English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill

Debate between Lord Fuller and Lord Lucas

Committee stage
Wednesday 11th February 2026 Grand Committee

[Lord Lucas (Con)]

Yes, but the town council will be on our current boundaries, presumably, whereas to work with the last 30 years of building and development we really ought to incorporate all those large areas of housing and commerce that Wealden has stuck on our boundaries rather than elsewhere. Understanding how the Government intend to proceed on this is relevant to the decisions that we are being asked to take now. I very much agree with what other noble Lords have said. Representation is important, as are the concepts of parish and local identity. We would like to take what will be a rather challenging decision in the full light of knowing what the alternatives open to us really are.

[Lord Fuller (Con)]

My Lords, this has been a really important debate because it has emphasised and demonstrated the muddle that is in the Bill: the vacuum that will be created following the local government reorganisation process. How is it that Clause 60 cannot even bring itself to mention the town and parish councils that have formed the bedrock of our society?

I know it is inconvenient to have those pesky politicians interfering in that administrative competence: why do we want delegates and deputies at that lowest level? I can understand why the dead hand of Marsham Street has written Clause 60 as it has, but it is not good enough, because it does not have the golden thread of legitimacy that comes only with elections or democratic accountability. We are not seeing authoritative governance, but authoritarian governance; we will be leaving it to local authorities to impose relationships in some smaller parts of their territory without any regard or requirement for democratic legitimacy.

We have had an interesting discussion. The number bandied around was that 20% of places are unparished. It is not equally spread throughout the nation but, by and large, the historic county boroughs have not been parished because they have been billing authorities and districts in their own right. Areas such as King’s Lynn —a proud Hanseatic town—are currently going through a consultation to form their own parish so that there is not a vacuum. I am very attracted to Amendments 207 and 210, and especially Amendment 209A from the noble Earl, Lord Lytton, because they would prevent a vacuum. Nature abhors a vacuum, but there will be one unless we have these absolute requirements here.

In our discussion about parishes, there was some confusion over what we might call ecclesiastical parishes —those parts of a town with a parish church—but we have not really got to constituted, incorporated parishes that are part of a parish council. It is important that our nomenclature is straightened out. I will talk about civil parishes as opposed to ecclesiastical ones.

There are already multiple arrangements. In my electoral ward, the two parishes of Alpington and Yelverton are inconveniently at both ends of the alphabet but have come together to form a community council—a joint parish council with warding for periodic elections. A minimum number of councillors from Alpington and a minimum number from Yelverton must come together as part of that. Put together, about 400 or 500 people live in those two parishes. Where is the equivalence between Alpington and Yelverton working together and Weston-super-Mare? We are trying to shoehorn this. The Bill should be clear.

In the previous session on the Bill on Monday, I ploughed a lonely furrow as I tried to make some sort of size distinction between these smaller parishes and the larger towns. I was on my own; had that debate been held today, I feel I might have got more support. Nevertheless, we must make sure that we end up with properly constituted, incorporated bodies to govern these smaller bits. Just establishing a joint committee or sub-committee of the new body that sits above it will not be any good, exactly because of the library point that was made so well.

The Bill is deficient because none of this texture is explained or laid out. There is just a muddle, with no legitimacy. This must be brought back on Report with significantly more flesh on the bones and I encourage the Minister to do so. I am not sure whether even Stevenage is parished; it was certainly a new town. That is a whole new class of authority that we may need to look at in this regard. We must try to bring together all those bits from my noble friend Lord Lansley, the noble Earl, Lord Lytton, and others to bring some order to this. Otherwise, it will be disorderly.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Fuller (Con)]

My Lords, I will speak to my Amendments 216A, 216B and 216C. I also associate myself with most of the other amendments, certainly the ones in the names of my noble friends. The noble Lord, Lord Pack, in Amendments 211 and 212 proposes a sort of ban. I do not agree with this, but we do need to allow for emergencies, so I agree with the thrust of what he is trying to say.

