Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill

Lord Northbrook Excerpts

Committee stage
Wednesday 3rd May 2023 Lords Chamber

Moved by

[Lord Northbrook]

311: After Clause 123, insert the following new Clause—
“British standards: publicationWhere legislation made under the Planning Acts, or a local authority planning policy, refers to a British standard, the Secretary of State or local authority must take such steps as are necessary to make the relevant standard publicly available online free of charge.”

[Lord Northbrook (Con)]

My Lords, Amendment 311 requires the British Standards Institution, the BSI, to publish electronically the text of at least some British standards without charge to readers. Secondary legislation and LPA’s planning policies frequently require compliance with British standards or employ definitions which refer to British standards. Examples include the building regulations, my local borough’s— the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea’s—definition of a basement and the Code of Construction Practice which, for example, requires compliance with

“BS 5228: Code of practice for noise and vibration control on construction and open sites”.

However, it costs £330 to obtain a hard copy of a BSI document or to download it in PDF format. The cost is reduced to £165 for BSI members, which we imagine includes the council.

A local residents’ association of the RBKC asked the council to reproduce in or attach as an appendix to the code all, or just the relevant parts, of BS 5228 so that neighbours and residents’ associations can see what is required. The council replied that it cannot do so as copyright vests with the BSI.

I believe that all citizens have the right to see the relevant British Standards without disproportionate charge, and that the BSI should be instructed to publish these standards on the internet. The Minister in another place responded in a letter to Richard Drax MP on 31 August 2022, saying:

“The BSI are an independent organisation and we therefore cannot compel them to publish some, or indeed any, of their standards without charge”.


I believe there must be numerous independent organisations referred to in statute whose publications are routinely made available free of charge on the internet. For example, air source heat pumps are legally required to comply with MCS planning standards or equivalent standards. The relevant microgeneration installation standard—MCS 020—is the property of the MCS Charitable Foundation and is published on the internet, available for anyone to read without charge. Why cannot the BSI do the same?

If the issue is one of cost, one solution would be for the Government to negotiate with the BSI and pay it to publish. If this is not acceptable to either party, the Government should take powers to compel publication. As a matter of principle, our citizens should not have to pay to read the text of those obligations with which they are legally obliged to comply. I beg to move.

[Lord Bellingham (Con)]

My Lords, I rise very briefly to support my noble friend Lord Northbrook. It is a very simple and straightforward amendment, but it raises some important principles. As my noble friend pointed out, the BSI is a well-resourced organisation—a commercial, not-for-profit body established under royal charter. I had a look at its website, although I did not look at its accounts. It would be wrong to say that it is awash with money, but it has plenty of money to carry out the excellent work it does on behalf of many different parts of industry in our society. There is no reason whatever why it cannot publish these matters, and it would make a huge difference to residents to be able to know exactly what is going on.

Maybe the Minister can look at one particular point —my noble friend did not mention this, though he mentioned a number of other bodies that are mentioned in statute and different legislation that do make reports and other information available free of charge. I gather that in Ulster such documents are online completely free of charge, and that is a precedent that our Government could follow.

I hope that if the Minister cannot promise to accept the amendment, she will at least undertake to talk to the British Standards Institution about this, because it is a problem that could be solved very easily.

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[Lord Northbrook (Con)]

My Lords, I am most grateful to the Minister for her reply. I was interested to hear that in some circumstances the Government have funded the publication of these standards. I am not sure of the total number of standards in this planning area—there may not be a huge number of them—but I do not see why the Government might not extend that action in this area. I have listened carefully to what the Minister has said and will read it carefully in Hansard. In the meantime, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment 311 withdrawn.

Moved by

[Lord Northbrook]

312: After Clause 123, insert the following new Clause—
“Change of use to café etcIn the Town and Country Planning (General Permitted Development) (England) Order 2015 (S.I. 2015/596), Schedule 2, Part 3, after Class B.1 insert—“(B.1A) Development is not permitted by Class BB from a use within Class E (a) or (c)-(g) (commercial, business and service) of Schedule 2 to the Use Classes Order, to Class E (b) (the sale of food and drink principally to visiting members of the public where consumption of that food and drink is mostly undertaken on the premises).””

[Lord Northbrook (Con)]

My Lords, Amendment 312 obliges the Secretary of State to amend the general permitted development order to make a change of use from business premises to a café or restaurant subject to planning control. Regulations made in 2020 amended the Town and Country Planning (Use Classes) Order 1987 by introducing, in Part A of Schedule 2, a new class E—“Commercial, Business and Service”—covering, inter alia, shops, offices, cafés and restaurants. Change of use from any part of this class E to any other part of class E is permitted development so, for example, a shop or an office may now change its use to a café or restaurant without requiring planning permission.

