Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill

(Limited Text - Ministerial Extracts only)

Committee stage
Thursday 18th May 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Lansley (Con)]

I want briefly to refer to the clause stand part notice tabled by my noble friend Lord Young of Cookham and I for a probing purpose. Clause 126 has the effect of retaining the community infrastructure levy in London and Wales, but I will not talk about Wales. We are leaving Wales out of it for these purposes. The clause retains the community infrastructure levy in London, alongside the introduction of the infrastructure levy. I understand that that is essentially because the mayoral CIL has been used for the provision of Crossrail and is expected to do so for years to come.

However, it has raised in our minds a question to ask my noble friend the Minister about whether the community infrastructure levy, which of course does not provide for affordable housing, can live alongside the infrastructure levy for a number of years. The technical consultation, which is to be concluded on 9 June, does not explain how the respective contributions are to be assessed in a combined fashion because they apply to different parameters of the development. That leads to the assumption that with a 10-year transition we are looking at many places across the country with a combination of community infrastructure levy obligations that have arisen in relation to developments over a number of years and past developments, alongside the introduction of the infrastructure levy. The technical consultation, to my reading, does not help us understand how these two things are going to be meshed together. Of course, many noble Lords tabled their amendments in this group before the technical consultation was published. It answers some of the questions, but not all of them, and I think this is one question that it does not quite answer.

Another question occurred to me while reading the technical consultation in relation to affordable housing. It does not yet provide certainty about whether contributions under the infrastructure levy may be regarded as an improvement on the situation where developers are able to negotiate or renegotiate their liabilities under Section 106. Developers are not engaging in negotiations simply because they can and therefore they do and local authorities do not give way simply because they ask for it. Circumstances change.

I am always burned by the fact of the October 2008 crash. In the space, literally, of weeks, the economic viability of many large-scale development projects changed dramatically. If you look at any system, including this system, and it cannot meet the test of what you would do under those circumstances, I am afraid it does not help. Renegotiation of the contributions is one solution. It might be said that if the market price and the gross development value of a large site crash in the way they did in October 2008, the infrastructure levy crashes as well. The problem then is: how is the affordable housing going to be funded? How is the other infrastructure to be funded?

I do not have answers to all these things, but my noble friend and I will perhaps have an opportunity in the next group to talk a bit more substantively about the infrastructure levy and what we might do about it, but that does not answer the question. If affordable housing presently often suffers by being a residual after other Section 106 obligations have been met, and if under the infrastructure levy it becomes, in effect, a right to require and it is elevated above other requirements, there will be a great deal of difficulty in local communities about the fact that there are many other obligations that the infrastructure levy has to meet that may not be able to be met if the gross development value comes down or if, for example, the affordable housing right to require and the tenures that have to be provided lead to a much higher cumulative discount needing to be paid. We have to have some flexibility built into the system, and the risk at the moment is that that is not presently available in the way that we have understood it in the past. We can strengthen local authorities, and in the next group I hope we can talk about how that might be possible.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities (Baroness Scott of Bybrook) (Con)]

My Lords, Amendments 313 and 317 propose to make the levy voluntary for local authorities or to introduce it through a pilot system. I acknowledge that the reforms we are proposing will need to be implemented in a sensible manner. There are problems with the existing system, but it is important that we do not introduce new issues. We want to ensure that the new levy delivers at least as much affordable housing as the existing system, and that is why we are currently consulting on the levy and intend to consult again on the draft regulations. We want input from across the private and public sectors, and we will consider the feedback carefully as we proceed. As I mentioned previously, the new levy will be introduced through a process of test and learn and a phased-out programme. I hope that this will provide the noble Baroness, Lady Taylor, the reassurance that further piloting powers are not needed.

In terms of introducing the levy as a voluntary system, we are seeking to create more certainty across the whole system of developer contributions. We recognise that the levy must be introduced carefully to ensure that it will deliver the intended results. That is the purpose of the test and learn. However, if we do not aim for a unified system, we will dilute the potential benefits. I hope this provides the noble Baroness, Lady Hayman, with sufficient reassurances to withdraw Amendment 313.

Amendments 364 and 364A are concerned with how the Government will assess the delivery of affordable homes under the new infrastructure levy. Given the length of time of the proposed rollout, requiring an assessment of the levy 120 days after the Bill is passed, as proposed in Amendment 364, provides an insufficient amount of time meaningfully to assess the impacts of the levy, but I reassure the Committee that during the rollout the Government will work closely with stakeholders to monitor the impacts of the levy. That includes monitoring our commitment to deliver at least as much, if not more, affordable housing.

In addition, the department has commissioned a scoping study to develop an approach to the evaluation of the planning elements of the Levelling-Up and Regeneration Bill, which we expect to report following Royal Assent, and the full evaluation informed by the findings of the scoping study will then be commissioned. I hope this gives reassurance to the noble Baroness, Lady Taylor, and that she will feel able not to move her amendment.

On Amendment 364A, first homes were a 2019 manifesto commitment and are already successfully established in the market through a grant-funded early delivery programme. Outside that programme, the first homes discount is funded by developers as part of their contribution through planning obligations. The Government currently publish information about the delivery of first homes through both the early delivery programme and planning obligations in our annual affordable housing supply statistical release, and I reassure the noble Baroness, Lady Hayman, that we will continue to do so. We will work closely with local authorities throughout the phased test-and-learn implementation programme to monitor the Government’s key objective to maintain affordable housing supply. This will include but will not be limited to first homes. I hope I have provided the noble Baroness with sufficient reassurance not to press that amendment.

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[Lord Foster of Bath (LD)]

I am sorry to interrupt the Minister. She has given a number of examples. Will the biodiversity net gains required in the Environment Act 2021 be included in the exceptions she has just listed?

[Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)]

I think I have just said that we are currently consulting on what will be in those. I would prefer to wait until after that consultation and then we will know what is going to be in them.

Amendments 332 and 333 seek to require a local authority to prepare an assessment of its affordable housing need and for the infrastructure levy rates to be set at a level that will meet this need in full. We must recognise that the total value that can be captured by the levy, or indeed any system of developer contributions, will not necessarily match the costs of meeting the entire affordable housing need of an area. Revenues will depend on the value of development that comes forward, and that will not always match need.

Nevertheless, new Section 204G(2) in Schedule 11 requires that charging authorities, when setting their rates, must have regard to the desirability of ensuring that affordable housing funded by developer contributions equals or exceeds present levels. That will ensure that affordable housing need is accounted for when levy rates are set. Furthermore, charging schedules will be subject to scrutiny by public examination to ensure that it does.

I want to make it clear that the list of infrastructure issues is not in priority order. Although affordable housing may be seventh on the list, that does not make it a priority. That list is also not necessarily complete.

As noble Lords will no doubt be aware, strategic housing market assessments or similar documents are currently part of the evidence base used to prepare a local plan. These are required as a result of national policy contained in the National Planning Policy Framework, rather than in primary legislation. Under the new system for preparing local plans, local authorities will continue to be required to prepare evidence regarding different types of housing need, including affordable housing. That will inform not only the local plan but the infrastructure delivery strategy.

I agree that it is important that the levy is based on up-to-date evidence of affordable housing need. It is the intention that local plans, charging schedules and infrastructure delivery strategies are prepared together. However, during the transition period, this may not always be possible. That is why our preferred approach is to use regulations and guidance to set out how evidence-based documents, including evidence on different types of housing need, should be considered. I hope I have given reassurance to the Committee that the provisions in the Bill will enable levy rates to be set with proper regard to affordable housing need, and that the noble and learned Lord, Lord Etherton, will feel able not to press his amendment.

Amendments 334 and 334A have the commendable purpose of ensuring that the levy meets its aims of delivering at least as much affordable housing as the current system, if not more, or otherwise addressing locally identified need for affordable housing. The Bill allows regulations to make provision about matters to be considered by charging authorities when setting rates, including the desirability of ensuring that affordable housing funded by developer contributions equals or exceeds present levels. This will ensure that affordable housing need is accounted for when rates are set but, if the Government are overly prescriptive about requirements, the development of an area could become unviable. That is because affordable housing need may exceed what can be captured through the levy. In such circumstances, rates would need to be set at such high levels that neither affordable housing nor market housing would come forward.

The Bill has been drafted carefully to enable local authorities to find the right balance when setting rates and capture as much value as they can while maintaining viability. As I have said, local authorities’ infrastructure levy charging schedules will be subject to public examination, meaning thorough scrutiny of how and why levy rates are set at a particular level. The infrastructure delivery strategy will also be subject to examination, alongside either a local authority’s charging schedule or its local plan. We envisage that the infrastructure delivery strategy will set out the proportion of levy payment that an authority will require to be delivered in kind as affordable housing. I hope that this provides the noble Baronesses, Lady Warwick and Lady Taylor, with sufficient reassurance not to press these amendments.

Amendments 340, 341, 344, 344A, 349 and 350 are all concerned with how local planning authorities should spend levy proceeds. With regard to Amendment 340, the infrastructure levy is an important tool to support sustainable development objectives at the local level. There is an existing requirement for local authorities, when exercising any function in relation to local plans, to do so with the objective of contributing to the achievement of sustainable development. This is set down in Section 39 of the Planning and Compulsory Purchase Act 2004 and will remain in the new plan-making system.

To create sustainable development and successful places, it is important that the infrastructure is appropriately planned for. Contributions from developers are a key tool in mitigating the impacts of new development, alongside wider government funding. The Bill provides a flexible framework to allow local authorities to decide which infrastructure projects they spend the proceeds on. When making such decisions, the Government expect local authorities to fulfil their functions by having regard to all their legal requirements in the round—for example, contributing to the achievement of sustainable development.

I turn to Amendments 341 and 344. As I hope that I have impressed on the Committee, we have designed the levy with the aim of delivering at least as much affordable housing as the current system of developer contributions, if not more. Should the levy generate more revenues than at present, local authorities would be able to choose to direct those additional revenues to meeting their local affordable housing need. Nevertheless, local authorities will need to balance this objective of affordable housing delivery with the levy’s other objectives, such as supporting the development of new roads and medical facilities. We think it is right that local authorities, which know their areas best, are best placed to make local decisions in balancing funding for matters such as affordable housing and other local infrastructure need. I hope noble Lords will therefore feel able not to press these amendments.

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[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Lansley, for initiating this clause stand part debate, because in the way we do business in your Lordships’ House, amending existing Bills, it is always worth taking a step back and asking whether we need to do this at all. He has generated a very interesting debate, and in the other groups on the infrastructure levy, it has always been worth holding in our minds whether this is the right way to do it, or whether we should go back to what we have already. That is always worth doing.

The local government community would welcome some clarity on the whole issue of developer contributions. The LGA has been quite supportive of the infrastructure levy, with some qualifications, but wants clarity on what quantum we are expecting to get from it, as well as what is expected to be achieved by it, because we are in danger of making it into the motherhood and apple pie of local government funding, and it certainly will not achieve that.

This is even further complicated in two-tier areas—I have the scars on my back to prove it—where the district council is the housing authority and is looking for substantial contributions to housing, but the upper-tier authority has a duty to press for funding for education, highways, flooding and all the other things that upper-tier authorities look after. It is important we understand the weighting of those various voices in the infrastructure levy process, because otherwise all the pressure on infrastructure will raise viability questions once again. The noble Lord, Lord Greenhalgh, who is not in his place today, previously raised issues about emergency services and whether they warrant consideration for infrastructure levy. These are questions we are rightly looking at as we go through the Bill.

