Planning and Infrastructure Bill

Debate between Lord Blencathra and Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay

Report stage
Wednesday 22nd October 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay (Con)]

My Lords, I tabled my Amendment 50 before the Government tabled their own Amendment 49 in this group. Both seek, as the noble Baroness, Lady Pinnock, said, to leave out Clause 41. It is fair to say that that was the part of the Bill that caused the most concern among heritage groups. We heard in Committee about the concerns raised by bodies including the National Trust, the Heritage Alliance and the Government’s own heritage adviser, Historic England. I am pleased to say that the noble Lord, Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill, who responded to the debate in Committee and is a man who cares about both our heritage and innovation, very sensibly listened to that chorus of disapproval and undertook to look at this matter again in discussion with other Ministers.

I was therefore very pleased when I saw the government amendment that the noble Baroness, Lady Taylor of Stevenage, has tabled in this group, which responds to the concerns raised in Committee, both in this House and in another place, and in the representations made by heritage bodies. I also welcome the fact that she and the Heritage Minister, the noble Baroness, Lady Twycross, have met heritage groups directly to discuss this and other aspects of the Bill. That is very welcome, and I understand that it is the first of a number of round tables that they will hold on this issue.

Heritage and the construction of new infrastructure are sometimes held up to be in competition, which of course they are not. As the noble Lord, Lord Hendy, knows, for instance, from his time as chairman of the Heritage Railway Association, a proper celebration of our past can help to inspire and drive the innovation of the future. As we heard in Committee, if development is done in a way that respects the past and the vernacular of local communities, it then has greater support from those communities and is a much speedier and more welcome thing.

Having seen the government amendment, I will not press my Amendment 50 here on Report. I am glad that the Government have listened to the concerns raised in these debates.

[Lord Blencathra (Con)]

My Lords, I am in the rather frightening position of agreeing with Amendment 48 in the names of the noble Baronesses, Lady Pinnock and Lady Bennett of Manor Castle—no doubt they are as concerned about my support for them as I am. However, they have raised some very good points here.

I am in complete agreement with my noble friend Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay and his desire to delete Clause 41 in its entirety—now with the Government's amendment—but the noble Baronesses who have tabled Amendment 48 deserve some praise. We can all look at buildings, monuments or parts of the countryside and think that they are wonderful and should not be built on or destroyed, but we do not have our valuable heritage determined by such random means. As the amendment makes clear in proposed new sub-paragraph (b),

“structures and sites are designated for protection only where they are of special or particular historic or cultural significance”.

That is the key point. These protected sites are not based on the subjective opinions of us or local people, but on an objective determination using nationally approved criteria on what qualifies a building for listed building protection, or to be a scheduled monument or conservation area. Proposed new sub-paragraph (c) merely asks that due regard be given to conserving the historic environment alongside the need for future infrastructure. The question is, how long will that new infrastructure last?

I did a Google search, and this is what I got on typical building lifespan expectations. Standard residential buildings often have a design life of 50 years, with a possible maximum of 100 years. Commercial buildings can vary widely: some modern commercial properties may be constructed with a short design life of just 20 or 30 years, while others, such as high-quality concrete and steel structures, are built to last 100 years or more. Historical and monumental structures can, with constant care, last hundreds or even thousands of years, as seen with some Roman structures.

We destroy our history at our peril. It was Sir Winston Churchill who said:

“We shape our buildings and afterwards our buildings shape us”. —[Official Report, Commons, 28/10/1943; col. 403.]


On the one hand, we have the magnificent House of Commons next door and this marvellous Palace here. On the other, we have some of those appalling—but, no doubt, award-winning at the time—1970s tower blocks, which we are now flattening as quickly as possible because of their destructive effect on the people forced to reside in them. No Government would dare to demolish Stonehenge or Hadrian’s Wall, nor to drive a road through them, but there are thousands of ancient buildings that, although not as famous or sexy as Stonehenge or Hadrian’s Wall, are a vital part of our history and deserve protection—or, at the very least, special consideration—before they are demolished for some new construction.

In England, there are 9,320 grade 1 listed buildings and 21,782 grade 2 listed buildings. It is estimated that more than 1,000 of these buildings are over 1,000 years old. I cannot imagine any new development that would justify the destruction or damage of one of these buildings —except, possibly, a runway extension at Heathrow. Very few projects would justify it.