This will have a number of undesirable consequences in quiet residential areas. For example, planning permission may have been granted for a change of use of a building, or part of it, from residential to office without any objection, and the office may now change its use to a café or restaurant without planning control. On the face of it, there would be nothing to stop, say, an estate agent turning into a McDonald’s, open throughout the night, providing it did not sell alcohol. LPAs would no longer be able to use planning policies to regulate or prevent such activities.

If a café or restaurant wishes to sell alcohol, it needs a licence to do so under the Licensing Act 2003. I take comfort from the ability of local authorities to refuse permission by virtue of the specified licensing objective of the prevention of public nuisance. However, noise nuisance and disturbance from customer parking, loading and unloading, waste disposal and odours can be as disquieting from unlicensed as from licensed premises, and they are now impossible to control by planning policy.

My suggested solution is to amend Part 3 of Schedule 2 to the GPDO, entitled “Changes of use”, by inserting a new class BB—commercial, business and service to restaurant or café—with the text as follows:

“Development is not permitted by Class BB from a use within Class E (a) or (c)-(g) (commercial, business and service) of Schedule 2 to the Use Classes Order, to Class E (b) (the sale of food and drink principally to visiting members of the public where consumption of that food and drink is mostly undertaken on the premises)”.


The Minister responded in a letter to Richard Drax on 31 August 2022:

“We have created a new ‘Commercial, business and service’ use class (Class E). This encompasses offices, shops, restaurants and other uses which are suitable in a town centre. Changes of use within the class does not require planning permission. The new class also allows for a mix of uses to reflect changing retail and business models, allowing businesses the ability to adapt to changing circumstances and respond to the needs of their local communities more easily and quickly. However, it remains the case that planning permission is required to change use to or from a pub. This ensures that local consideration can be given to any such proposals, in consultation with the local community”.


I believe that local communities should have a say in the establishment of new cafés and restaurants, not just pubs. I beg to move.

[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

My Lords, this group of amendments is another indication of why we believe it would have been better to bring forward a dedicated planning Bill rather than trying to amend some of the interconnecting pieces of legislation that have overcomplicated the planning scene in the last decade and have certainly had some undesirable effects because unintended consequences have not properly been taken into account. The noble Lord, Lord Northbrook, has eloquently described some of the impacts of widening the use classes so that local people and local authorities no longer have much control over what takes place in their own high streets. We get a proliferation of betting shops and things that people do not really want to see so much of in their high street.

I will give just two examples of permitted development. In Hertfordshire, over 750,000 square feet of economic and commercial space has been lost to permitted development. These developments are delivered with none of the community engagement and consultation that go on with standard planning applications, and they then often result in the infrastructure needs of the development being ignored. This has had the longer-term impact of alienating communities from development altogether, as they see housing developed in unsuitable locations and with no consideration of the proximity of any local facilities. One of the worst examples of this is in Harlow new town. Harlow, like Stevenage, has a commercial and industrial zone deliberately segregated from its residential areas. This was part of the master-planning for first-generation new towns. A permitted development saw a housing development conversion in the middle of this commercial/industrial area, leaving its residents feeling isolated from community facilities and other neighbourhoods.

The other example has been in relation to the creation of houses of multiple occupation from family homes in residential streets, putting unreasonable extra pressure on local resources and creating often far more transient populations, which has disrupted previously settled neighbourhoods.

There seems to be something very perverse in pursuing this permitted development regime at the same time as withdrawing the requirement to set housing targets. The former allows often substandard housing to be developed without the benefit of infrastructure funding, funding for social and affordable housing, or adequate consideration of the needs of the local area. It can put unnecessary pressure on public services in that area and create further pressures on housing as local people are priced out of reasonable developments or forced into poor conversions that are totally unsuitable for family living.

My Amendment 312F calls for a review of this permitted development regime to properly gather data on what it has delivered in terms of: achieving housing targets; importantly, the quality of housing delivered; the impact on heritage and conservation areas; the overall carbon impact since permitted development expanded to demolition; the relative costs to local authorities of dealing with processing permitted development compared with full planning consents; and how it is intended that permitted development sits within the role of the national development management policies.

We are also interested to learn from the review how the Government assess that a permitted development has contributed to levelling up. The feeling of the local government community is that permitted development has done the exact opposite of levelling up and driven a coach and horses through the rigour of the planning regime. That is why the Local Government Association’s comment on this issue was that

“if the Government is serious about strengthening the role of Local Plans, they should also urgently revoke permitted development rights”.

