THIS week's Councillor Column is written by David Kinniburgh, Conservative member for Helensburgh and Lomond South and Argyll and Bute's policy lead on planning and regulatory services.

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AS I write this column Argyll and Bute Council have commenced a ‘Planning Our Future Consultation’ seeking public opinion on what matters to you when it comes to delivering the services provided by them. In February 2017 Council’s across the country will set their budgets for the coming year and the information provided by the consultation being carried out by Argyll and Bute Council will on the one hand be used to establish the services that are important to you and on the other to identify areas where savings could be made.

Eighty per cent of the funding Argyll and Bute Council receives each year is provided by the Scottish Government and those funding levels are being significantly reduced each year. It is expected that the savings Argyll and Bute Council will need to make will be between £4 million and £13.1 million in 2017/18.

This of course means that difficult choices have to be made and that is why the information provided by the consultation is so important because it allows elected members to best represent your views when making the difficult choices they are asked to make each year - choices that no one wants to make but ever decreasing funding from Scottish Government demands!

I would therefore urge everyone to take part in the consultation which is available on line at: www.argyll-bute.gov.uk/consultations/planning-our-future-budget-consultation-2016 until 9th January 2017 where as well as being able to complete the consultation document you will find useful information on the Budget Challenge along with facts and figures.

In an earlier column I advised of the Scottish Government's response to the independent planning review consultation ”Empowering Planning to Deliver Great Places”.

As previously advised an issue that is raised regularly at our Planning Committee meetings is increased planning fees for major planning application. The Scottish Government have just commenced a consultation which runs until the end of February 2017 seeking views on setting a new maximum fee of £125,000 for major applications for most categories of development (£62,500 for planning permissions in principle).

In my view this would be a welcome increase from the current capped levels if approved by the Scottish Government.