Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill

Debate between Baroness Thornhill and Lord Young of Cookham

Report stage
Wednesday 6th September 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Young of Cookham (Con)]

My Lords, I have added my name to Amendment 199 on cycling in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Berkeley, and I will follow briefly in his slipstream, if I may.

I am grateful to the Minister for the Teams meeting that she held on this subject at the end of last month to find common ground. Throughout our debates on the Bill, the Government have suggested that our objectives could be better met through NPPFs rather than through legislation. But throughout the debate there has been some scepticism about that, as there is ample evidence that leaving things to guidance does not actually produce the results.

The NPPF guidance on cycling was last revised in 2018, but there is a real problem with that guidance, and I hope that my noble friend can give me some assurance. One paragraph of that guidance said:

“Development should only be prevented or refused on highways grounds if there would be an unacceptable impact on highway safety, or the residual cumulative impacts on the road network would be severe”.


This paragraph makes it very difficult for local planning authorities to refuse developments whose location or design fails adequately to support walking, cycling and other sustainable transport modes. If we are to rely on future NPPFs, can my noble friend give me an assurance that that provision will be removed, because it stands in the way of many of the Bill’s objectives?

The final point raised in the Teams meeting was one that the noble Lord, Lord Berkeley, has just mentioned: the conflict between upper and lower-tier authorities. At the meeting, my noble friend was good enough to say that she would have another look at this and would perhaps be able to respond on it.

I very much welcome what has been said—that Active Travel England is now a statutory consultee—but it would be better if it could be involved at an earlier stage of the proposals, as the noble Lord, Lord Berkeley, said, rather than at a later stage, when it would be difficult to retrofit the provisions for cycling that we would all want to see. I hope that my noble friend the Minister is able to provide some reassurance on those two points.

[Baroness Thornhill (LD)]

My Lords, in view of the remarks of the noble Baroness, Lady Williams, I will be much briefer than I intended, so we might ramble around a little.

On Amendments 193 and 194 in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Lansley, I absolutely understand his points and will await the Minister’s answer on the reasons for that omission from the Bill. I have to confess to the noble Lord to having made the assumption that they would be in the Bill. In fact, reading through this section, I thought “Why are people putting down these amendments? Aren’t they what people already do in a good local plan?”, so I am grateful for his attention to detail.

Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill

Debate between Baroness Thornhill and Lord Young of Cookham

Committee stage
Monday 27th March 2023 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Thornhill (LD)]

My Lords, the main debate on the new plan hierarchy was clearly spelled out in this Chamber last week, but Covid prevented me from joining in, although I listened with interest. I will not waste time going over that debate, but I still want to reiterate certain facts. As was well demonstrated in the debate on the last group, it is a fact that so much detail is still missing and so many important matters are still out for consultation—that is probably why there are so many amendments and why there is so much anxiety around the content of NDMPs. In particular, as was well expressed by the noble Baroness, Lady Taylor, what will truly be left over for local councillors and their communities to shape their place? The Bill is very strong on the rhetoric of place shaping, but it feels that we are being disempowered to do that.

Before turning to the specifics of the amendment, I will say that it is absolutely clear that the potential for conflict is significant. Without some clarity and legal clout from the Bill—not just ministerial promises that there will be more details in the revised NPPF, or that it will be more clear when we have the NDMPs—what will happen as a result of this is that there will be plenty of work for the planning chambers and litigators going forward. There will be a long transition period—the Government are quite sensibly allowing for that—because this is a new system, so there will be quite some time before we get precedents set, we get used to it and we get to see which way it is going.

The amendments have regard to the obvious potential conflicts between NDMPs and local development plans, and they also question the increasingly all-powerful Secretary of State role and the position of combined authorities. The issues concerning Secretary of State powers have also been well articulated, but, as drafted, Clause 86, which was previously debated, and Clause 87 very clearly—I do not think there is any ambiguity—favour NDMPs over development plans. But they also transfer significant policy-making powers directly to the Secretary of State—this is yet another area of concern and potential conflict because, as we know, NDMPs come with no minimum public consultation or primary parliamentary scrutiny requirements. Despite the Government’s previous assurances that this undemocratic effect was not the intention of the clauses, no legal safeguards have been introduced, so this is an area in which we would certainly hope to see movement from the Government.

