To ask the Minister of the Environment what plans are in place to ensure that Planning Service staff who are re-deployed under the current proposals, have ample opportunity to avail of training to keep their professional skills and registration current, in the event of a future upturn in planning applications.

In developing arrangements for the redeployment of specialist planning staff to other duties in the Department and the wider NICS, the Department will seek to incorporate provisions that would enable those staff to be considered for future vacancies in planning.

The Department’s officials have already been in discussion with the RTPI and clarified that if a specialist planner is not working in a specialist planning role they can still retain their planning status provided they can demonstrate 50 hours of Continuous Professional Development (CPD) over a 24 month period. It would be the Department’s intention, with the co-operation of receiving Departments, to agree that specialist planning staff who are voluntarily re-graded and redeployed are provided with the opportunity to avail of CPD activity or training for 12 months from the date of redeployment.