Solar Panels

Baroness Pinnock Excerpts

Wednesday 12th February 2025 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

I agree with the noble Baroness that the fitting of more efficient energy methods contributes to both the energy security of our country and the efficiency of those buildings. It is very important that we focus on that as much as we can and we will do all we can to encourage that with non-domestic buildings. Some technical issues came up as part of the consultation responses—we had 2,000 responses, including some on the fitting of solar panels to roofs and other efficiency measures—and it is important that we look at them before we issue our statement.

[Baroness Pinnock (LD)]

My Lords, one of the big challenges in encouraging more solar panels on large industrial premises is the lack of ability to connect to the national grid. I am sure that the Government are aware of that challenge, but what are they going to do about it?

[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

The noble Baroness raises a very important question for all the growth that we are predicting for our country. My colleagues in the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero are working very closely with the national grid to improve grid capacity; it will be essential to have that going forward. We need to make sure that that is the case, both to drive the growth that we want to see, because energy is vital to that, and to keep our energy security for the country the way we want it as we grow the economy.

English Devolution and Local Government

Baroness Pinnock Excerpts

Wednesday 12th February 2025 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)]

My Lords, the Government’s announcement on local government restructuring is a hugely significant upheaval for local democracy. We support the principles of devolution, but we do not support the Government’s method of achieving it. No council should be bullied or blackmailed into top-down restructuring. This was not in the Labour Party manifesto, and the Labour Government have massively rushed this whole exercise.

The Conservative Party has a proud record of supporting devolution. While we were in government, we empowered residents and their councils. We gave councils more control over local planning, improved accountability through elected mayors and police and crime commissioners, and decentralised power to the people by letting parents create free schools and giving residents power over neighbourhood planning.

In December 2024 we set out five tests for the Government that we believed any form of devolution should satisfy. Is this a genuine choice for local councils? In two-tier areas, do both district and county councils agree with restructuring? Will local government be more accountable to local residents? Will the overall changes help keep council tax down? Finally, will restructuring avoid disruption of social care?

We already know that the Government have failed each of these tests. Restructuring is compulsory. There has been no attempt to gather consensus within two-tier areas. Residents have not been consulted, and there has been no time for proper communication with local people about the plans that local councils are putting in place. The Government are incentivising council tax rises across the board—no, worse: punishing councils that keep council tax down. I have not been reassured by the Government that they understand the needs of adult and children’s social care, and the impact that this could have on it, compounded by Labour’s national insurance hikes. Nevertheless, I would be grateful if the Minister could address these five points in turn, and explain what consideration the Government have given each of them.

The shadow Secretary of State in the other place, Kevin Hollinrake, asked a number of questions of the Secretary of State, Angela Rayner, that went unanswered. Now the Government have had more time to consider these serious and reasonable questions, I ask the Minister to answer some of them, but this time with substance and not politics.

First, how exactly will this restructuring put more money into people’s pockets? How is it compatible with Labour’s changes to the local government funding formula that punish councils that keep their council tax low? Do the Government accept that these changes, which will mean that every single council employee in two-tier areas has to reapply for their job, will have an impact on local services, including planning delays? How will this impact on the Government’s plans to deliver 1.5 million homes in this Parliament? Finally, what support will the Government give to authorities—such as Woking and Thurrock—facing significant levels of debt? Will this debt be written off or passed on to the new unitary authorities?

We support stronger local accountability, but there are different ways to do this, and there should have been proper, full and open consultation. Local government must remain local and accountable to its residents. The whole process should be considered more slowly, to ensure that the people understand their future representation and have their say on it.

[Baroness Pinnock (LD)]

I remind the House that I have relevant interests as a councillor and as a vice- president of the Local Government Association. This is a wide-ranging Statement about the future of local government. There are three different elements within the Statement, and I want to address each separately.

First, I want to think about the creation of the so-called strategic authorities. The Government, in the headline to their Statement, described it as “devolution”. It is not devolution; it is delegation of powers from the centre in Westminster. True devolution will occur only when funding is raised locally and decisions are made locally, without the iron grip of Whitehall being exerted. This is a bit of a challenge for the Minister: if they are to have devolution, can she describe the route to the place where there is freedom for local government to make and fund its decisions, without the diktat from above?

The next challenge I have for the Minister—I am sorry, there are one or two here—is that of the democratic deficit that is being deliberately created. We are, apparently, going to have mayors for these so-called strategic authorities. If the evidence from the past in the election of mayors is to continue, mayors are elected—when they are stand-alone elections—by less than 20% of the electorate, which is hardly a resounding vote of confidence in that system. Those of us who care about local democracy are rightly concerned about increasing powers. For example, the mayors of the strategic authorities will have the power to create policy on housing and on strategic planning, which really affect the lives of residents. How will those decisions be respected when the mayors have been elected by such a low number of electors?

One small step that the Government could take to help reverse this democratic deficit is to return to the voting system that prevailed in the election of mayors until the previous Government, in their last throes, decided to remove the additional vote system and return to first past the post. I guess they thought it would help their cause; it did not. At least having an additional vote—albeit that is not what would I want—means that more people help to support the person who is elected.

The next element of the Statement is the abolition of district councils. I serve on a metropolitan council, so district councils are not anything I have experienced, but we know that they are very efficient in running very local services and are very close to the residents they serve. Systems always need reform, so if there is going to be reform of this two-tier system, why do we not think of change rather than abolition? Is it because the county councils are running out of money, and they need the district council reserves to prop them up?

In the new era of unitary authorities, the Government are talking about the average size of these unitary authorities being a population of 500,000. That is very much like the metropolitan area that I serve in. I can tell the House that this means that the wards that councillors will be elected to serve in will be large, and in rural areas they will be geographically large. I suspect that the Government are considering a ratio of councillor to electors of about 1:5,000. That is a very large number of people, and it would take local democracy away from people.

