Ms Charlotte Sheridan:

It is a matter we must consider because there is significant duplication of effort. As plans are prepared, data are gathered but there is no central place for them to be held. Plans sit on shelves and the value of that effort gets lost. There is a significant amount of information we should be gathering. There should be a centralised means for so doing. The GIS facilitates us doing so. That can provide us with great information in terms of developing proposals for particular areas. It goes from including information on trees and nature within cities and towns, as well as landscape assessments, which is very important, right through to the building fabric. An important issue we all talk about is vacancy and the levels thereof. One can have layers of information that can provide a sense of what we have now and the levels of vacancy. That can be a great way of measuring the extent to which policies are working effectively. We can look back to a particular point and assess the data in order to see where we are now, whether improvements have been made and whether the policies and objectives have been effective.