Item 13: Standing Orders Committee Report

Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity Ugh­dar­ras Pàirc Nàiseanta a’ Mhon­aidh Ruaidh

Plan­ning Com­mit­tee, Item 13 29 August 2025 Page 1 of 9

For decision

Title: Update of Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Stand­ing Orders Pre­pared by: Dav­id Berry, Head of Plan­ning and Chief Plan­ning Officer

Pur­pose This paper seeks approv­al of pro­posed updates to the Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Stand­ing Orders.

Recom­mend­a­tions The Com­mit­tee is asked to: α) Con­sider the pro­posed changes to the Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Stand­ing Orders; and b) Agree updated Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Stand­ing Orders

Back­ground and stra­tegic context

1. The Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Stand­ing Orders out­line the pro­ced­ures which apply to meet­ings of the Park Authority’s Plan­ning Com­mit­tee. The cur­rent Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Stand­ing Orders were adop­ted in Septem­ber 2019.

2. Updated Stand­ing Orders for meet­ings of the Park Authority’s Board were adop­ted in Novem­ber 2024, and it is neces­sary to review the Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Stand­ing Orders to ensure con­sist­ency between the two sets of pro­ced­ures. The cur­rent Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Stand­ing Orders also pre-date the sig­ni­fic­ant changes to work­ing prac­tices which were intro­duced dur­ing the Cov­id-19 pan­dem­ic and which have been main­tained sub­sequently – for example, online and hybrid meet­ings. There is a need to review the Com­mit­tee Stand­ing Orders to reflect these and oth­er changes to work­ing prac­tices in the inter­ven­ing peri­od. A review of the Com­mit­tee Stand­ing Orders also provides an oppor­tun­ity to con­sider oth­er pro­ced­ur­al changes which may be of bene­fit to users of the plan­ning system.

Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity Ugh­dar­ras Pàirc Nàiseanta a’ Mhon­aidh Ruaidh

Plan­ning Com­mit­tee, Item 13 29 August 2025 Page 2 of 9

Pro­pos­als

1. Table 1 over­leaf sets out the sub-head­ings in the exist­ing Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Stand­ing Orders and iden­ti­fies a sum­mary of, and jus­ti­fic­a­tion for, the changes that are pro­posed under each sub-head­ing. An inform­al dis­cus­sion on the Stand­ing Orders was held with the Plan­ning Com­mit­tee on 13 June 2025 and the pro­posed changes aim, as far as pos­sible, to reflect the views expressed dur­ing that discussion.

Table 1: Sum­mary of pro­posed changes to Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Stand­ing Orders

Sub-head­ing title	Pro­posed change/​s	Reason/​s
Fre­quency and loc­a­tion of meetings	Update meet­ing fre­quency from four to six weekly.	To reflect cur­rent work­ing practices.
	Cla­ri­fy that spe­cial meet­ings may be called by the Com­mit­tee Con­vener when it appears that an item of busi­ness requires urgent attention.	To ensure con­sist­ency with Board Stand­ing Orders.
	Cla­ri­fy that com­mit­tee meet­ings will nor­mally be held in hybrid format from the Park Authority’s offices in Grant­own-on-Spey, but that com­mit­tee meet­ings may be held in-per­son at a loc­a­tion close to the site of pro­posed devel­op­ments that raise issues of par­tic­u­lar significance.	To reflect cur­rent work­ing prac­tices in rela­tion to hybrid meet­ings whilst provid­ing scope for in-per­son meet­ings in cer­tain cir­cum­stances (see fur­ther com­ments in paras 6 – 11).
	Delete ref­er­ence to can­cel­la­tion of meet­ings due to adverse weath­er circumstances.	To reflect cap­ab­il­ity to hold meet­ings in hybrid / online form.

Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity Ugh­dar­ras Pàirc Nàiseanta a’ Mhon­aidh Ruaidh

