A small group of us met with members of Highland Council Planning Department yesterday to discuss the Highland Wide Local Development Plan. We particularly raised the vision which we felt set the tone for everything that followed. Julian has been looking at the vision wording.

The vision of Highland Council as set out in the Development Plan is:

By 2030, Highland will be one of Europe’s leading regions. We will have
created sustainable communities balancing population growth and economic
development across the area, and have built a fairer and healthier Highlands.

'A fuller and focused vision should be realistic about the 2030 world and beyond. Planning
in the next 20 years will create the environment for those who live in Highland into the
end of the century and beyond. The Scottish Government has accepted the inevitability
of climate change and passed the Climate Change Act that constrains the carbon footprint
of Highland Region by law until at least 2050. Any development plan has to meet this
obligation head on and requires new thinking of its consequences, rather than believe it
will be met by sleight of hand or creative accounting. The requirements of the Climate
Change Act which demand a year-on-year reduction in carbon emissions by around
3% needs to be an identifiable focus of Highland’s vision, and this demands that new
infrastructure takes a disproportionately large role in achieving this reduction'.

We are trying to suggest an amendment to the vision of the Highland-wide local development plan perhaps extended to read:

By 2030, Highland will be one of Europe’s leading regions. We will have
created sustainable communities balancing population growth and economic
development across the area, have built a fairer and healthier Highlands, and
led Scotland’s challenge to reduce carbon emissions to safeguard the long-term
prosperity of the Highlands.

 An suggestions?