectation as to how often that would happen, but I would not expect it to be a very regular occurrence. It is up to the planning authorities to bring such amendments forward as they see fit.

I will ask officials to comment on the specifics of why those areas were included.

The national planning framework can be reviewed in a number of ways, but specific amendments would be at the discretion of ministers, where we see that a significant change to one of the policies has come to light and we feel that there needs to be an amendment. We do not expect that to happen very often, but we have that provision, if it is required, if we see that something significant has arisen and there is a need to address that.

Obviously, we are going through a process in which NPF4 is still bedding in. As it is a new approach to planning, we are working through and issuing guidance letters and so on as things come up. If we came to a situation where we felt that there was a need to amend one or more of the policies, we would have the scope to do that. At present, however, we have no expectations or plans to address anything specific that has come to light through such amendments.

The plans are in place for a period of time, and planning authorities will go through the process, with the evidence that they need to provide as part of it, as well as the gate checks. As you know, we are starting off on that process with a number of planning authorities, which will proceed on the basis of the information that they have available at the time.

Circumstances can of course change, and it may be that the planning authority itself will have a change of direction, or other events may happen that require the authority to review things. Evidence may come to light that the authority was not aware of previously, which would require it to review the LDP. We would not want authorities to be locked into something that could not be amended, so an amending provision should be allowed if it is required.

As I say, I would not expect such amendments to be made very often. My officials can correct me, but I assume that, if planning authorities were to amend an LDP, they would introduce all the various changes that they wanted to make in one go, rather than making several changes to the LDP concurrently.

Regarding the substance of your question, we are very conscious of the resourcing challenges that planning authorities and the whole planning ecosystem are suffering from, and we are taking separate steps, which I will outline to the Parliament in the near future, to help with and address those resourcing challenges.

As I say, it will be up to the planning authorities to decide when they need to make amendments to their LDPs. I am sure that they will factor in the resourcing requirements accordingly.

Good morning, committee. Trade agreements often include provisions for providing for reciprocal access to public procurement. Although we know that trade is a reserved matter, implementation often occurs in devolved areas, such as public procurement. Accordingly, Scottish procurement regulations set out that bidders from countries where a relevant agreement applies are entitled to equal treatment when bidding for specified contracts in Scotland.

The instrument updates the list of relevant agreements, inserts a reference to a new agreement between the United Kingdom and Kazakhstan, and updates references to agreements with Ukraine, Moldova, Georgia, Kosovo, North Macedonia and Albania. Agreements with those countries, which were originally reached by the European Union and then rolled over by the UK, included contracts for some healthcare services in their scope. Although that did not compel public bodies to award contracts for those services rather than provide them in-house, it meant that, if contracts for those services were ever to be awarded, bidders from those countries would be entitled to equal treatment.

The agreements have been renegotiated to remove healthcare services from their scope. The instrument will ensure that Scottish regulations refer to the refreshed agreements.

The Scottish Government has consistently and successfully implemented international obligations on procurement since 2006, when it first transposed EU procurement directives, and is consistent in its commitment to upholding international law. The amendments to trade agreements that are contained in the SSI are necessary to reflect changes to international obligations, and there is no substantive discretion exercisable in their implementation.