The Building Safety Regulator: Building a Better Regulator (Industry and Regulators Committee Report)

Lord Best Excerpts

Monday 8th June 2026 Grand Committee

[Lord Best (CB)]

My Lords, I too was delighted to be a member of the Industry and Regulators Committee that produced this report. I also thank the clerk and the team who looked after us. They did an absolutely brilliant job. What we discovered six months ago has been brilliantly explained by our esteemed then chair, the noble Baroness, Lady Taylor of Bolton. I would just like to summarise our findings.

First, the ghastly Grenfell Tower tragedy revealed the long-overdue need for expert, decisive regulation for building safety. Secondly, the Government’s response in establishing the Building Safety Regulator had floundered and the BSR urgently needed to improve its performance. Thirdly, the Government were seized of the urgency of this situation and, not least with the appointment of the noble Lord, Lord Roe of West Wickham, as the new BSR chair—I am delighted to see him here—there were important signs of real progress in clearing the backlog and achieving faster and more effective regulation. I am sure we will hear more of this progress tonight.

This story is not one of a need for deregulation. No one would wish us to return to a system that allowed dangerous practices across the construction industry. Rather, it is about speedy and effective regulation. The BSR in its initial form was opaque in its requirements and irresponsibly slow in its decision-making. The new-look BSR is not about deregulation but about better regulation, as I am sure this debate will make clear.

I would like to raise the related issue of regulation of construction products, which the noble Baroness, Lady Taylor of Bolton, has touched on. The BSR is not directly responsible for this. The task falls to the Office for Product Safety and Standards, the OPSS, located within the Department for Business and Trade, which has the duty of protecting

“people and places from product-related harm”.

Dame Judith Hackitt’s 2017 review had found the process for testing and certifying products for use in construction is

“disjointed, confusing, unhelpful, and lacks any sort of transparency”.

It is clearly impossible for the BSR to make buildings safe if the products being used are unsafe. In one of our debates on the Grenfell disaster, the noble Lord, Lord Porter of Spalding, told us how the tiles for cladding were used as the best fuel for bonfires on construction sites, with those working in construction entirely familiar with just how inflammable—and therefore dangerous—these products could be. Yet there they were on the face of the tallest buildings, which were the least likely to cope with a serious fire.

The Grenfell Tower Inquiry’s phase 2 report, published last September, argued that there was systemic dishonesty on the part of those who made and sold the cladding panels and insulation products as used on the building. The phase 2 report suggested enhanced arrangements for regulating construction products. Samantha Dixon, the Minister for Building Safety, told our committee that the plans to establish a single construction regulator would include greater regulation of construction products. Could the Minister update us on progress in achieving a new regime for regulating construction products?

There was good news last summer in the extension of government support to cover the remediation costs of social rented homes in buildings over 11 metres. The cost is being largely covered by the original builders that are still in business and by the building safety levy. Are there now plans to go further and compensate occupiers for safety measures in buildings that are less than 11 metres high but which have life-critical safety defects, as certified by qualified fire engineers? Can we expect support for the unfortunate shared owners and leaseholders, some still facing truly ruinous bills, in these less tall but just as unsafe homes? An update from the Minister would be much appreciated.

Affordable Housing: Young People

Lord Best Excerpts

Monday 8th June 2026 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

A detailed analysis has been done of the Help to Buy scheme, and we will learn lessons from it. We will not reintroduce it as it was, but I agree with the noble Lord that, for many young people renting property, their rent is higher than a mortgage payment would be. Since I gave him my previous answer, I have been working with the sector. A wide variety of mortgage products are available in the UK, including a range of products available at a high loan-to-value ratio, such as 95% and even 100%. I met the Building Societies Association last week, and it is very keen to offer more innovative products that can help first-time buyers, including some that take account of a track record of paying rent, as they deal with a mortgage application. These are innovative systems. We know that many first-time buyers are not aware of the mortgage products that may help them, so we are working on a communications campaign. The Building Societies Association is doing its own, and the Government will also do something to make people aware of the steps they can take to get on to the housing ladder.

[Lord Best (CB)]

My Lords, does the Minister agree that there is now a brilliant new way of helping young people get the accommodation they need: intergenerational housing? Pioneered by the Phoenix Community Housing association in Lewisham, in schemes involving apartments for older people, a proportion are allocated to young people, who, in return for an affordable rent, provide social amenities, services and help with IT for the older people in the same scheme. Will she encourage Homes England to do more of these fantastic schemes that help both young and old together?

Social Housing Bill [HL]

Lord Best Excerpts

2nd reading
Monday 1st June 2026 Lords Chamber

[Lord Best (CB)]

My Lords, it is a delight to follow the noble Baroness, Lady Pinnock. I declare my housing interests as in the register.

I commend the Bill, which introduces a number of legislative changes to enhance the quantity and quality of desperately needed affordable and social housing. I particularly welcome its provisions for constraining the right to buy, for the repeal of the awful and never-enacted measures to enforce sales of the best social housing, for the next steps in the endless story of the Grenfell tragedy, and for greater security for domestic abuse victims. Together, this whole package of measures will make an important difference.

In Committee, I will be bringing forward some modest but important amendments on points of detail, but for this Second Reading debate perhaps I could set the Social Housing Bill in its wider context. The Government have been taking significant steps to increase the output of councils and housing associations. The social housing sector’s subsidy settlement via Homes England, at £39 billion for the next 10 years, is the best since 2010. The national housing bank looks promising, and the agreement for rents to be increased by CPI plus 1% annually for a decade should ensure ongoing management and maintenance costs are properly funded. Other government measures aim to streamline planning consents and get the reluctant housebuilders to allocate a proper proportion of their new homes for social housing. That is all good stuff which will, I hope, produce around 50,000 new affordable homes per annum, more than half at social rents.

However, it is worth remembering that total investment in the social sector is a fraction of its level in times past. The proportion of the nation’s homes represented by council and housing association accommodation has fallen from its peak of 32% to just 17% today, partly due to the more than 2 million sales under the right to buy. The Bill seeks to address this problem of running the bath with the plug out, which should encourage councils to build once again.

