Draft Financial Guarantees for Minerals Development Supplementary Guidance

Overview

The draft Financial Guarantees for Minerals Development Supplementary Guidance sets out detailed advice about the range of financial guarantees that may be used to secure restoration of minerals sites. The consultation is aimed at owners and operators of minerals developments, solicitors, agents and staff who work on preparing planning applications.

Why your views matter

It is important that minerals sites are restored in accordance with approved plans soon after working has finished. Restoration plans are agreed in principle before the start of any development. Plans and sites are regularly checked and updated to make sure that as development progresses land is being restored. This is set out in our Local Development Plan, and the draft Supplementary Guidance supports the Plan’s policies on minerals development.

Usually site operators carry out the restoration work. A financial guarantee is needed in case the planning authority needs to take over the restoration work for any reason. The financial guarantee can be called on to pay to complete the restoration work.

All responses to the consultation will be fully considered and will be used to inform the finalised guidance. The guidance and all consultation responses are scheduled for consideration at a public meeting of our Strategic Policy and Resources Committee. This will take place shortly after the close of the consultation.

Strategic Environmental Assessment

We consulted Scottish Natural Heritage, Historic Environment Scotland and Scottish Environment Protection Agency to check whether this supplementary guidance is likely to raise issues of significant environmental impact. We also considered the criteria that are set out in the Environmental Assessment (Scotland) Act 2005.

The Council has determined that the Financial Guarantees for Minerals Development Supplementary Guidance is unlikely to have significant environmental effects and has therefore decided that Strategic Environmental Assessment is not required. Our Screening Determination sets this out in more detail.

Who Is Consulting

Perth & Kinross Council, Housing & Environment Service, Planning & Development, Development Plans Team.

Who Can Comment

Anyone can comment, including:

• Landowners or minerals developers who are responsible for lodging bonds and carrying out minerals development;
• Agents or advisors who are involved in preparing and reviewing bonds, and programming how the minerals development will be carried out;
• Planning & Enforcement Officers and Solicitors because they monitor compliance and change to the development’s progress and programme plans at appropriate intervals, and take part in discussions on the level of any bond or guarantee to be negotiated or amended.

How To Comment

You can make comments on the supplementary guidance online by clicking on the 'Give Us Your Views' link below. Or you may send your comments by email to the address at the top of this page, or by post to the Local Development Plan Team at Perth & Kinross Council, Housing & Environment Service, Pullar House, 35 Kinnoull Street, Perth, PH1 5GD.

Give Us Your Views

What happens next

This consultation has now closed. Your comments are valuable because they will be used to shape the final version of the Supplementary Guidance.

The Council will consider the issues raised in the comments that were made during the consultation. We will prepare a report setting out the comments we received and an explanation of how these comments were taken into account when preparing and finalising the Supplementary Guidance. The finalised Supplementary Guidance will be issued and adopted, and it will then form part of the Development Plan and will be used when determining planning applications.