Neighbourhood Planning Bill

Lord Porter of Spalding Excerpts

3rd reading (Hansard): House of Lords
Wednesday 15th March 2017 Lords Chamber

[Lord Beecham]

My Lords, I join the noble Lord in complimenting the noble Lord, Lord Taylor, for his very thoughtful and constructive contributions to the Bill and on this amendment. However, I have one question to put to him about it. Proposed new subsection (8) defines a local authority as,

“a district council … a county council, or … a London borough council”.

Where do the new mayoral combined authorities sit within this framework? Perhaps the noble Lord could assist me with that, or perhaps the Minister could indicate what role is envisaged for a combined authority, which will presumably by its very nature include land for development which crosses what would previously have been boundaries but are now within the new framework. I suspect the noble Lord, Lord Taylor, would wish that combined authority to exercise a role, but perhaps the Minister could indicate what the Government’s attitude would be and whether any further step needs to be taken to ensure that that outcome is fulfilled.

[Lord Porter of Spalding (Con)]

My Lords, I speak in favour of the amendment as well, and declare my interest in the register as chairman of the Local Government Association. The noble Lord, Lord Best, is right that the association welcomes this. It is pleased to do so, even in a version that is slightly watered down from the original. The Secretary of State should be congratulated on being prepared to cede some power: it is not very often that a Secretary of State is happy to let somebody else get on with something unless it is going to be a bad news story. I honestly believe this will be a good news story, so I am pleased that he is prepared to do it.

Like the noble Lord, Lord Beecham, though, I also have an issue with proposed new subsection (8): its definition of councils does not appear to allow unitary councils where they are the council of choice for people to be the body that makes a decision. It is fine for the districts or the counties to do that, but unitary councils outside London appear to be excluded. I am sure Newcastle or Sheffield would also want some space in this conversation. I am not sure at the moment how that could be changed, but perhaps it could be changed to “local planning authorities and county councils”. That would capture all existing councils. I urge against including combined authorities at this stage until we are sure where the constituent members of those authorities see this power resting.