Nevertheless, there is one serious omission in the Government’s support for the social housing sector: there is virtually no funding or strategy for the upgrading of hopelessly outdated current housing stock. That includes the leftover 1960s and 1970s prefabricated estates and tower blocks that now need renewing or replacing; the flats over shops in half-abandoned high streets; and the unfit privately rented pre-1919 properties that are long past their sell-by dates. While the Government’s emphasis on adding 1.5 million extra homes over the life of this Parliament is to be greatly applauded—particularly with the emphasis on social housing—it is a serious hole in the Government’s strategy that existing outdated housing is largely ignored. While I welcome the special help for particularly deprived neighbourhoods in the form of the Government’s Pride in Place initiative, this new funding does not stretch to improving existing accommodation. Sadly, the current absolute priority for new building is leaving tens of thousands of tenants in the sort of conditions that led to the untimely death from cold and mould of little Awaab Ishak in Rochdale.

Investment in housing-led regeneration has its own paybacks, with beneficial side-effects that are not always so apparent from the building of new homes: the most hard-hit local economies get a boost; much-needed opportunities emerge for training and apprenticeships for the growing number of NEETs; communities can see and engage with the renewal of their local environments; health and well-being can improve for populations with the worst health records; and hope and aspiration, after years of neglect, can be restored. The Renew project, representing the social housing providers in the northern regions, shows what can be done using devolved powers and funding for pilot schemes. In Greater Manchester, mayoral development corporations—MDCs—with wide powers are busy with major regeneration projects.

In relation to private sector properties in urgent need of upgrading, Blackpool Council, for example, is putting pressure on the worst landlords and taking direct action of its own through a local housing company. Elsewhere, community-based housing organisations are acquiring and modernising the poorest-quality private rented housing. So much more could be done to improve neglected estates and neighbourhoods if regeneration were mainstreamed once again. Maybe the Government’s overdue long-term housing strategy will address this omission. Perhaps the shift in powers to the mayors and combined authorities will lead to greater priority for regeneration activity. It would be helpful to hear from the Minister when the promised national housing strategy can now be expected.

Finally, I will comment on the state of the housing association sector. Mergers and takeovers have led to fewer and much larger organisations, which has brought some downsides. This trend has obvious financial advantages—lower borrowing costs and economies of scale in procurement and employment—but it has meant that some housing associations are geographically widely dispersed and decision-making is distant from those affected. Some of the sector’s broader, housing-related, place-shaping activity—local employment schemes, partnerships with local homelessness charities, civic engagement of staff in local affairs, et cetera—has unfortunately been lost. In return for the help that the Government are now providing and the extra support from this Bill, I hope more of the housing associations will behave like the best in class and increase their sensitivity to their tenants and communities at the local level, regaining the trust and confidence that this sector needs and deserves.

Home Ownership: First-Time Buyers

Lord Best Excerpts

Thursday 23rd April 2026 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

Social and affordable housing sit side by side. We have confirmed a new 10-year £39 billion social and affordable homes programme to kick-start social and affordable housebuilding at scale across the country. Our ambition is to deliver around 300,000 homes over the programme’s lifetime. At least 60% of the homes delivered will be for social rent, with the remainder available for other tenures, including shared ownership, affordable rent and intermediate rent in London. This programme is active now. The councils and housing associations are bidding into that programme, as are other bidders, and I hope we will be able to deliver at pace very quickly.

[Lord Best (CB)]

My Lords, will the Minister agree that it is the longer-term effect of having fewer first-time buyers that really counts? When you retire as a tenant, you have not paid off a mortgage, you have not got a capital asset and you see your rent rising every year but your income falling. It catches up with you on retirement. In that longer-term perspective, I ask the Minister: what has happened to the Government’s long-term national housing strategy, which she promised me on 11 February would be out by 31 March? Is this on the way, and will it include a good chunk on how to bolster the number of first-time buyers, which is so important?

[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

The noble Lord is quite right to say that, where people are not able to buy their own homes, this can lead to problems later on where people on fixed incomes later in life are on rapidly increasing rent. So it is very important that we try to encourage as many young people as possible who are able to buy property to carry on doing so. On his point about the long-term housing strategy, it is on its way. We said we would publish in the spring, and spring is not quite over yet. I hope we will be able to deliver it very soon.

English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill

Lord Best Excerpts

Report stage
Monday 13th April 2026 Lords Chamber

Moved by

[Lord Best]

307: After Clause 73, insert the following new Clause—
“Chief Planner After section 1 of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990 (local planning authorities), insert—“1A Local planning authorities and strategic authorities: Chief Planner(1) Each local planning authority and each strategic authority, as defined in section 1(2) of the English Devolution and Community Empowerment Act 2026 (strategic authorities), must appoint an officer, to be known as Chief Planner, for the purposes of their functions in relation to planning and spatial development.(2) Two or more authorities may, if they consider that the same person can efficiently discharge for both or all of the authorities the functions of Chief Planner, concur in the same appointment of a person as Chief Planner for both or all of these authorities.(3) An authority may not appoint a person as Chief Planner unless satisfied that the person has appropriate qualifications and experience for the role.””Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment would require authorities with planning and spatial development functions to appoint a Chief Planner to lead this professional work.

[Lord Best (CB)]

My Lords, I will speak for one minute on Amendment 307. It is in my name but has been championed by the noble Lord, Lord Lansley, for months, and he is very sorry not to be here tonight. It is supported by the noble Lord, Lord Shipley, and the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett of Manor Castle. It would require local authorities and strategic authorities to have a named, qualified, responsible chief planner, shared with another authority if so desired. After the underresourcing of local authority planning for 20 years or more, leading to delay and frustration all round, this amendment would raise the status and profile of planning within local government. It would identify the responsible officer in each authority, which would speed up decision-making and enhance accountability.

