I haven’t heard anything so far. I held a press conference last week to present the bill but there has been no negative feedback so far. I think there is no reason to show opposition to this reform and I hope discussions will lead to a positive conclusion.

<B> What does this bill aim at exactly?</B>

The goal is to make sure that permits are issued in a transparent way. Guidelines have been set up and specific criteria exist to obtain a permit. Like the recent law on local communities, this new reform aims at facilitating the issuing of industrial and commercial permits. This bill will also provide for a specific appeal tribunal. At the moment, the town and country planning board is judge and party at the same time as it deals with the issuing of permits. In other words, when someone finds that the refusal of his/her permit is unfair, he/she has to go to the same authority to complain about unfairness. As a result, we are creating a specific tribunal for appeals: the planning appeals tribunal. We are going even further: if this tribunal rejects the appeal, the plaintiff can go to court as a last resort. However, this will be possible only if the plaintiff bases him/herself on a legal point.