Business and Planning Bill

Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb Excerpts

2nd reading & 2nd reading (Hansard) & 2nd reading (Hansard): House of Lords
Monday 6th July 2020 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Jones of Moulsecoomb (GP) [V]]

My Lords, I have heard a lot of the debate, and a lot of the issues that I was going to raise have been dealt with already, so I will just mention them in passing. I will also take a moment to contradict noble Lords who have said that we need to get back into the Chamber as soon as possible. Quite honestly, many of us enjoy remote working and do not want to experience disease and death. We are happy with the way things are. I understand that this might change, but we have to learn to adapt. The lack of democracy and holding our Government to account comes not from the fact that we are remote but from the fact that we are being ruled by ministerial diktat at the moment. Again and again, laws are passed that could have been brought before Parliament to be properly scrutinised but were not.

This Bill is being pushed through very fast as emergency legislation, so there really is not much time to scrutinise it. I will come back to these issues at a later stage. I will be focusing on a few specific issues. Road safety is incredibly important. We have to bear that in mind when we talk about the use of pavements. Walking and cycling are extremely important. If we are to have a continental-style cafe culture, with beautifully arranged tables and street dining, we have to ensure that these places are safe and accessible. We do not want to impose disabilities on people. We should make sure that everybody has access to these spaces.

I will also mention environmental issues. The Prime Minister’s comments about newts were absolutely baseless and rather lowered the tone of the whole debate. We have to think about environmental issues when it comes to business and planning.

I have not heard community land trusts being mentioned. I would like the Government to do a little bit of research on this. Community land trusts enable communities to create the sort of housing that they want in their area, with the big advantage that it would be affordable houses that stay affordable in perpetuity. Unlike affordable houses built by councils, which can then be sold at the market rate the first time they change hands, community land trusts hold the houses for ever and allow them to be affordable to local people.

The last issue I will raise is provision of adequate toilet facilities. So many businesses have closed and, even when they are open, many are not allowing people to use their facilities. There could be real problems, especially with people drinking so much. I urge the Government to think about public toilets. Somehow in this century we do not like using them and we do not have many of them anymore. That is really something that we should consider.