Plan­ning Com­mit­tee, Item 13 29 August 2025 Page 3 of 9

Sub-head­ing title	Pro­posed change/​s	Reason/​s
Pre-agenda brief­ing meetings	Minor updates for cla­ri­fic­a­tion but no sig­ni­fic­ant changes.	Exist­ing arrange­ments remain valid.
Notice of meetings	Minor change to remove ref­er­ence to dis­play of meet­ing notices in loc­al author­ity offices, as this is now done online. No oth­er sig­ni­fic­ant changes.	Exist­ing arrange­ments remain valid.
Agenda papers	Cla­ri­fy that, as well as being sent to Board mem­bers, all agenda papers are pub­lished online sev­en days before each meet­ing oth­er than where there are con­fid­en­ti­al­ity considerations.	To fully reflect cur­rent work­ing practices.
Quor­um	Cla­ri­fy that quor­um require­ments apply irre­spect­ive of any vacan­cies in mem­ber­ship and out­line the pro­ced­ures that apply if the num­ber of mem­bers reduces below quor­um dur­ing a meet­ing – for example, due to mem­bers leav­ing the meet­ing because of declar­a­tions of interest.	To ensure con­sist­ency with Board Stand­ing Orders.
Plan­ning applic­a­tions: writ­ten representations	Allow longer peri­ods for writ­ten rep­res­ent­a­tions where pos­sible. The cur­rent Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Stand­ing Orders only allow rep­res­ent­a­tions received in writ­ing with­in 28 days of call-in to be included in com­mit­tee papers. In prac­tice, there is usu­ally scope to include rep­res­ent­a­tions received after this date in com­mit­tee papers, and a change is pro­posed to enable this. A min­im­um peri­od of 28 days for writ­ten rep­res­ent­a­tions will be	To provide scope for con­sid­er­ing writ­ten rep­res­ent­a­tions which would not be per­mit­ted under the exist­ing Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Stand­ing Orders.

Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity Ugh­dar­ras Pàirc Nàiseanta a’ Mhon­aidh Ruaidh

Plan­ning Com­mit­tee, Item 13 29 August 2025 Page 4 of 9

Sub-head­ing title	Pro­posed change/​s	Reason/​s
	retained, and a new a cut-off point bey­ond which rep­res­ent­a­tions can­not be included in com­mit­tee papers is pro­posed (21 days pri­or to the date on which the applic­a­tion will be repor­ted to com­mit­tee). This change will allow a longer peri­od for writ­ten rep­res­ent­a­tions for most plan­ning applications.
Plan­ning applic­a­tions: oral representations	Minor updates for cla­ri­fic­a­tion but no sig­ni­fic­ant changes.	Exist­ing arrange­ments remain valid.
Writ­ten and oral rep­res­ent­a­tions on oth­er agenda items	Minor updates for cla­ri­fic­a­tion but no sig­ni­fic­ant changes.	Exist­ing arrange­ments remain valid.
Site vis­its	Retain the abil­ity for Com­mit­tee Mem­bers to pro­pose a motion for a site vis­it where they deem this neces­sary for the effect­ive determ­in­a­tion of a plan­ning applic­a­tion but cla­ri­fy that the nor­mal pro­cess is for the Plan­ning Con­vener / Deputy Con­vener, in con­sulta­tion with the Head of Plan­ning, to identi­fy instances where site vis­its are required and arrange these in advance of com­mit­tee meetings.	To reflect cur­rent work­ing prac­tices on advance iden­ti­fic­a­tion of plan­ning applic­a­tions requir­ing site visits.
	Intro­duce a man­dat­ory require­ment for mem­ber attend­ance at site visits	To respond to views expressed dur­ing the inform­al dis­cus­sion on Com­mit­tee Stand­ing Orders.

Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity Ugh­dar­ras Pàirc Nàiseanta a’ Mhon­aidh Ruaidh

Plan­ning Com­mit­tee, Item 13 29 August 2025 Page 5 of 9

Sub-head­ing title	Pro­posed change/​s	Reason/​s
	that are iden­ti­fied and arranged in advance of a plan­ning applic­a­tion being con­sidered at plan­ning com­mit­tee, but retain the non-man­dat­ory status of site vis­its that are agreed in response to a mem­ber motion.
How motions and amend­ments are moved and decided on	Minor updates for cla­ri­fic­a­tion but no sig­ni­fic­ant changes.	Exist­ing arrange­ments remain valid.
What hap­pens if votes are equal?	Minor updates for cla­ri­fic­a­tion but no sig­ni­fic­ant changes.	Exist­ing arrange­ments remain valid.
Adjourn­ing a meeting	Minor updates for cla­ri­fic­a­tion but no sig­ni­fic­ant changes.	Exist­ing arrange­ments remain valid.
Del­eg­a­tion of responsibilities	For clar­ity, include a ref­er­ence to mon­it­or­ing and enforce­ment pro­cesses (except those which involve serving form­al enforce­ment notices), and the nego­ti­ation and con­clu­sion of sec­tion 75 leg­al agree­ments post-Com­mit­tee in the sec­tion on oper­a­tion­al decision-making.	To reflect estab­lished work­ing practices.