The amendment comes with the endorsement of the Royal Town Planning Institute and the Better Planning Coalition, which represents the 40 key planning-related organisations across the country. It would give the Government the perfect opportunity to help restore the position of planning to front and centre within local government, while increasing the respect of council members and the confidence of developers and providers. I see no reason why the Government are not enthusiastically positive about the amendment, and I wish to test the opinion of the House.

English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill

Lord Best Excerpts

Report stage
Tuesday 24th March 2026 Lords Chamber

[Lord Cameron of Dillington (CB)]

My Lords, I have put my name to Amendment 310 under the welcome leadership of the noble Baroness, Lady Royall. I declare an interest as a retired participant in a mixed family farming business in Somerset.

In Committee I spoke at length on the very real need for some form of rural-proofing or rural duty, preferably even a rural commissioner, where a strategic or combined authority had any rural communities within its boundaries. I will not repeat what I said then or speak at such length, noble Lords will be glad to hear, but things are very different in rural England compared with urban England. The needs are different and the solutions to those needs are different. Without some form of rural thinking at the seat of power, rural communities will inevitably lose out if they are poor and need special attention or, at the other end of the scale, if they are enterprising and need help to fulfil their potential.

Rural communities have lost out for decades from not having any clout, rural-proofing or consideration at the various seats of power. We touched on these issues in Committee; some have been raised already in this debate. First, houses are more expensive and wages are lower. In many rural communities there are no houses to rent or buy unless you are very rich. It is a serious rural problem.

Secondly, on transport, how do you get your children to the doctor, to local football training or to the local HE college without an extra car in your family? The answer is that you cannot. Local political administrative thinking needs to take this into account.

Thirdly, on energy, most rural houses have poor insulation and very rarely is mains gas available, so you have to have more costly forms of heating—oil, electricity or bottled gas. The Government have recognised this in recent days, and we are very grateful for that.

Fourthly—this is the most convincing one—there is higher council tax. Central government support for rural local authorities, despite delivery of services being more expensive in rural areas—is 40% less per head compared with the towns, which is why rural council tax is on average 20% higher per head than in urban areas and is about to get worse. This is caused by the fact that there has never been a proper rural voice in central government, which supports the point we are making.

These are some of the shortcomings that rural dwellers have to suffer, but there are also missed opportunities. For instance, in delivering training for entrepreneurs, how do you reach out to the various different businesses that exist many miles distant from each other? How do you set about pumping new life into the various market towns in your area? It is amazing what can be done in this respect by, for example, finding a business theme that can inspire visitors and customers. For instance, there are food festivals at Padstow, which is near me in Cornwall, and at Bridport in Dorset; there are culture festivals, such as those at Hay-on-Wye, Broad Chalke or Cheltenham; or those on art, as at St Ives, again in Cornwall. But there could be garden attractions, nature tours, beer festivals or a major town attraction to attract footfall in its various forms.

I remember visiting, a few years ago now, a small town in central France that had a massive sports centre with a swimming pool, ice rink, gymnasium and climbing walls—note the plural. As a result, every day the town and shops were humming with families who had come from far and wide. The possibilities are endless, but you need a rural focus to help kick-start them and provide some pump-priming funding. In essence, this issue has at its heart both deprivation and need, as well as opportunity and possibilities. It should not be ignored.

Finally, I remind noble Lords that the Bill is called the English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill. What we are trying to do here is to empower rural communities. I would be appalled if we missed this opportunity to empower our rural communities, when it is such an easy change to make.

[Lord Best (CB)]

My Lords, I will speak in support of Amendment 310 from the noble Baroness, Lady Royall of Blaisdon, while also supporting all the other amendments in this group. I declare my interests as a vice-president of the Local Government Association and of the Town and Country Planning Association, and as an honorary member of the Royal Town Planning Institute.

Amendment 310 would create a duty for strategic authorities to consider the needs of rural communities. It specifically covers land use, development of land and regeneration, housing, employment, health and well-being. Several noble Lords have made the point that there are quite different considerations for these functions when addressing rural needs as opposed to those of urban communities. For example, on housing, many rural areas will see competition for available accommodation from those commuting from elsewhere, from rightsizing retirees and, in many places, from second-home buyers and those letting on a short-term basis of the Airbnb variety. Yet, on average, social housing accounts for just 11% of homes in rural locations, compared with 17% in the country as a whole. Younger people brought up in the locality, including those badly needed for public and private sector jobs, are forced to move away to find somewhere affordable.

On land use, there will be severe constraints on rural areas including green belts, areas of outstanding natural beauty—now known as national landscapes—and local constraints. But urban-rural differences apply to opportunities as well, as the noble Lord, Lord Cameron, said. For example, rural exception sites allow development that would not be permitted elsewhere, and there are opportunities to work with major landowners.

In many respects, there are substantial differences that require different policies and actions for rural communities, yet these communities are likely to comprise only a small fraction of the total population of a mayoralty or combined authority, and pressing priorities from the majority urban areas may drown out the rural voice. A duty to take on board the needs of rural communities would counter this imbalance.

Of course, the mayor or the combined authority could take a far-sighted approach to embracing the rural agenda for their area without any legislative prompting, but this is by no means guaranteed. The amendment provides the safety net that would make sure that rural issues are not neglected in places where towns and cities dominate. I strongly support the amendment.

[Baroness Butler-Sloss (CB)]

My Lords, I support all these amendments, and in particular the speech of the noble Lord, Lord Best. The tiny village where I have a house, 10 miles from Exeter, is not just a rural community but a farming community. For years, Exeter City Council has wanted to take over the area; those of us living in this tiny village and the other villages round about it know perfectly well that there is not a single person in the city council who has the slightest knowledge of anything to do with rural affairs. It is very important that the Government pick up and take on the fact that rural affairs need to be separately considered.

