Local development plan evidence report - defining Gypsies and Travellers: consultation

We asked for views on the Scottish Government’s proposed definition of ‘Gypsies and Travellers’ for the purposes of section 16B of the Town and Country Planning (Scotland) Act 1997, as amended by the Planning (Scotland) Act 2019. This would be provided in Local Development Planning Regulations that will overall support the implementation of the future local development plan system, a system which manages the development and use of land in the long term public interest.

We asked 7 consultation questions. These sought views on our proposed definition of ‘Gypsies and Travellers’, how councils can better involve the Gypsy and Traveller communities in planning consultations and processes, and the impact this (or any) definition would have in businesses and protected characteristics (to inform the Business and Regulatory Impact Assessment and Equalities Impact Assessment).  We asked for responses by 15 February 2023, allowing 8 weeks for comments.

As part of this consultation, we also conducted four in-person engagement events with Travelling community members and have been considering the feedback from these events alongside the online responses.

You provided us with 41 responses to our consultation questions. These included responses from 23 organisations and 17 individuals. Respondents included local authorities, housing services, Gypsy/Traveller representative bodies, Travelling Showpeople organisations, third sector organisations and other professional bodies, as well as communities and individuals.

Respondents were generally supportive a definition of ‘Gypsies and Travellers’ to provide clarity on the Evidence Report consultation stage of the local development plan. Key recurring issues with our proposed definition included:

• The need to recognise ethnic Gypsy/Travellers as a distinct category to Travelling Showpeople
• The acknowledgement that Travellers stop travelling for various reasons that cannot be pinpointed exactly and thus cannot be listed in one definition
• The need to ensure that the definition is not so broad that it includes non-travelling people, as the proposed definition included ‘persons who require the provision of land for temporary or permanent living’ and this is not restricted to Gypsies and Travellers

We have taken account of the responses which have informed the final definition to be included in Development Planning regulations, laid in Parliament on the 24^th March 2023.