A veteran campaigner who has been a thorn in the side of planning officials through her battles to save St Andrews from a “tsunami” of development has spoken out about the “difficulties” she believes are faced getting information from Fife Council planning service.
Tenacious campaigner Penny Uprichard, who is a member of St Andrews Community Council’s planning committee, hit out at the planning service’s “refusal” to supply her with paper copies of planning documents.
Despite the prevalent use of the internet to access council websites, she believes “most people” prefer paper copies of planning documents.
Miss Uprichard, who recently lost a high profile planning case at the UK Supreme Court, feels Fife Council is putting “obstacles” in the way of scrutiny.
She says it is like “extracting teeth” to get information from council websites as there are thousands of pages which can be impractical to read. She also said it was difficult to speak to planning officials when she had questions.
She complained that there was “never enough voicemail memory space” to leave messages on the phones belonging to the “lower echelons” of council staff, despite she said, the installation of a new £20 million phone system a few years ago.
She said the phones often “ring and ring and ring or you get put through to a call centre where you are told to make an appointment.”
She added: “This is ridiculous.”
Bill Lindsay, Fife Council service manager (development plan) said: “We have been in lengthy written correspondence over the availability of development planning documents.
“We publish all of our information online and there is no obstacle placed to anyone wishing to access that information.
“Our experience, confirmed in recent talks with community and stakeholder groups, is that most people are content to use online information but we do need to find a reasonable balance by offering a printed version of documents in libraries.
“We will look to provide bespoke printed copies on request (and at a cost, where appropriate) and we will place a printed reference copy in each of our local offices and/or libraries in the plan area.
“The appointment system for planning application discussions is also working well. Callers are phoned back at an agreed time.”