My first question for the Minister on this group is on the issue of local plan soundness, as it seems to me that a lot of conflict could and should be avoided if both the NDMPs and the local development plan are very clear about what they are trying to achieve, where the boundaries of their scope are, and where one might take over from another—I was envisaging the Venn diagram and hoping that there was not very much in the middle. It seems highly desirable that the overlap should be almost impossibly small, or as limited as possible, so can the Minister confirm whether a plan would be found sound under the new regime if it contained policies that were at variance with NDMPs?

The proposed introduction of gateway checks, which is an excellent suggestion, would seem to indicate that the intention is, on the one hand, to allow both parties an opportunity to point out unacceptable variance, or, on the other, for the local planning authority to present its evidence as to why local policies should deviate from the NDMPs and therefore receive advice and engage in constructive dialogue. From the thrust of the questions of the NPPF consultations and the subsequent Written Ministerial Statements, it seems that local variance is both expected and accounted for—good.

If that is the case, why do we need new subsection (5C), and why can we not just accept the amendment tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Taylor? It is very definite and legally tight—too definite and legally tight to allow for circumstances when it might be absolutely legitimate to give the local plan precedence. Is that deemed to be a bad thing by the Government? If not, under the current system, in which decisions are now weighed and balanced, surely a degree of leeway is desirable—the more so, as has already been mentioned, as the main criticism around NDMPs is the worry that they will set a low floor and stifle ambition and innovation, which has always been, in the main, local authority-led. New subsection (5C) might sound definite, final and firm, and therefore intended to reduce conflict—but at what cost? Could there be unintended consequences?

If the Government do not accept that proposal, the amendment in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Lansley, provides a more nuanced response to a very complex issue to allow for a time when the NDMP may not necessarily be “Top Trumps” because it is appropriate in those local circumstances. I believe that the weight of new subsection (5C) does not allow that for that discretion, so we will certainly support that amendment. As to the discussion of the word “significant”, I respectfully suggest that planners, inspectors and litigators have always weighed up, and probably always will weigh up, these words. It is part of their bread and butter, it is what they do all the time, and this will be no exception.

Amendment 187 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Hayman of Ullock, is a natural extension of that same logic. She can envisage times when a local plan can and should take precedence, especially if it relates to the additional responsibilities in a larger geographical area. On these Benches, we believe that there is real value in the Government incentivising, encouraging and supporting local authorities to work together to get a larger—and, dare we use the word, regional—spatial strategy of that sort. In effect, we would not want any barriers to be put in the way of that, because there is far more at stake in a local area, such as economic growth, than just meeting housing need.

The noble Baroness’s Amendments 192 and 195 are an interesting extension of this dilemma. I wonder whether her Amendment 193 could be logistically challenging, as the Secretary of State would have to actually hear and know about every single challenge and conflict. But the principle of a feedback loop regarding conflicts seems a good one, particularly during a period of transition, as all this will all new and very different territory for everyone. I think we would all like to know where the pinch points and places with the most disagreement are and, more importantly, how they are being resolved. We will be interested in the Minister’s thoughts on this thread of feedback, reporting, learning and, presumably, revising.

Amendment 187B in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Young of Cookham, seems very sensible. If the Bill is, as we hear all the time, to truly make the system a plan-led system, it absolutely makes sense that local plans must and should be up to date. My concern, particularly now, is with the removal of the tilted balance and planning by appeal, plus the supremacy of NDMPs. Can the Minister explain how the Government intend to incentivise councils to keep their plans up to date? I cannot see how that will be done, as there appears to be no disincentives to do otherwise.

We will support any amendment to insert a process for the Secretary of State to designate and review a national development management policy, including minimum public consultation requirements and a process of parliamentary scrutiny, as has been set out in the Planning Act 2008 and is already deemed necessary for national policy statements. If local authorities are rightly required to consult on such policies when preparing local plans today, in future it must be right that Secretaries of State be held to account by the public and Parliament in a similar way. As with national policy statements, we ask that Parliament be required to scrutinise NDMPs and that the public be allowed to consult on proposed changes to them.

