Planning system improvement call

Mr McMillan will speak at the Enterprising Scotland conference

Business leaders have urged the Scottish Government and local councils to "get a grip" and provide resources to improve the planning system.

Iain McMillan, director of CBI Scotland, said that despite recent reforms, there were still issues in the planning system that needed addressed.

He is due to discuss the issue at a conference in Glasgow later.

CBI Scotland previously calculated that problems with the system were costing Scotland £600m each year.

While national targets mean local authorities should decide 80% of major applications within four months, government figures showed that fewer than half of all major applications are determined within that time - a worse performance than two years ago.

Figures showed that in 2006-07 just 46.5% of major applications were determined within the target period, compared to 51.5% in 2004-05.

Mr McMillan said that was "truly shocking, not least given the great focus on planning reform" in recent years.

He added "local and the Scottish Government need to get a firm grip and apply the appropriate resources" to address the situation.

Wider work is progressing on the skills and culture change required to support modernisation Stewart Stevenson Infrastructure minister

Speaking ahead of the Enterprising Scotland conference, he said: "Local councils and the Scottish Government must give much greater weight to economic growth when considering planning applications.

"There must be a greater presumption in favour of development built into our planning system.

"If the Scottish Government does not deal with this, ministers' own ambitions to equal the UK's rate of economic growth by 2011 will be put at serious risk."

Infrastructure minister Stewart Stevenson said planning reform was crucial to "help, not hinder, our aim of increasing sustainable economic growth".

He added: "The government is creating a planning system which gives developers greater certainty with up-to-date development plans, helping create quicker processing of applications.

"The new system has a more proportionate approach, with the focus on efficient delivery of major and significant proposals."