Our provision in the first group was for pilots, and we would have preferred that they were carried out before the Bill came to the House, which would have enabled some testing of the efficacy of the infrastructure levy before we went down this route, but that is shutting the stable door. I should be interested to hear the Minister’s responses on how long the transition period will be and what will be done to test this out as we go through the process.

The noble Lord, Lord Lansley, asked why, if what the Government are trying to achieve is a minimum contribution levy, they do not just do that. I should be interested to hear the Minister’s answer to that question. It is a really good point that, if we must assess this at planning, post-commencement and at final adjustment, what happens if there is significant inflationary pressure, a market crash or whatever between those stages? If it works one way and the final adjustment ended up being a further contribution in cash from developers to make up the difference, that is one thing; if it goes the other way, however, and the viability at the planning stage is greater than what is achieved at the final adjustment, what happens then to the difference? There is quite a lot still to be thought through on this.

I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Lansley, for raising the question, but the local government community is quite keen now to have the issue of developer contributions resolved. If the infrastructure levy is going to do that, that would be a good thing, but there are many more questions to answer before that happens.

[Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)]

My Lords, I thank my noble friend Lord Lansley for tabling these amendments.

As we have discussed, infrastructure delivery strategies will help local authorities to plan for the vital infrastructure that is needed to support sustainable development in their area. The infrastructure levy is designed to be a more effective and streamlined system than CIL and planning obligations. Unlike CIL, the new levy will be a mandatory charge which all relevant authorities will be required to adopt. This is an important step in reducing the complexities of the existing system and ensuring uniformity. Also, it ensures that all local authorities benefit from the levy receipts for their local area over time. The levy will be designed to be responsive to market conditions, meaning that local authorities get a fairer share of the uplift in land value that often occurs between the grant of planning permission and site completion to fund local infrastructure.

My noble friend Lord Lansley asked what happened if there was a 10% reduction in GDV which resulted in a 40% reduction in developer profit. As the final liability is based on the gross development value, if the sales value falls, the levy liability will also reduce—that happens similarly at the moment anyway.

The infrastructure levy will be able to fund the provision of affordable housing, largely replacing the operation of the Section 106 agreement. At the moment, the Section 106 agreement is what delivers most of the affordable housing and is often hard fought by local authorities. This will be a much more stable way of delivering affordable housing. The new right to require will mean that local authorities can stipulate the affordable housing that they require to be delivered in kind as part of that levy liability.

My noble friend Lord Lansley also asked about regional inequalities. We can only capture the land value uplift that is there. We expect to capture more in high-value greenfield areas, obviously, and this is what happens in the existing system—you cannot do that any other way.

The noble Baroness, Lady Pinnock, also brought in the point about the infrastructure delivery strategy and existing local plans, which is an important issue. We must accept that we are making a big change here. An assessment of infrastructure need will be undertaken alongside the local plan. In the long term, we expect these two parts of the delivery strategy will be brought together, but during transition they may have to be undertaken separately. We are talking about long-term here, and we expect those two plans to be together eventually and as soon as possible.

[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

The issue about regional inequalities is really important. This is supposed to be a levelling-up Bill. If there will be more inequalities in the infrastructure levy in different parts of the country, then it is hard to see how it will help the Bill to do its job in terms of levelling up. It will exacerbate inequalities, not help to level them up.

[Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)]

I am not sure that is right. To take affordable housing, in an area with lower housing-cost needs and where housing is of lower value, you cannot expect the same infrastructure levy for houses and land of £150,000 to £350,000, so you must get that balance right. However, with levelling up, we would expect the values to come up and level as we go through the levelling-up procedure.

[Lord Stunell (LD)]

The noble Baroness makes a very interesting point, but the problem is that construction costs are not as widely differentiated as land costs. This means that an area with a low level of levy will not be able to build an equivalent number of homes to an area with a high levy. The mismatch between costs and income will be the problem.

[Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)]

I take that point. We have talked about the different rates from different development typologies, and we expect local authorities to set different rates. As the noble Baroness said, they do that with COUNCIL for different development types. We have published research that shows the range of possible rates for different case study areas, and I have put the results of that research in a letter.

For all these reasons, the Government are introducing the new infrastructure levy through the Bill and it is the correct thing to do for the country. There are too many local communities that, with the CIL system and the Section 106 system, are not getting what they deserve from the developments in those areas. So a new system, however difficult it is or however long it takes to deliver, has to be the right way to go.

[Baroness Pinnock (LD)]

The Minister makes a very important point about the infrastructure levy, as opposed to Section 106 and CIL. Could she provide us with some evidence that the infrastructure levy will raise more money than the existing system?

[Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)]

I will look to the evidence but, as I have clearly stated many times, we are expecting the same if not more housing, particularly affordable housing, from this infrastructure levy. I just say to my noble friend Lord Lansley, as I have said before, that we are not getting rid of Section 106 agreements, but will use them only in very restricted circumstances. The main issue from this is that affordable housing comes out of the Section 106 system and into the infrastructure levy system. When the whole country moves to the infrastructure levy, it will make affordable housing a much more important issue when it comes to how we use developer contributions in the future.

I move on now to government Amendment 361A. This makes three consequential changes to other Acts of Parliament to ensure that the new infrastructure levy will be treated in the same way as CIL in relevant legal contexts. First, Section 101(6) of the Local Government Act 1972 requires that a local authority’s functions in relation to levying rates may be exercised only by that authority—in other words, those functions may not be delegated—but CIL is not a “rate” for this purpose. This means that a local authority may delegate its CIL functions.

Amendment 361A replicates this approach in respect of infrastructure levy functions. I emphasise, however, that the Bill contains important safeguards for democratic accountability. For example, new Section 204K(6) makes it clear that a local authority may approve its infrastructure levy charging schedule only at a meeting of the authority and by a majority of the members present.

Secondly, Section 70 of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990 provides that “local finance considerations” can be a material consideration when determining planning applications. Local finance considerations include CIL, which can therefore be a material consideration when a planning application is determined.

Government Amendment 361A treats the infrastructure levy in the same way, allowing infrastructure levy receipts—anticipated and received—to be taken into account when determining planning applications. This does not override the primary aims of the infrastructure levy to support the development of an area by providing infrastructure, including affordable housing, or its meeting of other purposes, as set out in regulations, in a way that does not make development of the area economically unviable.

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Moved by

[Baroness Scott of Bybrook]

355A: Schedule 11, page 365, line 22, at end insert—
“(ea) may make provision treating CIL as if it were IL,”Member's explanatory statement
This amendment enables IL regulations made under new Part 10A of the Planning Act 2008 (as inserted by Schedule 11 to the Bill) to make provision treating the charge known as the community infrastructure levy under section 205 of that Act to be treated as if it were the charge known as the infrastructure levy.

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Moved by

[Baroness Scott of Bybrook]

357A: Schedule 11, page 365, line 38, after “obligations)” insert “(including provision about obtaining sums under subsection (1)(d) of that section for use in connection with IL)”
Member's explanatory statement
This amendment enables IL regulations made under new Part 10A of the Planning Act 2008 (as inserted by Schedule 11 to the Bill) to make provision about the use of the power under section 106(1)(d) of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990 to obtain sums for use in connection with IL.

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Moved by

[Baroness Scott of Bybrook]

361A: Schedule 11, page 366, line 36, at end insert—
“Local Government Act 1972
1A In section 101 of the Local Government Act 1972 (arrangements for discharge of functions by local authorities), after subsection (6) insert—“(6ZA) Infrastructure Levy under Part 10A of the Planning Act 2008 is not a rate for the purposes of subsection (6).”TCPA 1990
1B In section 70(4) of the TCPA 1990 (determination of applications: general considerations), in paragraph (b) of the definition of “local finance consideration”, after “payment of” insert “Infrastructure Levy or”.Deregulation and Contracting Out Act 1994
1C In section 71(3) of the Deregulation and Contracting Out Act 1994 (functions excluded from sections 69 and 70), omit the word “and” at the end of paragraph (h) and after that paragraph insert—“(ha) sections 204R and 204S of the Planning Act 2008 (Infrastructure Levy: collection and enforcement); and”.”Member's explanatory statement
This amendment makes amendments to a number of Acts in consequence of new Part 10A of the Planning Act 2008, inserted by Part 1 of Schedule 11 of the Bill, which makes provision for a new Infrastructure Levy.

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[Baroness Pinnock (LD)]

My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Young of Cookham, very much for the best explanation of community land auctions that I have heard. I have searched the internet to find a good explanation but have heard the best one this afternoon from him.

The issue is how we capture for local communities the uplift—a very large uplift in many cases—in land values once planning consent has been given to a site. This is one way in which it could work and it has some attraction to it. However, living as I do in West Yorkshire, where land values are not like those in Surrey, Hampshire or Berkshire, the inevitable consequence of community land auctions is exactly as the noble Lord, Lord Young, said: to the well off, more shall be given while to the least well off, little shall be given.

As far as I can tell, this will exacerbate regional inequalities. As the noble Lord, Lord Young, said, this is a levelling-up Bill. Living where I do, I was really looking forward to lots of proposals in it to reduce regional inequalities, but this is one example of where it will do the opposite. Somehow we have to find ways of extracting the very considerable uplift in land values once planning consent is given for housing.

Where I live, we still have many former industrial sites in need of costly remediation, and those land values will not be there for a community land auction. The provision will work only on greenfield sites, which is contrary to what we are trying to achieve. It will increase regional inequalities, which is contrary to the purpose of the Bill. If we can find a better way of extracting land value once planning consent or planning allocations have been given, that is where we should go. I am not convinced that this is the way, interesting though the proposal is. “Let us see the evidence” is what I would like to say. I know we are going to do a pilot, but somebody somewhere in the department has done some thinking and provided some evidence. Let us see it before we make a decision on this, because otherwise it is a dive into the unknown.

My last point is that there have not been good examples recently of local authorities getting involved in commercial practice—in fact, the contrary is the case. That is where this would take us: local authorities bidding for and buying land at a certain value and then hoping that, once they sell it on with planning consent, the extra can be extracted. That is putting a lot of faith in the commercial expertise within local authorities, which I am not sure they have. If I was putting a bet on developers and landowners against local authorities, I know which one would win.

[Earl Howe (Con)]

My Lords, in addition to the levy we have been debating, the Government are interested in testing other mechanisms that could improve land value capture.

Community land auctions are an innovative process of identifying land for allocation for development in a local planning authority’s area in a way that seeks to optimise land value capture. Their aim is to introduce transparency and certainty by allowing local planning authorities to know the exact price at which a landowner is willing to sell their land. The crux of our approach is to encourage landowners to compete against each other to secure allocation of their land for development in the local plan by granting a legally binding option over their land to the local planning authority.

The competitive nature of community land auction arrangements incentivises landowners to reveal the true price at which they would willingly part with their land. If the land is allocated in the local plan upon its adoption, the local planning authority can sell the CLA option, keeping the amount that the successful bidder has paid and capturing the value that has accrued to the land as a result of the allocation. The successful bidder must then pay the price set out by the original landowner in the option agreement to purchase the land. The detailed design of community land auction arrangements will be set out in regulations that will be subject to the affirmative procedure. In a moment, I will address my noble friend Lord Young’s clause stand part notice but, for now, I hope that that is useful background, by way of introduction.

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[The Earl of Caithness (Con)]

My Lords, maybe it is because it is Thursday afternoon, but I am slightly more confused now than before my noble friend gave his reply. He said that the land would be within the development plan, but he also said that it is an innovative way of identifying land for development. Those two statements do not seem to agree; there is a contradiction. I do not think that my noble friend answered my noble friend Lord Young’s point about the distortions that this can cause to a potential development plan.