The noble Baroness, Lady Young of Old Scone, has amendments in later groups on protecting heritage trees. In Committee and in HS2 Bills, we have debated saving ancient woodlands. Once they are gone, they can never be replaced. The same applies to conservation areas. Amendment 48 does not call for a complete ban; it calls merely for regard to be had to the need to conserve our historic environment alongside the need for future infrastructure. I commend the noble Baronesses for tabling that amendment and bringing it to the attention of the House.

House of Lords (Hereditary Peers) Bill

Debate between Lord Blencathra and Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay

Committee stage
Tuesday 25th March 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay (Con)]

My Lords, after what I acknowledge was not a popular measure, I hope that this one will find more support on both principal Benches of your Lordships’ House.

My Amendment 90 seeks to address the long-running problem we all acknowledge of the number of Ministers serving in this House who are not salaried. When I had the privilege of being a Minister in the previous Conservative Government, I was lucky enough to be in receipt of a salary that was important, principally, for the pension contributions and the national insurance contributions it allowed me to pay. But some 40% of my colleagues on the Front Bench in the previous Conservative Government were unsalaried. That meant that not only were they not taking home a salary cheque at the end of the month, they were also not paying into their pension, their national insurance contributions were not being made and, in some cases, because of this and because of their age, they were not in receipt of severance pay when the general election put an end to their time as Ministers.

This is a problem that affects both the major parties when they are in government. It dates from the Ministerial and Other Salaries Act of 1975, which was written with a noble aim to ensure that the Executive does not grow too large by comparison to the legislature and that the cost to the public purse should be limited, but it was drawn in an age when Ministers in the House of Lords were assumed to be drawn from the landed gentry. We are not anymore, and, in the absence of baronial lands in Whitley Bay being granted to me, I was very grateful for the salary that allowed me to carry out my work as a Minister.

This is a problem that my noble friend Lord Forsyth of Drumlean and many others have raised in previous Parliaments and in this one. I know that it is one that draws the attention of the noble Baroness the Leader of the House. I hope that, much as in the debate on power of attorney, this may be an opportunity for us to solve a long-running problem that causes problems for Governments’ ability to find Front-Benchers and to draw people from all walks of life, from modest backgrounds, to serve their country in government. I beg to move.

[Lord Blencathra (Con)]

My Lords, I rise briefly to support my noble friend, who is absolutely right. If I have got my figures correct this time, this Labour Government are abusing only four Lords Ministers, while the last Conservative Government, disgracefully, abused 11 Lords Ministers, by not paying them. That is simply not right.

Part of the problem is that Prime Ministers like to stuff their departments full of paid MPs and, of course, they have their PPSs as well to help them. The larger the payroll of MPs in the Commons, the less likely there is to be a rebellion. So it pays for any Government to have as many paid Members of Parliament as possible, and their PPSs.

About 35 years ago, as a junior Whip, I encountered a colleague who was very concerned that that he was not fully involved in policy development in his department. He said to his Secretary of State that he would like to be more fully involved. The Secretary of state told him, “You’re just a PUS. Your job is to reply to all the letters from people whingeing about not getting their bypass”. That rather put him in his place.

My noble friend is right: there has been a large expansion of the roles of PUSs and others. I personally think that that is wrong. There is also a view that Peers can afford to do it for free: “Let’s have as many paid MPs as we can within the ceiling of the allowance, and then get Peers to do it for free”. That is utterly wrong. Many of them cannot do it for free. Noble Lords in this House who have been doing it for free have been doing it out of a sense of duty, not because they can afford it.

On that note, I see my noble friend Lord Younger of Leckie in his place. He and my noble friend Earl Howe were Ministers for 30 or 40 years between them. I doubt if they got paid for two or three years of that. There were those who did job after job unpaid. It is not right that any Government, whether Conservative or Labour, should abuse Peers in that way.

Asylum Seekers: Croatia and Bosnia-Herzegovina

Debate between Lord Blencathra and Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay

Wednesday 18th November 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay (Con)]

Yes, my Lords, we make these representations both bilaterally with the countries involved and through multilateral organisations—not just the EU but the International Organization for Migration, the UNHCR and other fora. The European Commission and the European Parliament are both taking an increasingly involved approach to this issue, which is welcome. Indeed, as part of the Croatian EU presidency in the first half of this year, there was a ministerial conference on the challenges of illegal migration, which is important in this regard.

[Lord Blencathra (Con)]

Surely these appalling allegations show that the flow of illegal immigration across the European continent is certainly not good for the migrants concerned, nor the countries through which they pass. Does my noble friend agree that it shows the wisdom of the Government’s policy of seeking to deter and discourage such illegal movement in the first place and trying to deal with the problem closer to home?