201113DraftPCDraftMinutes

DRAFT COM­MIT­TEE MINUTES

CAIRNGORMS NATION­AL PARK AUTHORITY

DRAFT MINUTES OF THE PLAN­NING COM­MIT­TEE held via Video Con­fer­ence on 13^th Novem­ber 2020 at 11am

Mem­bers Present: Elean­or Mack­in­tosh (Con­vener) Douglas McAdam Peter Argyle (Deputy Con­vener) Xan­der McDade Geva Black­ett Wil­lie McK­enna Car­o­lyn Cad­dick Ian McLar­en Deirdre Fal­con­er Dr Fiona McLean Pippa Had­ley Wil­li­am Mun­ro Janet Hunter Dr Gaen­er Rodger John Kirk Derek Ross John Lath­am Judith Webb Anne Rae Macdonald

In Attend­ance: Gav­in Miles, Head of Plan­ning and Com­munit­ies Mur­ray Fer­guson, Dir­ect­or of Plan­ning & Rur­al Devel­op­ment Grant Moir, CEO Ed Swales, Mon­it­or­ing & Enforce­ment Officer Stephanie Wade, Plan­ning Officer, Devel­op­ment Man­age­ment Dan Har­ris, Plan­ning Man­ager, Devel­op­ment Plan­ning Nina Caudrey, Plan­ning Officer, Devel­op­ment Plan­ning Peter Fer­guson, Harp­er McLeod LLP

Apo­lo­gies: None.

Agenda Items I & 2: Wel­come & Apologies

1. The Con­vener wel­comed all present and there were no apologies.

Agenda Item 3: Minutes & Mat­ters Arising from the Pre­vi­ous Meeting

1. The minutes of the pre­vi­ous meet­ing, 25 Septem­ber 2020, held video con­fer­en­cing were approved with no amendments/​the fol­low­ing amend­ments: • At Para 11: The reas­on to be amended to reflect that he had car­ried out Con­sultancy work for SSE but not for that par­tic­u­lar applic­a­tion. | DRAFT COM­MIT­TEE MINUTES

2. The Con­vener provided an update on the actions arising from the minutes of 28 August 2020: a) At Para 31i): Closed – Emer­ging New Loc­al Devel­op­ment Plan for sub­mis­sion to Scot­tish Gov­ern­ment Min­is­ters was dis­cussed at the Form­al Board meet­ing that morn­ing and was now ready for submission.

3. Action Points arising: None.

4. There were no mat­ters arising.

Agenda Item 4: Declar­a­tion of Interest by Mem­bers on Items Appear­ing on the Agenda

1. Geva Black­ett declared an Indir­ect Interest in Item 5. Reas­on: had made motion to refuse to the ori­gin­al applic­a­tion for whole site but sat­is­fied that this was a com­pletely dif­fer­ent application.

2. Fiona McLean declared an Indir­ect Interest in Item 5. Reas­on: Is a Board mem­ber of His­tor­ic Envir­on­ment Scotland.

Agenda Item 5: Detailed Plan­ning Per­mis­sion 2020/0206/DET (APP/2020/1666) Repair and remov­al to walls, chim­ney stacks, pavil­ion façade and slates, fur­ther to plan­ning approv­al 2019/0003/DET And Applic­a­tion for Lis­ted Build­ing Con­sent 2020/0207/LBC (APP/2020/1667) Repair and remov­al to walls, chim­ney stacks, pavil­ion façade and slates, fur­ther to plan­ning approv­al 2019/0006/LBC Both at Bal­later Old School, Abergel­die Road, Bal­later, Aber­deen­shire, AB35 5RR Recom­mend­a­tion: Approve Sub­ject to Conditions

