Digital Planning: EIR release

Information requested

1. How much the collective budget for the overall digital planning project has been since its inception (i.e. formation of Digital Planning team) to date, broken down by financial year?

2. For each financial year, how much of the budget was spent on salaried employees vs external contractors? 

3. Of the project deliverables, what has been delivered and what how much was spent on external contractors to deliver that outcome?

4. Of the other project deliverables still to be delivered, what has been spent to date on external contractors, along with a timescale for the completion of these?

Response

As the information you have requested is ‘environmental information’ for the purposes of the Environmental Information (Scotland) Regulations 2004 (EIRs), we are required to deal with your request under those Regulations. We are applying the exemption at section 39(2) of FOISA, so that we do not also have to deal with your request under that regime. This exemption is subject to the ‘public interest test’. Therefore, taking account of all the circumstances of this case, we have considered if the public interest in disclosing the information outweighs the public interest in applying the exemption. We have found that, on balance, the public interest lies in favour of upholding the exemption, because there is no public interest in dealing with the same request under two different regimes. This is essentially a technical point and has no material effect on the outcome of your request.

1. How much the collective budget for the overall digital planning project has been since its inception (i.e. formation of Digital Planning team) to date, broken down by financial year? 

Financial Year	Budget
2019-20	2.4m
2020-21	£2.6m
2021-22	£2.2m
2022-23	£4.6m
2023-24	£3.1m

2. For each financial year, how much of the budget was spent on salaried employees vs external contractors?

While our aim is to provide information whenever possible, we are unable to provide you with all the information sought in this element of your request. This is because the Scottish Government does not hold some of the information you have requested. Therefore, we are partially refusing this request under the exception at regulation 10(4)(a) of the EIRs. This is because the nature of work within Scottish Government requires staff to work across different workstreams and we do not as a rule record the time spent or staff costs incurred across the different elements of our work. However, I have provided specific records of the team’s staff costs. I should stress however that some of these costs will have been incurred supporting work outwith the digital planning programme including support for planning authorities and the planning profession during Covid and support for the Ukraine Resettlement Directorate. This exception is subject to a public interest test. I have set out the reasons in Appendix A of this response.

Financial Year	Salaried Employees	External Contractors
2019/20	£484,933	£1,292,781
2020/21	£565,982	£1,770,122
2021/22	£473,387	£1,586,657
2022/23	£640,453	£2,033,400
2023/24	£790,377*	£1,720,067*

*Costs until 31 December 2023

3. Of the project deliverables, what has been delivered and what how much was spent on external contractors to deliver that outcome?

Our approach to delivery was structured around a four-phase methodology; exploration, prototyping, building and live. In the exploration phase we identified and examined potential opportunities and challenges. This was followed by prototyping, where we developed and tested initial solutions. The building phase involved refining these solutions and preparing them for deployment. Finally, the live phase is the final operational product. Our approach ensured we adhered to the Scottish Governments Digital Scotland Service Standards, a process that ensures that all corporate delivery meets expected standards. For the purpose of your request, I have extracted the following information from the division’s Business Plan annual reports and other sources.

Financial Year	Deliverables	External Contractor costs
2020/21	In November 2020 we published Transforming Places Together:Scotland’s digital strategy for planning, setting out a framework for a world-leading digital planning system with key missions to deliver it – based on people, data, technology, working practices and a culture of innovation. In March 2021 we launched our Digital Transformation Delivery Programme which will deliver the digital tools, technology and data to make planning more inclusive and efficient realising benefits for all users of the planning system. The programme is underpinned by a £35m  funding commitment over the next five years. We provided support for the COVID pandemic including the creation of a number of data dashboards. They included: COVID Impact Analysis, Vaccine Centre Location Analysis, Community Support Funding dashboard designed to communicate the delivery of COVID related community funding, Non-Domestic Rates analytical support and other one-off analyses including mapping stalled high value construction projects and public access to greenspace.	See part 2 of request
2021/22	We began programme initiation activities, including establishing programme governance arrangements and agreeing high level priorities with the Programme Board We completed the exploration phase (1) of the new single payment system A landscape review of technology capabilities across local planning authorities was completed.	See part 2 of request
2022/23	Completed the exploration phase (1) of a new ‘smart’ planning application service which has included building a prototype and testing different ideas based on the findings of the discovery stage to provide a solution to take forward to the next stage.  Phase (2) of new single payment system forthe current live service was developed. Roll out of the Placebuilder tool went underway with licences available for interested parties  We completed the exploration & prototyping phases (1 & 2) of a Planning Gateway.  We completed the design of a technical blueprint that provided a comprehensive view of the technical landscape in the planning systems used across Scotland. We completed the assessment of the practical use of a 3D visualisation tool for future planning integration.	See part 2 of request
2023/24	We completed foundational work to establish a national process for the submission and approval of planning and building standards applications. We completed the technical architecture of a ‘Cloud Platform’ that will support the infrastructure for the Programmes services outputs and deliverables. We have completed the vacant and derelict land viewer, an interactive web map which aims to “encourage, promote and facilitate the reuse of brownfield, vacant and derelict land and empty buildings, and to help reduce the need for greenfield development.” A Data Strategy including a delivery roadmap was completed ready for publication. A ‘Data Platform’ foundation was created that will support the data storage and management for the Programmes service outputs and deliverables. A Digital Skills Portal was created to provide a ‘one stop’ web portal to improve the confidence of digital skills, amongst all planners in their everyday roles. In partnership with the Scottish Futures Trust, we delivered the Place-Tech Lab with three Local Authorities to test the way in which innovative digital resources and data analytics can be used. Phase 3 of the new single Payment System was completed in preparation for testing with early adopters.	See part 2 of request

4. Of the other project deliverables still to be delivered, what has been spent to date on external contractors, along with a timescale for the completion of these? 

Of the other project deliverables still to be delivered, what has been spent to date on external contractors, along with a timescale for the completion of these. As indicated in part 2 of my response. The nature of work within Scottish Government requires staff to work across different workstreams. Consequently, I am refusing this element of your request under the exception at regulation 10(4)(a) of the EIRs. While I have been unable to provide all of the information you requested, I hope that the information provided proves helpful.

Appendix A

Public Interest Test
Under the terms of the exception at regulation 10(4)(a) of the EIRs (information not held), the Scottish Government is not required to provide information which it does not have. The Scottish Government does not have the information you have requested because the nature of our work requires colleagues to work across different workstreams. This exception is subject to the ‘public interest test’. Therefore, taking account of all the circumstances of this case, we have considered if the public interest in disclosing the information outweighs the public interest in applying the exception. We have found that, on balance, the public interest lies in favour of upholding the exception. While we recognise that there may be some public interest in information about, clearly we cannot provide information which we do not hold.

About FOI

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