Scotland’s public finance minister has pledged changes to the planning system to help it play a “full part” in tackling the country’s housing emergency.

Ivan McKee has announced that a specialist hub is to be created to help increase the rate at which homes for which planning permission has been granted are delivered.

The new hub, which should be up and running early next year, is being staffed and funded by the Scottish government.

McKee also said the government would treble the number of bursaries being made available to post-graduate students looking to study planning, and added that a “fuller package of training” is being developed for local councillors who have to make planning decisions.

The public finance minister announced the actions the day after he admitted he is “concerned” about the length of time it takes for projects to get planning permission.

But in a statement to Holyrood he insisted that “planning is not the only, or even the most significant, reason for the challenges we are facing in housing”.

McKee said that “across Scotland, we estimate that more than 164,000 homes have planning permission but have not yet been built”.

He added: “In the Glasgow and Edinburgh city regions alone, planning permission has been granted for 121,000 homes that have not yet been built. Of these, around 38,000 units have been started but are not yet complete.”

McKee added that making progress on the number of “stalled” planning applications would be an “absolute priority” for the Scottish government.

To help with that, McKee announced the creation of the Housing Planning Hub, saying ministers want it to “enable more efficient, responsive and timely decisions and delivery”.

Housebuilding body Homes for Scotland (HFS) has welcomed yesterday’s announcement on planning by McKee. This follows fresh statistics showing that the average processing time for major residential applications had increased to 60 weeks despite a 29% fall in the volume of applications.

The Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) also identified the planning system as limiting levels of home building due to lack of predictability; length, cost and complexity of the process; and insufficient clarity and consistency in its market study final report earlier this year.

HFS chief executive, Jane Wood, said: “In the context of the housing emergency, this announcement is six months overdue but nonetheless very welcome, recognising as it does the key role that the planning system has to play in facilitating the delivery of more homes of all tenures across Scotland and the need for it to be properly equipped to do so.  It is clear that the Minister has clearly listened to sector concerns and taken steps to address them.  We applaud him for doing so, and to committing to ensuring tangible results in the next 12 months.

“Given the scale of the challenge that faces us, this will be no easy task and there is clearly much detail to be unpicked – for example, we do not recognise the figures referenced regarding the number of homes having been granted planning permission but not yet built and would suggest that they do not reflect either the complexity of the myriad of issues facing home builders or the very real nature of the housing emergency.

“But this is the opportunity for a positive reset and we are fully dedicated to working with stakeholders, including government at all levels and our colleagues in local planning authorities, to provide the homes that meet the needs of all those living in Scotland and that they can afford.  The ‘Team Scotland’ approach and ambition to use the planning system to make our country the most attractive part of the UK for investment is both refreshing and reinvigorating.  We will play our full part in helping to achieve this.”

Specific measures announced by the minister for public finance include the establishment of a further Planning Hub to support housing delivery and the stopping of work on the introduction of an infrastructure levy, with the focus instead to be on improving guidance on Section 75 planning agreements.

With regards to SME home builders and the sites referenced by the Minister which have been permissioned but not taken forward.

Wood said: “We have already published a comprehensive package of recommendations to support SME home builders in June on which an official response from the Scottish Government is awaited and followed this up with a roundtable discussion between members and the Ministers for Housing and Public Finance in August so we trust work in this area will be able to move at pace.

“On the stalling of sites, we are already working with members to understand the reasons behind any such examples and look forward to interrogating the Scottish government’s datasets when published to assist with this.” 

Also in response to McKee’s announcement on reforming Scotland’s planning system, Timothy Douglas, head of policy and campaigns at Propertymark, commented: “Reforming Scotland’s planning system is key to making housing more affordable and measures to create a new planning hub and increasing the capacity of local authorities by training additional planners to accelerate planning applications will help build the homes that Scotland needs.

“However, as the minister said, planning isn’t the only solution to unlock more homes in Scotland and solve the housing crisis. Reviewing the tax people pay when purchasing property, bringing more empty homes back into use through financial grant support, building more social homes, introducing tax incentives to encourage investment in the private rental sector as well as requiring local authorities to have a plan for retirement housing and incentivising people to right size can also boost the supply of homes. Propertymark will continue to call for action in these areas.”