True, strategic planning has delivered precious little for Derry so far – the number of competing 'visions' is proof of that. But anyone who looks at the progress on the Ebrington site, or the exciting plans for Ebrington and Fort George, can see that Derry is on its way to becoming a truly exciting and vibrant city. It is not the principle of planning that is wrong – just that it was handled badly in the past. We can have confidence in the current Ilex plans and the progress in implementing them.

Superficially, Brendan Duddy's argument looks attractive. “If some entrepreneur in Derry or elsewhere has the funds to build the first unit give them a clear run in either Fort George or Ebrington,” he says. But where would that leave the proposals for a massive cultural quarter at Ebrington, or the modern business centre that will create permanent, well-paid, jobs for the long term at Fort George?

No one can criticise Brendan Duddy's demand for fast action. The Planning Service needs to get its act together and its failure to do so continues to harm Derry and all of Northern Ireland. This is why Peter Robinson and the Northern Ireland Executive are to be congratulated that the Planning Service is the first target of the new Performance and Efficiency Delivery Unit. Getting the Planning Service to perform quickly and to be efficient could dramatically improve economic development in the North West.

Despite the obstacles created by slow planning approvals, the answer to Derry's problem of shortages of jobs and skills is not just to throw up low quality buildings and wait for them to come down – as could be argued happened in the past, with the Ulster Bank building in Waterloo Place and the Quayside and Richmond shopping centres. What happened during the Troubles as a crisis response should not be regarded as a precedent for peacetime development. Such an attitude would produce a new blight on a city that should be one of the most beautiful in Ireland, sustaining a substantial local tourism industry.

While Brendan Duddy rightly calls on Magee to provide higher quality courses that support the local economy – as it should have been doing for many years, with an enlarged campus – that will not provide the immediate jobs in the short term that he, rightly, wants to see. But more than this, we need a coherent labour market strategy that provides the skills locally to meet predicted demand opportunities – this needs to be an agreed approach that draws in not only Magee, but also the North West Regional College and local schools.

We need a clear economic plan for Derry. Dublin has financial services. Cork has pharmaceuticals. Galway has IT and medical equipment. In which sector does Derry's future lie?

Long-term local progress also requires improvements to our road connections and airport – factors that have shown to be key for economic development of other cities across Europe.