Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill

Baroness Pinnock Excerpts

Consideration of Commons amendments
Monday 23rd October 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Shipley (LD)]

My Lords, I will make a brief comment in response to the Minister’s Motion C in relation to Amendment 3, which I moved on Report. I want to put on the record that I understand the line that the Government have taken. It is difficult to make statutory geographical disparities. What matters is the assurance that the Minister has given on that issue. It will really matter, in respect of policy formulation to address geographical disparities, for the evidence to be constantly collected to identify what those disparities are. I accept the assurances that the Minister has given and I have no intention of pursuing the matter further. I am grateful to the Minister.

[Baroness Pinnock (LD)]

My Lords, I remind the House that I have relevant interests as a vice-president of the Local Government Association and as a councillor in West Yorkshire.

I will speak specifically to Motion B1 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Lister of Burtersett. The finest achievement of the levelling-up Bill could be putting the reduction of child poverty and health inequalities at its heart. After all, it is levelling up that we have been talking about during the many hours that we have debated the Bill. Unfortunately, the government amendment fails to make it absolutely specific that that is what the Bill is going to try to achieve.

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[Lord Lansley (Con)]

My Lords, I briefly intervene on this group to make two points, one on Motion F1 and one on Motion J1. I am prompted on Motion F1 by what the noble Lord, Lord Shipley, was asking about South Cambridgeshire. I declare an interest as I am chair of the Cambridgeshire Development Forum and used to be the Member of Parliament for South Cambridgeshire.

To set this in context, the Cambridgeshire and Peterborough combined authority is a mayoral combined authority and is not intending to be a county combined authority, but this does prompt a question. One of the essential problems with a mayoral combined authority is the difficulty of there being both a combined and a county authority infrastructure. For many people in Cambridgeshire and Peterborough, this is too confused and duplicatory a structure.

For the sake of argument—this is not one that has been advanced in Cambridgeshire, but it might be—let us say that it moves from a mayoral to a county combined authority. As the legislation is presently constructed, one could clearly not do that as it would, in effect, disempower district councils in the process. So if my noble friend Lord Howe is saying that the nature of a county combined authority requires that it is for upper-tier authorities only—in this context, the county and Peterborough, and not the district councils—and if the local devolution settlement were found to be unsatisfactory and a change were desired locally, why are there no legislative provisions to allow that to happen? That is the question I put to my noble friend.

Secondly, I support my noble friend Lady McIntosh. Her Amendment 22B very reasonably says that the Government may make regulations relating to remote participation in local government meetings. That creates an opportunity for Ministers to think about this and, if necessary, move slowly. It is clearly not their wish to move rapidly but, without dwelling on the detail, there are physical, demographic and personal circumstances that mean that members may wish or need to participate in meetings remotely. Frankly, there might also be meetings where there is a relatively modest need for everybody to come together. As we know, there can sometimes be large numbers of meetings in local government that are not places where large numbers of votes happen and it would be perfectly reasonable for Ministers to enable such meetings to take place remotely. Given the permissive nature of Amendment 22B, which my noble friend has put forward, it is rather surprising that she was not able to find a compromise.

[Baroness Pinnock (LD)]

My Lords, I will speak to Motion J1 and then Motion ZE1. I support the amendment from the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh of Pickering. There is one element that has not yet been discussed, which is that this House allows for hybrid meetings of its committees. Now, you have to say to yourself, if it is right and proper for this House to enable Members to take part virtually in its committees, why is it not possible for local democracy to have the same rights? The arguments have been made for inclusivity—or, as it will be, exclusivity if the Government unfortunately fail to hear the arguments that have been made.

I will point to one example, which I think shows the strength of the argument of the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh. The Government have, in their wisdom, created new unitary authorities, one of which is North Yorkshire. Now, North Yorkshire is a very large area to be in one unitary authority. It also does not have the best of weather in the winter. So, if you live towards the south or even the east of the area, because the county council headquarters is more or less in the middle—so it is useful in that sense—you will have a round trip of over 100 miles to go to a council meeting. If, as often is the case, you have to go across the Yorkshire Dales or the North York moors, where roads are impassable, you will be excluded from the meetings—not because you want to be excluded but because the weather is excluding you. And, if you are not able to drive, I can tell you now that you would simply not be able to get to a meeting in Northallerton in the heart of North Yorkshire.

For those reasons alone, it seems to me practical that the Government should allow for flexibility for local government to make those sorts of decisions, to enhance local democracy and be more inclusive. So we support the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh in her quest to enable hybrid meetings to take place.

I turn to Motion ZE1. It is a travesty of local democracy if a fundamental change to the constitution of a combined authority—which is what we are considering in the instance of the West Midlands combined authority—can be made without a full consultation and involvement of all those who wish to have their voices heard. I live in West Yorkshire, so I can absolutely confirm what the noble Lord, Lord Bach, said: that at the heart of the discussions was the combination of the two roles of mayor and PCC. Not all of us agreed, but the outcome was as it was. The consequence of combining those two roles in West Yorkshire and in the Manchester combined authority is that we elect a mayor and then the mayor appoints one of their colleagues to be police and crime commissioner.

