Hansard

We have had a fascinating and constructive debate, which has teased out misunderstandings. I am disappointed by my own inability to get across the purpose of amendment 126, which I think has been misunderstood by Christine Grahame and Tricia Marwick.Amendment 126 is not too broad in scope; it is the reverse. I expected members to argue that the amendment is too narrow in scope, because it would limit the right of appeal to people who have received notification of the application and have made representations to the planning authority. Not even everyone who received notification of the application would have the right to appeal. Far from being too broad, the amendment is laser-beam narrow in scope. As Euan Robson acknowledged, it identifies a particular group of people.Amendment 126 will be put to the vote before the other amendments in the group and I urge members to support it. Their votes would take nothing away from the amendments that Sandra White and Donald Gorrie lodged.On Christine Grahame's point, I did not say that the example that I gave was about a mistake by a planning officer; I said that although all the officials had recommended that the application should not be approved, it had been approved. That brings us back to a fundamental point. I am not talking about battles between officials and democratically elected councillors; I am describing a cry for help when a mistake has been made and people say, "Can someone else please just look at the decision?"Scott Barrie said that the proposed approach is about closing the stable door after the horse has bolted. Cathie Craigie agreed with him. However, Scott Barrie did not seem to recognise that mistakes—or, if you like, bad decisions—are made. We all make bad decisions. I have made bad decisions and mistakes and I am sure that Scott Barrie has. We all have, because we are human beings and human beings make mistakes. It is not good enough to say, "We've got a super-duper system." It probably will be a super-duper system, but that is not enough. I am trying to make the committee consider the whole issue. It is not enough to say, "We want to front-load everything and therefore we can't look at the end result." We have to consider the system as a whole. As Patrick Harvie said, when people go through the whole process and come to the end result, we do not want them to think, "I was not heard. They didn't understand and nobody else looked at the decision."I agree with everything that Patrick Harvie said. I was delighted to hear, once again, the voice of reason from him. He talked about appeal pressure existing in only one direction. That is an important point because, as I hope we all know, the Scottish Executive inquiry reporters unit sees 1,200 appeals every year—there were certainly between 1,150 and 1,200 last year. Of course, those appeals all relate to the applicant, because neighbours and others cannot appeal. Patrick Harvie hit the nail on the head when he implied that the term "third party" is a bit anoraky. We are talking about real people—Mr and Mrs Smith or Mr and Mrs Jones—and not about people in the abstract. That is why I gave an example, but I am sure that our mailbags are full of examples.Both Cathie Craigie and the minister said that they have faith in our democratically elected councillors but, again, I say that this is not meant to be a battle. It is not a case of saying, "They are democratically elected, therefore their decisions stand." We cannot argue with that. I am simply saying, "Can we have somewhere in the system where somebody casts an eye over decisions again?"I liked John Home Robertson's phrase "a happy applicant". It is suggested that people are not happy with the decision, so they want an appeal to overturn the decision. Of course, every decision is the right decision for one person and the wrong decision for someone else. I think that that is the point that John Home Robertson was trying to make. He made it quite well when he talked about the happy applicant, but that is not the point that I am making. I do not expect that every appeal should overturn the decision. In fact, I imagine that many decisions would be upheld. The point is that people should feel that we have the best system that we can get. It is not a question of one person winning and one person losing.I understand Dave Petrie's point and I would agree with him except for one thing. If we follow his logic, appeals would not be necessary at all. That is what he was saying. I thought, "Crikey, wait a minute. If that's the case, why do we have appeals at all? Why does the inquiry reporters unit deal with 1,200 appeals a year if appeals are not necessary?" I would understand the argument that we do not need a third-party right of appeal if the people who make that argument said, "We do not need appeals because the system is so good." I am challenging the system. Whatever system we put in, it will not be infallible. Mistakes are made because we are human beings. Through my simple amendment, I argue that those people who are most directly involved should have the feeling that somebody else cast an eye over the decision.The convener's contribution at the end of the debate was very good. She hit the nail on the head. We are gathered around the table for today's meeting, whether or not we are members of the committee. I am a substitute member, but I have never been called to attend. I am looking forward to my first attendance as a substitute.