Amendment 312J refers to the totally inconsistent way in which Article 4 directions have been applied across the country. Such directions restrict the scope of permitted development in relation either to a particular area or site or to a particular type of development anywhere in an authority’s area. They can be used to control works that could threaten the character of an area of acknowledged importance, such as a conservation area. Article 4 directions are not needed for listed buildings, which are protected under different legislation, but noble Lords will remember the Harlow example that I gave earlier. Stevenage, which also has a segregated area for commercial and industrial uses, successfully argued that an Article 4 direction should apply to that area so that we were not faced with permitted development housing there, isolated from all our community facilities.

However, the Government have threatened to remove the provision of Article 4 directions altogether and have applied them inconsistently in different locations. Our Amendment 312J asks that a statement be laid before both Houses, setting out how the Government intend to achieve consistency in the application of Article 4 directions.

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[Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)]

It is in the current consultation. I assure the noble Baroness that we will be taking account of the consultation responses on this.

I turn next to Amendment 312J, in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Hayman of Ullock, which seeks to require the Secretary of State, within 60 days of the Bill achieving Royal Assent, to make a statement on the use of Article 4 directions by local authorities, and to explain the reasoning behind occasions when they may be modified by the Secretary of State and their resulting consistency.

It may be helpful if I briefly explain Article 4 directions. Permitted development rights are a national grant of planning permission. These allow certain building works and changes of use to be carried out without having to make an application for planning permission. Where it can be clearly evidenced that a permitted development right will cause unacceptable harm to a particular area, local authorities can make an Article 4 direction. This stops development proceeding under the permitted development right and requires that a planning application is submitted.

While Article 4 directions are consulted on and made locally, the Secretary of State has the power to modify or cancel an Article 4 direction. He will intervene where he considers that there are clear reasons for doing so, most particularly where he considers that they do not comply with national policy, as set out in paragraph 53 of the National Planning Policy Framework. This policy requires that all Article 4 directions should cover the smallest geographic area possible. Where they relate to a change from non-residential to residential use, they should be made only to avoid wholly unacceptable adverse impacts. All other Article 4 directions should be necessary to protect local amenity or the well-being of an area. Local authorities must notify the Secretary of State when they make an Article 4 direction.

When it is considered that an Article 4 direction as made by a local authority does not comply with national policy, officials have worked with the local authority to agree a revised Article 4 direction. Between 1 July 2021, when there was a change in national policy, and 3 May 2023, modifications have been made to Article 4 directions from 10 local authorities to ensure that they comply with national policy. I hope that noble Lords will be reassured that there is consistency in Article 4 directions that is ensured by the statutory process, policy and guidance. The Secretary of State exercises his power to intervene where there are clear reasons to do so, and in a consistent and measured way. With these reassurances, I hope that noble Lords will agree that Amendment 312J is not necessary.

To conclude, I hope that I have said enough to enable my noble friend Lord Northbrook to withdraw his Amendment 312 and for the other amendments in this group not to be moved when reached.

[Lord Northbrook (Con)]

My Lords, I listened carefully to the Minister’s reply. I should like to say straightaway that I applaud the useful overall relaxation in permitted development rights. I take her point and that of my noble friend Lord Bellingham that there could be problems in high streets with my proposed permitted development BB1. I still believe that in residential areas it is important to propose change. I am noting some support from the Benches opposite. I should like maybe to recraft the amendment so that perhaps residents’ associations could have a say in residential areas.

[Lord Bellingham (Con)]

Before my noble friend withdraws his amendment—once he has done so, I would be unable to speak again—I was disappointed when the Minister said that the amendment was flawed, whereas Amendments 312F and 312J were fit for purpose but not flawed. Just because she does not agree with it does not mean that it is flawed. The amendment was well drafted and perfectly sustainable.

There is a possible compromise to be had here because we do not, as my noble friend pointed out, want to do anything to curb enterprise investment and wealth creation in the high street, but we want to try and protect those residents in a small number of residential areas where there might be this particular problem. Perhaps some adjustment could be made so that, if there is a potential permitted change of use and permitted development in a residential area that could lead to all sorts of disturbance and people’s quiet livelihoods being put at risk, maybe there could be an argument for local residents going to the council and asking for the proposal to go through the planning system. Perhaps my noble friend and I can come back to this on Report and have a meeting with the Minister in the meantime so we can go through it in more detail.

[Lord Northbrook (Con)]

I thank my noble friend Lord Bellingham. It may be that we can craft a new amendment whereby, if there is a recognised residents’ association, some consultation process should be able to take place on the matter. In the meantime, I beg leave to withdraw my amendment.

Amendment 312 withdrawn.