Housing and Planning Bill

Lord True Excerpts

Tuesday 26th January 2016 Lords Chamber

[Lord True (Con)]

My Lords, I declare an interest as leader of a London borough council, but one that, after a large-scale voluntary transfer 15 years ago, is no longer a direct provider of social housing—something I sometimes regret.

I want to make one general point and then raise a few concerns for Committee. That may give the impression that I am negative, but I make it clear that I think there is a lot of good in this Bill. I certainly do not share the views of those opposing the right to buy. Certainly, there are points of detail to look at in Committee, including how you ensure replacement, but we should not stand in the way of aspiration.

My general point takes a slightly different tack from the noble Baroness who has just spoken. We all speak of a housing crisis, particularly in London. I do not demur from the need to build. However, too few of us ask the prior questions. We talk about supply but not about the causes of demand. What factors are stoking soaring asset prices and growing demand? I believe that building sustainable and integrated communities, which is what we need, means local consent. We have just heard that London’s population is fated to grow by a Birmingham a decade, and that it may soar towards 11 million in less than 25 years. Parts of central London are already being hollowed out, as are some rural areas, as we have heard. At the same time, the prolonged artificial depression of the cost of borrowing risks promoting an asset price bubble, which is driving the truly and sustainably affordable ever further away.

With the leaders of five other south London boroughs, I recently attended a presentation from our chief executives pointing to the upper-end projections for population growth—feasible projections, which you can find in the graphs—reaching more than 13 million by 2050. That could mean, on the chief executives’ estimate, 200,000 more homes in south-west London by 2050, or two to two and a half boroughs the size of Sutton or Kingston. Such population and housing growth would irreversibly change the character of many parts of London. I do not mean in terms of people—before the snickerers come in—but in the quality and character of public services and the built environment. Where will we find the transport, health provision, schools and, indeed, the open spaces to support that growth? Too many policies seem to require no provision for that.

Do Londoners actually support a surge to an international megalopolis with building on demand? Is it not high time that we had a debate about this to see whether we can secure consent for an end? If we first agree a sustainable future, then we can create the housing, social and financial policies to match, and make it possible. Once we have consent, we could more easily deliver the homes. By the way, I agree with my noble friend Lady Hodgson that good design—and, from that, planning—has a great part to play in securing consent.

I support starter homes, although I shall be interested to learn in Committee whether it was a Minister or a civil servant who left the question mark in above Clause 2. Your Lordships have rightly asked whether we could see more of the draft regulations. We certainly need clarity about the relationship between starter homes —good idea as they are—and affordable obligations. Why are developers spared obligations to contribute to infrastructure? What is the social case for that?

On planning, I object to yet more powers being given to the Mayor of London to overrule local democratic determination. Recently, I met people from a community group who had worked for years with our council to create a brief for sustainable development in an area of our borough with schools and other facilities, but who are terrified at the prospect of staff from a remote City Hall intervening with scant knowledge of local needs and aspirations. I would like to test the rationale for Clauses 133 and 135. I personally believe profoundly in localism, so it is disappointing to me to see more centralism. I wish councils were not always put on the spot and blamed. Why can councils not challenge public sector bodies that refuse to develop? I should point out that I might name a few names in Committee. And, after all our debates, why does the department persist in a one-club formula for neighbourhood planning? My own authority has had a plan since 2008. We are implementing local village and community plans, adopted after local consultation, and local people would strongly object to the imposition of the bureaucracy of Part 6 of the Bill to replicate or replace adopted village plans. Please sanction or permit councils that are actually doing local community planning to do it.

On exemption, I will be tabling amendments to allow councils to opt out of a damaging policy of automatic arbitraging of office value to residential without planning control. Dozens of small businesses in our borough are being tossed out by developers, as we speak, as a result of this policy. I urge my noble friend to listen on this point. In conclusion, I also ask her to consider allowing councils to recover costs on planning fees. I am grateful for the words I have had with her on this. Subsidising developers in this way cost taxpayers tens of millions a year across London alone. I find it potentially attractive to attach an amendment to Clause 141 but, knowing my noble friend, I am sure she will be able to meet us. She and the Secretary of State are good listeners. Her love and knowledge of local government comes out in everything she says. I hope that, with the help of Ministers and this House, we will make a very important Bill even better.