High Speed Rail (West Midlands-Crewe) Bill

Debate between Earl of Lytton and Baroness Henig

Committee stage & Committee: 2nd sitting (Hansard) & Committee: 2nd sitting (Hansard): House of Lords & Committee: 2nd sitting : House of Lords & Committee: 2nd sitting
Thursday 12th November 2020 Grand Committee

[The Deputy Chairman of Committees (Baroness Henig) (Lab)]

There are no questions to the Minister, so perhaps the noble Earl, Lord Lytton, might want to comment briefly on what has been said.

[The Earl of Lytton (CB) [V]]

I am grateful to all noble Lords who have spoken in this debate. Perhaps I may deal with a few points raised by the noble Lord, Lord Berkeley. My understanding, having spoken to Shirley Waldron—who I mentioned earlier, and who was closely involved in Crossrail matters—is that Crossrail disapplied only Section 6 of the Party Wall etc. Act 1996; it did not disapply Sections 1 or 3, as the Bill seeks to do. She also told me in a phone conversation that the party wall matters had been completed so long ago that they could not possibly have been responsible for the current delays that have recently come to light. However, that might be only her view. I can confirm on good authority, because I checked today, that no one consulted the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors regarding the drafting of this Bill or, for that matter, the phase 1 Bill.

The noble Lord, Lord Snape, raised an interesting point about how many properties might be affected. It is difficult to know because the party wall Act provisions apply not only to party walls but to adjacent excavation and construction near to adjoining owners’ properties. Even with phase 1, in many instances the detailed design has not yet got to the point where an accurate quantification of all those affected in a densely urban area can be calculated. So I have to say that I just do not know. The noble Baroness, Lady Randerson, asked the Minister to report to the Committee. I am sure that there will be more to come out of this, and that point is noted.

The noble Lord, Lord Tunnicliffe, gave due praise to the operation of the party wall Act—of which I was not the architect; I was simply what is known in the trade as the parliamentary midwife of a private Bill. However, the provisions have been in existence in the metropolitan area of central London since the 1930s, and the principles of party walls have been with us since the year after the Great Fire. So in enacting legislation in 1996 that was going to apply to the whole of England and Wales, one was drawing on a cadre of very experienced specialists in central London. That experience has been rolled out across the country. It is a philosophical issue and a situation where all the provisions of the party wall Act hang together as a whole. The notification, the counternotification and all that follows, up to the conclusion of the dispute resolution procedure—the way in which it is appealed and the safeguards—are of a piece. They all interrelate. It is quite difficult to unpick bits of the Act without doing some serious mischief to the rest, and I think that that is what this Bill threatens to do.