I agree with my noble friends about the importance of not cancelling elections for LGR, but this does not take into account the funny business around cancelling mayoral or PCC elections or council polls when LGR is not the reason. My amendments are therefore drawn more widely than those of my noble friends Lady Scott and Lord Jamieson.

There has not been a revolution here for about 350 years. Your Lordships might say that this is because the British are a placid race, but they can easily be stirred. The reason the rule of law has been sustained for so long is that we are a democratic country. We sit in this House, in a building that is the cradle of democracy and mother of Parliaments. The people of this nation go to the ballot box to select those who are to represent them in pursuance of a stronger economy, better lives, robust defence and all those other things that the state provides. That consent lasts until the next election, at which point those elected are either replaced or re-elected.

I know that this is obvious, but it needs to be said because the Government have forgotten it. The democratic principle is the cornerstone of our society and our civility. It safeguards the boundaries between the state and the individual. It takes something pretty important to disturb that delicate equilibrium, such as national emergencies. The foot and mouth epidemic and Covid were two cases in point, when elections were delayed for proper purposes.

But this time last year, elections were cancelled. Last March, we had a debate and the Minister made it quite clear that the 12-month cancellation was strictly a one-off. Back then, LGR was nothing more than an outside possibility. No detailed plans had been submitted, there had been no consultation and it was not clear what type of reconfiguration might be proposed. Surrey thought it was getting a mayor until it was not, and London was most definitely in until it was not. It was all just nods and winks. Local government reorganisation was no more certain then than saying now that the Prime Minister will be in place until the next elections—which would have been in May, until they were cancelled.

I am not saying that the Minister misled the House last March, but events have shown that she did not have the authority to give the reassurances that she did. She certainly did not advance the ridiculous notion that decisions to cancel elections should be made by those who are already elected and have the most to lose. Had she explained that process back in March, she would have been laughed out of the Chamber, but that is her Government’s position today.

I have been a councillor for many years. I can tell noble Lords that you do not go into local government for the money but, once you are in, the money can be pretty handy, so asking those people whether they ought to stay on is both a conflict of interest and a moral hazard. Part of the justification for the delay was that economic growth was the number one priority. Mayors were to be the conduit through which growth would be delivered. Those elections have been delayed by two years, which says all you need to know about the commitment to growth. The mayoral angle is why I prefer my amendments over those of my colleagues, because I have amendments that would not just go for local elections but mayoral and PCC elections.

I am sure that the Minister will want to say that three elections were cancelled in Yorkshire, Somerset and Cumbria in 2021, and therefore there is precedent, but I do not accept that for a moment. The noble Lord, Lord Shipley, will be reassured that I argued forcefully with the Minister that, in the case of Yorkshire, putting Skipton, Selby and Scarborough in the same so-called local authority was crazy. But at least, by that moment, although I disagreed with the outcome, orders had been laid and proposals had been made and consulted on. There was certainty about the creation of local government reorganisation when the elections were cancelled—and, in any event, it was only a single year’s delay. None of that relates to today’s situation. It is dishonest to draw some equivalence between the circumstances in 2021 and those of today. That is why the law needs to be changed to stop the abuse.

Those who want to dodge democracy have advanced quite a few bogus reasons. The county councils talk about capacity issues, forgetting that it is the district councils that run the elections in the shires. They said that it was all rather expensive—but democracy has its price, and the money has already been salted away, accrued and set aside. So that argument holds no water. I have heard it said that staff are busy with other things, but running elections is a specialist task and the electoral registration officers tend to focus on that alone. They are not the people who are engaged in LGR and consultation on the big strategic matters with other authorities, including matters such as disposal of assets. All these arguments are bogus when measured against the fact that free and fair elections should be operated separately from those standing in them, which is one of the fundamental separations of duties and one for which the Electoral Commission, among other bodies, was established.

