Housing and Planning Bill

Lord Best Excerpts

Wednesday 23rd March 2016 Lords Chamber

[Lord Taylor of Goss Moor (LD)]

My Lords, I shall speak to Amendments 103A and 103B and in support of Amendment 103. Given the hour and the timing, I will say much less than I would have liked to on this issue, about which I feel quite passionate. I will restrain myself despite the fact that, as a Cornishman, I have already missed my last train home. A little bit of me feels that I could speak for a few hours and bring noble Lords the same pain that I already feel. I am quite grateful that the Motion to adjourn was withdrawn; at least I get the chance to speak to these amendments, having missed my train.

For some years, I have been arguing that it is extraordinarily important that we find ways to deliver the amount of housing needed and that we give local authorities new options for doing that. The principles of the new towns were abandoned in the early 1980s because housing need was basically being met by housing supply at that point and there were projections of big falls in population so there was an assumption that we did not need large new settlements to come forward. We are now in period where the number of over-65s will go from 10 million today to 19 million by 2050, while more babies were born last year than in any year since 1971. We are seeing big increases in population but we are no longer delivering the houses to meet them.

We should offer local authorities and local communities the option of creating new garden villages—settlements to meet local need—that can capture the value of land, rather than making multimillionaires of lucky landowners or lucky speculative developers, and can create fantastic places that have doctors’ surgeries, schools, parks, shops and all the facilities to create a genuine community and restore our faith in ourselves that, just as our predecessors built wonderful villages and towns, we can do the same. At the moment, that is near impossible because so much value is captured in the process, so what we get are bland estates without facilities. If anyone is going to pay for those facilities, it is the taxpayer, while a few people make themselves very rich indeed.

That is why I have argued that the powers in the New Towns Act should be extended to communities, and I was delighted last week to see the Government making commitments to do that. However, if we are to do that, we need to be clear about the role of the development bodies that will do that place-making, create those fantastic places and ensure that the houses and communities are built in a timely way and at prices people can afford. If the land value has been captured, they can be affordable homes. The remit of that place-making body is critical. Amendment 103 goes to the heart of that because the existing duties are long outdated and will need bringing up to speed. We will need to be clear about that remit. Amendment 103 is a very good first amendment on that. There are other elements that can be brought to it. I hope the Minister will be able to come back with some proposals on that, given the commitments that the Government made last week.

My own amendments are about modernising the process. Let me be absolutely clear what I believe that process must be for these local scale communities. That process must be one that is locally led. This is not something forced on communities. It is a new opportunity for communities to deal with their needs in a different way, and then protect themselves much more effectively from unwelcome development that otherwise might take place on appeal—or perforce around existing historic market towns and villages, many of which, frankly, are at bursting point and congestion point and cannot go on developing in that way.

The starting point will be the local plan process—or amendment to the local plan—and it would then go through all the normal community consultation and examination. The question is then: what is the next stage? At the moment, to bring forward a new town involves a public inquiry process, as if that local plan-making had not taken place at all, but no proper parliamentary scrutiny process, let alone any up-to-date parliamentary scrutiny. The old system quite simply is not fit for purpose.

I was going to run the Committee through what happens under the old New Towns Act and what can happen under a modern urban development corporation-type approach. I will not do that because people can do without the lecture. I was recently appointed a professor of planning and I guess the temptation is now always to lecture. I definitely will not do that. I understand that I have missed my train, but other noble Lords have not missed theirs. All I would say is that it is incredibly important to have a system that is modern and fit for purpose. The Government have made a commitment to go down this route. The Bill provides an opportunity to provide a modern, accountable, fit-for-purpose way of delivering these development bodies.

[Lord Best (CB)]

My Lords, I intend to make myself extremely popular by not speaking to this amendment, other than to say that I am extremely supportive of the amendments in my name and that of the noble Lord, Lord Taylor of Goss Moor—and to say that my speech is available by email if anyone would like to read it later.

[Lord Harris of Haringey]

My Lords, I want to speak to this group of amendments because I think they are very important. Earlier on in the Committee today, I specifically raised the importance, in terms of planning, of looking at the concept of what is the community that you are trying to create—and making sure that the community is sustainable and has all the benefits you would hope for.

Over the past 20 or 30 years there has been enormous progress in understanding what makes a community work. It is not simply the number of homes. It is not simply the mix of homes. It is also what else is there. That is the place-making function. This is the content of Amendment 103, moved by my noble friend: it has focused on the series of expectations about the role that the new town development corporation—or whatever else—might use in trying to create a community.

The issue is not simply identifying the possibilities for development and putting up more new homes. That would be the route to some of the urban disasters that we have seen over the past 30 or 40 years. It is about creating a place. It is about creating an environment in which people can live and have a sense of community. The content contained in the amendment refers specifically to the vibrant cultural and artistic development of the community. It talks about protecting the natural and historic environment and the importance of high quality and inclusive design. This is about creating places in which people actually want to live. That should be fundamental to the whole planning process, and writing those into the legislation—the Local Government, Planning and Land Act, and the New Towns Act 1981 —is exactly the right way forward for the Bill. However, my concern is that they have not been included in the Bill up to now. I hope that the Minister—she is now nodding, so perhaps that is a good sign—will be able to tell us that the Government accept the principles behind my noble friend’s amendment.

On the point that has just been made by the noble Lord, Lord Taylor, about the importance of consulting and involving communities, communities live and thrive only if they have the support of the people who are going to live there. That is why consultation and involvement in that process are such a critical part of making sure that those communities and places are indeed viable. That is my understanding of the intention of these amendments, and I hope that the Minister is going to tell us that the Government wholeheartedly embrace that and are going to accept them.