Only yesterday, I met the Economy Minister on the planning process, specifically in regard to green energy. The subject that I have discussed most since coming back into post is planning. On that matter, I have met a wide range of stakeholders; I have engaged with my officials; I have met people involved in planning improvement; and I have met the commission that I formed to improve planning. We are beginning to see the green shoots of improvement.

I keep coming back to one conclusion in every discussion that I have had about planning: unless the planning application that is submitted is complete, providing all the information and environmental statements etc that are required, you will face delay. It is like any other process: if you do not get the first step right, the rest of it will not work out for you. The most important step that we will take is implementing the validation checklist, learning from the best-practice example of Belfast City Council, which, for an application to be submitted, requires a completed validation checklist to ensure that the application contains all the materials that are required.