In an earlier group we discussed local government reorganisation. One problem is that the public have not been offered a chance to express an opinion on LGR, just in case the electors do not share the same view. My noble friend Lord Pickles told me in 2008, “If you don’t trust the folks, don’t go into politics”. He was right, but that does not suit a Government with a tin ear for democracy and the value of civic history. Democracy is being denied in councils; it has already been denied in the mayoral elections. While the Government are signalling that the police and crime commissioners are on their way out into the sunset, my amendments would at least require that the strongest possible relationship between the state and individual is not to result in a reckoning, because society has been abused by these proposals.

My proposal is that only the super-affirmative process can be used when you might want to cancel elections. I cannot think of reasons why you might want to do that in future but, if it was so, this would ensure that there was a two-step process whereby permission must first be sought to enter secondary legislation and then only by the affirmative method would it be separately approved by resolutions laid before both Houses. In any event, any resolution to cancel an election should be made no less than three months before the date of publication of the election, because it is important for parties and individuals to have enough time to prepare a manifesto, select candidates, raise funds and address all the practical matters that need to be taken care of. My amendments would ensure that the preparation could take place effectively, allowing voters to mark their choices clearly on the ballot.

It is not just that it is the right thing; it is wrong that confidence in elections has been undermined. That infects, contaminates and taints democratic structures and processes. Democracy is the underpinning of our society, the stability of our nation and the integrity of all we hold dear. Here is the paradox: this evening, in this Room, the unelected Chamber is standing up for the elected rights of the population. I am not going to go on about Schedule 28 and the funny business against first past the post, but by this debate, noble Lords are being seen to be on the side of the people. Those who would reform your Lordships’ House can see what a slippery slope would happen if we are shoved out of the way: more cancellation of elections. What an irony that would be. The law should be changed so that elections cannot be cancelled for ministerial convenience, except in the most extreme and robust cases of national emergency, such as Covid or foot and mouth, but not local government reorganisation.

[Lord Lucas (Con)]

My Lords, Amendment 216D seeks to deal with a consequence of the correct and necessary but sad development that councillors and those standing for council seats and in other elections are allowed to hide where they live. It has become necessary. I am sad about it, but it has meant that in these elections it is extraordinarily difficult for an elector to contact people who are standing for election. There is no way of getting messages to them if they are not part of a mainstream party. Even where they are from a mainstream party, you send the message in and it sticks with that party’s central office and does not get out to the candidate because the candidate is allowed to have only the authorised views of the party. I would like to restore that connection between voters and candidates by making sure that there is a way in which voters can contact candidates and hopefully receive replies from them.

Planning and Infrastructure Bill

Debate between Lord Fuller and Lord Lucas

Committee stage
Wednesday 17th September 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Lucas (Con)]

My Lords, I support the amendments from the noble Baroness, Lady Young, and my noble friend Lord Randall. First, turning to baseline data and coming back to earlier discussions in Committee, I know that work is going on to improve what we have by way of baseline data, and I have been involved in extensive discussions with the local environment record centres and others. I would really appreciate being given an understanding, either now or by letter, of what the Government’s intentions are by way of giving momentum and a sense of determination to taking our current system and moving it on to the point where we gather all the environmental information, which we collect into one place, both that generated by the planning system and the extensive environmental data generated through high-quality amateur systems, and use for the benefit of understanding what is going on in local ecology.

It is all very well to do a baseline survey—it is traditional around us to do them in February—but doing proper baseline to really understand what is going on in an area requires presence throughout the year over a period of years. We have that data. We are collecting it. The world is full of seriously good amateur natural historians putting in a lot of work for free, and we are not taking advantage of that. We do not even use it to monitor the condition of SSSIs. Where the Government intend to go on this and how they will pick up on the discussions currently taking place and take them forward are important to understand before we get to Report. I will write to the Minister on that subject.

Secondly, when it comes to such things as water quality and nutrient neutrality, I am afraid that the monitoring system run by the Environment Agency has been run down to such an extent that we really do not have a good picture of what is going on in the average river catchment. As I have said before in Committee, my brother, Tim Palmer, is involved in the efforts that the Wylye Valley farmers are making. They have created their own laboratory. They are doing their own measurements, working with the Environment Agency, producing a much better quality of baseline data, and understanding where the problems come from and what can be done to deal with them.

