THE Scottish Government has announced that planning fees are to rise from April 1 in order to provide ‘much needed’ additional resources to local authorities.
It will see the fee for new build properties increase from £401 to £600 per house for the first 10 homes, with the rate dropping to £450 per house for property builds between 11-49 and to £250 for each house in developments containing over 50 up to the maximum fee of £150,000.
Planning minister Tom Arthur said, “The planning system plays a central role in shaping the places where we live, work and access local services – and in delivering a just transition to a net zero economy. Ensuring planning departments are efficient and effectively resourced is vital to realising our ambitions for Scotland and supporting recovery.
“That is why reviewing planning fees and performance is a key part of our planning reform programme. This is a significant change to planning fees, which will provide substantial additional income to authorities and help to move towards fully recovering the cost of dealing with planning applications.
“I expect these increases to lead to improvements in planning performance and we will shortly progress the recruitment of Scotland’s first national planning improvement co-ordinator.”