--- Later in debate ---

Finally, I believe that Amendment 306 in my name is extremely important. If the Government are persisting with these clean energy projects and insisting on removing the power of local residents to object to them, common sense would dictate that fire and rescue services should have the right to be statutory consultees, particularly where these clean energy projects are highly flammable and at risk of thermal runaway and could spread very quickly. These projects are often very close to schools, nurseries, housing and other existing developments, so I frankly find it weird and very alarming that these potentially highly flammable planning projects are not benefiting from advice from fire and rescue services. If they were statutory consultees, it would make the potential sites safer. I end on that note and ask the Minister in her heart to explain to the House this evening for what possible reason of safety and good practice fire and rescue services are not statutory consultees to these potentially very dangerous sites.

[Lord Best (CB)]

My Lords, Amendment 307 would require every local planning authority and every strategic authority, separately or jointly, to appoint a qualified and experienced person to act as chief planner, as a number have done already. This amendment has been championed by the noble Lord, Lord Lansley, who has been steadfast in his commitment to this reform, which he has maintained would accelerate housing delivery and growth. I am also grateful for the support of the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett of Manor Castle, and the noble Lord, Lord Shipley, who in Committee stressed the value of a high level of professional planning input for mayors and strategic authorities.

The proposal for a chief planner has been gathering momentum from the time of the Planning and Infrastructure Act 2025. It has been promoted by the Royal Town Planning Institute with support from the Better Planning Coalition, which represents some 40 organisations in this sector. Just last week, the All-Party Parliamentary Group for Excellence in the Built Environment recommended this approach to drive the professionalism and responsibility in decision-making that is required to unlock planning delays and command the level of respect needed when negotiating and liaising with senior local authority members.

The relationship between council members and their officers is changing. The Government’s policy for deregulation of planning decision-making means that decisions on whether a planning application should be taken to the planning committee or dealt with by planning officers alone will be determined by the elected member who chairs the planning committee and the chief planning officer. This procedure underlines the need for a senior figure to be identified with the status to assume this responsibility. It has also been suggested that the chief planner might have a formal role in ongoing training for council members with planning duties, a role that requires a person of seniority who commands respect.

Having a named chief planner who is fully qualified and experienced with the corresponding status attaching to the role provides, in the words of the chief planner for Newcastle City Council and the North East Combined Authority, the strategic direction and strong professional leadership that a planning authority needs. It creates a clear and trusted voice for our communities, our elected members and our developers. She concluded:

“Making this role statutory would strengthen our profession and inspire the next generation to aspire to be chief planners themselves”.


Meanwhile, the experience of taking this approach in Scotland has demonstrated its value there, not least in enabling everyone to identify the key person responsible for planning matters. It is worth noting that the amendment would enable authorities to choose to share a chief planner with one or more other authorities, if they so wish.

Here is a chance to help reverse the decline in the position of planning, raise morale and support the profession without costs to the Government. Planning departments have been starved of resources over recent decades, yet planning is set to be hugely important in the work of new mayoral and other strategic authorities. The RTPI’s latest survey of the state of the profession lists the recruitment and retention challenges. Local planning departments are short of up to a third of their staff. Two-thirds of them are using agency staff to fill gaps. Shortages of suitably qualified people mean delays that undermine new development and less proactive engagement before and during a planning application, leading to worse outcomes. The profession needs boosting, bolstering, encouraging and promoting, as well as very welcome additional government funding. This means changing perceptions and enhancing the status of a vital profession. Appointment of the key officer as chief planner would do much to achieve this.

In Committee the Minister said she would continue to keep this matter under review but would want

“to do a bit more work on this before we take any decisions on it”.—[Official Report, 4/2/26; col. GC 593.]

I hope that she has now been able to satisfy herself that this is a worthwhile initiative and that she is able to accept the amendment.

[The Earl of Clancarty (CB)]

My Lords, in this group I have Amendment 186, which would allow a separate cultural ecosystem plan to be put in place to sit beside the local growth plan. I was very heartened by the support for this amendment in Committee from the noble Lord, Lord Shipley. He said this amendment

“really matters … because it is the means whereby clarity will be produced about who in the mayoral and local authorities is responsible for what”.

Furthermore, he drew attention to

“the need to ensure that local government maintains the key responsibility that it has always had for the development of cultural assets in its area”.—[Official Report, 4/2/26; col. GC 619.]

I could not have put it better myself.

Our cultural assets are an ecosystem that crosses boundaries as well as being hugely important at the local level, as the noble Lord, Lord Shipley, emphasises. We talked at some length about culture on the first group today, but I ask the Minister once again whether cultural ecosystem plans might be considered for the guidelines at the very least.

I have also put my name to Amendments 124, 127 and 246 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh of Pickering, which she fully explained. Her agent of change amendment is hugely important. I will not repeat the arguments I gave in Committee except to say that the Music Venue Trust points out the significant difference between how the system works in England, where it is non-statutory and unsatisfactory, and in Scotland, where there is a statutory requirement and it works well. If the noble Baroness wishes to take this to a vote when the time comes, I will certainly support her in the Lobby.

New Homes Target

Lord Best Excerpts

Wednesday 11th February 2026 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

We have introduced a whole package of support, working with our colleagues in London to make sure that they are supported and helped to get building the homes they need.

In the previous Question, perhaps the noble Lord heard me say that I am working very closely with a whole partnership of people from across the sector on developing the support that young people need to get into home ownership, including on a new ISA that will help with this and making sure that the whole industry is focused on freeing up the system so that it is possible for young people to buy homes. It was good to hear, when I spoke to the sector last week, that both Lloyds and Santander have brought in very low-start mortgage packages. That was just last week. I am very pleased to see that, and I hope that will help some of our young people get out of high-cost renting and enable them to buy their own property.

[Lord Best (CB)]

My Lords, the 1.5 million new homes target is only part of the big housing jigsaw. It is about quality as well as quantity and regeneration as well as new build. All this is meant to come together in the Government’s long-term national housing strategy. This was due out about a year ago. I ask the Minister: when we will see the national housing strategy?

[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

I am grateful to the noble Lord for his patience on the long-term housing strategy. We will be publishing that in the first quarter of this year.

