Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill

Baroness Parminter Excerpts

Report stage
Monday 4th September 2023 Lords Chamber

Moved by

[Baroness Parminter]

182: After Clause 86, insert the following new Clause—
“Local nature recovery strategies(1) A local planning authority must ensure that their development plan (taken as a whole) incorporates such policies and proposals so as to deliver the objectives of the local nature recovery strategy.(2) Any policies or proposals in subsection (1) must be consistent with the proper exercise of the authority’s plan making functions.”Member's explanatory statement
This new Clause sets out the relationship between local nature recovery strategies (LNRSs) and statutory development plans to ensure LNRSs objectives are delivered and aligned with development plans. This is to help secure implementation of Environment Act requirements.

[Baroness Parminter (LD)]

My Lords, I have two amendments in this group, which have been kindly supported by the noble Baroness, Lady Willis of Summertown, who cannot be here this afternoon, and the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Whitchurch, for which I am extremely grateful.

I do not wish to detain the House long by explaining what local nature recovery strategies are; we have been through that in Committee. They are an important new initiative created by this Government to find a mechanism to ensure that we can bring forward the nature recovery we need. However, they will not work unless they have a firm purchase in the local plans and spatial plans and various other constraints of the planning system. That is what the arguments we made throughout Committee were about. Presently, local authorities do not have to sufficiently have regard to them. The amendments we proposed called upon the Government to bring forward legislation which would incorporate the policies and proposals of local nature recovery strategies in local plans.

I am pleased that, over the summer, following much consultation with Ministers and their civil servants, while we may not have come to an accord we have come to a position where the Government have certainly moved more than half way. They are now proposing seven amendments, whereby local authorities “must” take account of local nature recovery strategies in their various plans and proposals. That does not mean they have to incorporate the policies and proposals, but to my mind—and indeed to legal minds—if the local authority plans were to go, for example, to an inspector, the local authority would have to show how they had taken the local nature recovery strategies into account.

I think we have made demonstrable progress. It has not gone as far as I would have liked but I am a politician and I know you do not always get what you want. However, we have in this House made the arguments and the Government have been prepared to listen in a way that they have perhaps not been prepared to, and are not going to be prepared to, on other environmental arguments.

I thank Ministers and their civil servants, who have gone to the trouble of putting together seven amendments to make the intentions of the Government crystal clear. I hope that, when the guidance comes forward to local authorities on how they should implement this new legislation, it is crystal clear that they “must” take account, as the Government’s new wording says, and that we can therefore do what I think both sides of the House want and ensure that local nature recovery strategies have a firm footing in the planning process. We know that without that we will not deliver the environmental gains that we all want. I beg to move.

[Baroness Jones of Whitchurch (Lab)]

My Lords, I will speak briefly to the amendment. The noble Baroness, Lady Parminter, has set out extremely well why we are keen to make local nature recovery strategies an effective tool for helping the Government hit their legally binding 2030 nature targets.

The noble Baroness quite rightly said that we did not believe that the current requirements for local planning development plans to simply “have regard to” their local nature recovery strategies would be an effective delivery mechanism. A planning authority could disregard all the spatial recommendations of the local nature recovery strategy and still be compliant with the duty. They could simply write that they “had regard to” the local nature recovery strategy without providing any evidence of how it had shaped the substance of their plans.

When we debated this in Committee, the Minister extolled the virtues of the guidance, and the noble Baroness made reference to the forthcoming guidance. But we did have a very good debate, led by the noble Baroness, Lady Willis, which highlighted the many omissions of the guidance already published. I will not go over all of that, but there is still a concern about the detail of it, and I hope that it will now reflect this new wording in the Bill.

As I said, and like the noble Baroness, I am grateful for Ministers having had subsequent meetings and for the further consideration of our arguments that has now taken place. The Government’s proposals make it much clearer that all tiers in the planning process must take account of local nature recovery strategies when they make their plans. It is not perfect, but it is a welcome concession. I therefore share the view of the noble Baroness, Lady Parminter, that we should not pursue Amendment 182 at this stage.

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Young of Old Scone (Lab)]

I am extremely confused about the order we are taking this in, but I understand that the government amendment has to be put. I just want to say one thing: every single time I have a conversation with Ministers or civil servants about the land use framework the Government are preparing, they tell me that local nature recovery strategies are fundamental and central to that. That is why it is important that the government amendment to strengthen the link between local nature recovery strategies and the planning system not only happens but is vigorously pursued and implemented.

[Baroness Parminter (LD)]

I apologise if the order has been a bit wrong; it is just that we are not very used to saying thank you to the Minister. So, I will just sit down and withdraw the amendment.

Amendment 182 withdrawn.