1. Stephanie Wade, Plan­ning Officer presen­ted the paper to the Committee.

2. The Com­mit­tee were invited to ask points of clar­ity, the fol­low­ing points were raised: a) The Con­vener sought reas­sur­ance that her under­stand­ing was cor­rect that the Her­it­age Con­ser­va­tion officer at Aber­deeen­shire Coun­cil was ini­tially con­cerned about the remov­al of the chim­neys on the lis­ted build­ing how­ever they were now con­tent? Plan­ning Officer agreed and explained that when the applic­a­tion was first sub­mit­ted there had been no clear jus­ti­fic­a­tion for their remov­al, but the applic­ant sub­sequently provided the jus­ti­fic­a­tion that sat­is­fied the officer. b) Con­cern raised on the remov­al of the chim­ney and sug­ges­tion made to build a false one to make it look like it is still there without the prob­lems the cur­rent one brings. Plan­ning Officer advised that this had not been put for­ward by the applic­ant. c) Com­ment made that the decision on this applic­a­tion hangs around the chim­ney, the impact on the look of build­ing and con­ser­va­tion area, reas­ons giv­en, argu­ments put for­ward that are robust and sens­ible, this is afford­able hous­ing in Bal­later and there would be costs asso­ci­ated with erect­ing a fake chim­ney. 2 DRAFT COM­MIT­TEE MINUTES d) Could it be cla­ri­fied who would bear the costs of ongo­ing main­ten­ance of that chim­ney to ensure it was oper­at­ing safely. Head of Plan­ning & Com­munit­ies advised that the cost would be part of the main­ten­ance costs that res­id­ents would have to pay. e) Could it be explained why harling of the walls was being pro­posed? Plan­ning Officer advised that the cement render had dam­aged them and that they would need harling to pro­tect them. f) Com­ment made that there were oth­er altern­at­ives rather than harl, in oth­er older build­ings was not the best option though, was it because of the costs involved? Head of Plan­ning & Com­munit­ies advised that lime harl or renders were a tra­di­tion­al extern­al treat­ment in North East Scot­land. He added that the Aber­deen­shire coun­cil Her­it­age officer had looked at the applic­a­tion in detail, and are con­tent it fits and is appro­pri­ate in this loc­a­tion. g) Com­ment made that while cement harling is bad for walls, lime harling is com­monly used in Aber­deen­shire and allows walls to breath.

3. The Com­mit­tee agreed these applic­a­tions as per the con­di­tions stated in the report.

4. Action Point arising: None.

Agenda Item 6: Applic­a­tion for Detailed Plan­ning Per­mis­sion 2020/0213/DET (20/03246/FUL) Sec­tion 42 applic­a­tion for non-com­pli­ance of Con­di­tion I of Plan­ning Per­mis­sion 19/04135/S42 (replace­ment of ces­sa­tion date 19.11.20 with 19.11.21 At Cairngorm Moun­tain, Glen­more, Aviemore, High­land, PH22 IRB Recom­mend­a­tion: Approve Sub­ject to Conditions

1. Ed Swales, Mon­it­or­ing & Enforce­ment Officer presen­ted the paper to the Committee.

2. The Com­mit­tee were invited to ask points of clar­ity, the fol­low­ing points were raised: a) The Con­vener asked how many tem­por­ary applic­a­tions would be approved before this devel­op­ment would become per­man­ent? Mon­it­or­ing and Enforce­ment Officer advised that this per­mis­sion was for a fur­ther 12months and could be con­sidered again next year. Head of Plan­ning & Com­munit­ies added that HIE and Cairngorm Moun­tain knew it was not a per­man­ent solu­tion how­ever the abil­ity to make arti­fi­cial snow was seen as vital ele­ment of the snowsports busi­ness either on its cur­rent site or a new site. b) Sug­ges­tion made to request for fur­ther inform­a­tion around the envir­on­ment­al impacts the devel­op­ment brings includ­ing cus­tom­er usage at the next tem­por­ary per­mis­sion applic­a­tion. Head of Plan­ning & Com­munit­ies advised that it would be bet­ter to simply ask for that inform­a­tion with any fur­ther applic­a­tion. Peter Fer­guson, Leg­al Advisor added that it might be tech­nic­ally accept­able to make it a con­di­tion but that simply request­ing the inform­a­tion would be more appro­pri­ate. c) Com­ment made that if people can­not get abroad for ski­ing, ski resorts in Scot­land could be inund­ated with vis­it­ors. 3 DRAFT COM­MIT­TEE MINUTES d) Com­ment made that they did not think it needed to be a con­di­tion and that they trust Cairngorm Moun­tain not to run the snow mak­ing machine when not neces­sary. e) Com­ment made that the pro­pos­al was inher­ently unsus­tain­able giv­en the use of fuel and energy to cre­ate snow. This was noted. f) The Com­mit­tee agreed that at any future applic­a­tion stage, fur­ther inform­a­tion on usage would be requested.

3. The Com­mit­tee agreed to approve the applic­a­tion as per the Officer’s recom­mend­a­tion sub­ject to the con­di­tions stated in the report.

4. Action Point arising: i. Any future tem­por­ary or oth­er­wise applic­a­tion for this per­mis­sion to be reques­ted to provide inform­a­tion on use.