English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill

Lord Best Excerpts

Committee stage
Wednesday 4th February 2026 Grand Committee

[Baroness Shah (Lab)]

My Lords, I apologise for not having been here previously. I was not a Member of the House when the Bill first came to the House, so I could not speak on it then, but I would like to speak on it today. I will set out some context about my understanding of planning and where I come from. I was eight years as a planning lead in my local council, as the regeneration and planning cabinet member. I should also point out that I am an employee of the Local Government Association and I am still a councillor, so my remarks will be based on my own opinions and experience.

I will speak on Amendment 126, and I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Pinnock, for explaining her position on her amendment. I want to challenge that perception with my experience. I do not think this amendment is needed in actual practice. The points around democratic accountability and community involvement are based within the planning system already and the planning reforms that have come through. Good local plans should have involvement of the community and are democratically voted on in a full council chamber. Should an applicant come to a local council with a planning application and in good faith follow those policies, there should be some safeguards around making sure that those plans are upheld and seen through in development coming forward.

In my experience in London, in the eight years that I was planning lead, not one application needed to be called in or used by the Mayor of London to challenge what the local council had done, because we made sure that the developer or the applicant was able to follow the planning policies. So it is important to note that, in a good planning process, the local plan should be where the heavy lifting is done through community engagement and democratic accountability.

[Lord Best (CB)]

My Lords, I have added my name to Amendment 131 in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Lansley, also supported by the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett of Manor Castle, and the noble Lord, Lord Shipley. The amendment requires local planning authorities, separately or jointly, to appoint one qualified and experienced person to be chief planner. It would give due recognition to the officer responsible for planning matters in each local authority, as promoted by the Royal Town Planning Institute—I declare that I am an honorary member of the institute. A very similar amendment was debated in the Planning and Infrastructure Bill last October. At the conclusion of that debate, the Minister said that she would

“keep this issue under review as we progress with further reforms to the planning system”.—[Official Report, 27/10/25; col. 1199.]

Our hope is that she will now be able to accept this proposition.

The case for a chief planner seems an excellent one. It would be a boost to the morale of those working in local planning authorities. It would represent an acknowledgement by the Government that planning needs to be recognised, as it once was, as a very prominent part of local government. When we debated this matter last year, it was noted that identifying the chief planner role is now more significant than it was following the Government’s action to achieve a national planning scheme of delegation for planning decision-making. Decisions on whether a planning application should be taken to the planning committee or dealt with by officers alone will depend on the judgment of two individuals: the elected member who chairs the planning committee and the chief planning officer. This important responsibility underlines the need for an enhanced status for the planning officer at the helm.

In preparation for the debate on this issue during the passage of the Planning and Infrastructure Bill, I spoke to the chief planner for Glasgow City Council, where legislation already confers a statutory status on the chief planning officer, accompanied by guidance from the Scottish Government on the duties, responsibilities, qualifications, skills and experience required. Glasgow’s chief planner told me of the importance of having one fully qualified person holding the position of chief planner, not least in enabling everyone to identify the key person responsible for planning matters. Indeed, events are now being organised that bring together chief planners from across Scotland, now that it is clear who shares this common identity. I spoke to an experienced planner in Wales who told me of hopes for a similar measure for Wales to that addressed by this arrangement. I strongly support this amendment as part of the devolution package for England.

[Lord Jamieson (Con)]

My Lords, I, too, welcome back the noble Baroness, Lady Pinnock—it is great to see her back here on her two feet. I shall speak first to Amendment 130 in my name and that of my noble friend Lady Scott of Bybrook. This amendment is straightforward. It provides that greenfield land should not be designated for development unless the relevant authority

“is satisfied that no suitable brownfield land is available within the relevant area”.

There appears to be universal agreement that building on brownfield first is the right thing to do. It provides a number of advantages. Not only does it save greenfield land, but it helps regeneration, utilises existing infra- structure and minimises transport distances, whether that is to work or to employment. It creates a better environment and promotes growth. While this is recognised, what does not appear to be recognised is the difficulty of building on brownfield land, particularly in high-cost areas such as London, due not only to the remediation costs but to high existing land use values.

When it comes to financing, if you are building an apartment block, you cannot generally sell an apartment until you have built the whole block, whereas if you are building on a green field, you can virtually sell house by house. Time scales tend to be longer and costs higher, due to the complexity of building in urban areas. Because of the high and early capital outlays, return on capital is often the determining factor, meaning that delays inevitably make projects unviable. In urban areas, it is all too easy to find grounds for objection, delaying the process. While a committed applicant may get through all these hoops, it can take years, by which time the project is no longer viable. Many do not even try, or they seek to build with lower quality in order to recoup their costs.

That is a particular problem in London. Last year only around 5,000 new private homes were started, against a target of 88,000 new homes. That has real-world consequences. London Councils estimates that more than 200,000 people in London are living in temporary accommodation or are homeless, of whom around 100,000 are children. That is more than 50% of the UK total. The previous Government introduced a presumption in favour of sustainable development. This has proved to be a very effective tool in delivering development in rural areas because the relatively low upfront costs and the potentially sudden significant uplift in land values where there is not a five-year supply mean that landowners and developers can profitably challenge the planning system and regularly do so. Local planning authorities generally recognise this and tend to be much more reasonable with applications because they do not want planning by appeal and the risk of unplanned and poor-quality developments. This does not appear to work in urban brownfield areas, where, as I outlined earlier, high upfront costs and the complexity of development militate against challenging planning decisions, with developers often taking the easier route of seeking greenfield development opportunities elsewhere.

If we are to get more brownfield development, the balance between brownfield and greenfield needs to be tilted more in favour of brownfield. That is why the previous Conservative Government proposed a strong material presumption in favour of development on brownfield land. The purpose of this amendment is to oblige planning authorities to look at brownfield first, to recognise the potential additional costs and timescales of brownfield development and, through the strategic spatial plan, to seek to address them. With greater certainty and speed in the planning process, we will get the homes that this country needs with more on brownfield, helping urban regeneration and protecting greenfield sites. While the Minister may say that this is already in guidance, that has been the case for many years and it is simply not delivering. It needs to be stepped up; it needs to be in legislation.