It is perhaps true more in the south of England than in the north, where land values are cheaper, but if a landowner gets in cahoots with the local authority and says, “I will sell you my land at X”, knowing very well that his chances of getting planning permission are zero, would that not encourage the local authority to alter the development plan to benefit itself and the community rather than doing planning in the old-fashioned way, which was to develop with a holistic view of the area?

One thing I am not certain about is where local authorities will get the funds from to buy that land, particularly in the expensive south-east. I wonder whether my noble friend can help me on that.

[Earl Howe (Con)]

My Lords, the process will not be as my noble friend has described. The simplest way I can describe this is that community land auctions will be a process of price discovery. In the current system, local planning authorities have to make assumptions about the premium required by a reasonable landowner to release their land for development. For Section 106 agreements, this manifests itself through viability negotiations between the local planning authority and a developer. As these can be negotiated, there is a higher risk that, in effect, higher land prices lead to reduced developer contributions, rather than contributions being fully priced by developers into the amount that they pay for land.

For the community infrastructure levy and the proposed infrastructure levy, a levy rate is set for all development within certain parameters. When setting rates, the local planning authority has to calculate how much value uplift will occur on average, and has to make assumptions about landowner premiums and set a levy rate on that basis. The actual premium required by individual landowners will not be available to local planning authorities and will vary depending on individual circumstances. If the local planning authority makes an inaccurate assumption about landowner premiums, they may either make a lot of sites unviable by setting too high a levy rate, or else they will collect much less than they might have done otherwise by setting too low a levy rate.

Under the CLA process, landowners bid to have their land selected for allocation in an emerging local plan, as I have described, by stating the price at which they would willingly sell their land to the LPA for development. The offer from the landowner, once an option agreement is in place with the LPA, becomes legally binding. The LPA can either exercise it themselves, thereby purchasing the land, or auction it to developers. The competitive nature of CLAs incentivises landowners to reveal the true price at which they would willingly part with their land. If they choose to offer a higher price, they risk another piece of land being allocated for development, in which case they will not secure any value uplift at all.

I do not want to prolong the debate unnecessarily, so I will respond to my noble friend in writing on the other questions I have not covered.

[Lord Young of Cookham (Con)]

I am very grateful to my noble friend the Minister for the very patient way he dealt with the argument I put forward. I will take him up on two points. First, he said that the Government will consult local authorities about this. Surely, before introducing primary legislation on a major planning system, they should consult the local authorities first, rather than after the Bill has gone through. Secondly, and perhaps more importantly, I think he said that when the local authorities were drawing up the plan they could take into account the financial benefits. I think that is moving towards what he subsequently deplored: namely, the sale of planning permission.

[Earl Howe (Con)]

The extent to which those financial benefits can be taken into account will be set out, as I mentioned, in regulations. My noble friend makes a fair point, but parameters will be set around this. On the issue of prior consultation, which the noble Baroness, Lady Taylor, also raised, one can take two views: one is to go through the process that my noble friend advocated, and the other is to say that the integrity and workability of the scheme is such that we can afford to come to this House and the other place first before launching a pilot. Our view is that it will be perfectly satisfactory to take that course.

[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

My Lords, this has been a very interesting discussion. This is probably one of the cases where there is less clarity at the end of the debate than there was at the beginning. I am very grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Young, for once again giving a very forensic and detailed analysis of the subject and for raising all the key issues that sit within it. As the noble Baroness, Lady Pinnock, said, it was a very clear description of community land auctions.

On the issue of consultation, I remind the Committee that the noble Lord, Lord Benyon, in answer to an Oral Question earlier today, said that we are in danger of doing too much consultation. In this case, it would have been helpful if councils had been consulted before this proposal was put forward in primary legislation, because some of the issues raised in the debate would have come up immediately—they are quite obvious to those of us engaged in local government.

I have great sympathy with what the noble Lord, Lord Young, said. There is a queue of things that many of us feel should be in this Bill, including renters reform, leasehold reform, repealing the Vagrancy Act and so on. They did not get across the line and put into this primary legislation; yet here we have a fairly unformed idea, which has not been tested, which is in the legislation. That process is a bit mysterious to some of us.

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[Baroness Hayman of Ullock (Lab)]

My Lords, I am delighted to see the Minister in his place because it gives him the opportunity to make me gruntled again. If he is doing the next two groups, I am beginning to think I should set him a weekly target to ensure that I am never disgruntled again with any of the things he is dealing with.

To be serious, this is a critical environmental issue. I thank the noble Viscount, Lord Trenchard, for tabling this amendment and for his excellent introduction. I also join the noble Baroness, Lady Bakewell, in her tribute to Lord Chidgey. He was deeply committed to this issue, and I think we should recognise that.

As we have heard, England has 85% of the world’s chalk streams, and they are at risk. They are very, very precious, and I really do not think this should be a political issue; it is something we should all be getting behind, and we should all be supporting their protection. As at the noble Lord, Lord Deben, said, they are more vulnerable than other waterways. There are many reasons for that, and we have heard many during the debate: agricultural pollution; sewage pollution; the decline of native species, particularly invertebrates; the introduction of non-native invasive species; development; population growth; and the fact that we simply use and waste far too much water. On average in Britain, we use more water per head per day than most other European countries. Most pressing are the low flows and the chronic abstraction, which noble Lords have talked about. We have also had issues in recent years with not having enough rainfall to support the levels of abstraction, even though people have been given warnings about the damage that that can cause.

As noble Lords have said, we support the reform of the abstraction licensing system, which is currently allowing too much water be taken from our chalk streams. We need to look at more robust infrastructure to support that, dealing with the ongoing strain of an unpredictable climate and rising populations. We need greater investment in storage capacity, and water metering needs to be managed more and developed.

One of the recommendations of the chalk stream restoration group—it is really good that the Government are getting behind it and supporting what it is trying to do—is that chalk streams should be given overarching protection and priority status. That is the one big wish we have heard noble Lords talk about. If there is anything the Minister should take from this debate and previous debates on the Environment Act, for example, it is that the Government really must give chalk streams a status that reflects that they are not just locally precious but, as we have heard, globally unique. This amendment would provide those protections. We support it and I urge the Minister to get behind it. If the Government cannot do anything today, I urge them to bring something forward.

[The Minister of State, Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Lord Benyon) (Con)]

My Lords, I refer to my entry in the register. Amendment 372ZA seeks to amend the definition “environmental protection” to include specific reference to the protection of chalk streams. It was so eloquently moved by my noble friend Lord Trenchard, and I pay tribute to his and other noble Lords’ passion on this issue. I assure them that I would not stand at this Dispatch Box and in any way jeopardise the future recovery of our chalk streams. I was in one last weekend and I will be in one again this weekend, as the mayfly start to hatch.

Mention was made of the catchment-based approach— CaBA—which is a wonderful piece of partnership working, so ably led by Charles Rangeley-Wilson. I was fortunate enough to visit him in Norfolk, to see where he has reconnected with the valley bottom or river bottom chalk streams that were previously canalised for water meadows, sometimes hundreds of years ago. There are remarkable benefits, which we measure rather technically in the water framework directive, but the key indicators, such as ranunculus and fish populations, can be massively enhanced by many measures that he and others carry out. The work was led in this House by Lord Chidgey and, of course, in Hertfordshire by my right honourable friend Sir Oliver Heald, whom I met just a couple of weeks ago to talk about this.

There is undoubtedly some good news about chalk streams. The Mimram, which I visited in the past and which suffered from massively low flow, has seen some improvement, but there is still huge pressure on these remarkable places. I am on record talking about them as our country’s equivalent of the rainforests: these areas are, in large part, particular to England—85% of them are here—and we want to see them thrive. Some excellent points have been made.

This Government are committed to protecting chalk streams, which we defined as priority sites in the Storm Overflows Discharge Reduction Plan, with a target of a 75% reduction in harmful sewage spills by 2035. In our Plan for Water, the Government also committed to reviewing the impact on chalk streams of private sewerage systems—my noble friend Lord Caithness made this point well. The pressures on them are from sewage outflows and inadequate sewage-treatment plants, farming and run-off, and serious problems due to misconnections and private sewerage systems that are not functioning properly.

I say to my noble friend Lord Lucas that we will certainly address the Lottbridge Sewer—how on earth it got that name I do not know—and make sure that it is part of our consideration of chalk streams. To the noble Baroness, Lady Jones, I say: the riverfly project of which she is part is one of the great examples of citizen science. It sees an enormous number of people assisting the regulator—the Environment Agency—in identifying when a problem occurs, so that it can then step in.

My noble friend Lord Caithness mentioned my visit to Marlborough in 2010, just after I became a Minister. I stood in a riverbed that was dry because water was being extracted from the Kennet and pumped out of the catchment to provide water for the people of Swindon. They needed water, but it should not have come out of the catchment. This really damaged a very special SPA and SSSI, but I am delighted that, through measures that the Government drove through our abstraction incentive mechanism, Thames Water then delivered water from the same catchment—the Thames—rather than the Kennet. The Kennet is now in a better, although not perfect, state. There are now huge opportunities, through private sector green finance initiatives and habitat restoration—driven by government actions, through ELMS and our Plan for Water—for chalk streams’ amazing natural environments to be restored, so that we can show the world that we lead the way on river restoration.

I certainly share my noble friend Lord Trenchard’s concern for the protection of chalk streams. I stress that the definition of “environmental protection”, for the purposes of the environmental outcomes report, has been drafted to ensure that the Secretary of State is capable of setting outcomes across the breadth of environmental concerns, very much including chalk streams.

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[Lord Deben (Con)]

I am sure that my noble friend’s comments are absolutely acceptable and I see perfectly well why he does not want this here. But is it possible just to consider whether attention might be drawn to this point somewhere else in the Bill? As he said, it is very special; I say this with a perfect lack of interest because, coming from the flatlands of Suffolk—where I am afraid we do not have any chalk streams—I am particularly keen to support the noble Viscount. Might the Minister consider putting this somewhere else in the meantime?

[Lord Benyon (Con)]

I will have to have discussions with colleagues and officials to see whether there are other areas of legislation, or areas in this legislation, where we could reassure the House. I have listened and will continue to listen on this, and I hope that noble Lords will reflect on this.

[Lord Berkeley of Knighton (CB)]

My Lords, the Minister mentioned the Kennet case. Is he satisfied that enough legislation is in place to prevent that happening again?

[Lord Benyon (Con)]

A decade ago, we provided a mechanism whereby overextraction would require action to be taken, in this case by water companies. It was a fairly geeky measure called the abstraction incentive mechanism, and it worked. Countless other measures can and should be taken, and our direction to Ofwat and the commitments in our Plan for Water will drive this forward, as will our abstraction reforms.

Rivers such as the Kennet can be affected by something incredibly small. Three miles of the Kennet’s ecosystem was destroyed about seven years ago by about an egg cup of a chemical called chlorpyrifos, which went through the drainage system—which is the responsibility of the local authority and the water company—into the river. That tiny amount wiped out life for about three miles. That is an indication of how fragile these systems are and how we must have protections that can trace this, make the polluter pay and make sure that this never happens again. It is incredibly important that we do this.

[Viscount Trenchard (Con)]

My Lords, I thank all noble Lords who have participated in this debate. I am greatly heartened by the universal tone of the speeches and contributions made.