The last item I want to raise is the cancelling of elections. I do not think that, in a democracy, we should ever cancel elections. I know that the previous Government cancelled elections, so there is a bit of a precedent, but I do not think that it is one that should be repeated. People have a right to have their say in electing people to represent them. The difficulty that cancelling these elections creates is that the existing councillors who were elected four years ago will be the ones who determine the set-up for the new unitary councils in their area. If you do that you need the electoral mandate to do it, which they will not have.

I am very disappointed that the Government have decided that democracy is not worthy of the name, and that we are moving local government further and further away from local people. I hope that the Minister will be able to answer my questions and put some life back in local democracy.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government (Baroness Taylor of Stevenage) (Lab)]

I thank both noble Baronesses for their questions. The number one mission of our Government is to unlock growth in our regions. It is to this end that we are working very hard to start this generational opportunity to devolve powers and funding from Whitehall and Westminster to our local areas, where local leaders have skin in the game in making things happen for their communities. It is a very important part of our mission. With the measures we announced last Wednesday, over 44 million people will see the benefits of devolution. That is close to 80% of the county—more progress in a short amount of time than any Government in Britain’s history.

It is very important that we get on with this. This issue has been hanging around for most of my local government career, which is longer that I care to admit to. I have been involved in at least four long-term proposals for devolution in my time, and it is time that we got on with the job.

We have heard from councils that unitarisation or council mergers can help strengthen local leadership, improve local services, save taxpayers money and improve local accountability. That is why we invited formal unitary proposals from all the councils in two-tier areas and their neighbouring small unitaries.

We acknowledge that, for some areas, the timing of election affects their planning for devolution, particularly alongside reorganisation. To help manage these demands, we have considered requests to postpone elections from May 2025 to May 2026. We have been very clear that we would consider these requests only where it would help the area to deliver reorganisation and devolution to the most ambitious timeframe. That is a very high bar, and rightly so. Of these requests, the Government agree that for Norfolk and Suffolk, Essex and Thurrock, Hampshire and the Isle of Wight, and East Sussex and West Sussex, postponement is essential for the delivery of the devolution priority programme and complementary reorganisation. The Government have also agreed to postpone elections in Surrey, where reorganisation is essential to locking devolution options. We had a much larger number of proposals than that but, as I say, it was a very high bar.

I will address the questions posed by the noble Baronesses. I completely disagree with the characterisation from the noble Baroness, Lady Scott, that local authorities are being bullied and blackmailed, and that this is a top-down reorganisation. That is completely wrong. We asked local authorities to put proposals forward, and the fact that we were oversubscribed, with the number of local authorities that did so, shows the enthusiasm for this. I met with a large number of local authorities over the course of the consultation, and they are all very enthusiastic and positive about this proposal. We have driven local authorities to the edge of this then marched them back down the hill so many times. It is time that we just got on with the job.

On the noble Baroness’s points about consultation, we are undertaking extensive consultation in all the areas that I outlined just now. The Government will be starting that next week. We have asked for the local authorities to help us contact their stakeholders—whether they are community stakeholders, business groups or other channels—so that consultation is as wide as possible. We will continue to use consultation as the basis for the plans we take forward.

On council tax, I remind the party opposite that the failure properly to fund local government over many years was the worst thing that happened to social care and children’s services in my time in local government. We need to take steps now to restructure local government to make it sustainable for the future, and to make sure that it works properly to deliver the services that we need now, not the services that were needed 30 years ago.

On how restructuring will put more money in people’s pockets, I note that people will get better services from their local councils. The addition of a strategic level will make sure that every region in this country will benefit from the growth that we hope to see going forward, and every region will contribute to it. I am afraid that the levelling-up mission of the previous Government did not reach out to many areas of our country, so it is now time we did that.

We are of course aware of the issues with council staff, and we will work very closely with the Local Government Association and council colleagues on that.

On the impact on housing delivery, I genuinely believe that having mayors in a strategic role in our local areas, driving forward both housing and growth—in a way that makes sense for their area, which is the important part of this procedure—will be critical to seeing the housing delivery and growth that we want to see.

On the significant levels of debt that the noble Baroness mentioned, it is the responsibility of councils to manage their debts, and it is standard for councils to borrow and hold debt. We will work with local leaders to explore how best to support local government reorganisation where there has been failure, and we will continue to work with best value commissioners to support councils’ financial recovery.

The noble Baroness, Lady Pinnock, raised a number of issues, some of which I have already answered. The devolution of powers from Westminster down to local areas is a critical, once-in-a-generation step that we want to see. I am afraid that I disagree with her point that that is not devolution; I genuinely believe that it is. It will then be for the councils to facilitate further devolution out to the people in their local areas.

The noble Baroness mentioned the democratic deficit. If you look at what mayors have been able to achieve in their areas in improving skills, transport and many other things, you will see that there is no democratic deficit. In fact, the people in the areas that already have elected mayors are really benefiting from that. We have decided at this stage not to return to an alternative voting system, and we will stick with first past the post for these elections.

On district councils, the two tiers make for a complex picture. I was in a two-tier area for all my local government career. Many people do not understand which council does which services. Now is the time to address that issue once and for all, to make sure that there is only one council delivering for the people it serves. It will be for the Local Government Boundary Commission to decide the size of the wards and their representation. As I explained, cancelling elections will give local authorities the space to manage the process in order to get their new structures in place in time for mayoral elections in 2026.

Council Tax

Baroness Pinnock Excerpts

Monday 3rd February 2025 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

My Lords, fees and charges form an important part of councils’ income. Whether that is fair or not is for the council tax payers of the area in question to make their minds up about locally. The three strands of council tax funding very much include those fees and charges, and the voters will decide whether they are reasonable or not.

