HC Deb 25 May 1994 vol 244 cc153-4W
Mr. Waterson

To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment what performance targets he has set for the Planning Inspectorate Agency for the financial year 1994–95.

Mr. Baldry

The key objectives for the agency in 1994–95 remain to preserve the impartiality and quality of the inspectorate's work while seeking further to improve efficiency. I have set the following further key targets for the agency's work in England:

Timeliness:

  1. (a) 80 per cent. of planning appeals by written representations to be decided within 18 weeks;
  2. (b) To provide an inspector for local plan inquiries when requested within 26 weeks of the end of the objection period;

Financial:

  1. (a) Unit costs of planning appeals decided by written representations to be held at or below £690;
  2. (b) Recover 90 per cent. of receipts due within 8 weeks of invoice date;

Efficiency: Generate a 3 per cent. efficiency improvement in running costs, as compared with 1993–94;

Quality:

  1. (a) The number of justified complaints about the way Inspectors have carried out their duties, and the number of High Court challenges, should be less than one in every hundred decisions issued;
  2. (b) The number of justified complaints about the way the Inspectorate handled the procedural aspects of casework should be less than one in every hundred cases received;

Volume: To determine 15,500, appeals, subject to intake not declining;

Information and Guidance: To complete a third customer survey by 31 December 1994.

These and other performance targets for the agency will be included in its business plan for 1994–95 which will be published shortly.

Separate targets for the agency's work in Wales are being announced today by my right hon. Friend the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Wales.