There are loads of possible advantages of NDMPs, and there seems to be a general acceptance of this in principle, but the devil will always be in the detail. The unprecedented level of central control for planning that they introduce means that safeguards are needed to maintain local consent. These amendments touch on only a few areas of potential conflict, and we had plenty in the previous group. We have yet to touch on street votes versus local plans, neighbourhood policy statements versus the rest, and—one matter that is starting to come to the fore—the turning of supplementary planning documents into supplementary plans and all that this will entail. Those are debates for another day.

[Lord Young of Cookham (Con)]

My Lords, I want to add a short footnote to the excellent speech made by my noble friend Lord Lansley, and to try to understand in what circumstances the conflict that we have been debating can arise—that is, the conflict between the local plan and the national development management policy.

Page 294 of the Bill—I appreciate that we have not got quite that far yet—describes the process that a local authority must go through when it prepares its local plan. New section 15CA(5) states that:

“In preparing their local plan, a local planning authority must have regard to … any observations or advice received from a person appointed by the Secretary of State … other national policies and advice contained in guidance issued by the Secretary of State”.


If that process has been gone through, the local plan should already be consistent with the national development management policies—it would have been spotted. So is it the case that the only time a conflict can arise is when, subsequent to a conforming local development plan having been adopted, the Government actually change the policy? Is that the only time that a conflict can arise? It cannot arise if a plan has gone through the process under the current NDMP.

Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill

Debate between Baroness Thornhill and Lord Young of Cookham

Report stage
Monday 17th January 2022 Lords Chamber

[Lord Young of Cookham (Con)]

My Lords, I will add a very short footnote to the excellent speech of the noble Lord, Lord Best, and pay tribute to the way that he has spearheaded the campaign to repeal the Vagrancy Act. He has summarised the case for repeal succinctly. Nearly a year ago, on 25 February, the then Secretary of State said that the Act had been reviewed and, in his opinion, “should be repealed”. He said that it was

“an antiquated piece of legislation whose time has been and gone.”—[Official Report, Commons, 25/2/21; col. 1138.]

Since then, the noble Lord, Lord Best, and others have consulted extensively with a range of stakeholders—the police, local government, housing charities and legal experts—confirming the view that the Act is indeed redundant and can safely be repealed, with other, more up-to-date pieces of legislation to deal with aggressive behaviour. That took us to Committee stage, when the Government applied the brakes.

To get an insight into the Government’s reservations —as the noble Lord has just said—we met Ministers on 2 December and asked for details of why they believed that sections of the Act were still needed. We needed that so we could amend, if necessary, our amendments for Report and avoid a Division. We were told we could have the necessary details. Here, I am afraid, the Department for Levelling Up, whose policy area this is, has let my noble friend the Minister down. Despite repeated reminders, as we have just heard, only on the last working day before today did we get the reply—far too late to table amendments, six weeks after the meeting and with arguments I found less than compelling. As we are trying to deliver what is stated government policy, I think the performance of that department fell below the standard that we were entitled to receive.

The noble Lord, Lord Best, has set out what seems to me a perfectly respectable compromise, which even at this late stage would enable us to withdraw the amendment, and I hope that the Minister can agree to it. If not, then with some regret—because we have been willing to compromise throughout—I will support the amendment and hope it goes to the other place, where we know it will have support not just from the former Secretary of State but from Conservative Members of Parliament in London, including the former leader of Westminster City Council. I support the amendment.

[Baroness Thornhill (LD)]

My Lords, we on these Benches support the amendments in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Best, to which I have added my name. In view of the hour, I too will be brief, as the two noble Lords have already said it all. I thank the Minister for the time that she gave us both in meetings and in numerous emails. I genuinely believe that there is real commitment to undoing this blot on our societal conscience. Therefore, given the genuineness of that feeling, it is massively disappointing that it appears that the Government have decided not to seize the only opportunity that we can see in the legislative calendar to actually repeal this piece of legislation.