[Baroness Pinnock (LD)]

My Lords, further to the question from my noble friend Lord Shipley, some council tax payers are now paying 12% on top of the council tax bill to pay for social care—the social care precept. Is that a fair and reasonable way to raise money to pay for social care? I remind the Minister that it was introduced by the previous Government.

[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

The social care precept was introduced by the previous Government. There is an increase in demand for social care in our demographic, and that has to be funded. The Government continue to keep under review how adult social care is paid for. At the moment, it is paid for by an additional precept on council tax for those who need social care. It is very important that we continue to support people in our communities who need it, and I am sure the noble Baroness would want us to continue to do that.

Non-Domestic Rating (Multipliers and Private Schools) Bill

Baroness Pinnock Excerpts

2nd reading
Wednesday 29th January 2025 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Pinnock (LD)]

My Lords, I hope I am okay in asking the Minister to pass on my condolences to the noble Lord, Lord Khan of Burnley, and his family at this particularly sad time for them all.

I remind the House of my relevant interests as a councillor and as a vice-president of the Local Government Association. As my noble friend Lord Fox has indicated, a radical overhaul of taxation of business properties is long overdue. Successive Governments have tinkered with the multipliers and valuation periods. In addition, the increasing discrimination of the system against town centre businesses has been recognised and the response has been in the shape of various levels of relief. All that demonstrates, however, is that the non-domestic ratings system is no longer fit for purpose. The Government have admitted that to be the case. Unfortunately, this Bill does not address fundamental reform— at which point, I commend to the Minister the Liberal Democrat policy of a commercial landowner levy; I am sure she will read that with interest.

However, the Bill makes a small step in the right direction by attempting to make a significant change to the balance of rates paid by some small businesses, with a larger share demanded, rightly, of the warehouse distribution sector.

What it fails to do is assess the impact of those changes with the loss of relief that is also proposed. As the noble Earl, Lord Lytton, and my noble friend both said, you cannot deal with one without dealing with the other, and it is very difficult to assess what changes these proposals will make.

We on the Liberal Democrat Benches have long argued that online retailing should have business rates comparable with those of small businesses in town centres. The Bill proposes that retail, hospitality and leisure businesses based in town centres—whatever that means—should have a multiplier that is up to 20p in the pound lower than it is now. The Government’s argument is that these changes will help to support small businesses in local centres and encourage the community and economic value they provide. However, this change is restricted to a sector of businesses located in town centres. Can the Minister first provide a definition of them? I believe she did say, in her opening speech, that a definition of retail, hospitality and leisure businesses will come later. To be frank, I do not think that that is acceptable when we are being asked to understand changes that are going to be made, yet we are not sure of a clear definition of those businesses. Do they include, for instance, council-run indoor markets? Those are retail businesses in town centres: my understanding is that they might be excluded. I would love to know from the Minister, because for me it is an important question.

Can the Minister say why professional businesses in town centres are not able to benefit? Solicitors and accountants are at the heart of the commercial operation in small towns, as are post offices and doctors’ surgeries. If the aim is to support our high streets, all these businesses should be included.

Many local centres also include small manufacturing businesses of various sorts, which provide local employment and are often the source of innovation. Can the Minister explain why these businesses in town centres are excluded? How much better it would be to have a blanket of small businesses in town centres all being part of this reduction in the multipliers.

Out-of-town warehouse distributors have long had a competitive advantage over their bricks-and-mortar counterparts. The Bill proposes that the multiplier for these businesses should be up to 10p in the pound greater than it is now. However, the Bill fails to link the valuations of these warehouses compared with to those in small centres. I think I have quoted this before in your Lordships’ House, but an Amazon warehouse in South Yorkshire is valued at around £25 per square metre, whereas a small shop in my town centre has a valuation of £250 per square metre. That is at the heart of business rates because, if those do not change, tinkering around the edges with multipliers will still leave disadvantages for town centres. That is at the heart of the problem we would seek to address in order to redress the balance between online retailers and those in our town centres.

The other issue concerns larger stores, often located in large town centres, and out of town retail centres. It would be interesting to know how those will be judged in this new Bill. Will they be in that 1% or not? If they are, that will put the business model of some of them in jeopardy. The basis of the valuation of rental values makes life very difficult. Can the Minister explain why it is that, despite the number of empty shops in many towns, the rental valuation does not appear to be on the same declining path? My noble friend had a potential answer to that question when he said that the problem is that properties in many market towns are increasingly owned by a single owner. Certainly, in my local small town, most of the properties are in the ownership of two people, and that makes competitive rental values difficult to achieve. I am sure that the Minister will ask her officials about that.

I am very grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Khan, who I met, and his officials for their time in understanding the impact of all these changes, but the main question I had was not satisfactorily answered, I am afraid. It was, “Where is the impact statement?” I was told that, because impact assessments are not published for tax changes, there was not going to be one, but the Government must have done their sums, so let us see them. Otherwise, we cannot understand. We are all making estimates of the various moving parts, as various noble Lords have said, and how those are going to change. The Government must have done those sums, so it would be really good if they would share them and, if the Minister cannot share them today, perhaps she will be able to before Committee.

I will move on. It is also vital that councils know what the impact will be on business rate income, as that contributes a very large slice of funding for local services. I was told that the overall impact will be neutral, but, in her opening speech, the Minister suggested that, although the overall impact would be neutral, it would be difficult to ensure that no council loses out by these changes. Actually, as I know the Minister understands, every pound for a local council is now critical, so, again, I hope she will be able to find the answer to that before Committee.

