The Planning Inspectorate’s new digital appeals service is being rolled out nationally following a successful pilot with five London boroughs. The roll-out will take place in three phases, with all authorities in England joining the service by December.
The service has been piloted in five London boroughs (Barnet, Greenwich, Havering, Richmond upon Thames, and Bromley), where householder appeals (fast-track cases) and section 78 (full planning) appeals have been ‘thoroughly tested’ with the system.
The first cohort in the roll-out is active, with planning authorities in Glocestershire and Gosport already using the system. The number of authorities will be increased towards the end of July, with the remaining planning authorites in England added by the end of the year.
In a statement announcing the roll-out, the Planning Inspectorate said:
“We want to thank our pilot local planning authorities for their valuable feedback and collaboration, which has been crucial in refining the service. We’re also grateful to our project team, casework teams and inspectors for their hard work in developing this system.”
The Inspectorate says the benefits of using the online system for local planning authorities are numerous and include several improvements. Efficiencies have been introduced with the streamlined submission and management of appeals, a user-friendly dashboard enables the reviewing and monitoring of cases, and communication between all parties is improved while reducing paper-based processes.
In June, around 800 people from over 230 local planning authorities joined an online session to showcase the new service and outline the changes. A recording of the session can be seen at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j-7VupbL8ZI