I thank my noble friend Lord Lucas for his support. It is most unfortunate that his local chalk stream has the name it does; I do not know how easy it will be for him to change it, but I imagine there is some kind of complicated procedure for changing names—there is for roads, so there should be for rivers as well.

I am also very happy to have received support from some noble Lords whose support I am unaccustomed to receive—in particular, the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb, and my noble friend Lord Deben. To answer my noble friend’s point, I am sure that my noble friend the Minister, together with his officials, could prepare a comprehensive list of defined chalk streams, because I am sure that we have not quite caught all of them. It may never be a perfect list, but at least, as my noble friend said, it would be a pretty good and near comprehensive one.

My noble friend Lord Caithness made a strong, comprehensive speech of support, for which I am most grateful. I agree with what he said about the Environment Agency and how it conducted itself immediately after its establishment, because I had to deal with it at great length over developments in the River Tamar. I also endorse entirely what he said about the small group of determined people who work so hard to protect our beautiful chalk streams.

I was also grateful to my noble friend for riling the noble Baroness, Lady Hayman of Ullock, into supporting my amendment—I think riling is the right word in this context.

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Moved by

[Baroness Scott of Bybrook]

373A: Clause 139, page 170, line 36, at end insert—
“(aa) any proposals for increasing the extent to which a specified environmental outcome is delivered,”Member's explanatory statement
This amendment is consequential upon the second amendment in the Minister’s name to clause 139. It inserts a provision which is equivalent to the sub-paragraph removed by that amendment from clause 139(4)(b).

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Moved by

[Baroness Scott of Bybrook]

374A: Clause 141, page 173, line 16, after “(4)” insert “(aa),”
Member's explanatory statement
This amendment is consequential upon the first amendment in the Minister’s name to clause 139.

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[Lord Benyon (Con)]

My Lords, I thank my noble friend Lord Randall of Uxbridge for tabling Amendment 387, and my noble friend Lady McIntosh of Pickering for tabling Amendments 504GA and 504GB, and the noble Baroness, Lady Hayman of Ullock, for Amendment 504B.

These amendments would give national parks and areas of outstanding natural beauty additional statutory purposes and update the duties on relevant authorities. I am grateful for the quality of the debate that we have had on this and share noble Lords’ passion for our national parks and the beauty that they provide in landscape terms, as well as the human benefits that they give for our health and well-being. I assure the noble Baroness, Lady Willis, that our commitment to 30 by 30, and the inclusion of national parks and designated landscapes in this, is fundamental. She is right that I have a sign in my office saying “30 by 30” and then quoting NASA:

“Failure is not an option”.


It is about the quality of the environment as well as the line on the map.

My noble friend Lord Lucas has rightly raised, in another amendment, issues around OECMs. There are a variety of ways in which we will achieve this commitment, which is important for us domestically—and internationally, if we are to walk the talk that we have done in international fora on successfully encouraging countries around the world to commit to 30 by 30.

The noble Baroness, Lady Willis, also identified a point about the quality of our interventions as land managers and the types of trees that we plant. She identified perhaps a conflict between tackling carbon and biodiversity. The trees that she described in a pejorative way grow much quicker. They form parts of the furniture and other features in our rooms or whatever. That is keeping that carbon still locked up, and they sequester carbon much more quickly. However, the biodiversity that we want is largely absent from them, whereas the broadleaves, abundant in biodiversity, are slower growing and more susceptible to pests and diseases. We want to ensure that we are getting all that, the carbon benefits as well as the biodiversity benefits, and there is a landscape issue there.

The Government recognise how important our protected landscapes are for improving nature, tackling climate change, supporting rural communities and removing barriers to access. To deliver 30 by 30, we need to strengthen governance and management through the Environment Act 2021. We have strengthened the biodiversity duty on public bodies such as national parks and AONBs, and set ambitious environmental targets. We are also setting specific targets for protected landscapes and issuing guidance for public bodies with responsibilities in those areas.

We are extending land protected for nature through carefully chosen new designations and other habitat-creation projects. We are investing in restoring habitat through the successful Farming in Protected Landscapes programme and the biodiversity challenge fund, while working with partners to attract private investment in protected landscapes.

In opening this debate, my noble friend Lord Randall eloquently set out why he thinks this change is necessary. I hope I can prove that the Government are absolutely committed, because we have taken on-the-ground action to implement the excellent landscape review led by Julian Glover. As I said, our Farming in Protected Landscapes programme supports farmers in protected landscapes to deliver projects for nature, climate, people and place, addressing exactly the points raised by the noble Baroness, Lady Willis. It delivers good environmental and habitat management. Our Access for All programme is also helping local teams to improve accessibility in our protected landscapes. We are also investing in a new protected landscapes partnership to enable national parks, AONBs and—crucially for a subsequent amendment—national trails to collaborate on national priorities more closely.

The Environment Act strengthens the duty on public bodies to have regard to conserving and enhancing biodiversity. In addition, under the National Parks and Access to the Countryside Act 1949 and the Countryside and Rights of Way Act 2000, public bodies already have duties to have regard to the statutory purposes of protected landscapes when exercising their functions. The Government intend to publish guidance to ensure that the existing duties on public bodies are correctly interpreted and applied when exercising their functions in protected landscapes.

I will study my noble friend Lord Blencathra’s words in the record, because he raised some interesting points where a compromise is perhaps achievable.

I hope I have said enough to convince my noble friend Lord Randall of Uxbridge—I know he takes a lot of convincing—to move on these issues that he feels so strongly and speaks so eloquently about. I hope I have persuaded him to withdraw his amendment.

Amendment 471 repeals the 2026 cut-off date for recording historic rights of way. I draw noble Lords’ attention to our commitments on public access in our environmental improvement plan, our desire for everyone to be within at least 15 minutes of green open space, our commitments to complete the England Coast Path and to enhance national trails, and what we are doing on social prescribing. We are using the benefits of nature and access to it to divert people away from the NHS, with new access provisions through a variety of other measures, as well.

It is important to give users, landowners and local authorities certainty about recording unregistered rights of way. Regulations will provide for certain unrecorded historic rights of way to be excepted from extinguishment, such as where they are currently in use or applications to register them remain undetermined. The Government therefore intend to commence the cut-off date provisions, in line with the original intention of the Countryside and Rights of Way Act 2000.

However, in answer to my noble friend Lord Hodgson, who spoke with great passion on this issue, given the delays caused by Covid and the impact it had on a great many areas of the public realm, but particularly local authorities, the Government will take steps to use existing powers and extend this deadline by five years to 1 January 2031. The Government are committed to delivering rights of way reform, which will make processes to add historic rights of way to the definitive map faster, fairer, cheaper and less bureaucratic. Our reforms will also give landowners a new right to apply to have certain routes diverted or extinguished. The regulations needed to bring these into effect will be introduced as soon as is reasonably practicable.

The Government are keen to promote responsible access, protect nature and support people who live and work in the countryside. We also recognise the importance of providing access to the outdoors for people’s health and well-being, and we are working to ensure this and that we are achieving that balance in all that we do. We will continue working with landowners and user groups to promote responsible access, so that we achieve our 25-year environment plan commitment to make it easier for more people, from every background, to connect with nature.

[Lord Hodgson of Astley Abbotts (Con)]

I am grateful to my noble friend for the news of a five-year extension. Could his department try to explain to local authorities the importance of giving some priority to registrations? As the noble Baroness, Lady Scott of Needham Market, said, they inevitably tend to get pushed down the hierarchy. We need to find as many ways as possible to bring them up to get this finished. However, I understand that there is a balance to be struck, and the Minister is fair to point that out.

[Lord Benyon (Con)]

I thank my noble friend. He and the noble Baroness made very important points, but this is a question of resourcing and of prioritisation in local authorities. Of course, some local authorities are inundated and others are less so. It is about supporting them to register these rights of way. I will work with him and all interested noble Lords to make sure that we assess how this is going against the new timescale.

Amendment 475 would have the effect of permitting the right to wild camp on open access land. The Government understand concerns about the ability to wild camp in Dartmoor National Park, as raised by the noble Baroness. As a result of the local court judgment, this has come into much clearer view for the wider public. Private Members’ Bills in the other place also seek to make similar legislative amendments to those proposed here.

For the record, it is worth saying that Dartmoor has never banned wild camping: there was just never a right to it. It is a question of which end of the telescope you look at this issue from. There was what I thought was a very fair report on “Countryfile” a few weeks ago, which gave the perspective of both those who want that access as a right and those who very often end up clearing up the mess from the small proportion of those who act irresponsibly and damage our natural environment. The amendment would have negative impacts, including potential legal conflict and complexity surrounding the rights of private landowners, concerns about health and safety and the liability of landowners, and the risk of damage to the natural and historic environment.

Amendment 480 requires the Government to review recreational access to land and open access land. The Government are already required by law to complete a review of open access land under the Countryside and Rights of Way Act 2000, and the next review is due by 2024-25. We will consult on extending the rights to open access land after having completed the review of our existing maps of open access land; this point was raised by the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett. I understand the point that she raised, and I have been active in providing access to land close to where a lot of people live. I understand the tensions and problems. Much can be done by good joint working between land managers and the people who wish to use it. I am very happy to continue that debate.

[Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP)]

I thank the Minister for giving way. I have a point of clarification. The term “recreational access to land” may have been interpreted as meaning open access land. This amendment is meant to mean all land, not just open access land, and I think that the way it is written shows that.

[Lord Benyon (Con)]

I understand the campaigning point that the noble Baroness makes. That is perhaps for another occasion in this House; I am very happy to have that debate. I want to see more access but, over the next six years, the recovery of species in this country has to be our priority, as there has been a catastrophic decline. We have to work with people to give them more access where it is appropriate, but we also have to protect our countryside and rare habitats and make sure that hotspots of biodiversity are allowed to thrive, because the benefits from those will spill out right across our country.

Amendment 504GJC, so ably spoken to by my noble friend Lord Lucas, enables local communities, landowners and organisations to contribute directly to the 30 by 30 target through an internationally recognised structure—namely, the other effective area-based conservation measure. We understand the intentions behind this amendment. I provide reassurance that, as I said earlier, the Government are committed to protecting 30% of land for nature by 2030 and to developing the most appropriate approach to increasing and enhancing our protected areas and other land of value to nature.

We are working with partners across the country, including members of the public, the environmental sector, academics, farmers, landowners and the private sector, to deliver against this commitment. The nature recovery Green Paper sought views on our approach to 30 by 30. This included our plans to explore how land that is delivering for biodiversity outside of our designated protected areas can contribute to our 30 by 30 target. Many of the reforms explored in the Green Paper have fed into the Government’s environmental improvement plan, our delivery plan for protecting nature. The noble Lord is absolutely right to raise these points. More areas will be developed for nature as part of our reforms, and I very strongly believe that these should be included in our 30 by 30 calculations.

Government Amendments 467G, 504O, 509E and 515 address the requirement for Natural England to review the maps of open access land in their entirety at set intervals, with the first review currently due to be delivered by 2024-25 and subsequent reviews to be completed every 20 years following this date. These amendments allow Natural England to complete proportionate reviews, focusing on areas that were mapped incorrectly or have changed status, on an ongoing basis. While much open access land is already mapped correctly, some mistakes were made during the initial mapping process, and a first review of these areas is required to establish an accurate baseline. The amendments do not remove the first review deadline completely but move it to 2031 to allow for sufficient preparation of the review.