I will move on, I think. The other major sector of the Bill is about private schools, about which we have heard various noble Lords speak this afternoon. As we know, it removes the business rate exemption for those schools which are charities, and Liberal Democrats are opposed in principle to the taxation of education. I think in particular of the 100,000 or so children with SEND in private education without education and healthcare plans. Those families will be hit hard by the proposals in the Bill when they are already facing more challenges than most of us. Private education provision has already faced the introduction of VAT and the NIC increases on employers. The removal of business rate exemption is the third financial hit in as many months. Well-endowed private schools will weather the financial storm, but others may not, resulting in increasing pressure on state school places.

In conclusion, this Bill is a small step in the right direction, but it fails to assess all the moving parts. As many speakers have said, the Government should think again about the exemption of relief to private schools, and we urge the Government to rethink the totality of the impact of the Bill on business.

Devon and Torbay Combined County Authority Regulations 2024

Baroness Pinnock Excerpts

Monday 27th January 2025 Grand Committee

I pay tribute to the local leaders, councils and officers for their hard work and the significant part they play in making the Government’s ambitious agenda to widen and deepen devolution a reality in their areas. I also thank all those who took part in the consultation process. It is great when we get a good response from the public, local businesses and voluntary organisations to these consultations. It is vital that they have their say. I look forward to answering any questions noble Lords may have and to participating in our discussion of these four instruments. I beg to move.

[Baroness Pinnock (LD)]

My Lords, I remind the Committee of my relevant interests as a councillor on Kirklees Council in West Yorkshire and as a vice-president of the Local Government Association.

These four statutory instruments are politically and historically interesting. First, they recreate in whole or in part the historic counties of Devon, Lancashire, Lincolnshire and the East Riding of Yorkshire. That is a positive change. It is another reversal of Thatcherite policy, which, in this instance, abolished county councils. Strategic planning and provision of such key local services as public transport, housing and economic development can be much better made across a larger geography. That change is therefore welcome. However, I am not letting the Minister off the hook that easily. I have a number of questions applicable to each of the relevant instruments.

First, on governance, can the Minister confirm that meetings of either the mayoral or the combined county authorities will be held in public and that scrutiny committees are a requirement, with powers for pre-decision scrutiny and to call any decision that is challenged under the relevant procedural rules?

The Devon and Torbay Combined County Authority combines two very unequal—in both population and geography—partners. Can the Minister say whether that disparity has been considered and whether any issues have been raised in the wider county on this point in the consultation, the details of which I obviously have not seen? I ask this because there will be inequality of representation on the authority from these very unequal parts, and I wonder whether that will result in a bit of friction when it comes to making difficult decisions.

I note at this point that, because of the efforts made during the passage of the then levelling-up Bill by the Minister, her team and me, district councils will have representation on the combined authorities by law. That was a very important change to the Bill.

I move on to the Hull and East Riding Mayoral Combined Authority. There will be a mayor from May this year; we will see how that pans out. I recognise the appeal to the Government of having a single person elected to lead a combined authority. However, I and my colleagues are not convinced that, from the residents’ standpoint, this is a positive move. Mayors will be tolerated—this is my experience; I live in a mayoral authority—while there is no mayoral precept and while they are basically determining the details of delegated powers and funding from government. However, when either of those things changes—if there is a mayoral precept of a considerable amount or when there are difficult decisions to be made on funding allocation, which I anticipate will come with bus franchising—I anticipate greater concern from residents that their voice is not being heard.

For instance, in the Hull and East Riding Mayoral Combined Authority area, which I know better, I can easily see that, with the rural parts of East Riding and the very urban area of Hull City Council, it could be difficult to make decisions on allocating funding under the bus franchising legislation, which I hope will be passed. Trouble is coming down the track, I think.

The Greater Lincolnshire Combined County Authority recreates the historic county of Lincolnshire, which is positive. It combines the seven district councils of the current county council, plus the two unitaries of North Lincs and North East Lincs. The issue I want to raise concerns transport funding. In this statutory instrument, the constituent authorities remain the highways authorities but central funding goes directly to the mayor, who then has the responsibility of cascading the funding to each of the three existing highways authorities. Can the Minister describe how fair allocation can be assured and whether using this mechanism will add to bureaucracy by adding yet another layer of governance?

The Lancashire Combined County Authority will, as we know, consist of the existing county council, the unitaries of Blackpool and Blackburn and Darwen, plus the 12 existing district councils of the current county council. We have had the devolution White Paper. If its proposals are accepted—I hope that there will be some challenge to them—this will result in the demise of district councils. For Lancashire and Lincolnshire, this would result in another wholesale local government reorganisation within a short period, with the added confusion that accompanies such structural change. Those of us who are involved understand what might happen; residents will not. Have the Government considered these two separate reorganisations and how they will be managed without causing confusion and additional costs?

As I said at the outset, this is the right move for strategic decision-making. However, I look forward to the answers to my queries from the Minister.

[Lord Lucas (Con)]

My Lords, I am grateful for the Minister’s exposition of these SIs. I completely understand why we are moving in this direction: greater efficiency and effectiveness. I very much hope that the Government can, as this process moves on, increase the level of effective devolution and perhaps even give some real independence over revenue to these authorities so that they can develop their full potential.

In addition, when we reach Committee on the hereditary Peers Bill, I will propose that, rather than hereditary Peers being the eligible candidates in by-elections, it should be people nominated by these new authorities and their mayors. We can use the existing mechanisms that we have to start to introduce a measure of regional representation into the House. I hope that the Government will have their imaginative hat on when we come to that. The mechanism is in place; let us use it to move in a direction that many of us would like to go in and to take at least a small step.

