The provisions in Part 2 of the Community Empowerment Act regarding Community Planning, and the sole regulation regarding locality planning, came into force on 20 December 2016. The final guidance for statutory partners and a Plain English Guide, designed to help people and community bodies understand what Community Planning is all about, have also been published.
Part 5 of the Community Empowerment Act sets out the key rights and duties regarding Asset Transfer. This legislation came into force on 23 January 2017. Guidance has been developed for both relevant authorities and community bodies and can be accessed via the Scottish Government’s website.
The council are currently revising the existing asset transfer policy and process in light of the new guidance.
Draft guidance has also been published for the Participation Requests part of the Act (Part 3). The Scottish Government have been developing the revised regulations and expect these to be laid before Parliament in early 2017. The provisions in this part of the Act will then come into force on or around 1 April 2017.
Each public service authority is expected to develop its own process for promoting and dealing with requests. The Community Planning team are currently developing a range of supporting materials to raise awareness of the Act across the CPP and within communities. Further information on this will be available shortly.