The new legislation rolled out by the Planning Authority is holistically reforming the planning application procedures with the purpose of ensuring better public participation in the planning process and achieving fairer and faster decisions.
One of the major changes earmarked in the new legal notice includes the introduction of a new type of planning application which now sits along the familiar full development application and the Development Notification Order (DNO). This new planning application, which is known as the ‘Summary Procedures’ will incorporate a number of development types which have been removed from the DNO legislation.
The ‘Summary Procedures’ will include development works which do not require external consultations and which are easily assessed by existing planning policies. The Summary Procedures has been categorised into 12 development types.
More importantly, this new procedure ensures that a notice is affixed to a property where the intervention is proposed to be carried out while giving the public 15 days to submit an objection. A Summary Procedures application must be decided within 42 days.
For a full development application, while the period for the public to submit objections has been increased to 30 days, the established time frame for these applications to be determined is a maximum of a 100-day window from the date of validation.
The new legal notice has also introduced a ‘penalty’ on the authority when it does not honour its legal time frame
To safeguard the rights of registered objectors to submit an appeal, all planning development permissions issued are automatically temporarily suspended for a period of 30 days from the publication of the decision.
The new legal notice has also introduced for the first time a ‘penalty’ on the authority when it does not honour the legal time frame in the processing of a planning application.
An applicant now has the right to request a refund of the original fees paid from the authority. For major projects planning applications, the daily ‘penalty’ is of €500, whereas for full development applications and Summary Procedures, the daily rate is of €100 and €25 respectively, provided that the refund does not exceed 50 per cent of the Development Planning Fee. The applicant has a 30-day period for which to submit to the authority a request for a refund.
All planning applications received and decisions taken by the authority will be published on a Wednesday in a special edition of the Government Gazette and on the Department of Information website.
The authority has also reintroduced the provision for an applicant to apply for an outline development permit. This type of planning permission gives approval in principle to a proposed development for which a full development application will spell out the specific matters. The outline permit will state the time frame by when a full development permit must be submitted to the authority.
To ensure better scrutiny and reduce the discretion of a case officer on which entity to consult on any given planning application, the new legal notice demands that irrespective of where or what development is being proposed, the authority must notify and consult with all 11 external consultees.
The consultees include the Superintendent of Cultural Heritage, National Commission Persons with Disability (KNPD), Environment and Resources Authority, Occupational Health and Safety Authority, Transport Malta, Water Services Corporation, Malta Tourism Authority, Enemalta Corporation, Civil Protection Department, the Environmental Health Directorate and the local council within whose boundaries the application is located.
When it comes to enforcement issues, the authority has also introduced a number of measures which will strengthen its purpose. The authority is placing greater emphasis on the need for an applicant to submit the commencement of work notice five days prior to the start of works on site. Failure to adhere to this requirement will render the development permission as never having been utilised.