I am a resident of East Sussex, which is one of the candidates for the next round of this measure. I note that the local proposals involve a mayor for the whole of Sussex, thereby recreating not the original county council but the original kingdom of Sussex—perhaps we might have a prince rather than a mayor. What concerns me most is how the towns and communities in these new unitaries will come to cherish, assert and grow their own identities. I very much hope that I can persuade the Minister to circulate widely to all the councils that are candidates for this, as well as their constituent parts, examples of how communities flourish in unitaries, including what structures and relationships make that happen well.

The process of transition from “a county plus districts” to a unitary system will be hugely time-absorbing for the councils involved. They will have no space in their heads to do anything other than make that work well. The constituent communities underneath that need to understand how to play their part and how best to organise themselves so that they have a real role to play in what comes afterwards.

Looking in particular at East Sussex, along the seaside, we have Rye, Hastings, St Leonards, Bexhill, Pevensey, Eastbourne, Seaford and Newhaven. They are all immensely different places. Each has its own identity and its own way of doing things. In the interior, you have towns such as Lewes, which are really different, as well as ordinary country towns such as Uckfield and Heathfield. There is a huge variety of different communities within what will be one unitary: different histories, different spirits.

Community Engagement Principles and Extremism Definition

Baroness Pinnock Excerpts

Wednesday 22nd January 2025 Lords Chamber

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government (Lord Khan of Burnley) (Lab)]

My Lords, let me first of all say that national security will always come first for this Government, and we will always treat the threat of extremism with the seriousness that it requires. The noble Lord makes an interesting point. I confirm to the House that the Government take the threat of extremism very seriously and will continue to work with partners to tackle extremism in all parts and forms. That is why the Home Secretary commissioned a rapid review of extremism in 2024. The Government will set out their approach to countering extremism in due course and will update Parliament accordingly. I am sure that many of the issues that the noble Lord raised will be part of that review.

[Baroness Pinnock (LD)]

My Lords, knowledge and understanding of communities is crucial in this regard. Councillors are elected to serve their communities and know them well. Does the Minister agree with that proposition? Does he also agree that plans to create large wards make that more challenging for councillors? Will the Government therefore keep ward sizes appropriate to their role in knowing and representing their communities, and will the Government provide additional support to councillors in that critical role?

[Lord Khan of Burnley (Lab)]

My Lords, let me reassure the noble Baroness that, having been a councillor for 16 years in the wonderful district of Burnley, I understand the fantastic work that local councils do. I reaffirm the Deputy Prime Minister’s position that we want to work in equal partnership with the local authorities and we want to give them more power. I would not be able to comment on the size of the wards because that is the responsibility of the Minister, Jim McMahon, in the other place.

Combined Authorities (Borrowing) and East Midlands Combined County Authority (Borrowing and Functions) (Amendment) Regulations 2025

Baroness Pinnock Excerpts

Monday 13th January 2025 Grand Committee

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government (Baroness Taylor of Stevenage) (Lab)]

My Lords, these regulations were laid before this House on 19 November 2024. The other place debated them on 8 January 2025. The regulations relate to the York and North Yorkshire Combined Authority, the East Midlands Combined County Authority and the North East Mayoral Combined Authority. Via Section 1 of the Local Government Act 2003, they will enable these authorities to borrow money for use against their relevant functions.

Presently, the York and North Yorkshire Combined Authority and the North East Mayoral Combined Authority are already able to borrow against their transport functions, and the York and North Yorkshire Combined Authority is able to borrow against its police and fire authority functions. The East Midlands, as a combined county authority, is unable to borrow against any of its functions.

The regulations before us will enable the York and North Yorkshire Combined Authority, the North East Mayoral Combined Authority and the East Midlands Combined County Authority to make use of borrowing powers for purposes relevant to their current and future functions. This will bring all three authorities in line with existing combined authorities and fulfil commitments made in their original devolution agreements.

On consent, I bring it to the Committee’s attention that all three authorities and their respective constituent councils have given consent to the conferral of borrowing powers. Similarly, the three authorities have agreed their respective debt caps with HM Treasury for 2024-25.

The regulations will also confer the East Midlands Combined County Authority’s constituent councils’ general power of competence for economic development and regeneration upon the combined county authority. The power will be held concurrently with the East Midlands constituent councils; the East Midlands Combined County Authority will be able to exercise the general power of competence only in relation to economic development and regeneration. The conferral of this power will fulfil the East Midlands’ original devolution agreement and enable the combined county authority to support local businesses and charities, as well as strengthening the area’s visitor economy.

As the conferral of the general power of competence for economic development and regeneration upon the East Midlands constitutes a new power, Section 48 of the Levelling-up and Regeneration Act 2023 applies. I can confirm that the requirements under Section 48 have been met, and that the East Midlands Combined County Authority and its constituent councils have consented to this conferral.

I come to the final part of these regulations, which will make amendments to the East Midlands Combined County Authority Regulations. Specifically, these are by: first, amending a typographical error so that the combined county authority is the local housing authority for housing needs, laundry facilities, shops, recreation grounds and housing purposes, and with respect to buildings acquired for housing purposes; secondly, enabling the mayor of the combined county authority to arrange for a committee of the combined county authority to exercise mayoral functions; thirdly, allowing non-constituent members of the combined county authority to have voting rights in an authority committee; and, finally, clarifying the voting arrangements for the combined county authority, including the requirement for a two-thirds majority to pass its mayoral budget. These amendments have been discussed with the East Midlands and its constituent members, with the councils and the combined county authority consenting to the amendments being made.

These regulations, which are supported by the authorities and their constituent councils, are a necessary step in fulfilling the original devolution agreements that had been reached. Devolution across England is fundamental to achieving the change that the public expect and deserve: growth; the more joined-up delivery of public services; and policies being done with communities, not to them. I commend the draft regulations to the Committee.