Agenda Item 7: Update on Applic­a­tions Approved by Com­mit­tee sub­ject to con­clu­sion of Developer Contributions

1. Gav­in Miles, Head of Plan­ning & Com­munit­ies presen­ted the paper to the Committee.

2. The Con­vener invited the Com­mit­tee to dis­cuss the report, the fol­low­ing points were raised: a) Com­ment made that both applic­a­tions had legit­im­ate reas­ons for the delays. b) Peter Fer­guson, Leg­al Advisor provided a brief explan­a­tion around leg­al agree­ments involving the NPA and loc­al author­it­ies. He explained it is a three- way agree­ment with the Loc­al Author­ity also wear­ing dif­fer­ent hats e.g. edu­ca­tion and plan­ning author­ity. He went on to advise that they are explor­ing stream­lin­ing the pro­cess with High­land Coun­cil which would see put­ting a pro­tocol in place. He added that this had worked well with LLT­NP but was more com­plic­ated the great­er the range of con­tri­bu­tions that could be collected.

3. The Com­mit­tee noted the recommendations.

4. Action Point arising: None.

Agenda Item 9: LDP Mon­it­or­ing Report 2020

1. Nina Caudrey, Plan­ning Officer presen­ted the paper to the Committee.

2. The Deputy Con­vener invited the Com­mit­tee to dis­cuss the report, the fol­low­ing points were raised: a) Com­ment made the total num­ber of over­turned appeals was quite high and could this be a learn­ing point for the Com­mit­tee. b) How many of the appeals were against non-determ­in­a­tion as opposed to refus­al? Plan­ning Officer advised that she thought only I was non-determ­in­a­tion but would have to check and con­firm. 4 DRAFT COM­MIT­TEE MINUTES c) Clar­ity sought to the reas­on­ing why Loc­al Author­it­ies were less likely to refer to Policies 4 and 5 of the LDP as the CNPA were. Plan­ning Officer explained that this reflects that the applic­a­tions that are likely to be called-in by the Author­ity are more likely to trig­ger those policies while the ones the loc­al author­it­ies routinely deal with are unlikely to. Head of Plan­ning & Com­munit­ies reminded the Com­mit­tee that Loc­al Author­it­ies deal with many house­hold­er devel­op­ments such as exten­sions. d) Point of under­stand­ing sought was there a set num­ber of applic­a­tions called-in annu­ally or is it depend­ent on the nature of the applic­a­tions that come in? Head of Plan­ning & Com­munit­ies con­firmed that the num­ber called-in depended on what comes through the sys­tem. He advised that there aid cri­ter­ia to aid the Call-in pro­cess which aids which ones are likely to be called-in. He added that the CNPA try and call-in big or sens­it­ive applic­a­tions. e) Was there scope to add anoth­er meas­ure­ment how much of 1800 applic­a­tions have been delivered on the ground? Want to see deliv­ery, rest of it is pro­cess and would like to see what has been delivered? Head of Plan­ning & Com­munit­ies advised that they are try­ing to get bet­ter inform­a­tion how­ever they rely on com­ple­tions notices come through build­ing con­trol pro­cess com­ing to Loc­al Author­it­ies which par­tic­u­larly takes a long time. f) The Con­vener repor­ted that she had received feed­back from the Developer’s For­um that the aver­age num­ber of con­di­tions on an approv­al by the NPA is 43 which is dis­ap­point­ing to hear, was this a true fig­ure? Head of Plan­ning & Com­munit­ies advised that 43 con­di­tions was extreme and that few applic­a­tions ever had any­thing close to that num­ber. He noted that if the Com­mit­tee con­sider there are any unne­ces­sary con­di­tions attached to an applic­a­tion, they should raise it at the meet­ing where they determ­ine the applic­a­tion. g) The Con­vener added that it would be good to have some fig­ures on the true num­ber of con­di­tions and oth­er help­ful facts and fig­ures provided to the Com­mit­tee so they are pre­pared with answers for such feed­back. Head of Plan­ning & Com­munit­ies con­firmed that officers would pre­pare such a brief­ing. h) Com­ment made that some of sur­veys can come cost a sig­ni­fic­ant amount and impact neg­at­ively on small busi­nesses apply­ing for per­mis­sions. Sug­ges­tion made that it would be good to have review to ensure what we are ask­ing is abso­lutely neces­sary, easy to become mat­ter of routine, mind­ful going for­ward addi­tion­al cost put­ting on busi­nesses or indi­vidu­als. Head of Plan­ning & Com­munit­ies agreed that this was a good point. How­ever he reminded the Com­mit­tee that the Nation­al Park has some of the most import­ant biod­iversity in Scot­land, and more of the rare and pro­tec­ted hab­it­ats and spe­cies than any oth­er plan­ning author­ity area, so it was inev­it­able that these would have an impact on the plan­ning sys­tem. A Mem­ber com­men­ted that this was one of the chal­lenges of devel­op­ing in the NP.