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[Earl Howe (Con)]

My Lords, I am once again grateful to noble Lords for their contributions to the debate on this group of Motions and amendments. As I indicated at the outset, the Government cannot support the three amendments to the government Motions in this group.

Motion F1, tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Taylor of Stevenage, would have the same effect as the original amendment but apply only to local authorities. I urge the House not to go down this road. The basis of the CCA model is that only upper-tier and unitary authorities can be members, not least because they are the bodies in whom financial responsibility will be vested and who will contribute financially to the running of the CCA.

However, as I am sure the noble Baroness accepts, because we debated this at length at earlier stages of the Bill, we recognise the vital role that district councils play. In response to the noble Lord, Lord Shipley, and my noble friend Lord Lansley, and as Ministers said in the other place, we are sympathetic to the idea that district councils should have voting rights pertaining to them as non-constituent members. We have deliberately left scope for this to happen. However, we are clear that that should be a matter to be determined at the local level. District councils need not be shut out of the room, as the noble Baroness, Lady Taylor, suggested, nor do I expect them to be so. We expect the upper-tier local authorities that we agree devolution deals with to work with district councils to deliver the powers most effectively being provided. In discussions thus far, we are encouraging potential deal areas to consider how best to involve district councils, in recognition of the role they can play. My ministerial colleagues have been engaging personally with district councils and the District Councils’ Network on this issue.

My noble friend Lady McIntosh of Pickering has returned to the charge on virtual or hybrid meetings with her Motion J1. As I stated in my opening remarks, at the heart of the issue is the strength of the scrutiny exercised by local authorities and the importance of maintaining the integrity of local democratic principles. I need not remind the House that virtual and hybrid proceedings have significant limitations for scrutiny and interaction of members of any legislature. As such, we do not agree that councillors should be able to attend these meetings and cast their votes remotely. The Government are therefore unable to support the amendment in lieu. I respond to the noble Baroness, Lady Pinnock, who drew the comparison with committees of this House, by saying that the functions, roles and powers of committees of this House are wholly different from the functions, roles and powers of committees of local authorities.

[Baroness Pinnock (LD)]

I am sorry to interrupt the noble Earl, but I remind him that councils have scrutiny committees, which frequently do not vote, so there are similarities between the committees of this House and, for example, scrutiny committees of local authorities.

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[Lord Lansley (Con)]

My Lords, I apologise for intervening before the noble Baroness, Lady Pinnock, has a chance to speak to Motion R1, but I have to disagree with my noble friend on this occasion. Last week, we had a debate on planning fees, in which I participated. The risk in what the noble Baroness proposes is that it would lead to local authorities significantly increasing the fees that would be charged for householder applications.

I remind the House that I chair the Cambridgeshire development forum. As far as larger developers are concerned, the point I made last week is that we should promote planning performance agreements to enable local authorities and developers to come to proper agreements, with potential sanctions and performance obligations on the part of the local planning authority. They would give them access to greater resources in dealing with major developments. I fear that what the Liberal Democrat Front Bench proposes would just lead to increases in fees for householder applications.

I also want to say a word about Motion M1 on climate change. The noble Lord, Lord Ravensdale, knows that I thoroughly agree with what he proposes but, at this stage, sending back the same amendments is inherently undesirable if it can be avoided. I hope that my noble friend on the Front Bench will tell us more about how the Government will use the new national development management policies, which will have statutory backing. If the Government set down NDMPs in terms that are clear about the importance of decisions that take account of mitigation of and adaptation to climate change, they will have the effect that my noble friend and other Members of the House look for from this Motion.

The distinctive point of the original Amendment 45 was that it would extend specific consideration of mitigation of and adaptation to climate change to individual planning decisions—there is plenty in the statute about the application of this to plan-making—so that is where the gap lies. That gap can be filled if national development management policies are absolutely clear about how decisions are to be made on the impact of climate change. I hope that my noble friend says something that allows me to feel that we do not need to send the same Amendment 45 back to the other place.

[Baroness Pinnock (LD)]

My Lords, first, I thank the noble Earl most sincerely for the time he has spent with me and my colleagues in discussions about these issues. They were, of course, of great interest to the noble Baroness, Lady Scott of Bybrook, and I repeat my good wishes to her for a speedy recovery.

It is not often that you get a Motion both agreed and disagreed with before it is proposed, but here we go. I will speak to Motion R1, about planning fees, which is in my name. I thank the noble Lord, Lord Young of Cookham, for his support. He has made the powerful case in favour of enabling local authorities to determine their planning fees to cover costs: no more, no less.

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[Lord Lansley (Con)]

I apologise for interrupting the noble Baroness, but surely we discovered from the documentation that came with the statutory instrument last week that after the increase in fees, the great majority of that subsidy would be to householder applications? What the noble Baroness is looking for is for householder application fees in effect to be doubled.