[Baroness Pinnock (LD)]

My Lords, these are important changes to the devolution in the three mayoral authorities referenced by the Minister. In general, I and my party support devolution, of course, but we remain concerned about the mayoral system being adopted across England because of the way in which it concentrates too much authority and decision-making in the hands of one person. So, it is a “yes” to devolution, but mayoral authority may need some adjustment to make it more democratic, particularly as it is happening in this statutory instrument, with more powers being extended to mayoral authorities—hence budgets becoming enlarged, sometimes substantially. It seems to me that, if there is more capital borrowing, there will be a requirement to fund that borrowing, and there will therefore be an increase in the mayoral precept. My first question for the Minister is this: will there be a cap on either capital borrowing or mayoral precepts so that we understand the extent of the borrowing and the cost to the taxpayer?

Building Homes

Baroness Pinnock Excerpts

Tuesday 17th December 2024 Lords Chamber

[Lord Jamieson (Con)]

My Lords, I declare my interest as a councillor in Central Bedfordshire. I thank the Minister for the Statement from the other place.

I think we can all agree that we need more homes. However, they must be in the right places, with the right infrastructure, and constructed in a way that fosters a sense of home and community—homes that will stand the test of time. Under the Conservative Government, between 2013 and 2023 we saw a record level of new housing, greater than in any other period since the 1960s. We also delivered 550,000 affordable homes since 2010, including some 63,000 in 2022-23 alone.

The Government have taken a one-size-fits-all approach to a region-specific issue. Many rural areas, which do not have the requisite infrastructure to support rapid population growth, are facing sky-high housing target increases. In Westmorland and Furness it is 487%, in North East Lincolnshire it is 272%, in North Yorkshire it is 200% and in the New Forest it is 106%, while London and Birmingham see a reduction. How will the Minister achieve these targets while still ensuring that the required local facilities and infrastructure are in place? The Centre for Cities and the OBR have both said the Government are going to manage only around 1.1 million homes this Parliament.

I do not disagree that the planning system needs improving. It is too complex and takes too long. However, concreting over green fields rather than focusing on supporting building in urban areas will not solve this problem—nor will removing the local democratic accountability of planning committees, or the suggestion that regional mayors allocate housing with call-in powers and greater call-in by the Secretary of State. I must ask the Minister to assure the House that the Government do not intend to bulldoze through low-quality developments in rural areas just to hit their housing targets.

The Government are demanding that all councils rapidly review their local plans to deliver the new mandatory targets. Having spent eight years trying to get a local plan over the line, and succeeding, I know how difficult it can be to get local plans through, particularly when challenged by landowners who are incentivised to challenge the plan. These proposals risk making local plans harder to deliver. What will the Government do to make local plans easier and speedier to deliver?

I would also like to raise some concerns about mandatory housing targets. These are based on a flawed methodology. Affordability is a reasonable metric to look at, but it needs to compare similar properties. Comparing the cost of a one-bedroom apartment in Camden with a three-bedroom home in Stevenage, for instance, is not a fair comparison. Will the Minister look at the affordability ratio on a cost per square metre basis?

There are other challenges regarding the delivery of homes. We need to look at capacity to build, the use of judicial review and the impact of other legislation, such as on nutrient neutrality. Can the Minister tell the House what the Government are doing to address these?

I must also add, even though I may be accused of stating the blindingly obvious, that councils do not actually build homes, or not that many; developers do. To that end, will the Government provide local councils with adequate powers to ensure that allocated and permissioned sites actually get built?

The Government have said that they want brownfield first, but other than rhetoric, what evidence is there of this? All we have seen so far is substantial housing target increases for rural areas, where brownfield sites are somewhat thin on the ground. Will the Government continue with the previous Conservative Government’s proposal of a strong presumption in favour of brownfield development? I suggest that this is the best way of protecting the green belt and our countryside, and focusing development on where it is most needed.

Will the Government’s proposals actually improve the planning system? Will they simplify the system? Will they help councils to deliver quality homes in the quantity and locations needed? Will they speed up the planning process? Will they encourage developers to build where homes are most needed? I fear not. I thank the Minister once again for repeating this Statement and I look forward to hearing her response and answers to my questions.

[Baroness Pinnock (LD)]

My Lords, I too have relevant interests, primarily as a councillor in a metropolitan authority in west Yorkshire.

This is the season of good will, so I am going to start by sharing the areas of agreement with the Minister. There is an agreement in principle on the fundamental need for considerably more housing units, and we on these Benches broadly agree with the total numbers being proposed. We agree that housebuilding is a stimulant for economic growth, although not on its own. We agree with the notion of strategic planning at a sub-regional or mayoral level, and we agree that all councils should have an up-to-date local plan. I am still shocked that only 30% do; how that has escaped past Governments, I have no idea.

Now I will have to move on to the areas where there is less agreement. First, on strategic planning, there has to be a greater element of democratic and community involvement in making judgments about areas and sites within a strategic plan. The single mayor and leaders system simply does not enable that. Will the Minister spell out how the Government anticipate community involvement and wider democratic involvement in developing such plans?

The second area of less agreement—the Minister will not be surprised to hear me say this—is that there is a constant confusion in government thinking, probably deliberate, between so-called affordable housing and social housing. There is a need for about 150,000 homes for social rent every year. That is essential, and it must be a priority, so why is it not? Why does the plan not say that, within the 370,000 homes the Government are committing to, they will commit to build whatever number they choose—I would choose 150,000—of homes for social rent?