As I have said, we recognise the importance of enabling access to the countryside. That is why we have established 13 community forests, alongside substantial programmes to create more green open space and significantly expand national trails. We have also created and restored some 360,000 football fields of habitat since 2010. Our response to the Glover recommendations made clear that we will not consider whether CROW rights should be expanded until the review of the CROW maps is complete. Our stakeholders have been clear that reviewing the maps is a necessary first step before any consideration of expanding rights can be made. Once the first review is completed and a baseline established, the amendments will enable us to move to a continuous selective review system. Any changes in land use can be amended on the maps in good time rather than needing to wait up to 20 years for further review.

Amendment 467G inserts a new provision into the Countryside and Rights of Way Act 2000 regarding when Natural England must carry out reviews following the issuing of open access maps, and the matters that such a review must cover. The amendment also makes provision for regulations to set out the procedure on a review and makes consequential amendments.

I hope noble Lords will support these important amendments. A substantial amount of planning is required if we are to ensure that the reviewed maps are fit for purpose, so that we can then switch to a system of limited continuous review rather than the periodic reviews required at present. Amendment 467H would reduce, by three years, the time we have to make sure that the first review of maps is completed to the standard needed. The Government have tabled amendments which remove the scope for regulations to push back the deadline for the review, so I offer the noble Baroness assurance that this date will not move again.

Amendment 467I would insert a legal requirement to make regulations to enable subsequent reviews of the open access maps. Once the Bill has achieved Royal Assent, the Government intend to make regulations to enable a continuous review following the completion of the first review, which I hope will reassure the noble Baroness that the ability to do this will not be lost.

Amendment 467J would take the opposite approach of the government amendment by returning to the existing power to invoke the original appeals regime so that it applies to the review process. The Government feel it is important that we have the flexibility to fit the details of the appeal regime to the very different circumstances of the review, and therefore do not feel able to support this amendment.

[Lord Randall of Uxbridge (Con)]

My Lords, we have had a very interesting debate. I thank all those who have supported my amendment.

Because of the lateness of the hour I will not go into details, except to thank the noble Baroness, Lady Willis, for her speech, which was not just passionate but full of expertise, which shows the strength of this Chamber. I also thank my noble friend Lord Blencathra, not just for his almost complete support but for two ideas. One is tweaking. I am always up for tweaking and I hope my noble friend the Minister is too. My noble friend’s other suggestion involved a bottle of Highland Park. Perhaps we could get together and tweak this amendment with the Minister, and perhaps even his boss, so that we can go forward. Then, if the Government do not come forward with the appropriate amendment on Report, I assure my noble friend that I will return to it. With that, I beg leave to withdraw my amendment.

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Parminter (LD)]

My Lords, I support the noble Baroness, Lady Willis, in her Amendment 390, to which I have added my name. It is a really important amendment as we struggle to meet the Government’s environmental target and our need to build more homes and develop our land. We have to do that in a way that understands there are fundamental environmental problems we need to address, particularly nutrient pollution.

It is clear that we need a statutory underpinning for nature-based solutions because, without that, they are not going to happen. We have evidence of that. You only have to look through previous price reviews, in which Ofwat turned down recommendations from water companies for nature-based solutions because, on a crude cost-benefit analysis, putting in a grey concrete storm tank was a damn sight cheaper than wetlands and various other proposals. If my memory serves me right, Ofwat turned down some very detailed and thoughtful proposals from Anglian Water because of the cost. Unless there is statutory underpinning, Ofwat will just carry on with its usual economic model.

This amendment is an important way of ensuring we get that win-win of nature-based solutions as we seek to address our nutrient pollution problems. It is an elegant way to move forward on the Dasgupta review, which talked about finding new ways to build nature into our economic model. Giving this a statutory underpinning would, as I have just made clear, give Ofwat the confidence to build into its economic models support for nature-based solutions. We know these are going to be fundamental if we are going to get to our 30 by 30 target.

The only thing I want to say, because it is late and so much has been brilliantly said by the noble Baroness, Lady Willis, is that you would expect us to say this. We are the usual green environmentalists. But I hope the Minister hears that we are also saying that we understand why this is important. We need development, and there is stalemate in many housing developments because the nutrient pollution issues cannot be solved. We are trying to be constructive in resolving that problem. We are not just saying this with our usual green hats on. We realise that this is a tricky issue which needs resolving.

It is not just us in the environmental groups, such as Wildlife and Countryside Link. The House of Lords Science and Technology Committee did an excellent report on nature-based solutions recently. Again, this underpins the support for this amendment. The Government’s own environmental improvement plan talks about the benefits of nature-based solutions. If you are going to deliver on your own words, then you should be supporting this.

For me, the most important and powerful thing is that the water companies support this amendment. In addition to the comments made individually to the noble Baroness, Lady Willis, Water UK put out a release saying that the water companies want this amendment. It would be wonderful to be able to say that this amendment has been supported on a day when the water companies have said, “Mea culpa”, said sorry for the appalling way that they have handled our sewage problems, and promised that they will put £10 billion-worth of new investment into this area. This would ensure that we get the win-win, both to overcome some of our problems with building the homes we need and to ensure that we get the benefits we need for our hard-pressed nature.

[Lord Benyon (Con)]

I am grateful to noble Lords for their contributions. I will come to the various points but, first, I say that I agreed with nearly everything that the noble Baroness, Lady Parminter, said, particularly the quotation from Dasgupta. But her criticism of Ofwat is slightly out of date: I had those arguments with it a decade ago. It liked a bit of concrete and steel then because it could measure water going into it and the quality going out, and it did not trust nature-based solutions because it could not get that degree of measurement of asset value. There has been a sea-change in how we do that, but I agree with her in every other respect.

On this group on nutrient pollution standards, I begin my remarks with Amendment 390. I agree with the noble Baroness, Lady Willis of Summertown, and others that we should ensure that water companies deliver this new statutory duty in a timely way. Throughout the delivery of the Water Industry National Environment Programme, the Environment Agency regularly liaises with water companies to ensure progress and to address risks to delivery. Under Section 202 of the Water Industry Act, the Government have the power to request that water companies provide information regarding the delivery of improvements to wastewater infrastructure, and we intend to use these powers if necessary.

Should it become evident that a delay in upgrading a particular wastewater treatment works is unavoidable, the legislation makes provision for the Secretary of State to disapply the requirement placed on local planning authorities to assume that the upgrade will be delivered by 1 April 2030 for the purposes of a habitats regulations assessment. The Secretary of State must notify local planning authorities accordingly so that they can factor this into their planning discussions.

I agree with the noble Baroness that we should ensure that water companies are delivering against this duty in a way that maximises benefits for the environment, and ensure that nature-based solutions are a vital part of our sewage treatment infrastructure. The Government want to see water companies making use of these solutions as part of the treatment processes that they apply. In the strategic policy statement for Ofwat, we set out that water companies should

“increase … the use of nature-based solutions where appropriate”.

The new statutory duty has been designed to ensure that water companies can use nature-based solutions as part of the wastewater treatment process—for example, water companies may use integrated wetlands to remove nutrients from wastewater. The legislation also allows water companies to use nature-based solutions as part of this process. I am repeating myself, so I will move on, as the hour is late.

In the most recent strategic policy statement for Ofwat, the Government set the clear expectation that it should continue in this form. Therefore, I assure the Committee that sufficient provisions are already in place to ensure that nature-based solutions are taken forward where appropriate.

I turn to Amendment 391 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Hayman of Ullock. Upgrading wastewater treatment plants smaller than a plant capacity of 2,000 population equivalent would require significant investment in new infrastructure and deliver minimal environmental benefit, and it is therefore unlikely to represent value for money. However, we have provided a power for the Secretary of State to lower the plant capacity in individual catchments so that, where appropriate, we can require upgrades at smaller treatment works too.

Although I welcome Amendment 392 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Hayman of Ullock, it is unnecessary because the Secretary of State will of course consider all relevant information and advice before making any exemptions from achieving the nutrient pollution standard. In addition, if a wastewater treatment plant is exempt from this statutory duty, the Environment Agency will still make use of environmental permits to set limits on the quality of wastewater being discharged, thereby ensuring that the water environment is protected.

In relation to Amendment 393, I reassure the Committee that wastewater treatment plants with a capacity of less than 250 population equivalent can already be designated as not exempt where appropriate. If the evidence shows that it is necessary to put enhanced treatment in place at a wastewater treatment plant with a capacity of less than 250 population equivalent, the legislation allows for the Secretary of State to do so within a set timeframe.

I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Stunell, that we should ensure that nutrient pollution standards for wastewater are protected. However, as already made clear, wastewater treatment works that are exempt will still be subject to all the other existing standards set by the Environment Agency on a site-specific basis, but I am happy to continue discussions on this as the Bill progresses.

Amendment 400 raises the issue of accurate monitoring and reporting. I agree that this is critical. Under this Government, we have gone from just 7% of storm overflows being fitted with event duration monitors in 2010 to over 90% today, and by the end of this year that will rise to 100%. The Environment Agency already regulates many water quality monitoring stations through permits to ensure that they operate to established regulatory standards. We aim to bring forward regulations to implement a new duty on water companies to report data on sewage discharges from storm overflows in near real time. In those same regulations, we will implement a duty to monitor the water quality impacts of those discharges. That will make the UK world leaders in understanding the impact of sewage discharges on the receiving environment. I therefore reassure the Committee that this amendment is not necessary, as the Government are already taking steps to ensure the accurate and timely reporting of monitoring data from wastewater treatment works. The Committee should expect further announcements on this soon.

Considering Amendment 401 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Hayman of Ullock, I will assume that she is referring in it to the environmental improvement plan. The plan includes the steps that we are taking to meet the legally binding long-term target to reduce phosphorus loadings from treated wastewater to the water environment. Every five years, the Government must review the environmental improvement plan and update it as necessary to ensure that it contains any further policies needed to achieve long-term and interim targets. It is therefore important that we retain flexibility to update the actions in the plan rather than setting them on a statutory footing, so that we can ensure that the actions reflect the most appropriate path to achieving our policy. It will be for this and the other place to hold Ministers to account on this in future years.

Government Amendments 393A to 393J will improve the enforceability of these provisions by making it clear that the Environment Agency needs to treat excess nutrient pollution discharge which results from the failure to deliver upgrades on time as environmental damage. The sewerage undertaker would then be liable to remediate the excess nutrient pollution determined as having been discharged. For the reasons set out, which I hope provide sufficient reassurance, I ask the noble Baroness, Lady Willis, to withdraw Amendment 390, and noble Lords not to move the other amendments in their names and to support the government amendments.

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Moved by

[Baroness Scott of Bybrook]

393A: Clause 153, page 187, line 18, leave out from “remediate” to end of line 19 and insert “environmental damage (within the meaning of those regulations) that is treated as occurring by regulation 9A of those regulations (nutrient significant sewage disposal works: environmental damage).”
Member's explanatory statement
This amendment is consequential on the Minister’s amendment at page 190, line 36.

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Moved by

[Baroness Scott of Bybrook]

393B: Clause 155, page 190, line 36, leave out from “Any” to “caused” in line 2 on page 191 and insert “excess nutrient pollution is to be treated for the purposes of these regulations as damage to the related habitats site that is environmental damage”
Member's explanatory statement
This amendment would change what is treated as environmental damage for the purposes of the Environmental Damage (Prevention and Remediation) (England) Regulations 2015 where a plant is in breach of a nutrient pollution standard to the excess nutrient pollution discharged (instead of the damage caused to a site).

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[Lord Stunell (LD)]

My Lords, I support what the noble Baroness, Lady Taylor of Stevenage, said, as well as what my noble friend Lady Pinnock had to say about this.

