The decision to try out the 'Streamlined Consultation Scheme' for a six month period was taken at last Thursday night's meeting of Council's Public Sector Liaison Committee following a presentation on its many benefits by Divisional Planning Manager, Fiona McCandless.

Councillors were told that the scheme, currently being piloted in Derry and Limavady, largely mirrored the successful system which operates in many councils during the summer recess, whereby non-contentious planning applications are issued by the Planning Service without formal Council consultation.

The aim is to both help councillors in their decision taking on key planning applications and to accelerate the processing of all planning proposals by reaching an agreed decision on minor applications and issuing decisions quickly.

Currently, all planning applications are processed with similar agreed procedures.

Following consideration by the Planning Service, planning applications are presented on a schedule before a monthly meeting of the planning committee (Public Sector Liaison) with an opinion to either approve or refuse and, after consultation with councillors, a decision is issued by the Planning Service.

Ms McCandless pointed out that the applicants currently must await the monthly meeting of the Planning Committee before even the most straightforward decisions can issue and that this can add several weeks to the processing time for minor applications.

She said Ballymena Borough Council receives, on average, over 1,100 planning applications per year and said research had shown that about 56% of these would fall within the proposals of the pilot scheme.

Responding to queries from a number of councillors, she confirmed that they would continue to have the right to request that any application be included for discussion on the monthly schedule which is presented with 'opinions' to their planning committee.

However, she stressed the pilot scheme had the potential to reduce the size of their agenda, enabling councillors to concentrate scarce resources on major, finely balanced or controversial planning proposals.

Councillors also heard that the scheme had proved highly successful in Londonderry where all the political parties and 85% of agents had expressed satisfaction with it.

Proposing that Ballymena Borough Council introduce the scheme on a six months trial basis, Councillor Tommy Nicholl said: "Anything that can speed up the system is to be welcomed".

His proposal was seconded by Councillor Hubert Nicholl who said that, in the past, he had seen some straightforward planning applications held up for two or three months.

Also commenting, Councillor Paul Frew added: "I feel for people who are waiting for decisions to be made - this is a great way of fast-tracking applications".

Mr Frew, however, queried whether, given the speed of the scheme, neighbour notificiation would be maintained.

He was assured by Ms McCandless that this would be the case.

Among the minor applications which will be included in the scheme are - extension and alterations to dwellings, boundary walls and fences, residential garages and garden sheds, advertisements and direction signs, electricity lines up to 33kv, change of house types on approved sites, shop fronts, new accesses, agricultural buildings and structures, minor alterations and extensions to schools/churches/health centres and other civic or community facilities, and other minor developments such as smoking shelters and disability access arrangements.