That brings me on to land use, which we are now colour-coding, apparently. Who thought we would colour-code land use? Green belt, grey belt and brown belt—well, brownfield. The NPPF accepts that green belt has a role to play. That definition of green belt is being nibbled away at, though, and, as the noble Lord, Lord Jamieson, suggested, in rural areas there could be considerable use of green-belt land where there is not already brownfield or grey belt. I am not sure how acceptable that is going to be to those local communities. Local plans currently have to consider the green-belt boundary. How do the Government anticipate that that will now work, given what is said in the NPPF?

The grey belt, our next colour, is very grey because it is not very well defined. I was at a seminar this morning on all this, where it was suggested that it is so poorly defined that it will be open to constant legal challenge as it stands. Perhaps the Minister will spell out how the Government will get greater definition of the grey belt.

It must be 25 years ago or so that I first heard the phrase “brownfield first”. That is interesting, because in my own town there is still a large area of brownfield land that has planning consent but has still not been built on.

I shall now move away from land use and on to the planning process. It seems to me that we are moving to a more top-down planning approach, and I do not think that is acceptable to local people and their democratic representatives. Power currently remains in the hands of landowners; they can still offer up their sites in the system and challenge local plans, as has been said. The major housebuilders have the power to determine what is or is not built. How will the Government influence or constrain that power, so that the types of housing tenures defined by local councils are actually built by developers? Unless we do that, we are not going to get, as the Statement says, houses in the numbers and types of tenures that we need.

I turn to the issue of the five-year supply, the lack of which leaves local councils open to speculative building. It has always struck me that the five-year supply ought to include sites that already have permission but have not been built or even started. That is a game developers play: they get planning permission and then they can say, “There is not a five-year supply”, and more sites are allocated but we still not have the homes we desperately need. I hope that the Government are considering dealing with that sleight of hand by developers.

Finally, I emphasise that we on these Benches will completely oppose any suggestion that reduces the democratic nature of our planning committees. Planning committees have an important role to play. They enable a local voice to be heard. They enable the experience and knowledge of local people to be shared, and I will give one example. Where I am, of course, there are a lot of Victorian mineshafts, which are not recorded. Fortunately for a builder, some local people knew exactly where they were, which is not where he thought they were. That would not have come out unless there had been a planning committee where they could speak. We need a local voice, local decisions and local influence. I hope that the noble Baroness agrees.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government (Baroness Taylor of Stevenage) (Lab)]

My Lords, I am grateful to both the noble Lord and the noble Baroness for their questions. I have only six minutes left, so I shall probably struggle to answer all of them in the time allotted, but please be assured that I will respond in writing to anything that I do not manage to cover.

In our first month in office, we proposed this bold set of reforms to overhaul the planning system. We have met our commitment, following extensive consultation, to meet publication by the end of the year. This will support our ambitious target of building 1.5 million new homes this Parliament. We needed to grasp the nettle of planning reform to both boost housing supply and unleash the economic growth that we want, and I hope that is incontrovertible. We received over 10,000 responses and have had extensive engagement with housebuilders, affordable housing providers, local authorities and other organisations, which led to the publication yesterday of this plan.

Before I set out a number of the important areas in which we have made changes, I will touch on some of the proposals that we intend to implement unamended, because they answer some of the questions raised by the noble Lord and the noble Baroness. First, we have reversed the anti-supply changes introduced by the last Government a year ago and reverted to mandatory housing targets. In response to the noble Lord, Lord Jamieson, I say that we have done detailed work on how to set up these targets, and I will come on to some more information about how we are doing that in a moment.

Secondly, we have made explicit the importance of growth supporting development, from labs to data centres, to supply chains and logistics. In the same vein, we have made it clear that the default position for renewable energy deployment should be “yes”. Thirdly, we have strongly promoted mixed tenure developments, reflecting the robust evidence which attests to the fact that they build out faster and create better, more diverse communities.

Fourthly, we have made a series of changes to bolster affordable housing delivery and enable local authorities to determine the right mix of affordable housing for their communities. That includes separating out houses for social rent and affordable housing, so local councils when making their plans are now able to do that. That will support our commitment to deliver the biggest increase in social and affordable housing in a generation.

Then there are four important areas where we have refined our proposals. I will speak first about housing targets. We made it clear when we launched the consultation in July that restoring a mandatory standard method for assessing housing needs would be insufficient if the method itself was not up to the job. We proposed a bold change, increasing the total annual target from 300,000 to 370,000, ending the reliance on the decade-old population projections and removing the arbitrary 35% urban uplift that resulted in the skewed national distribution.

We fully intend to maintain that level of ambition set out in July, but we heard a clear view that we should do more to target housing growth on the places where affordability pressures were the most acute, and that is the way we have designed the formula. We have made the method more responsive to demand, redistributing housing targets towards those places where housing is least affordable, while maintaining the overall target envelope.

I turn next to reforms to the green belt, another subject on which noble Lords questioned me. Ours is a “brownfield first” approach to development. As a result of a number of targeted changes we are making to the framework and our proposals for a brownfield passport, we are prioritising and fast-tracking building on previously developed urban land wherever possible, but we know that there are simply not enough sites on brownfield land registers to deliver the volume of homes that we need, let alone enough that are viable and in the right locations.

In the summer, we proposed that local authorities should take a sequential approach to releasing land to meet their housing needs—so brownfield first, followed by low-quality land in the green belt, and only then higher-performing land. We have therefore set out a clearer description of how to assess whether land meets the definition of grey belt, and we will provide further guidance to local authorities in the new year—a point raised by the noble Lord, Lord Jamieson—to support them with green-belt reviews.

At the centre of our green-belt reforms lie our golden rules. They are designed to make sure that where green-belt land is released, the public derive real benefit from development on it, including more affordable housing to meet local need.

