Housing and Planning Bill

Viscount Younger of Leckie Excerpts

Monday 25th April 2016 Lords Chamber

[Lord Campbell-Savours (Lab)]

My Lords, I totally oppose Amendment 119B. I made a long contribution in Committee —I think it was 18 or 20 minutes—on the whole question of the compulsory purchase of land.

I want to ask the mover of this amendment and his supporters a very simple question. In Committee I drew attention to the value of agricultural land, and the value of that land when it is given full planning permission. If I go by memory, I quoted figures of £880,000 in west Cumberland, where my former constituency was; £4 million per hectare in Watford; and £7 million per hectare somewhere on the southern outskirts of London, although I cannot remember the place exactly. Why should a landowner have the value of his or her land transformed from between £15,000 and £20,000 a hectare to between £4 million and £7 million a hectare simply on the stroke of a pen designating a national infrastructure scheme somewhere in the UK? What right does he or she have to that increased value on land to which they have done absolutely nothing to secure that additional value apart from own it?

When our fathers went to war in the Second World War, they did not fight for a country where people could make vast fortunes simply by holding land. The cost of that land falls upon people all over the UK who now cannot afford to buy a home, particularly in our major cities. The price that they are paying for all that is to feed the landowners who own the land, who should be readily giving up that land to help to deal with the national housing crisis at the price of its worth to them in its existing use, but of course they do not want to do that.

If people outside reading Hansard think the amendment is complicated, it is actually quite simple: it would protect landowners and their wealth, and the people who would pay for that are the people who cannot afford to do so—young people throughout the country who cannot afford to buy a home.

[Viscount Younger of Leckie (Con)]

My Lords, the noble Earl, Lord Lytton, has helpfully expressed concerns about landowners losing out from any uplift in land values when the compulsory acquisition of land is sought for housing as part of an application for nationally significant infrastructure. He has also raised the important issue of how claimants are treated by acquiring authorities. I recognise that these are also issues of concern for members of the Country Land and Business Association, who met the Minister for Housing and Planning last week to discuss these matters and our proposals for further compulsory purchase reforms, which are now out to consultation, which the noble Earl alluded to. We welcome these discussions with the CLA and look forward to receiving its further thoughts in response to the current consultation.

I turn first to Amendment 119B. We had quite an interesting short debate, particularly with the intervention just now from the noble Lord, Lord Campbell-Savours. In response to the noble Earl, and taking account of the comments from the noble Duke, the Duke of Somerset, I can only reiterate the main points of the response to the amendment made in Committee. A key principle under the Land Compensation Act 1961 is that compensation is offered at the open market value of the land. The open market value will take into account the effect of any existing planning permissions, and any that might be given in future in accordance with the planning assumptions in the 1961 Act. Any increase or decrease in value that is due solely to the scheme that will acquire the land—for example, a nationally significant infrastructure project including related housing development—is disregarded. The same principles apply irrespective of the powers under which compulsory acquisition is granted.

Amendment 128YAR would introduce a statutory duty of care to be owed by acquiring authorities to claimants. I agree completely with the noble Earl, Lord Lytton, that those whose land is being taken by compulsion should be treated fairly and with respect. I also listened carefully to the comments from the noble Lord, Lord Cameron, and I know that stretch of the A303 reasonably well. I also respected the comments made by the noble Duke, the Duke of Somerset. However, I do not think that imposing a statutory duty is necessary to achieve that fairness and respect. Instead, the way forward is to set out clear expectations for acquiring authorities’ behaviour in dealing with claimants in guidance, and to ensure that the system itself is fair to claimants. We have done the former already: updated guidance was published in October 2015. The latter is being addressed through measures in the Bill; provisions on lengthening the notice before entry and earlier advance payments will make the system fairer for claimants. We are also consulting on further proposals to ensure that claimants receive fair compensation, to further encourage the prompt payment of advance payments and to ensure that claimants in areas with high rateable values are not systematically excluded from issuing blight notices.

As I am sure the noble Earl will appreciate, Amendment 119B would require a fundamental change to the provisions for assessing compensation for land compulsorily acquired in the Land Compensation Act 1961. For that reason, we will be unable to support this amendment. On Amendment 128YAR, as I have explained, the Government do not consider that a statutory duty of care is necessary. I know the noble Earl will be disappointed by this, but none the less I ask him not to move his amendment.

However, I emphasise that we will of course be happy to continue our engagement with the noble Earl and other interested parties, should they wish to discuss these matters further, particularly in relation to Amendment 128YAR, as it may be possible that more can be done through changes to guidance.

[The Earl of Lytton]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for that, particularly for his comments on the second of the two amendments, which seems to be a profitable suggestion and an appropriate way forward. I very much appreciate the opportunity of taking him up on that as matters proceed. In a sense, it is one of those “motherhood and apple pie” amendments. I make no apology for that because the overarching purpose and geometry of how these things are dealt with is important, as indeed corporate social responsibility might be in any other walk of life.

I am entirely unsurprised that the Minister does not go with the first of my amendments, Amendment 119B. I am equally entirely unsurprised that the noble Lord, Lord Campbell-Savours, disagrees in forthright terms with what I have suggested. The reality is that all sorts of businesses and individuals profit in one form or another from windfall gains, and it is a truism that those windfall gains do not coincide with the circumstances in which they could feed into the support of the needy and the underprivileged, particularly in housing terms, other than through the intervention of the state. That is a perfectly proper way of doing it.