I need to start by saying that I worked in the architects’ department of a new town for 13 years and lived in that new town during its raw development stage. Noble Lords will not be surprised to hear me say that I believe that the development corporation model has a proven track record, usually of building communities with all the essential infrastructure in a joined-up way. The Government are right to see the development corporation model as one means of accelerating necessary development, and I welcome the presence of these clauses in the Bill.

However, I will just briefly reflect on my experience. During the 1960s and 1970s, the new towns were very top-down in conception. The New Town Act made the development corporation I worked with simultaneously the client, the designer, the planning authority and the funding channel for the delivery of the projects I worked on, which was a very cosy situation for those of us working on the projects but not so good if you lived next door or sometimes literally underneath where we were developing. The later generation of urban development corporations mostly paid better lip service to local democratic institutions than that.

However, there are deficiencies, and my noble friend Lady Pinnock has put her finger on one of them. It is good that the relevant clauses inform a model whereby development corporations spring from local government initiatives and are not to be imposed by somebody with a map sitting in Whitehall. That brings me to my first question to the Minister. Clause 156(2) still reserves the power to declare urban development corporations independent of any local proposals—the Secretary of State can in fact sit behind a desk in Whitehall. Do the Government have in mind making any such designations, and if not, why do we have Clause 156(2) in the Bill?

My second question relates to the consultees listed in Clause 156(4), which inserts new provisions. Indeed, the noble Baroness, Lady Taylor of Stevenage, refers to that in her Amendment 407. A very good part of that clause says that local government is to be involved even if it is not the commissioning authority. There is then a less good list of what local government consists of. Very surprisingly, it does not include parish and town councils. They are not listed as statutory consultees, although district and county councils are. There is a parallel provision in the legislation for the urban development corporations to what we might call the green belt ones. In each case, parish councils are left out. In any normal use of language, they qualify as local government, do they not? They also qualify as legislative and statutory as well, so it is a great puzzle to me why they are not there. An important point is that they will probably be the best informed about their areas, and at a detailed level which certainly will be missed by county councils, for instance. I therefore want to hear from the Minister why parish councils are not statutory consultees.

The Minister may say that there is a catch-all here;

“any other person whom the proposing authority considers it appropriate to consult”

is among the consultees. However, that is an option for the consulting authority, not a statutory consultation partner. If you want to rely on that catch-all, why not rely on it for county councils? If it is blindingly obvious that you would always consult a parish council, and therefore you do not need to say it, it must surely be blindingly obvious that you need to consult the county council, so you do not need to say that. If you are mentioning one, why not the other?

Secondly, what led to the omission of town and parish councils? If it was an oversight, will the Minister please correct it on Report or at least tell us that the inevitable statutory instrument will make it unambiguously clear that any town or parish council in or in the vicinity of a proposal should be consulted as a matter of course? I would be very happy to receive an answer by letter, if that makes it easier.

[Earl Howe (Con)]

My Lords, as the noble Baroness, Lady Taylor, has explained, this group of amendments concerns development corporations. I am grateful for the broadly supportive comments from noble Lords for these provisions.

Amendment 403 probes the issue of local accountability, which was a theme picked up strongly by the noble Baroness, Lady Pinnock, whose amendment I will come to in a moment. One of the key priorities of the Government’s levelling-up agenda is to empower local leaders and communities. Introducing a new, locally led urban development corporation model will support local aspirations for regeneration without the need to establish a body accountable to central government, but which is instead accountable to local authorities. For it is local authorities—local councillors, elected by their local community—who will be the originators of the proposal and oversee the locally led development corporation, ensuring clear democratic accountability.

We completely recognise the importance of community involvement and participation in the creation of locally led development corporations. That is why we have included statutory public consultation arrangements for locally led urban and new town development corporations in the Bill, which proposing authorities must implement before submitting their proposal to the Secretary of State.

We intend also to use regulations to set out further details on the composition of board membership and aims of the oversight authority for locally led urban development corporations, as we did in relation to locally led new town development corporations in 2018. In appointing independent members, we expect the oversight authority to ensure that the board has the relevant skills and experience needed and includes those with an understanding of the local area.

I turn to Amendments 404 and 405. We recognise the importance of ensuring that appropriate scrutiny has taken place, including from the local community, where a proposal is being developed to designate the development area of a new settlement or urban development area and establishing a locally led development corporation. As I have mentioned before, we have included provisions for statutory public consultation where people can have their say on the proposals at the formative stage before it is submitted to the Secretary of State. When the proposal is received by the Secretary of State, they will look very carefully at the robustness of the plans, including at community involvement and views expressed, before making a decision on whether the proposal is expedient in the local interest and making an order to designate the development corporation’s development area.

The noble Baroness, Lady Taylor, asked whether all planning would become the responsibility of the locally led UDC and whether all powers would transfer from the local authority to the locally led urban development corporation. The answer is no—or rather, not necessarily. It is for local authorities to propose and for the Secretary of State to decide, under his discretion, whether and to what extent functions should transfer.

The noble Baroness and the noble Baroness, Lady Pinnock, also asked about the conformity of locally led UDC development with local plans. A development corporation that takes on plan-making or development management functions will be subject to the same rules as a local planning authority. I would be happy to fill out that answer in writing, if I may.

Amendments 404 and 405 are therefore an unnecessary addition to these consultation requirements. They would slow down the designation of development corporation areas. The purpose of designating the area is to determine the area in which the locally led development corporation will operate and deliver a programme of urban regeneration or a new town. There will be further opportunities for the local community to have its say on the planning proposals for the area as proposals for development come forward through the planning system.

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Moved by

[Baroness Scott of Bybrook]

412A: Clause 168, page 213, line 21, leave out subsection (4) and insert—
“(4) Schedule (Conditional confirmation and making of compulsory purchase orders: consequential amendments) contains, and makes provision in connection with, amendments in consequence of this section and paragraph 3 of Schedule 15.”Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment introduces the new Schedule in the Minister’s name before Schedule 15, and omits one of the provisions superseded by that new Schedule.

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Moved by

[Baroness Scott of Bybrook]

412B: Before Schedule 15, insert the following new Schedule—
“ScheduleConditional confirmation and making of compulsory purchase orders: consequential amendmentsLand Compensation Act 1973 (c. 26)
1 In section 33D of the Land Compensation Act 1973 (exclusions from entitlement to loss payments), for subsection (6) substitute—““(6) The relevant time is the time at which any of the following occurs in respect of the compulsory purchase order relating to the person’s interest in the land—(a) the order is confirmed, other than conditionally, under section 13 or 13A of the Acquisition of Land Act 1981;(b) the order is made, other than conditionally, under paragraph 4 or 4A of Schedule 1 to that Act;“(c) a decision is made under section 13BA(2)(a) of the Acquisition of Land Act 1981 (decision that conditions subject to which order was confirmed have been met);(d) a decision is made under paragraph 4AA(2)(a) of Schedule 1 to that Act (decision that conditions subject to which order was made have been met).”Compulsory Purchase (Vesting Declarations) Act 1981 (c. 66)
“2 In section 5(2) of the Compulsory Purchase (Vesting Declarations) Act 1981 (vesting declaration not to be executed before purchase order operative), for “26(1)” substitute “26”.Acquisition of Land Act 1981 (c. 67)
3 (1) The Acquisition of Land Act 1981 is amended as follows.(2) In section 7—(a) in subsection (3) (regulations subject to negative procedure)—(i) after “13A” insert “or 13BA”;(ii) after “paragraph 4A” insert “or 4AA”;(b) after subsection (3) insert—““(4) So far as anything is required or authorised to be prescribed as mentioned in subsection (2) in relation to orders that fall to be made or confirmed by the Welsh Ministers— “(a) the reference in that subsection to the Secretary of State is to be read as a reference to the Welsh Ministers, and“(b) the reference in subsection (3) to either House of Parliament is to be read as a reference to Senedd Cymru.”(3) In section 26 (date of operation of orders and certificates), for subsections (1) and (2) substitute—“(1A) A compulsory purchase order confirmed under Part 2 becomes operative—(a) if it is confirmed unconditionally, on the date on which a confirmation notice in respect of the order is first published as required by section 15(3)(a);(b) if it is confirmed conditionally, on the date on which a fulfilment notice in respect of the order is first published as required by section 15(4C)(b)(i).“(1B) A compulsory purchase order made under Schedule 1 becomes operative—“(a) if it is made unconditionally, on the date on which a making notice in respect of the order is first published as required by paragraph 6(3)(a) of that Schedule;“(b) if it is made conditionally, on the date on which a fulfilment notice in respect of the order is first published as required by paragraph 6(4C)(b)(i) of that Schedule.“(1C) Subsections (1A) and (1B) do not apply to an order to which the Statutory Orders (Special Procedure) Act 1945 applies.“(2A) A certificate given under Part 3 becomes operative on the date on which it is first published as required by section 22(a).“(2B) A certificate given under Schedule 3 becomes operative on the date on which it is first published as required by paragraph 9(a) of that Schedule.(3) This section is subject to section 24.”Housing Act 1985 (c. 68)
4 (1) The Housing Act 1985 is amended as follows.“(2) In section 582 (suspension of recovery of possession of certain premises when compulsory purchase order made)—(a) in subsection (2), for paragraph (b) substitute—“(b) any earlier date on which—(i) the Secretary of State notifies the authority that the Secretary of State declines to confirm the order,(ii) the order (having been confirmed conditionally) expires by virtue of section 13BA(2)(b) of the Acquisition of Land Act 1981, or(iii) the order is quashed by a court.”;(b) in subsection (6), for paragraph (a) substitute—“(aa) the Secretary of State notifies the authority that the Secretary of State declines to confirm the compulsory purchase order,(ab) the order (having been confirmed conditionally) expires by virtue of section 13BA(2)(b) of the Acquisition of Land Act 1981,(ac) the order is quashed by a court, or”.(3) In paragraph 3 of Schedule 5A (termination of initial demolition notices)—(a) in sub-paragraph (2), after “(3)(a)” insert “or (aa)”;(b) in sub-paragraph (3)—(i) omit the “or” at the end of paragraph (a);(ii) after paragraph (a) insert—“(aa) a decision under section 13BA(2)(b)(ii) of that Act that conditions subject to which the order was confirmed have not been met, or” (c) in sub-paragraph (4), after “(3)(a)” insert “or (aa)”;(d) after sub-paragraph (6) insert—“(6A) If—(a) a compulsory purchase order has been made as described in sub-paragraph (2),(b) the order expires by virtue of section 13BA(2)(b)(i) of the Acquisition of Land Act 1981, and(c) the effect of the expiry is that the landlord will not be able, by virtue of that order, to carry out the demolition of the dwelling-house,the notice ceases to be in force as from the date when the order expires.”;(e) in sub-paragraph (7), after “(2)” insert “or (6A)”.Town and Country Planning Act 1990 (c. 8)
5 (1) TCPA 1990 is amended as follows.(2) In section 137(7)(b) (discontinuance of compulsory purchase for purpose of blight notice exception)—(a) in sub-paragraph (i), after “order” insert “or the order (having been made conditionally) expires by virtue of paragraph 4AA(2) of Schedule 1 to the Acquisition of Land Act 1981”;(b) in sub-paragraph (ii), at the end insert “or (having been confirmed conditionally) it expires by virtue of section 13BA(2)(b) of the Acquisition of Land Act 1981”.(3) In Note (2) in paragraph 22 of Schedule 13 (land ceasing to be blighted by proposed compulsory purchase order)—(a) omit the “or” at the end of paragraph (a);(b) at the end of paragraph (b) insert “; or“(c) the order (having been confirmed or made conditionally) expires by virtue of section 13BA(2)(b) of, or paragraph 4AA(2) of Schedule 1 to, the Acquisition of Land Act 1981.”Planning (Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas) Act 1990 (c. 9)
“6 In section 48(6)(b) of the Listed Buildings Act (discontinuance of compulsory purchase for purpose of listed building purchase notice exception)—“(a) in sub-paragraph (i), at the end insert “or the order (having been made conditionally) expires by virtue of paragraph 4AA(2) of Schedule 1 to the Acquisition of Land Act 1981”;“(b) in sub-paragraph (ii), at the end insert “or (having been confirmed conditionally) it expires by virtue of section 13BA(2)(b) of the Acquisition of Land Act 1981”.Historic Environment (Wales) Act 2023
7 (1) In section 111(8)(b) of the Historic Environment (Wales) Act 2023 (discontinuance of compulsory purchase for purpose of listed building purchase notice exception)—(a) in the English language text—(i) in sub-paragraph (i), at the end insert “or (having been confirmed conditionally) it expires by virtue of section 13BA(2)(b) of the Acquisition of Land Act 1981”;(ii) in sub-paragraph (ii), at the end insert “or the order (having been made conditionally) expires by virtue of paragraph 4AA(2) of Schedule 1 to that Act”;(b) in the Welsh language text—(i) in sub-paragraph (i), at the end insert “neu pan fydd (ar ôl cael ei gadarnhau’n amodol) yn dod i ben yn rhinwedd adran 13BA(2)(b) o Ddeddf Caffael Tir 1981”; “(ii) in sub-paragraph (ii), at the end insert “neu pan fydd y gorchymyn (ar ôl cael ei wneud yn amodol) yn dod i ben yn rhinwedd paragraff 4AA(2) o Atodlen 1 i’r Ddeddf honno”.“(2) The Secretary of State may, by regulations, amend sub-paragraph (1) before it comes into force in consequence of the provision amended by that sub-paragraph being enacted other than as proposed in the relevant iteration of the Historic Environment (Wales) Bill.(3) In sub-paragraph (2)—“(a) the “Historic Environment (Wales) Bill” means the Bill of that name introduced in Senedd Cymru on 4 July 2022, and“(b) the “relevant iteration” of that Bill is the Bill as it stands after consideration by the Legislation, Justice and Constitution Committee of the Senedd on 13 February 2023.”Member’s explanatory statement
This new Schedule brings together various amendments in consequence of the introduction of conditional compulsory purchase orders (some of which are currently elsewhere in the Bill and some of which are new).