I will speak briefly to the other amendments in this group. The amendments from the noble Baroness, Lady Pinnock, reflect a shared concern that strategic planning powers must be accompanied by safeguards, transparency and engagement with local communities. The amendment from the noble Baroness, Lady Freeman of Steventon, would extend this to national parks in a similar vein. My noble friend Lord Lansley’s Amendment 131 relates to a chief planner. We believe it has considerable merit, and I have heard similar from both the industry and the planning profession, as he outlined. My noble friend Lady McIntosh of Pickering rightly raised again the issue of flooding and the role and benefits of SUDS. This is an important issue that needs to be addressed. I look forward to the Minister’s response on all these issues and, in particular, on whether this Government are prepared to take the necessary step of legislating for brownfield development.

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Moved by

[Lord Best]

133: Schedule 18, page 216, line 30, at end insert—
“Support for Mayoral Development Corporations
4A (1) Section 198 is amended in accordance with this paragraph.(2) After subsection (2), insert—“(2A) The Secretary of State may—(a) provide financial assistance for the creation of Mayoral Development Corporations;(b) provide financial assistance for the acquisition of land or property by Mayoral Development Corporations;(c) provide guidance to Mayoral Development Corporations on any aspect of governance, land acquisition, development and regeneration, and ongoing management.””Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment would enable the Secretary of State to support the creation of Mayoral Development Corporations.

[Lord Best (CB)]

My Lords, I will speak to the three amendments in this group, starting with Amendment 133, which has the heading

“Support for Mayoral Development Corporations”.

The amendment concerns the measures in Part 2 of the Bill that will facilitate strategic authorities establishing mayoral development corporations and development corporations of combined authorities, including combined county authorities. These development corporations can take on planning powers and land acquisition and development powers.

I believe that these development corporations could create the real alternative that we need to the current reliance of government on a small number of volume housebuilders, on which we all depend for the delivery of most of the 1.5 million homes planned for this Parliament. The hope is that these developers will plan, design and construct the majority of new housing development, achieving high housing standards and a good quantum of affordable accommodation for local communities. But these companies have often failed to achieve the speed or quality of development, let alone to include a fair proportion of affordable homes.

An alternative is badly needed and the development corporations could be that alternative. Development corporations can trace their origins to the establishment of planning and development bodies for the pre-war garden cities and then for the post-war new towns. The London Docklands Development Corporation utterly transformed that part of east London and, more recently, the London Legacy Development Corporation —the LLDC—has been doing great work in the redevelopment of the 2012 Olympic Games site and its environs.

The excellent 2018 Letwin review recommended ending our dependency on the oligopoly of developers that, entirely predictably, work at their own pace and negotiate down the standards and quotas of affordable housing to maximise their profits. In their place, Letwin advocated the establishment of development corporations that would acquire the land and capture the increase in its value when planning consent was subsequently granted. The corporation’s master plan can then parcel out the site to different profit-making and non-profit-making bodies, incorporating a mix of house types, green space, play areas and a mix of providers—housing associations, SME builders, specialist players et cetera. Development corporations will be the chosen vehicle for the delivery—

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[Lord Best (CB)]

My Lords, development corporations will be the chosen vehicle for the delivery of the new generation of new towns. I was delighted to hear today the Housing Minister, Matthew Pennycook, announcing a consultation on the details of creating a development corporation for greater Cambridge. This model can be used far more widely, for other developments and area regeneration as well. But my worry is that this does not happen elsewhere, that new development corporations do not appear and that this part of the Bill—unless amended by Amendment 133—turns out to be a damp squib. Mayors and combined authorities have other important matters to handle and may fail to take advantage of the opportunity presented by the Bill to create the development corporations that really can achieve more and better new homes and communities.

Amendment 133 is intended to enable government to engage with the strategic authorities to incentivise and support the setting up of development corporations and sometimes to provide them with financial assistance, perhaps via Homes England, as well as ongoing advice on their governance, on land acquisition—including through compulsory purchase—on the creation of the masterplan and on the subsequent oversight of the management of the new development. The measures in this amendment could help to radically change the way housing and infrastructure are currently delivered. Publicly accountable bodies empowered to work for the common good could dramatically improve the speed of build-out, ensure more affordable homes and achieve the benefits of great place-making for the communities destined to live there.

Amendments 240 and 242 in my name have been grouped with my amendment on development corporations. These two additional amendments would insert a new clause with the heading

“Duty to optimise the use of public land”.

The amendments attempt to ensure that the precious asset of land owned by local authorities, including strategic authorities and development corporations, is put to best—“optimal”—use. The amendments seek to resolve long-standing complexities and arguments over the treatment of land holdings by public bodies. I pay tribute to the land economist, Stephen Hill, supported by leading real estate experts and a large number of public interest institutions, for his help in preparing these two amendments.

The amendments address the barrier of land prices being too high to allow for new developments to embrace important social purposes. The amendments would bring down the value of land by requiring public bodies to make available their own land holdings and redundant buildings on terms that make possible their best use. They would have to follow the 2018 principle of law set out by Mr Justice Holgate, which holds that true market value must reflect compliance with public policy. So this amendment would ensure that the market value of land must take account of the cost of abiding by the obligations both set out in the local plan and contained in central government’s requirements. Local authorities would have a duty to create a land use management plan for sites in their ownership to ensure that developments are ultimately for the public good.

Since the duty to optimise the use of public land would very often be of relevance when it is planned to dispose of land to others, the amendment also provides clarification on the meaning of the phrase “best consideration reasonably obtainable”, which governs the sale of publicly owned land at present. Public bodies believe that this means that they must accept the highest price offered, irrespective of the effects of this on their local community. Taking this line can prevent efforts to improve the quality of life for local citizens for generations to come.

