§ Mr. Alan Howarthasked the Secretary of State for the Environment what guidance is given to the planning inspectorate about the need to expedite planning appeals: and what steps are being taken to monitor the performance of individual inspectors in this regard.
§ Mr. TraceyThe planning inspectorate's first objective is to ensure that planning appeals are dealt with fairly and thoroughly, but as quickly and efficiently as possible. Inspectors are issued with all Governmemt Circulars which stress the need for promptness in dealing with planning applications and appeals. They are fully aware of the need to impose times for handling appeals. However, we continue to seek a significant improvement in overall performance, and in May 1985 set up an efficiency scrutiny to examine ways of accelerating handling times. An action plan will soon be published, in208W which an objective will be set of reducing median times for handling appeals dealt with by written representations. This median time has already been reduced from 22 weeks in the last quarter of 1984 to 19 weeks in the same period in 1985. By administrative and legislative action, and the introduction of modern technology, the aim is to reduce the median time to 11 weeks by 1988. A complementary study of the handling of appeals dealt with by local inquiries is expected to result in similar improvements in performance.
Individual inspectors' performance is monitored by the scrutiny of weekly returns submitted by every inspector. A computer-based management information system is currently being established which, among other things, will facilitate regular checks on the attainment of pre-set targets by individual inspectors.