1. Although there was gen­er­al agree­ment on most of the pro­posed changes to the Com­mit­tee Stand­ing Orders dur­ing the inform­al dis­cus­sion on 13 June 2025, there was no clear con­sensus on the fol­low­ing points: α) Wheth­er com­mit­tee meet­ings should con­tin­ue to be held in hybrid format from the Park Authority’s office at Grant­own-on-Spey or revert to the pre- Cov­id format of being in-per­son only and mov­ing around dif­fer­ent loc­a­tions across the Nation­al Park.

Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity Ugh­dar­ras Pàirc Nàiseanta a’ Mhon­aidh Ruaidh

Plan­ning Com­mit­tee, Item 13 29 August 2025 Page 6 of 9

1. b) Wheth­er or not mem­ber attend­ance at plan­ning site vis­its should be made mandatory.

A more detailed jus­ti­fic­a­tion for the pro­pos­als in respect of these two issues is provided below.

Format and loc­a­tion of meetings

1. To help inform decision mak­ing on meet­ing format and loc­a­tion, a cost com­par­is­on exer­cise has been under­taken by the Clerk to the Board – see Table 2 below. The table shows cost estim­ates for typ­ic­al hybrid and in-per­son meet­ings based at the Park Authority’s office at Grant­own-on-Spey and a typ­ic­al in-per­son meet­ing held else­where in the Nation­al Park (using Bal­later as an example).

Table 2: Cost com­par­is­ons between dif­fer­ent meet­ing formats

	Hybrid (Hos­ted from Grant­own)	In-per­son (Grant­own)	In-per­son (Bal­later)
Accom­mod­a­tion	£120	Accom­mod­a­tion £360	Accom­mod­a­tion £1,560
Room Hire	£0	Room Hire £0	Room Hire £270
Even­ing Meal	£30	Even­ing Meal £90	Even­ing Meal £390
Cater­ing	£300	Cater­ing £445	Cater­ing £695
Travel Expenses	£185	Travel Expenses £625	Travel Expenses £625
Total Cost	£635	Total Cost £1,520	Total Cost £3,540

1. Over the course of a year, dur­ing which there would nor­mally be at least sev­en com­mit­tee meet­ings, hybrid meet­ings hos­ted from Grant­own would be expec­ted to cost approx­im­ately £4,500, in-per­son meet­ings held at Grant­own would be expec­ted to cost approx­im­ately £10,500, and in-per­son meet­ings held else­where in the Nation­al Park would be expec­ted to cost approx­im­ately £24,500.

2. In light of the Nation­al Park Part­ner­ship Plan object­ives / tar­gets on net zero and car­bon neut­ral­ity for the Nation­al Park, the Clerk to the Board has also under­taken a com­par­is­on exer­cise to assess the estim­ated car­bon emis­sions asso­ci­ated with dif­fer­ent meet­ing formats – see Table 3 below for a sum­mary of these estimates.

Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity Ugh­dar­ras Pàirc Nàiseanta a’ Mhon­aidh Ruaidh

Plan­ning Com­mit­tee, Item 13 29 August 2025 Page 7 of 9

Table 3: Estim­ated car­bon emis­sion com­par­is­ons between dif­fer­ent meet­ing formats

	Hybrid (Hos­ted from Grant­own)	In-per­son (Grant­own)	In-per­son (Bal­later)
Estim­ated CO2 emis­sions per meeting	110kg	372kg	424kg

1. In the con­text of cur­rent budget con­straints and object­ives / tar­gets around net zero and car­bon neut­ral­ity for the Nation­al Park, the addi­tion­al fin­an­cial and car­bon costs asso­ci­ated with return­ing to in-per­son only meet­ings and / or reg­u­larly mov­ing the plan­ning com­mit­tee to dif­fer­ent loc­a­tions across the Nation­al Park are likely to be dif­fi­cult to jus­ti­fy. It is there­fore con­sidered appro­pri­ate that most plan­ning com­mit­tee meet­ings should con­tin­ue to be held in hybrid format from the Park Authority’s Grant­own-on-Spey office. The pro­posed updates to the Com­mit­tee Stand­ing Orders reflect this.

2. How­ever, there is likely to be scope to vary this approach when determ­in­ing plan­ning applic­a­tions that raise issues of par­tic­u­lar sig­ni­fic­ance – for example, applic­a­tions that are recom­men­ded for approv­al and are con­sidered to be depar­tures from the devel­op­ment plan. Such applic­a­tions gen­er­ally rep­res­ent a small pro­por­tion of our over­all applic­a­tion case­load, and it is con­sidered reas­on­able to hold the plan­ning com­mit­tee meet­ing in a loc­a­tion close to the site of the pro­posed devel­op­ment, and to require mem­ber attend­ance in per­son, in these rare instances. Again, the pro­posed updates to the Com­mit­tee Stand­ing Orders reflect this.