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Moved by

[Baroness Scott of Bybrook]

412C: Clause 171, page 216, line 3, at end insert—
““(4) In section 582 of the Housing Act 1985 (suspension of recovery of possession of certain premises when compulsory purchase order made)—“(a) in subsection (2)(a), for “third anniversary of” substitute “final day of the period of three years beginning with”;(b) after subsection (6) insert—““(6A) If the compulsory purchase order specifies a period longer than three years under section 13D of the Acquisition of Land Act 1981, the references in this section to the period of three years are to be read as references to the period specified in the order.””Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment adds consequential amendments to Clause 171.

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Moved by

[Baroness Scott of Bybrook]

412D: After Clause 175, insert the following new Clause—
“Power to require prospects of planning permission to be ignored(1) In the Acquisition of Land Act 1981—“(a) in section 7(3) (regulations subject to negative procedure), before “paragraph 4A” insert “section 15A(11) or”;“(b) in section 14A (confirmation by acquiring authority), after subsection (2) insert— ““(2A) Nor does it apply to an order directing that compensation is to be assessed in accordance with section 14A of the Land Compensation Act 1961 (see section 15A).”(c) after section 15 insert—“Special provision about compensation
15A
Directions applying section 14A of the Land Compensation Act 1961
(1) Subsection (2) applies if—(a) an acquiring authority submits a compulsory purchase order for confirmation, and(b) the authorising enactment is listed in Schedule 2A.“(2) The acquiring authority may include in the order a direction that compensation is to be assessed in accordance with section 14A of the Land Compensation Act 1961 (cases where prospect of planning permission to be ignored); and if it does so the following provisions of this section apply.(3) The acquiring authority must submit to the confirming authority a statement of commitments together with the order.“(4) A “statement of commitments” is a statement of the acquiring authority’s intentions as to what will be done with the project land should the acquisition proceed, so far as the authority relies on those intentions in contending that the direction is justified in the public interest.(5) If the authorising enactment is listed in any of paragraphs 1 to 6 of Schedule 2A, those intentions must include the provision of a certain number of units of affordable housing.“(6) The statement under section 12(1)(a) must include a statement of the effect of the direction; and paragraphs (ba) and (bb) of the same subsection apply in respect of the statement of commitments as they apply in respect of the compulsory purchase order.“(7) The confirming authority may permit the acquiring authority to amend the statement of commitments before the decision whether to confirm the order is made.(8) But the confirming authority may do so—“(a) only if satisfied that the amendment would not be unfair to any person who made or could have made a relevant objection for the purposes of section 13, and“(b) if the authorising enactment is listed in any of paragraphs 1 to 6 of Schedule 2A, only if the statement of commitments as amended will still comply with subsection (5).(9) If the confirming authority decides to confirm the order in accordance with the applicable provisions of this Part—(a) it may confirm the order with the direction included if satisfied that the direction is justified in the public interest;(b) otherwise, it must modify the order so as to remove the direction.“(10) If the order is confirmed with the direction included, a confirmation notice under section 15 must (in addition to the matters set out in subsection (4) of that section)—(a) state the effect of the direction,(b) explain how the statement of commitments may be viewed, and(c) explain that additional compensation may become payable if the statement of commitments is not fulfilled. (11) In this section—““the authorising enactment” means the enactment that confers the power to make the compulsory purchase to which the order in question relates;“the project land” means—(a) the land proposed to be acquired further to the compulsory purchase order, and(b) any other land that the acquiring authority intends to be used in connection with that land;“unit of affordable housing” means a building or part of a building that is—(a) constructed or adapted for use as a separate dwelling, and(b) is to be used as—(i) social housing within the meaning of Part 2 of the Housing and Regeneration Act 2008, or“(ii) housing of any other description that is prescribed.”;(d) after Schedule 2 insert—“Schedule 2AEnactments eligible for directions applying section 14A of the Land Compensation Act 1961Enactments authorising acquisitions for purposes including housing
1 Section 142 of the Local Government, Planning and Land Act 1980 (acquisition by urban development corporation).2 Section 17 of the Housing Act 1985 (acquisition by local housing authority).“3 Section 226 of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990 (acquisition by local authority for development or planning purposes).4 Section 333ZA of the Greater London Authority Act 1999 (acquisition by Greater London Authority for housing or regeneration purposes).“5 Section 9 of the Housing and Regeneration Act 2008 (acquisition by the Homes and Communities Agency).6 Section 207 of the Localism Act 2011 (acquisition by mayoral development corporation).Enactments authorising acquisitions for purposes of the NHS
7 Paragraph 46 of Schedule 4 to the Health and Social Care (Community Health and Standards) Act 2003 (acquisition by NHS foundation trust).8 Paragraph 27 of Schedule 4 to the National Health Service Act 2006 (acquisition by NHS trust).9 Paragraph 20 of Schedule 2 to the National Health Service (Wales) Act 2006 (acquisition by local health board).Enactment authorising acquisitions for educational purposes
10 Section 530 of the Education Act 1996 (acquisition by local authority for purposes of educational institution or function).”(2) In the Land Compensation Act 1961—(a) after section 14 insert—“14A Cases where prospect of planning permission to be ignored“(1) The following provisions apply in relation to an acquisition if the compulsory purchase order authorising the acquisition directs that compensation is to be assessed in accordance with this section.(2) Section 14 does not apply.“(3) In assessing the value of land in accordance with rule (2) in section 5, it is to be assumed that no planning permission would be granted for development on the relevant land (whether alone or together with other land). (4) Subsection (3) does not prevent account being taken of planning permission that has already been granted.(5) Subsection (3) does not apply in relation to development consisting of the use as two or more separate dwellings of any building previously used as a single dwelling.(6) Schedule 2A provides for the payment of additional compensation in respect of the acquisition in certain circumstances.”(b) in section 32 (interest from entry on land), after subsection (2) insert—““(3) This section does not apply in relation to additional compensation payable under Schedule 2A.”(c) after the second Schedule insert—“Schedule 2AAdditional compensation where section 14A appliedDirections for additional compensation
1 (1) This paragraph applies if—(a) an interest in land has been acquired further to a compulsory purchase order, and(b) the order directed that compensation was to be assessed in accordance with section 14A.“(2) The confirming authority must, on an application by an eligible person, make a direction for additional compensation if it appears to the confirming authority that the following conditions are met.(3) Those conditions are—(a) that the statement of commitments has not been fulfilled,(b) either—“(i) that the period of 10 years beginning with the date on which the compulsory purchase order became operative has expired, or“(ii) that there is no longer any realistic prospect of the statement of commitments being fulfilled within that period, and“(c) that the initial direction would not have been confirmed on the basis of a statement of commitments reflecting what has in fact been done with the project land since its acquisition.(4) In sub-paragraph (3)—“the statement of commitments” means the statement of commitments submitted in connection with the compulsory purchase order under section 15A(3) of the Acquisition of Land Act 1981 (and if the statement was amended after its submission, means the statement as amended);“the initial direction” means the direction referred to in sub-paragraph (1)(b) (and that direction was “confirmed” when the compulsory purchase order was confirmed with the inclusion of the direction);““the project land” means the land treated as the project land for the purposes of the statement of commitments;and that statement is “fulfilled” if what is done with that land after its acquisition is materially in accordance with the statement.“(5) The effect of a direction for additional compensation is that each eligible person may make a claim to the acquiring authority for any additional compensation in respect of the acquisition payable to the person under this Schedule.“(6) A person is an “eligible person” for the purposes of this Schedule if the person was entitled to compensation in respect of the acquisition (and see also paragraph 4(1)). Amount of additional compensation
“2 (1) Additional compensation in respect of an acquisition is payable to an eligible person only if, in relation to that person, the alternative amount is greater than the original amount.(2) The amount payable is the difference between the two amounts.(3) The “original amount” is the amount of compensation awarded or agreed to be paid to the person in respect of the acquisition.“(4) The “alternative amount” is the amount of compensation that would have been assessed as due to the person in respect of the acquisition had compensation been assessed without the application of section 14A.(5) If the original amount was agreed, the relevant valuation date for the purposes of the assessment imagined under sub-paragraph (4) is the date on which the agreement was concluded.“(6) In relation to the determination of an amount of additional compensation under this Schedule, section 17(2)(b) applies as if its reference to the amount of compensation were to the amount of additional compensation.“(7) A certificate issued under section 17 (or 18) after the award or agreement referred to in sub-paragraph (3) is to have effect for the purposes of the assessment imagined under sub-paragraph (4) as if it had been issued before that assessment.(8) Any amount of compensation that is or would be attributable to disturbance, severance or injurious affection is to be ignored for the purposes of sub-paragraphs (3) and (4).Time limit for application for direction
3 An application under paragraph 1(2) may not be made after the expiry of the period of 13 years beginning with the date on which the compulsory purchase order became operative.Mortgages
“(1) For the purposes of this Schedule an “eligible person” includes a person who would have been entitled to compensation in respect of the acquisition but for the existence of a mortgage (but the mortgage is in that case still to be taken into account in determining the original and alternative amounts under paragraph 2).(“2) An amount agreed or awarded to be paid to a mortgagee under section 15 or 16 of the Compulsory Purchase Act 1965 in respect of the acquisition is to be treated for the purposes of this Schedule as compensation in respect of the acquisition.“(3) The reference in sub-paragraph (2) to an amount paid under section 15 or 16 of the Compulsory Purchase Act 1965 (“the applicable section”) includes an amount paid under section 52ZA or 52ZB of the Land Compensation Act 1973 and taken into account by virtue of section 52ZC(7)(d) of that Act for the purposes of the applicable section.“(4) Additional compensation payable under this Schedule to a person in the person’s capacity as a mortgagee (or to a person exercising rights of a mortgagee) is to be applied towards the discharge of the sums secured by the mortgage.“(5) If there is no remaining sum secured by the mortgage, the additional compensation that would be payable as described in sub-paragraph (4) is instead payable to the person who is an eligible person by virtue of the interest that was subject to the mortgage. “(6) If the additional compensation that would be payable as described in sub-paragraph (4) exceeds the total of the remaining sums secured by the mortgage, the amount of the excess is instead payable to the person who is an eligible person by virtue of the interest that was subject to the mortgage.Successors-in-title