Our final policy takes a different approach to managing variation in land values. We have adjusted social housing need due to consultation responses so, rather than a single 50% target, we are introducing that 15 percentage-point premium on top of the targets set in local plans. That will be up to a maximum of 50%. Because that means the target itself will be responsive to local circumstances, we will be restricting the ability for site-specific viability assessments until such time as we have amended viability guidance in spring next year.

The noble Lord, Lord Jamieson, referred to changes to the presumption in favour of sustainable development. The presumption sits at the heart of the NPPF and means that where a local authority has underdelivered or an up-to-date plan is not in place, the balance of decision-making is tilted in favour of approval. We are determined to ensure that where the presumption applies, it will have real teeth. At the same time, we are clear that development consented through it must be consistent with the clear requirements in the national policy relating to sustainability, density, design and the provision of affordable homes. The changes we have made deliver on both these fronts.

Finally, in respect of the local authorities at an advanced stage of plan making, we have sought views on how to deal with those and have made proposals on transitional arrangements for local authorities in those late stages. We recognise that we are asking much from local authorities. The noble Lord, Lord Jamieson, referred to capacity and capability. That is why across dedicated local plan funding, the planning capacity and capability support announced at the Budget—income raised from fees—will inject more than £100 million into the system in the coming year.

With focus and determination, we have pushed on to ensure that we put in place a planning system geared towards meeting housing need in full and unleashing economic growth. I understand the points about community engagement; there are no real changes to the involvement that communities are able to have in plan-making processes. In fact, there is a specific part of the National Planning Policy Framework that refers to neighbourhood plans, and we want to support and encourage further engagement in those as well.

As I said, I did not think that I was going to get through all the questions in the time permitted, but anything that I have not picked up on I will respond to in writing. In terms of the buildout that the noble Lord, Lord Jamieson, referred to, there is a whole section in the report setting out what sanctions are available to local authorities where developers have failed to build out.

I hope I have set out as clearly as possible what we have been doing with the National Planning Policy Framework and thank noble Lords very much for their contributions.

Planning Committees: Reform

Baroness Pinnock Excerpts

Thursday 12th December 2024 Lords Chamber

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government (Baroness Taylor of Stevenage) (Lab)]

My Lords, I want to be clear that I do not think local authorities should have the finger pointed at them for holding up planning. However, applications can get stuck, and we need to do all we can to make the processes as efficient and effective as possible. We recognise the great importance of democratic oversight of planning decisions. This is a working paper for discussion with the sector, and the changes we propose will support that plan-led system by ensuring that planning committees operate as effectively as possible and encourage better-quality development that is aligned with local development plans. The paper puts forward for discussion with the sector three models for how this could work. It is not the intention to exclude local authority members but to get them, and the public, more involved at local plan stage, so that they can influence things at an earlier stage in the process before detailed applications come forward.

[Baroness Pinnock (LD)]

My Lords, strategic planning is very important but very difficult for members of the community to grasp. Often, local residents do not get involved until there is a real planning application in front of them, on an allocated site in the local plan. Does the Minister agree that it is at that practical level that local residents have local knowledge that can positively and constructively influence the outcome of a planning application at that stage? Does she agree that we should not deny this useful way for local people to help shape their area?

[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

I agree with the noble Baroness that the voice of local people and local councillors in the planning process is absolutely vital. There is no intention to change the consultation rules on planning applications. Representations will be considered by any decision-maker in the process. The best way for councillors and communities to engage in the development proposed for their areas is through the local plan process, which will be agreed by the council. Where a controversial development is proposed that has not been planned for, councillors will continue to play a key role in representing the voice of their communities. There will be no change to the ability of local people to inform and make their views known about planning applications; this is about speeding up the decision-making.

Homes: Existing Communities

Baroness Pinnock Excerpts

Thursday 12th December 2024 Grand Committee

[Baroness Pinnock (LD)]

My Lords, this debate took a turn that I was not expecting which has made me entirely rethink what I am going say. I ought to declare from the outset my relevant interests as a vice-president of the Local Government Association and a councillor in the north of England. I do not think anyone else in the Room is from the north. We look at things rather differently perhaps from what we have heard so far today.

The noble Lord, Lord Wolfson, made a speech turning all our ideas upside down. I understand why people get frustrated with the planning system, and I am not one who says that the planning system is entirely right, does everything as it should and produces the housing and infrastructure that we as a country and as communities want and need. However, a more free market approach to housebuilding—all I have heard is of housebuilding—puts more power into the hands of those who are already powerful: those with land to sell, who are, in our current system, powerful operators; and those who are going to build those homes, who are already powerful operators in the system. It omits the one element in the planning system that gives influence, rather than power, to people in that community and that place to help them think about how they want their place to be.

A free market approach, without giving power and influence to the third element of the equation, is not one I want to be part of. That is because, having been in local government for a long time, I know that developers do not have the best interests of local places in their hearts when they start building. They are interested in acting exactly as the noble Lord, Lord Wolfson, described: as a free market, building what they want, where they want to build it, without cognisance of the places around them.

There are many examples of developers who have taken liberties with the planning system and have not left the infrastructure as we would like it. In fact, they do not leave infrastructure at all; they do not build it. One of the main reasons you need a planning system is to put a rein around those whose objective is to see housing as a retail offer—or sale—and not as a place that shapes part of our communities.

I am mindful, having been made to think by the noble Lord, that I have not said any of the things that I had written down. One question that comes to mind, though, is: under that system who would build the million homes for social rent that this country and its people desperately need? It would not be as profitable, so who would do it? That is a key question for the noble Lord, Lord Wolfson. How do you then balance housebuilding and all the other interests local people have, such as the environment, infrastructure, public transport and avoiding flooding? How does that fit in? I cannot see it, and that is why we have a planning system. A plan-based system, even though it is not working as well as it should, is one that I hope we stick with.