Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill

Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist Excerpts

Committee stage
Monday 20th March 2023 Lords Chamber

Moved by

[Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist]

165: After Clause 71, insert the following new Clause—
“Disposal of landIn section 123 of the Local Government Act 1972 (disposal of land by principal councils), after subsection (2B) insert—“(2C) Police and crime commissioners and the Mayor's Office for Policing and Crime are to be treated as principal councils for the purposes of this section.””Member's explanatory statement
This amendment amends section 123 of the Local Government Act 1972 to confer a power on police and crime commissioners and the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime to dispose of land held by them in any manner they wish. This power is subject to the requirement of Secretary of State consent if the disposal is made for less than best consideration.

[Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist (Con)]

My Lords, government Amendment 165 and the consequential Amendments 508 and 509 seek to give police and crime commissioners, including mayors who exercise these functions, and the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime the same powers to dispose of surplus land as local authorities.

The Government’s general principle is that public bodies should dispose of surplus land at the best possible price reasonably obtainable. However, we recognise that selling land at less than best consideration can sometimes deliver wider public benefits, which is why there is a long-standing framework under Section 123 of the Local Government Act 1972 for enabling local authorities to dispose of their land for less than best consideration. Under this framework, the Secretary of State’s consent is required, but there is a general direction granting consent if the undervalue is below £2 million.

Prior to 2011 and the creation of police and crime commissioners, police authorities were covered by Section 123, but that is no longer the case. While police and crime commissioners now have broad powers to dispose of land as they see fit, there is no specific provision relating to disposal at less than best consideration. This perceived gap in police bodies’ powers was raised in the other place, and I know that this matter concerns the noble Baroness, Lady Pinnock. Having now explored the issue further with the Home Office, the Government agree that police and crime commissioners should have the same disposal powers as local authorities. Therefore, this amendment extends the scope of Section 123 of the Local Government Act 1972 to cover these elected police bodies.

These amendments will give police and crime commissioners greater certainty that they can dispose of land at less than best consideration where doing so will deliver wider public benefits. It will further empower police and crime commissioners to act in the interests of their local communities. The associated consent framework—with consent to be given by the Home Secretary in the case of police and crime commissioners —will increase transparency and public accountability.

For the reasons I have outlined, I hope that these amendments are welcome and that noble Lords will support them.

[Baroness Pinnock (LD)]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for introducing the government amendment, which concedes a principle of public bodies—the police—being able to use less than best consideration for land no longer needed. I am unashamedly seeking to extend that, as a result of the MP for Twickenham, my honourable friend Munira Wilson, introducing in the other place the idea of enabling public bodies to dispose of land for less than best consideration. That was already available in a limited form but the idea here is that it is out of date because of the change in land valuations—that is what the Minister said.

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However, generally speaking, the ability to use public land for the benefit of our communities should be right at the heart of levelling up, so I am keen to support the amendments in this group.

[Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist (Con)]

My Lords, I am grateful to all noble Lords for having participated in this debate. A lot of interesting subjects have come up, some of which will be discussed in greater depth as we go through the Bill.

Amendment 174 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Pinnock, seeks to give NHS bodies and police and crime commissioners the same powers as local authorities to dispose of surplus land. Government Amendment 165 already addresses this issue in relation to police and crime commissioners, but NHS bodies are accountable to the Secretary of State for Health and Social Care and there is a separate disposal regime in place for NHS land that enables disposal at “less than best” consideration where it brings public benefits. We do not therefore consider it necessary for those bodies to be included in Section 123 of the Local Government Act. Equally, general disposal consent is granted by way of a direction issued by the Secretary of State. As such, primary legislation is not required to amend it.

On what the noble Lord, Lord Crisp, might have wished to say, as enunciated by the noble Baroness, Lady Pinnock, I believe that it is broadly in line with what the Government are trying to achieve. In fact, having listened to all the contributions, I think that we all share the same objectives; the Government just do not believe that we need to legislate quite so much in order to achieve them. So, although I appreciate the sentiment behind this amendment, for the reasons given above we do not consider that any further changes beyond government Amendment 165 are necessary.

I thank the noble Lord, Lord Best, for tabling Amendment 312A and for setting out the rationale behind it. It proposes that local authorities, mayoral development corporations and Homes England should be subject to a new optimal use duty when disposing of their land. We all want to see public land disposed of by these bodies being used to support long-term improvements to the economic, social and environmental well-being of an area. However, we are not convinced that this new duty is necessary to achieve this.