High-resolution data makes it possible to resolve problems. The sort of stuff we have as the general flow from the Environment Agency just leaves us puzzling. Again, I very much hope that the Government will find themselves able to work with all the resources, interest and determination that are out there in the farming and other communities to get the data better and not just think that they have to pay huge amounts to environmental consultants to do it through the usual methods. There are better ways of doing these things by opening up. I hope that is the direction the Government will take.

[Lord Fuller (Con)]

My Lords, on the face of it, I welcome government Amendment 245A and the amendments from the noble Baroness, Lady Young of Old Scone, because it is clearly right that the public should understand what the sequence proposed might be.

My noble friend Lord Lucas has stolen some of my thunder in identifying that some of the research can take place only at certain times of year which, if it is a particular time window, may be, say, 11 months away, and there is this temporal longevity which may happen over many seasons. It is really important that, as part of that requirement for laying out the sequencing, we get an understanding of what timescales may be needed, because my concern is what happens at the point at which an EDP is first mooted and that sequencing process starts. What assurances can the Minister give that, because the process may take several years, it will not, in effect, impose a moratorium on any development while we wait for the sequences and processes to go through? These were laid out in the helpful diagram from the noble Lord, Lord Krebs, and the bits before.

It is important that government Amendment 245A which, as I say, I welcome, should be coupled with the anticipated timescales. It might be implicit in the amendment, but it would be helpful if the noble Baroness could make it explicit that sequences and timescales are in there and whether that applies to a moratorium in the meantime.

Planning and Infrastructure Bill

Debate between Lord Fuller and Lord Lucas

Committee stage
Tuesday 9th September 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Fuller (Con)]

My Lords, I rise to speak in support of Amendment 135 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Coffey, and declare an interest in that the sponsor of her amendment, Richard Bacon, was the Member of Parliament for South Norfolk, where I represented the council for many years; it is worth putting it on record that he devoted the greater part of his parliamentary career to pursuing the importance of self-building in our nation. Self-building is not just the right thing to do because it is going to deliver more homes; it enables striving families to build a house of their dreams. Of course, they do not actually build it themselves. Self-building is not about getting all the tools; it is about procuring and possibly designing a home for you to live in for the long term—the basis of community and empowerment in that sense.

I welcome the amendment, not least because we have sleepwalked into a situation where a small number of national housebuilders have created for themselves a substantial monopoly, not just in the building of homes but in their design. Local distinctiveness and vernacular have been lost. A bungalow that has gone a bomb in Barnsley is built in Bunwell, 200 miles away, yet it is the same design language. We need distinctiveness. The logical conclusion, the spirit of what this amendment seeks to achieve, is that not only do we give those wanting to build their own home or procure their own residence the chance but local authorities can be very distinctive about making sure that we are capturing the correct need for those people who have the wherewithal to do it—not just the casual want, as was the original case and has now been tightened up.

[Lord Lucas (Con)]

My Lords, I have Amendment 135H in this group. This is another of my attempts to help the Government make the way that housing is delivered slightly more efficient. I live in Eastbourne, and Eastbourne Borough Council has a long-standing partnership with a modular house builder called Boutique Modern, which has produced some very effective houses in the town, looking quite different from one another because it is easier to customise the outside of those modular homes; but the structure, what is happening inside, is the same. It is produced in a factory. It is daft, when you are producing identical goods, to have to go through type approval for them as if they were being built on the ground.

You have a design, which has passed all the tests and been approved by the Buildoffsite Property Assurance Scheme, I suggest—though it could equally be some other body—then you avoid all the processes and costs associated with whether it is an acceptable design for a place for someone to live in and can concentrate on how the site is laid out and what the building looks like. That makes a really effective way for people to build and procure their own houses, to go with my noble friend’s excellent amendment.

I urge this on the Government as a way in which they can make another small improvement that will, over time, decrease the cost and increase the rate of housebuilding.