The Planning (Electronic Communications) Order (Northern Ireland) 2006

1.—(1) Regulation 2 (interpretation) shall be amended as follows.

(2) In paragraph (1)—

(a) after the definition of “the Directive” there shall be inserted the following definition—

““electronic communication” has the meaning assigned to it by section 4 of the Electronic Communications Act (Northern Ireland) 2001.”;

(b) in the definition of “local advertisement”, after the words “replacement of a development plan;” there shall be inserted “and where the Department maintains a website for the purpose of advertisement, by publication of the notice on the website;”.

(3) After paragraph (3) there shall be inserted the following paragraphs—

“(4) In these Regulations, and in relation to the use of electronic communications for any purpose of these Regulations which is capable of being carried out electronically—

(a) the expression “address” includes any number or address used for the purpose of such communications;

(b) references to notices or other documents or to copies of such things include references to such documents or copies of them in electronic form.

(5) Paragraphs (6) to (9) apply where an electronic communication is used by a person for the purpose of fulfilling any requirement in these Regulations to give or send any notice or other document to any other person (“the recipient”).

(6) The requirement shall be taken to be fulfilled where the notice or other document transmitted by means of electronic communication is—

(a) capable of being accessed by the recipient;

(b) legible in all material respects; and

(c) sufficiently permanent to be used for subsequent reference.

(7) In paragraph (6), “legible in all material respects” means that the information contained in the notice or document is available to the recipient to no lesser extent than it would be if sent or given by means of a document in printed form.

(8) Where the electronic communication is received by the recipient outside the recipient’s business hours, it shall be taken to have been received on the next working day; and for this purpose “working day” means a day which is not a Saturday, Sunday or a public holiday.

(9) A requirement in these Regulations that any document should be in writing is fulfilled where that document meets the criteria in paragraph (6), and “written” and cognate expressions are to be construed accordingly.”.