“5 (1) This paragraph applies if, had the compensation to which an eligible person was entitled in respect of the acquisition remained unpaid, the right to be paid it would now vest in some other person (assuming that it remained enforceable and any obligations in respect of the right had been complied with).(2) If the eligible person is still alive or in existence, the rights that the eligible person would have under this Schedule are exercisable by the other person and not by the eligible person.“(3) If the eligible person is no longer alive or in existence, the rights that the eligible person would have under this Schedule if that person were still alive or in existence are exercisable by the other person.“(4) The right exercisable by the other person under sub-paragraph (2) or (3) is subject to any restriction, condition or other incident to which the right vested in that person as imagined under sub-paragraph (1) would be subject.(5) Additional compensation paid to the other person by virtue of sub-paragraph (2) or (3) must be dealt with by the person in any way in which the person would have to deal with compensation paid to that person further to the right vested in that person as imagined under sub-paragraph (1).“(6) If a person is an eligible person by virtue of paragraph 4(1), the reference in sub-paragraph (1) to compensation to which the person was entitled is to be read as a reference to the compensation to which the person would have been entitled but for the mortgage.Consequential losses
(1) The relevant authority may by regulations provide for additional compensation payable on a claim under paragraph 1(5) to include (in addition to any amount payable under paragraph 2) an amount to make good qualifying losses.“(2) “Qualifying losses” are financial losses shown to have been suffered by an eligible person, or a person entitled to exercise the rights of the eligible person under paragraph 5, as a result of the compensation initially payable to the eligible person in respect of the acquisition being of the original amount rather than the alternative amount.“(3) In the case of an eligible person who is so by virtue of an interest that was subject to a mortgage, the reference in sub-paragraph (2) to compensation payable to the eligible person is to be taken to include compensation payable to the mortgagee of that interest.“(4) Regulations under this paragraph may limit the qualifying losses in respect of which additional compensation is payable under the regulations by reference to—(a) a description of loss,(b) an amount, or(c) any other circumstance.Procedure etc
7 (1) The relevant authority may by regulations make provision— “(a) about the procedure for applications under paragraph 1(2) or claims under paragraph 1(5) (including provision about the costs of such applications or claims);“(b) about steps that must be taken by the acquiring authority or the confirming authority for the purposes of publicising or giving notice of a direction for additional compensation;(c) for interest to be applied to amounts of additional compensation that are payable;(d) about how or when additional compensation (and any interest) is to be paid.(2) Regulations under this paragraph about costs of claims under paragraph 1(5)—“(a) may modify or disapply section 29 of the Tribunals, Courts and Enforcement Act 2007 (costs or expenses) or provisions in Tribunal Procedure Rules relating to costs;(b) may apply (with or without modifications) section 4 of this Act;and section 4 of this Act does not apply in relation to such a claim unless so applied.Regulations
8 (1) For the purposes of this Schedule “the relevant authority” is—(a) the Secretary of State, in relation to England;(b) the Welsh Ministers, in relation to Wales.(2) Regulations under this Schedule may make—“(a) consequential, supplementary, incidental, transitional or saving provision;(b) different provision for different purposes.(3) Regulations under this Schedule are to be made by statutory instrument.(4) A statutory instrument containing such regulations is subject to annulment in pursuance of—(a) a resolution of either House of Parliament, in the case of regulations made by the Secretary of State, or(b) a resolution of Senedd Cymru, in the case of regulations made by the Welsh Ministers.Interpretation
9 (1) In this Schedule—(a) “the confirming authority” means—(i) the person who confirmed the compulsory purchase order, or(ii) any successor to that person’s function of confirming compulsory purchase orders of the type in question;(b) references to “the acquisition” or “the compulsory purchase order” are to the acquisition or order by virtue of which paragraph 1 applies;(c) references to the acquisition of an interest in land include—(i) the creation of such an interest, and(ii) the acquisition or creation of a right in or over land;and references to interests in land are to be read accordingly.“(2) In the case of a compulsory purchase order made under section 10(1) of, and Part 1 of Schedule 4 to, the New Towns Act 1981 (compulsory acquisition by new town development corporation in usual cases), the reference in paragraph 1(4) to section 15A(3) of the Acquisition of Land Act 1981 is to be read as a reference to paragraph 5A(2) of Schedule 4 to the New Towns Act 1981. “(3) In the case of a compulsory purchase order made under section 13(1)(a) of, and Part 1 of Schedule 5 to, the New Towns Act 1981 (compulsory acquisition by new town development corporation of statutory undertakers’ operational land)—(a) the reference in paragraph 1(4) to section 15A(3) of the Acquisition of Land Act 1981 is to be read as a reference to paragraph 5A(2) of Schedule 5 to the New Towns Act 1981, and(b) the references in paragraph 1(4) and sub-paragraph (1)(a) to the confirmation of the order are to be read as references to the making of the order.(4) If—“(a) an interest in land is acquired further to section 154(2) of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990 (deemed compulsory acquisition further to blight notice), and(b) the land falls within paragraph 22 of Schedule 13 to that Act (land blighted by compulsory purchase order),“the interest is to be treated for the purposes of this Schedule as having been acquired further to the compulsory purchase order by virtue of which the land falls within that paragraph.”(3) In the New Towns Act 1981—(a) in Schedule 4 (procedure for compulsory acquisition by new town development corporation in usual cases), after paragraph 5 insert—“(1) A development corporation submitting an order to the Secretary of State under this Part of this Schedule may include in the order a direction that compensation is to be assessed in accordance with section 14A of the Land Compensation Act 1961 (cases where prospect of planning permission to be ignored); and if it does so the following provisions of this paragraph apply.(2) The corporation must submit a statement of commitments together with the order.“(3) A “statement of commitments” is a statement of the corporation’s intentions as to what will be done with the project land should the acquisition proceed, so far as the corporation relies on those intentions in contending that the direction is justified in the public interest.(4) Those intentions must include the provision of a certain number of units of affordable housing.(5) The notice under paragraph 2(1) must—(a) state the effect of the direction, and(b) name a place where a copy of the statement of commitments may be seen at any reasonable hour.(6) The Secretary of State may permit the corporation to amend the statement of commitments before the decision whether to confirm the order is made.(7) But the Secretary of State may do so—“(a) only if satisfied that the amendment would not be unfair to any person who duly made or could duly have made an objection for the purposes of paragraph 4, and(b) only if the statement of commitments as amended will still comply with sub-paragraph (4).(8) If the Secretary of State decides to confirm the order under paragraph 3, the Secretary of State—(a) may confirm the order with the direction included if satisfied that the direction is justified in the public interest;(b) otherwise, must modify the order so as to remove the direction.“(9) If the order is confirmed with the direction included, the notice under paragraph 5 must— (a) state the effect of the direction,(b) explain how the statement of commitments may be viewed, and(c) explain that additional compensation may become payable if the statement of commitments is not fulfilled.(10) In this paragraph—“the project land” means—(a) the land proposed to be acquired further to the compulsory purchase order, and(b) any other land that the corporation intends to be used in connection with that land;“unit of affordable housing” means a building or part of a building that is—(a) constructed or adapted for use as a separate dwelling, and(b) is to be used as—(i) social housing within the meaning of Part 2 of the Housing and Regeneration Act 2008, or“(ii) housing of any other description that is prescribed.”;“(b) in Schedule 5 (procedure for compulsory acquisition by new town development corporation of statutory undertaker’s operational land), after paragraph 5 insert—““(1) A development corporation making an application under this Part of this Schedule may include in the application a request for a direction that compensation is to be assessed in accordance with section 14A of the Land Compensation Act 1961 (cases where prospect of planning permission to be ignored); and if it does so the following provisions of this paragraph apply.(2) The corporation must submit a statement of commitments together with the application.“(3) A “statement of commitments” is a statement of the corporation’s intentions as to what will be done with the project land should the acquisition proceed, so far as the corporation relies on those intentions in contending that the direction would be justified in the public interest.(4) Those intentions must include the provision of a certain number of units of affordable housing.(5) The notice under paragraph 2 must—(a) state that the request has been made and what the effect of the direction would be, and(b) name a place where a copy of the statement of commitments may be seen at all reasonable hours.(6) The Secretary of State and the appropriate Minister may permit the corporation to amend the statement of commitments before the decision whether to make an order on the application is made.(7) But they may do so—“(a) only if satisfied that the amendment would not be unfair to any person who duly made or could duly have made an objection for the purposes of paragraph 3, and(b) only if the statement of commitments as amended will still comply with sub-paragraph (4). “(8) If the Secretary of State and the appropriate Minister decide to make an order on the application under paragraph 3, they may include the direction in the order only if satisfied that the direction is justified in the public interest.(9) If an order is made with the direction included, the notice under paragraph 5 must—(a) state the effect of the direction,(b) explain how the statement of commitments may be viewed, and“(c) explain that additional compensation may become payable if the statement of commitments is not fulfilled.(10) In this paragraph—“the project land” means—(a) the land proposed to be acquired further to the compulsory purchase order, and(b) any other land that the corporation intends to be used in connection with that land;“unit of affordable housing” means a building or part of a building that is—(a) constructed or adapted for use as a separate dwelling, and(b) is to be used as—(i) social housing within the meaning of Part 2 of the Housing and Regeneration Act 2008, or“(ii) housing of any other description that is prescribed.”“(4) In section 157 of TCPA 1990 (special provisions as to compensation for acquisitions further to blight notices), before subsection (1) insert—“(A1) Where—(a) an interest in land is acquired in pursuance of a blight notice,(b) the interest is one in respect of which a compulsory purchase order is in force, and(c) the order directs that compensation is to be assessed in accordance with section 14A of the Land Compensation Act 1961,“the compensation payable for the acquisition is to be assessed in accordance with that direction and as if the notice to treat deemed to have been served in respect of the interest under section 154 had been served in pursuance of the compulsory purchase order.””Member’s explanatory statement
This new Clause allows a Minister confirming a compulsory purchase order to direct, in certain cases involving affordable housing, health or education, that compensation should be assessed on the basis that no new planning permission would be granted for the land. It also allows the effect of that direction to be reversed if the land is not subsequently used as planned.