Mr. Conor O'Sullivan:

There are two separate pre-application consultation phases, under section 247 and section 247(a). Effectively, a prospective applicant can engage in the section 247 process and there is no time requirement on them to proceed to the next stage, the section 247(a) process, so they can decide whether to move on to the section 247(a) process and at what stage they do so. Once they then decide to make an application to the local authority for the section 247(a) final consultation meeting, as we are calling it, there is an eight-week process for the determination of the opinion of the local authority, which has been outlined. Once that is received, the legislation states the opinion will only be valid for one year. Therefore, once people are in receipt of that opinion, they then have to proceed to make the planning application within one year or they have to recommence the process again.