As the amendment recognises, local authorities are currently subject to Section 123 of the Local Government Act 1972, which governs their disposal of land. Under the Section 123 framework, there is already a general consent which enables local authorities to dispose of land below less than best consideration when it supports the economic, social and environmental well-being of an area. Many local authorities already use the disposal of their land as an important lever to shape and improve places for the benefit of the communities, as the noble Lord acknowledged. We are not convinced that local authorities need these new duties on them to do this. As the noble Lord said, we want the planning system, through local plans, to identify the best use for a particular piece of land. Part 3 of the Bill sets out our proposals to reform local plans to achieve this. We do not think that a separate duty on local authorities is needed. In addition, it is not appropriate for the Secretary of State to impose objectives and requirements on a local authority’s land strategy. That should be a matter for the local authority to decide.

Similarly, mayoral development corporations are specifically designated to regenerate areas using land assembly, particularly to shape and drive forward development to maximise opportunities for the public good. Where appropriate, mayoral development corporations can dispose of land at less than best consideration that can reasonably be obtained with the consent of the mayor, as set out in Section 209 of the Localism Act 2011.

Supporting the creation, regeneration or development of communities is enshrined in Homes England’s statutory objectives, and it is proactively taking action through its land programmes. Homes England is already subject to a formal general consent, granted under Section 10 of the Housing and Regeneration Act 2008, to dispose of land for less than best consideration from the Government. This provides them with the statutory powers to dispose of land at less than best value under the criteria set out in the consent. The criteria include meeting value for money requirements and the undervalue being for the purposes of delivering public policy requirements. More legislation to achieve the noble Lord’s aims is not therefore needed, but I appreciate the underlying objectives behind the tabling of this amendment.

The noble Lord, Lord Best, and the noble Baroness, Lady Pinnock, mentioned indexation and the rising inflation problems with land values. We recognise that the threshold for the general consent is out of date, given the rise in land values since it was set in 2003. Following Royal Assent, we intend to consult on increasing the threshold. I think this was the consultation the noble Lord referred to, and which the Minister in the other place committed to, so that best consideration will be increased from £2 million.

The noble Baroness, Lady Bakewell, talked about local help for communities. She is probably aware that the £150 million community ownership fund is being used to help communities across the UK value ownership of assets at risk of closure and that it is available until March 2025. On a personal note, I am delighted that through this route, in Pembrokeshire we have just brought into community ownership the local hardware store, Havards, in Newport. I hope that with that reassurance, and the knowledge that Part 3 of the Bill will significantly reform the basis for formulating local plans and hopefully reduce the time it takes to produce a local plan, noble Lords will not need to move their amendments.

Amendment 165 agreed.

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[Lord Mann (Non-Afl)]

As reported in the last few days, the estate is saying to the local media that it does not have the money to renovate so the property will become empty. Over the years, I have seen on other comparable estates similar properties: properties in an appalling situation in terms of utility and investment. It is the failure to invest by landlords that is the problem. I repeat to the Minister: what remedy is open to the local authority to ensure that this property remains available for someone to use—preferably so that this widow of 62 years’ tenancy is able to continue to live in what I think it is reasonable to describe as her family home?

[Baroness Bloomfield of Hinton Waldrist (Con)]

My Lords, this group of amendments concerns second homes, holiday lets and empty properties. I declare my interest as set out in the register as the owner of a second home in Wales.

In relation to Amendment 166, tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Hayman of Ullock, I share her commitment to ensuring that we have the best-quality data to inform our policies. Indeed, I also share some of her concerns. I can assure her that we already have good systems in place; for example, local authorities report annually on the number of properties that have been classed as empty for more than six months. This data is published as part of the council tax base statistics. It is also used as the department’s measure of long-term empty dwellings that are published in the live tables on dwelling stock. This latter data includes the number of properties vacant on a particular day, as well as the number of properties that have been empty for more than six months.

As part of our council tax base statistics, we also detail the number of properties that are subject to the existing long-term empty property council tax premium. This shows the number of properties subject to the premium in each local authority area, broken down into the different levels of premium that apply, depending on the length of time that the property has been empty. We will continue to further refine the data we seek from local authorities to ensure that we have data on how many properties are subject to the extended premium, having been empty for more than 12 months. I hope that the noble Baroness is satisfied with that assurance on data that we already collect and propose to collect.