Neighbourhood Planning Bill

Debate between Lord Shipley and Lord Cameron of Dillington

Committee: 1st sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Tuesday 31st January 2017 Grand Committee

[Lord Shipley]

My Lords, I express my support for the amendments in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Cumberlege, but I want to speak in particular to Amendments 9, 10 and 11. They are important because once again they are about the definition of words. We discussed earlier the meaning of “modification” and “material”, and now we have to define “significant”, “substantial” and “exceptional”. The noble Baroness, Lady Cumberlege, has drawn our attention to the fact that these words can be interpreted in different ways.

First, paragraph 12(1) of new Schedule A2 refers to the “general rule”. If a rule is a general rule, it means that sometimes it is not. I think a rule needs to be rule. The elimination of the word “general”, which leads to doubt, seems the right thing to do. I hope the Minister will take the point that that word should be removed. Looking very closely at the Bill, paragraph 10(1) of the new schedule says that it is for the examiner to,

“determine whether the modifications contained in the draft plan are so significant or substantial as to change the nature of the neighbourhood development plan which the draft plan would replace”.

There we have the introduction of the words “significant” and “substantial”. However, it is then left with the examiner to proceed by the written representation route. So a substantial or a significant change is to be dealt with by the written route and, in paragraph 12(2), only the examiner can,

“cause a hearing to be held for the purpose of receiving oral representations … in any case where the examiner”—

but not anybody else—

“considers that there are exceptional reasons for doing so”.

So there are substantial and significant changes but unless the examiner thinks they are exceptional, there cannot be a formal hearing.

We need to get this right. I foresee a lot of trouble arising if those who have taken part in developing a neighbourhood plan are suddenly told that a substantial or significant change to it can be dealt with only by the written procedure, whereas they may have things that they wish to say and to be heard. If the process is to be sound, we should be encouraging more oral hearings where people can listen to the evidence and contribute to the discussion. I hope the Minister will take on board that these definitions really matter. Something that is significant or substantial should have an oral hearing; something less important than significant or substantial could have written representations. But simply to say that it must be exceptional in the eyes of the examiner does not seem right.

[Lord Cameron of Dillington (CB)]

My Lords, I support Amendments 6A and 6B. For the purposes of this Committee, I declare an interest as a farmer and landowner. Both amendments are about ensuring that the procedure governing an examiner’s report on a neighbourhood plan allows the neighbourhood to meet him halfway, as it were, or allows him to make helpful compromise amendments rather than full-scale deletions, which I gather is all too often the case.

As has been said frequently today, planning is a very complicated subject for the average lay man—that very definitely includes me. The noble Lord, Lord Horam, said that he was not a planning expert. If he is not a planning expert, I am a babe in arms. I have heard planning described as a minefield covered in a mist. In spite of this, villages, communities and neighbourhoods work really hard to master this misty minefield and over a long period of time—two years, five years, whatever it might be—they try to get to grips with the complications of the planning system, not to mention the complications of the diverse needs of their community and the divergent local views on how it should be developed, in line, of course, with the local plan and the NPPF. That point has been made several times and I thoroughly endorse it.

Housing and Planning Bill

Debate between Lord Shipley and Lord Cameron of Dillington

Thursday 3rd March 2016 Lords Chamber

[Lord Shipley]

My Lords, that is a very helpful intervention and it could well be one way in which we could proceed. However, we are in Committee on the Bill and I would have thought that the Government would be able to explain this to your Lordships’ House, as opposed to individual Members of the House having to come up with proposals for the Government to consider when the Bill has now been in front of Parliament for many months.

There are two approaches in terms of Amendment 46: our approach is the “in perpetuity” one and another one involves tapers. Some further thought has to be given to that. The noble Lord, Lord Kerslake, rightly identified that the Government have not presented any options for consideration. There has been no cost-benefit appraisal and I am very surprised about that. If there has not been, there should have been.

The issue of avoiding dead weight also seems to be very important. I concede entirely that occasionally dead weight will apply, because the overall gain is greater than the loss on dead weight. However, if there is too much dead weight, it means that some are being subsidised at the cost of others.

I agree entirely with those noble Lords who have said that the priority should be affordable rented housing, as so very many people cannot participate in buying starter homes because they either do not have the deposit or do not have the ability to repay the mortgage. I hope the Minister will respond to what the noble Lord, Lord Kerslake, called a gift, and the noble Lord, Lord Horam, referred to using the words “government largesse”. We have to be very clear who is getting the financial advantage here. At the moment, I believe that we are driving a deeper wedge in terms of social exclusion.

[Lord Cameron of Dillington (CB)]

My Lords, I put my name to Amendment 41. I was going to list the range of various abuses that I felt the starter homes regime would be open to, but that has been done with much greater expertise and experience by my colleagues, my noble friends Lord Best and Lord Kerslake, and, indeed, with greater eloquence.