There is widespread support for repealing this Act. To do so would actually be popular and uncontroversial, unlike much of this Bill. It is unequivocally the right thing to do. The fact that in Scotland it has been repealed for years and that most police forces rarely, if ever, use the powers in the Act is surely evidence enough that, in reality, it is of little use in tackling the current issues of homelessness, where there are, as the noble Lord, Lord Young of Cookham, said, a raft of alternative measures at the disposal of the police and local authorities. It will be a great disappointment for many if this can is to be kicked further down the road. That is why, if it comes to a vote, we will be supporting the noble Lord, Lord Best. To steal a slogan from somewhere else, why do not the Government “Just Do It”?

Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill

Debate between Baroness Thornhill and Lord Young of Cookham

Committee stage
Wednesday 24th November 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Young of Cookham (Con)]

My Lords, first, I will say a brief word on Amendment 292J, proposed by noble Lords on the Public Services Committee, on which I and my noble friend Lady Wyld also serve. It backs one of the recommendations made in last week’s report and I support the case being made. Indeed, on 25 October, I tabled an amendment with the noble Baroness, Lady Blake, to help exactly the same group as mentioned in this amendment, namely children at risk of domestic violence and criminal exploitation. In that amendment, I argued for them to be given housing priority, so I hope the Minister will reply sympathetically to the case made by the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, and others.

I have added my name to Amendment 328, which is consequential to Amendment 320, tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Best. I add a brief footnote to what he said, in support of the campaign which he has long championed. On 23 April 2020, in an Oral Question about the Vagrancy Act 1824, I asked the Minister if he agreed that

“attitudes to those who sleep rough have softened over the past 200 years and that legislation which refers to ‘idle and disorderly’, ‘rogues’ and ‘vagabonds’ living in ‘coach-houses’ and ‘stables’ has no place in modern legislation”.

Later in that exchange, the noble and learned Lord, Lord Judge, weighed in, saying:

“If Section 4 of the Vagrancy Act, which was enacted after repeated harvest failures created an army of the dispossessed, were presented to us today, beyond the archaic language to which the noble Lord, Lord Young, has already referred, we should reject it as being vague and uncertain, and arguably tarnished with an improper reverse burden of proof.”—[Official Report, 23/4/20; col. 84.]


We have heard the Prime Minister’s words on this. The former Secretary of State at the then MHCLG said that, in his opinion, the Vagrancy Act, whose short title is

“An Act for the Punishment of idle and disorderly Persons, and Rogues and Vagabonds, in England”,


should be repealed. As the noble Lord, Lord Best, said, here we have an amendment that would deliver government policy. At Second Reading, the Minister said she was sure the House would hold her to account on her assurance that she was on the case—so here we are.

This is not the first attempt at repeal. On 17 August 1911, Sir William Byles asked the Home Secretary

“whether the new Recorder of Liverpool, Mr. Hemmerde, K.C., has just sentenced a young man, Edward Gillibanks, to twenty-five strokes with the birch, in addition to twelve months’ hard labour, for being an incorrigible rogue; and whether, in view of the effect of this form of punishment, he will consider the desirability of proposing the repeal of the Vagrancy Act”.

The Home Secretary, one Mr Churchill, replied:

“I cannot say that I think the punishment inflicted on him supplies an argument for repealing the Vagrancy Act.”—[Official Report, Commons, 17/8/1911; cols. 2103-04.]


Let us hope we fare a little better today.

It is now common ground that the Act does nothing to resolve or tackle the causes of homelessness. On the contrary, by directing rough sleepers down the criminal justice route, it risks isolating them from the very sources of help now generously provided by the Government, which can help them to rebuild their lives.

The right approach is set out in the thoughtful and comprehensive approach of Westminster City Council, detailed in its rough sleeping strategy, which outlines how rough sleeping can be sensitively handled in a borough to which the magnetism of the capital attracts so many. Every rough sleeper is offered a personalised and sustainable route away from the streets, based on their circumstances. The council has remodelled its services to accept women, who make up some 17% of rough sleepers, and can accommodate women who will not be parted from their dogs.

Westminster also makes it clear that it needs powers to deal with those who behave aggressively or anti-socially. The amendment contains the necessary provisions and my noble friend Lord Sandhurst will refer to other provisions on the statute book to deal with unacceptable behaviour. We have the perfect vehicle to bring our legislation up to date. I hope we are pushing at an open door and I look forward to the Minister’s gracious speech of acceptance.

