Land Use Framework

Baroness Jones of Whitchurch Excerpts

Thursday 28th October 2021 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Jones of Whitchurch (Lab)]

My Lords, I should begin by declaring an interest as a board member of the South Downs National Park, which is the planning authority for that protected landscape.

I am extremely grateful to my noble friend Lady Young for tabling this debate today. I must say that when I saw the speakers’ list for this debate, despite the fact that there are some regrettable but understandable absentees, I knew that we would be in safe hands—and this has proved to be the case, because we have heard a number of wise and thoughtful contributions, for which I thank all noble Lords.

I particularly thank and welcome the noble Lord, Lord Harlech, and congratulate him on what I though was a very inspiring speech. He clearly has a great deal to contribute to our rural debates. I hope that his passion for organic farming and renewable technologies will indeed help to shape our policies for the future. I absolutely agreed when he said that we need to treat the countryside with the respect that it truly deserves.

As my noble friend Lady Young said, we debated the issue of land planning at length during the passage of the then Agriculture Bill and again during the passage of the then Environment Bill, and, on each outing, I am pleased to say that she has won more converts to her cause. She has certainly persuaded me along the way.

The fact is that in the UK, and particularly in England, we have an acute shortage of land and the demands and expectations of what the land will deliver are becoming intense. On the one hand, we want to set aside land for habitat renewal, to plant more trees for carbon sequestration, to provide more green spaces for recreation and to become more self-sufficient in food. On the other hand, as we have heard, the pressure for more housing, schools, hospitals and infrastructure competes with our love and respect for those green spaces. Add to that the fact that land is scarce, expensive and its ownership is concentrated in very few hands, and the pressures become insurmountable.

During the passage of the Environment Bill, we debated these pressures at length. My noble friend Lady Young talked about the Bill’s proposals for nature recovery strategies, which are intended to map and provide a nature recovery framework. Local government is intended to be a key partner in this, but we also know—and have heard again today—that it will be conflicted by pressures to build. As my noble friend Lord Whitty, the noble Baroness, Lady Boycott, and others have said, sadly, the balance of power between the environment and development now lies firmly with the developers.

The noble Baroness, Lady Bakewell, made a further important point, which is that even when developers get the right to develop, they do not—and it is an even worse use of land when it is just left moribund.

Meanwhile, as we know, in future, through the reforms of the Agriculture Act, landowners and farmers will be incentivised to renature their land. The sustainable farming incentive will replace the basic payments scheme and, we hope, will move away from intensive agriculture and change the face of our landscape. We can all see the sense in this, and it is essential that we use this opportunity to work with the farming community to halt the decline in biodiversity and ensure that it plays its part in achieving our net-zero ambitions.

However, I also agree with my noble friend Lord Whitty and the noble Baroness, Lady Boycott, that in this model, sadly, there is a danger that food production will be increasingly squeezed, as the strategy is that it should be determined by the market, with the worrying trend for trade deals to undermine the environmental and economic stability of the UK farming community. So food production must be an essential part of our land use going forward.

I also agree with the noble Baroness, Lady Boycott, that we need to look more closely at the types of food produced and the need for more locally sourced fruit and vegetables. I did not see that as the noble Lord, Lord Deben, described it—a big hand coming down on the farmers—but as part of the incentives that we give for different developments in agriculture for the future. We have an incentive-based scheme at the moment.

The Environment Bill also encourages landowners to sign up to long-term conservation covenants: taking land out of agriculture to provide environmental offsets for the damage caused by building elsewhere. The private sector is already establishing institutions that can buy and sell those offsets, and new markets will undoubtedly develop, which many have likened to the wild west, with little strategic oversight of the outcome of that buying and selling; some indeed being done by overseas investors, who do not necessarily have an interest in the use of that land.

In the South Downs, we are already hearing of farmers being approached to provide forgo farming and instead provide carbon offsets for developments taking place along the coast, and the introduction of biodiversity net gain will ramp up those sorts of offers. This is so far happening on a piecemeal basis, outside any strategic plan for the preservation of the protected landscapes. Meanwhile, the National Farmers’ Union has already talked about conservation covenant stacking, where one farmer could be providing offsets for a number of developers, potentially having multiple commitments on the same piece of land. There is clearly money to be made from this—but is it really what we want? These developments seem to be taking place before we have had a hard look at what is the best use of this very scarce resource.

My noble friend and the noble Baroness, Lady Boycott, made a compelling case for a Defra strategic map, underpinned by proper-quality data, which would help determine that land use and the priorities for the future. The case was made that that should not be for just one use; it should be multifunctional. You can have more than one use for a piece of land.

Meanwhile, over in DLUHC—are we allowed to call it “D-Luck”?; I will be interested to hear how the Minister describes it, but I will stick with that for the moment—the Government are seeking reforms to simplify and speed up planning decisions in an effort to increase the number of new homes. As we know, local residents, communities and local councils would be the losers from these reforms and it is fair to say that, as a result, the proposals have not gone down very well.

The Government’s accompanying planning White Paper had virtually nothing to say about how the new planning system would work towards the Government’s goals around net zero. This concern was echoed by the HCLG Select Committee, which urged that any changes to planning should also address climate change and creating sustainable development, as well as dealing with the increased threat of flooding. As the noble Lord, Lord Deben, said, the latest net-zero strategy, written by BEIS, also has little reference to land use. He rightly made the point that that is because Defra does not have a policy on it and is therefore missing out on the opportunity to have any influence on it.

Of course, the appointment of Michael Gove to the new department in September has allowed the unpopular reform of planning to be paused. We are all curious to know how much of a rethink is taking place in the department on this matter, so can the Minister confirm that any revamped reforms will place local people at the heart of decision-making? With COP 26 about to start, can he say what urgent steps are being taken to ensure that our planning system is fit for purpose? Does he accept that our planning system needs to go hand in hand with tackling the climate crisis, whether in insulating existing homes, providing sustainable transport links or tackling the amount of carbon in the construction process?

All those issues come back to the impact of development on the environment and how we make the best decisions for land use. It is an issue which interlinks a number of government departments, all of which currently have competing interests and priorities. This is where my noble friend’s land use framework should step in. It would provide an overarching strategy for approaching the planning and investment decisions that impact on our land. It would provide head space to balance out the competing pressures, away from the day-to-day micro decisions that impact on land use—many of which, once taken, are irreversible. It would also help to address the important point made by the noble Baroness, Lady Thornhill, about the pressures and trends to be too parochial, rather than addressing the greater good.

I hope that the Minister, having heard this debate today, will agree to take my noble friend’s land use framework back to the Secretary of State as something that should underpin any future planning reforms. I hope he has also listened to the persuasive case made by the noble Lord, Lord Deben, for a ministry of land use, and that he can at least agree that we should use this “Gove pause” as a chance for a complete rethink of our approach to land use, and take into account that in future, a strategic framework should be key. I look forward to the Minister’s response.