I will illustrate this by reference to negotiations in which I was involved to acquire a redundant hospital building for an extra care housing development for older people. This use of the old building and surrounding land would provide a service that meant substantial annual savings for the NHS and care services as a result of the housing with care provision. But the NHS trust was adamant that the sale must be to the highest bidder—in this case to a developer of luxury flats, principally for overseas buyers, forfeiting the gains to the community in return for a short-term financial receipt.

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The Planning and Infrastructure Act 2025 also introduced a new duty on all development corporations to have regard to sustainable development and climate change mitigation and adaptation, which would support the broader assessment that the noble Lord is seeking beyond best value alone. It is right that local authorities and development corporations should be able to determine the most important objectives in their area and pursue them flexibly. This duty would restrict flexibility in the objectives they pursue and how they use land to achieve them. As drafted, the amendment would require local authorities and development corporations to weigh the balance of a number of planning and environmental policies. I am therefore also concerned by the potential for additional legal risk on local authorities and development corporations which dispose of land if other organisations disagree with their decision. This risk could paralyse decision-making, and on that basis, I hope the noble Lord will withdraw his amendment.

[Lord Best (CB)]

I am very grateful to noble Lords for their support. The noble Lord, Lord Lansley, is as experienced as anybody in this field and my noble friend Lord Mawson brings community-based experience as well. They are heavyweights in support of my amendments, and I am most grateful for that. I am also grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Shipley, for not only supporting the amendment on mayoral development corporations but for his amendment on the optimum use of land.

I am also grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Jamieson, who rightly pointed to the role that councils must play within a development corporation set up by a mayoralty or a strategic authority of any kind. Local authorities must continue to play their part within that. He asked some important questions which I am not sure we have had very full answers to from the Minister. He basically said that central government has the power to support local initiatives and local development corporations and has strategic funds available to those mayoralties that could be used to promote new development corporations. My problem is that in a lot of cases, this will not be a priority. It will be something put to one side. Some incentive is needed to unlock that opportunity for the mayors and the strategic bodies, something that enables priority to be given to this way of producing homes that will end our dependence on that oligopoly of volume housebuilders and bring in a new way of doing things.

I am grateful to all noble Lords who have supported these two amendments, and we live to fight another day. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment 133 withdrawn.

English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill

Lord Best Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 20th January 2026 Grand Committee

As the Minister had a lovely birthday yesterday, I am sure, I hope that she is in such a good mood that she will look favourably on Amendments 52, 56, 60 and 260 and the reasons that they are needed. We need a legal base to create an additional commissioner, and I argue very vigorously that it should be a rural commissioner. The amendments tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Royall, quite rightly create the possibility of considering the needs of rural communities by having rural affairs added as a competence. I believe that there should be an obligation in the Bill for deeply rural areas such as North Yorkshire to have the possibility, with the legal basis in these amendments, of creating a rural commissioner. With those few words, I urge the Minister to support these perfectly formed amendments for this purpose.

[Lord Best (CB)]

My Lords, I shall speak to Amendments 7 and 128 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Royall of Blaisdon. They are supported by my noble friend Lord Cameron of Dillington and the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett of Manor Castle. I declare my interests as a vice-president of the Local Government Association, a vice-president of the Town and Country Planning Association, and an honorary member of the Royal Town Planning Institute, and I was once a rural development commissioner.

These amendments would add rural affairs to the areas of competence for strategic authorities and require those bodies to have regard to the needs of rural communities. As the noble Baroness explained, these amendments would ensure that rural areas are not overlooked in the affairs of mayors and combined authorities in relation to the use and development of land, regeneration, housing, employment, health and well-being. The fact is that rural areas have distinct characteristics, but rural communities are likely to comprise only a small fraction of the total population of a mayoralty or combined authority. The amendments would ensure that the needs of these localities get proper consideration.

I shall illustrate the kind of differences that distinguish a rural area from the rest by reference to the all-important housing matters that affect so many households in these places. They are very likely to be areas of lower incomes and higher house prices relative to the rest of the strategic authority area. The local population also faces extra competition for available accommodation from those commuting from elsewhere, rightsizing retirees and, in many places, second home buyers and those letting on a short-term basis of the Airbnb variety. Yet the amount of social housing is appreciably lower: about 11% for areas classified as rural locations, compared with 17% for the country as a whole. The right to buy has removed a larger proportion of council housing in these areas, and many villages now face a virtual absence of affordable homes for those born and bred in the area or needing to live there for family, caring or occupational reasons. Without affordable homes, rural communities can die. Recently, I chaired the Devon Housing Commission, which made important recommendations in relation to the strategic advantages of combined authorities. It also gave clear warnings of the huge significance of housing pressures for those living in rural areas. Since rural housing schemes are mostly small, they do not trigger the obligation on house- builders to include any affordable accommodation.

Set against these many disadvantages facing rural areas, there are positive opportunities that can uniquely help to address their different circumstances. Rural exception sites allow development that would not be permitted elsewhere. Rural housing enablers can help match social housing providers with landowners. Special grants are available from Defra and Homes England, so on the plus side as well, things are different for rural communities. The danger is that these distinctions are not taken on board by authorities which have very many other matters on their plates. Hence the value of these two amendments in requiring attention to be given specifically to the special aspects, good and bad, facing rural areas, as illustrated by my housing example. These amendments would ensure that these areas get the priority they so clearly deserve and I strongly support them.

[Lord Cameron of Dillington (CB)]

My Lords, I support the amendments in the names of the noble Baronesses, Lady Royall and Lady McIntosh, to all of which I have added my name.

First, I must declare my interest in that I still have a family farming interest in Somerset, although I am now retired and live in Cornwall. I must also declare an interest—it is more of a perspective, really—as having been the Prime Minister’s rural advocate under a previous Labour Government. I was charged with representing rural interests in the Blair Government and often reported directly to the Prime Minister himself, especially during the foot and mouth disease outbreak at that time, which caused major problems—both social and economic—for rural areas. At that time, I was also charged with producing an annual rural-proofing report for the Government. Believe me, it was badly needed—and still is, in my view. The Social Mobility Commission recently reported that inter- generational poverty in rural England is now as bad, if not worse, than in our most deprived urban slums.