[Baroness Thornhill (LD)]

My Lords, I give the support of our Benches to Amendments 320 and the consequential amendment, Amendment 328, to which I have put my name. We also support Amendments 292H and 292J. I ask for the indulgence of the Committee in allowing me to speak now, as I was unable to speak at Second Reading. I am also very conscious that time is short for the weighty matters that we are trying to achieve today, so I will try to be succinct in covering what should have been two separate interventions.

The noble Lord, Lord Best, has summed up only too well why the Vagrancy Act 1824 should be repealed, so noble Lords will be relieved to know that I will not repeat his arguments. That we still criminalise homelessness in 2021 is a stain on our societal conscience. Some 200 years ago, starving children were imprisoned for stealing bread, people hanged for petty theft and poverty was attributed—this is the key point—to individual fecklessness. The fact that vagrancy remains a crime is an anachronistic throwback to those times and repeal is long overdue.

Having dealt with several police chiefs in my 16 years as a directly elected mayor, I know that the very fact that begging and homelessness were in themselves crimes evoked different attitudes in different offices, in both the council and the police. This resulted in conflicting approaches to how we should work and how effective we were. We had to work together and go on a journey to find a truly multiagency approach. On that journey, we had to challenge some very firmly held views on the stereotypes of homelessness and what we believed might work. Repealing this Act would change this culture and ensure consistency of approach towards the homeless.

A concern that one might have in agreeing to the amendment is whether the police would feel that they would be unable to deal with some of the genuine issues that occur—I know because we have used some of these tools. When an area has a significant number of homeless people in the community, would they feel a loss of some powers? I am sure that the noble Lord, Lord Sandhurst, will expand on that. From my experience, I know that there are plenty of other arrows in the antisocial behaviour quiver to deal with such issues. Thus, we hope that the Government will give serious consideration to our amendments.

Housing: Permitted Development Rights

Debate between Baroness Thornhill and Lord Young of Cookham

Tuesday 23rd July 2019 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Thornhill (LD)]

My Lords, I beg leave to ask the Question standing in my name on the Order Paper. In doing so, I declare an interest as a vice-president of the Local Government Association.

[Lord Young of Cookham (Con)]

My Lords, all homes created through permitted development rights for change of use are required to comply with building regulations, including in respect of fire safety. We announced in a Written Ministerial Statement on 13 March our intention to review permitted development rights for the conversion of buildings to residential use in respect of the quality standard of homes delivered. This will inform any future decisions on permitted development rights for change to residential use.

[Baroness Thornhill]

I thank the Minister for that Answer, but building regulations are not quite the same thing as standards. Does he agree with Watford Borough Council in this instance that, with a total floor space of 16.5 square metres and containing no windows, these do not constitute homes in 21st-century Britain? As for the welcome review, the spring is quite a long way off. Can the Minister indicate how quickly changes will come into place and whether he can inject a little urgency into the process? Does he also acknowledge that these controversial permitted development rights have damaged relationships with an already anti-development public, who were quite incredulous that such standards were permitted without planning permission?

[Lord Young of Cookham]

On the case concerning Watford which the noble Baroness mentioned, the borough council may appeal against the planning inspector’s decision within the next few days, so she will understand if I put that to one side. I make two general points: first, I hope all noble Lords will agree that, if you have redundant office or industrial buildings in an area where there is a severe shortage of residential accommodation, it makes sense to convert the one to the other. That is why the coalition Government in 2013 issued the permitted development order, which said that if you have planning permission for an office, you have planning permission for residential. That policy has produced 46,000 new homes, the vast majority of which are of good quality. Secondly—here, I agree with the point the noble Baroness made in a debate last week and which the noble Lord, Lord Best, raised yesterday—there have been some very unsatisfactory applications of that policy and some homes of very poor quality have come on to the market. That is why we have announced the review. We want to learn from Watford. The review is scheduled to complete by the end of the year. I take what she says about urgency: we want the policy to produce properties of a decent quality.