3. The Com­mit­tee noted the paper.

4. Action Point arising: i. Plan­ning Com­mit­tee to be giv­en a brief­ing on plan­ning ser­vice and stat­ist­ics to help provide feed­back to any ques­tions or com­ments and to cor­rect inac­cur­ate claims. 5 DRAFT COM­MIT­TEE MINUTES Agenda Item 10: AOB

5. Gav­in Miles, Head of Plan­ning and Com­munit­ies provided the Com­mit­tee with inform­a­tion on the Scot­tish Gov­ern­ment Con­sulta­tion Review­ing and Extend­ing Per­mit­ted Devel­op­ment Rights (PDR) in Scotland.

6. The Com­mit­tee made the fol­low­ing com­ments: a) With regards to the tele­coms mast con­cern raised that it could restrict bet­ter broad­band avail­ab­il­ity. Head of Plan­ning & Com­munit­ies advised that this was about mobile tele­coms rather than fibre under­ground­ing. He explained that the increase in per­mit­ted devel­op­ment was sub­stan­tial and could allow devel­op­ment of masts that were sig­ni­fic­antly lar­ger than those cur­rently seen in the Nation­al Park without the cur­rent scru­tiny and con­trol. b) Com­ment made on size of agri­cul­tur­al build­ings, would we be dis­ad­vantaging our farm­ers as opposed to oth­er areas. Head of Plan­ning & Com­munit­ies agreed that it would be a very sig­ni­fic­ant change that few farms in the Nation­al Park were of a scale to require sheds as large as the pro­posed changes would allow so it was unlikely to have an impact on many farms. c) Com­ment made that it doesn’t allow any increase in foot­print, no change in out­side look of build­ing d) Com­ment made that they under­stood the con­cern that the struc­tures could poten­tially be sold as hol­i­day homes, but would that not then ease hous­ing pres­sures else­where in NP? Head of Plan­ning and Com­munit­ies advised that the num­bers of people look­ing for second or hol­i­day homes and their buy­ing power greatly exceeded that of res­id­ents so would be unlikely to ease pres­sure on loc­al need and demand. e) Cau­tion that it was import­ant not to restrict to agri-tour­ism. Head of Plan­ning & Com­munit­ies advised that CNPA plan­ning policies are sup­port­ive of agri-tour­ism and diver­si­fic­a­tion. f) Con­cern raised that pock­ets of res­id­en­tial devel­op­ment com­ing for­ward in this away that are a long way from bus routes, goes in wrong dir­ec­tion in our aspir­a­tion to net zero. Head of Plan­ning & Com­munit­ies provided some reas­sur­ance that if that or waste facil­it­ies was insuf­fi­cient the Plan­ning Author­ity could recom­mend refus­al of the applic­a­tion on those grounds. g) What was the sys­tem for the remov­al of masts? Head of Plan­ning & Com­munit­ies advised that it was pos­sible to have con­di­tions for remov­al of masts and that most tele­com company’s sign up to a European code of good prac­tice. h) Com­ment made that the con­ver­sion of agri-build­ings raises con­cerns. i) Com­ment made that the mem­ber had seen masts dis­guised as trees else­where. j) Com­ment made that if the NPA wants to encour­age young people into agri­cul­ture, the abil­ity to eas­ily con­vert dis­used farm build­ings was vital. Head of Plan­ning & Com­munit­ies agreed but advised that there was noth­ing to stop people com­ing with pro­pos­al under this sys­tem to cre­ate hol­i­day accom­mod­a­tion but without mak­ing the con­tri­bu­tions to afford­able hous­ing that would be required under cur­rent plan­ning policy. 6 DRAFT COM­MIT­TEE MINUTES k) Com­ment made around the Forestry ele­ment and pleased that there was a spe­cif­ic com­ment about it. Head of Plan­ning & Com­munit­ies agreed to add ref­er­ence to Scot­tish Forestry Policy in response.

7. The Plan­ning Com­mit­tee agreed the Con­sulta­tion response with addi­tion­al of ref­er­ence to Scot­tish Forestry policy.

8. Action Points arising: Addi­tion of ref­er­ence to Scot­tish Forestry policy in response.

Agenda Item 11: Date of Next Meeting

1. Fri­day 11^th Decem­ber 2020 at 10am via video/​telephone conference.

The pub­lic busi­ness of the meet­ing con­cluded at 12.45 hours. 7