I might add, just to prove my Cross-Bench credentials, that I was also asked to produce a one-off rural-proofing report for the Conservative Government some 10 years ago. I should say that I had more difficulty with the latter role than the former. No sooner had I produced my 2015 report outlining the important job that the rural affairs section of Defra had to play in the agenda than the department, under Liz Truss—she of sound judgmental fame—virtually closed down the rural affairs section, so the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs ceased to be Defra and became just Def.

I am glad to say that those times are now over and the voice of the countryside is once again being heard. Defra still seems to be a slightly shy promoter of the rural voice in MHCLG, the Department for Transport, the Department of Health, the Department for Education and, above all, the Treasury. It needs to be saying again and again, “Hey, what about our agenda? What about those who live in the countryside?” In the same way, such a voice is needed, or is going to be needed, in the new strategic authorities. Mainstreaming rural issues into policy-making and decision-taking is fundamental to enabling all strata of rural society to engage fully with modern life; and to ensuring that rural businesses, which are the lifeblood of these communities, can thrive in even the remotest parts of England. Of course, having a rural voice at the top table—or, at the very least, a duty to consider rural needs in each and every region—is absolutely key to this agenda.

There are more VAT-able businesses per head of population in rural England than in urban England. There are more manufacturing businesses in the countryside than in the towns—per se, not just per head. The percentage of self-employed people in the countryside is also more than in the towns, especially—this is why I am particularly proud of my fellow country folk—among those who are below the poverty line. This proves to me that we country folk desperately want to stand on our own two feet, but we need help to do so; we need help to release that entrepreneurial spirit.

As was touched on by the noble Lord, Lord Best, housing problems in most rural areas are worse than in towns. There are few affordable houses left. The houses are more expensive and wages are lower. The houses tend to be less well insulated and heating costs are higher; mains gas, for instance, is rare in rural areas. Of course, the solutions are different there than in the towns, but I will not go into that here.

Training and skills problems are also different. How does a young person get to their class in their college 15 miles away when there is no bus? There might be one at 11 am or once a week on a Tuesday, for instance, but that is of no use to anyone. After college, how do you then get your first job? It is probably 10 miles away or more. It is a rural Catch-22 situation: you cannot get a job without a set of wheels, and you cannot get a set of wheels without income from a job.

Again, there are solutions to these problems, such as Wheels to Work, but the solutions need knowledge and need thinking about, along with a drive to push them through. For that, you need someone at the top table to tell it as it is—someone who is perpetually thinking about rural issues to ensure that the right policies are put in place. We need to try to create local jobs in as many communities as possible. That means improving connectivity, broadband and mobile services, as well as enabling planning policies; again, both of those are large subjects that I will not go into here.

The point is that ordinary life in rural England—shopping, doctors’ visits or even sports for the kids—is immensely hard when the only, but vital, family car has gone to work with the breadwinner. This lack of a car also means that kids at many schools miss out on all the extracurricular activities—football, sports, drama, music, et cetera—because they have to be on that school bus which takes them back to their rural village immediately after lessons are finished.

Also, rural households in poverty experience what academics call a rural premium, with living costs some 14% higher than for their urban counterparts, according to the academics. There is no cheap mains gas, which I have already mentioned, but only Calor gas or electricity; there is only older housing stock with poor insulation; food, clothing and transport costs are consistently higher; and there is limited access to childcare, healthcare and other basic services. All this compounds financial vulnerability. Thus, I say again that you need someone who understands all this, and who can speak up for rural interests when decisions are being taken at the top table.

Another factor which underlines the need for rural focus or a rural commission in these strategic authorities is the desperate shortage of government funding for rural areas. Although it is quite obvious to anyone who thinks about it that it costs more to deliver services to remote and sparse populations, central government funding for rural councils is on average 40% less per head of the population than for urban authorities—yes, 40% less per head. This differential is about to get worse under the so-called fair funding review. Therefore, a rural commissioner, or at the very least a duty to consider rural communities, is desperately needed to find ways of minimising the harm that such urban prejudice imposes on rural people.

This prejudice already results in rural council tax payers, for instance, having to pay on average 20% more per head than their urban cousins. For too long, I have been knocking my head against this concrete wall of prejudice against rural areas—too long to think that there is any chance of actually changing the financial situation. That is why I believe it will require a real rural understanding and focus to come up with the imaginative solutions which are so desperately needed to correct this long-standing imbalance.

It is crucial that mayors should have to appoint a commissioner for rural affairs whenever there is a rural element in their bailiwick. It has to be someone who can promote new jobs and make the necessary links. As I say, I know from experience that such a person can make a big difference to the quality of life for many people, whether it be in business, sport, transport, education, health or housing; or whether it be for the young, old or those in between. The countryside deserves a voice at the top table, and I believe these amendments will provide it.

New Homes: Target

Lord Best Excerpts

Thursday 8th January 2026 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

We have a target to eliminate the use of bed-and-breakfast accommodation for families by the end of this Parliament, except in emergencies. I recognise the problems that it causes for families. We have funding of £969 million for temporary accommodation over the next three years and £950 million for local authority housing funds to increase the supply of good-quality temporary accommodation, providing up to 5,000 homes. There will be increased support for children through a new duty on councils to notify schools, health visitors and GPs that a child is in temporary accommodation. We have to end this scourge of children living in temporary accommodation.

[Lord Best (CB)]

My Lords, the Minister mentioned her negotiations with housebuilders—I think it was just yesterday. We depend on those volume housebuilders to produce all the homes that we need. Can she reassure the House that in those negotiations she will not wish away any of the affordable housing that housebuilders are obliged to provide but so often fail to?

[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

I can give the noble Lord that assurance. We are determined to make sure that, as we go through the process of building the 1.5 million homes, enough social and affordable housing is included in that target. He will know that I take particular care to not conflate the terms “affordable housing” and “social housing”; they are different things. We have to make sure that we do our best in that regard. From the £39 billion that we have allocated for affordable housing, 60% will be for social housing.