3. To ensure the ongo­ing effect­ive oper­a­tion of hybrid meet­ings, gen­er­al etiquette guid­ance on hybrid meet­ing attend­ance is also pro­posed with­in the updated Com­mit­tee Stand­ing Orders. This includes a gen­er­al expect­a­tion that mem­bers attend­ing meet­ings online should keep their cam­era on whenev­er pos­sible, as this is help­ful for both officers present­ing reports and applic­ants / mem­bers of the pub­lic address­ing the com­mit­tee, and it also assists the Plan­ning Con­vener to identi­fy mem­bers who wish to ask questions.

Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity Ugh­dar­ras Pàirc Nàiseanta a’ Mhon­aidh Ruaidh

Plan­ning Com­mit­tee, Item 13 29 August 2025 Page 8 of 9

Site vis­it attendance

1. The exist­ing Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Stand­ing Orders state that any mem­ber may pro­pose a motion for a site vis­it where they con­sider it neces­sary for the effect­ive determ­in­a­tion of a plan­ning applic­a­tion. Such a motion can only be pro­posed after the plan­ning officer’s present­a­tion on the applic­a­tion has been made to the com­mit­tee and any points of cla­ri­fic­a­tion have been dealt with.

2. As sum­mar­ised in Table 1, changes are pro­posed to the Com­mit­tee Stand­ing Orders to make it clear that in most cases the need for a site vis­it will be iden­ti­fied in advance of an applic­a­tion being presen­ted to the com­mit­tee (through agree­ment between the Plan­ning Con­vener / Deputy Con­vener and the Head of Plan­ning). This prac­tice has already been oper­at­ing for sev­er­al years but it is import­ant that the Com­mit­tee Stand­ing Orders are updated to reflect it. Such site vis­its are rel­at­ively rare, and they are gen­er­ally lim­ited to plan­ning applic­a­tions that raise issues of par­tic­u­lar sig­ni­fic­ance. It is likely that many of these cases will be the same as those for which it is pro­posed to hold the com­mit­tee meet­ing in a loc­a­tion close to the site of the pro­posed devel­op­ment and to require mem­ber attend­ance in per­son (see para­graph 10 above). As such, it is con­sidered reas­on­able that attend­ance at these site vis­its should be made man­dat­ory, and the pro­posed updates to the Com­mit­tee Stand­ing Orders reflect this.

3. The exist­ing abil­ity for mem­bers to pro­pose a motion for a site vis­it on any oth­er plan­ning applic­a­tion will be retained, and the exist­ing non-man­dat­ory nature of attend­ance at any such site vis­it will also be retained. This is because in such cases the applic­a­tion will have already been deemed as cap­able of determ­in­a­tion by the com­mit­tee, and the pro­cess of con­sid­er­a­tion will have star­ted. In such instances, if a defer­ral for a site vis­it is agreed, it is reas­on­able that not all mem­bers may feel the need to under­stand the spe­cif­ics of a site by way of a visit.

Next steps

1. Fol­low­ing agree­ment by Plan­ning Com­mit­tee, the updated Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Stand­ing Orders will be presen­ted for form­al approv­al at the next meet­ing of the Park Authority’s Board.

Cairngorms Nation­al Park Author­ity Ugh­dar­ras Pàirc Nàiseanta a’ Mhon­aidh Ruaidh

Plan­ning Com­mit­tee, Item 13 29 August 2025 Page 9 of 9

Stra­tegic risk management

1. Main­tain­ing up to date Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Stand­ing Orders will help to mit­ig­ate the risk of suc­cess­ful leg­al chal­lenge to decisions of the Park Authority’s Plan­ning Com­mit­tee on a pro­ced­ur­al basis.

Implic­a­tions

1. Resource implic­a­tions asso­ci­ated with spe­cif­ic aspects of the Stand­ing Orders are high­lighted in para­graphs 6 to 9 above (with respect to Plan­ning Com­mit­tee format and loc­a­tion). There are no oth­er dir­ect resource implic­a­tions asso­ci­ated with this item of business.

Sup­port­ing information

1. The pro­posed amend­ments to the Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Stand­ing Orders agreed in 2019 are set out in Appendix 1 to this paper. Pro­posed amend­ments are shown in tracked changes in Appendix 1 to high­light pro­posed changes.

2. Appendix 2 to this paper presents a ver­sion of the Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Stand­ing Orders should all pro­posed amend­ments be accep­ted. Appendix 2 is presen­ted for ease of read­ing the final pro­posed ver­sion of the Plan­ning Com­mit­tee Stand­ing Orders.

Dav­id Berry August 2025 davidberry@​cairngorms.​co.​uk