[Baroness Pinnock (LD)]

I thank the noble Lord, Lord Lansley, for his comment. What we did discover, and I have the papers with me, was that there would still be a subsidy for major applications—that was in the papers—and that there would be a subsidy for householder applications. But the case I make is this: if householders wish to add an extension to their house or improve it in some other way, then there is a cost to that, of which the planning application fee is a minor part. Why should their next-door neighbour subsidise it? I do not think it is a just or fair way of spending taxpayers’ money. If we told them that this was happening, I think they would be as cross as I am.

We need to recover costs because the principle that I have just outlined, but also because without local planning authorities being fully resourced, they will not turn around the situation that is well recorded by professional bodies, by the Local Government Association and by the Government in the papers that we had for the statutory instrument last week—that there is a significant shortfall in planning officers in local government because of the lack of resources. If we are going to reverse that, local planning authorities need to be properly resourced, so that in a plan-led system we have experienced and well-qualified planners who have the responsibility of ensuring that local and national plans are respected.

The only other point I want to make on this issue is this: many councils across the country are under severe financial pressure—let us put it like that. Some, as we heard from Birmingham, which was the latest council, are on the brink of having insufficient resources to fulfil their statutory obligations. Particularly in those circumstances, it seems quite wrong to expect councils to use council tax payer funding to subsidise planning applications, hence my continuing pursuit of a fair and just planning application fee process.

I suppose my final point on this is to totally agree with the noble Lord, Lord Young of Cookham, when he asks why on earth in a local democracy cannot local government have the right, responsibility and duty to set its own fees? It does on everything else, so why not on that? I will push this to a vote if the noble Earl fails to agree with me and others’ powerful speeches on this.

On the other amendments, I endorse the “healthy homes” Motion that the noble Lord, Lord Crisp, has pushed again today. He is absolutely right: why do we continue building places that produce problems, when we could solve it from the outset? If the noble Lord wishes to press his Motion, he will get our full support, as will the noble Lord, Lord Ravensdale, for his Motion on climate change. He is absolutely right; it is an existential threat to our country. We must take it seriously, and here is one area of policy where we can be seen to be doing that.

[Baroness Hayman of Ullock (Lab)]

My Lords, I shall be very brief. This has been quite a long debate, and we have a number of votes at the end of it.

First, on the amendment from the noble Baroness, Lady Thornhill, regarding NDMPs, we agree with her that the Government’s amendment is not sufficient to answer the concerns that were raised in Committee and on Report. If the noble Baroness wishes to divide the House, she will have our full support.

Secondly, on the amendment from the noble Lord, Lord Ravensdale, on planning and climate change, we consider this an extremely important issue, as other noble Lords have mentioned. If he wishes to divide the House, he will have our full support.

On the amendment from the noble Lord, Lord Crisp, on healthy homes, which he spoke to so eloquently—as did the noble Lord, Lord Young—we also believe that health needs to be at the centre of planning when making decisions about housing. If the noble Lord wishes to press this to a vote, he will have our full support.

We welcome the fact that there have been concessions on ancient woodland and offshore wind, and some concession for the noble Lord, Lord Best, on his amendment. We would have preferred to see mention of social housing, as well as affordable housing, in the Government’s Amendment 329A.

On the amendment from the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh, on floods, it is very important and the Government need to get a grip on whether people can get insurance—ideally through Flood Re—because we cannot have insurance with excess that is so huge that it makes the insurance pointless. We have a debate tomorrow on Storm Babet; I am sure these issues will be raised again then.

Finally, on the amendment from the noble Baroness, Lady Pinnock, on planning fees, we believe that this is an important point that we need to continue to discuss. Therefore, if the noble Baroness wishes to test the opinion of the House, she will have our strong support.

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Moved by

[Baroness Pinnock]

At end insert “, and do propose Amendment 82B in lieu—

82B: After Clause 123, insert the following new Clause—
“Planning application fees
(1) Section 303 of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990 (fees for planning applications etc.) is amended as follows.
(2) After subsection (4) insert—
“(4A) If the Secretary of State is satisfied that the income from the fees set by regulations does not meet the cost of performing the function, a local planning authority may make provision as to how a fee or charge under this section is to be calculated (including who is to make the calculation).”””

[Baroness Pinnock (LD)]

I beg to move.

[The Deputy Speaker (Baroness Pitkeathley) (Lab)]

I want to be sure that I have heard it right. Is the noble Baroness moving this one?

[Baroness Pinnock (LD)]

Yes, I wish to test the opinion of the House.

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[The Earl of Lytton (CB)]

My Lords, I have an interest in both the items that we are considering in this group. For the avoidance of doubt, I declare my involvement as a practising but nearly completely retired chartered surveyor with a knowledge of the leasehold and construction sectors.

The noble Lord, Lord Stunell, deserves the full appreciation of the House for what I can only describe as a progressive defenestration of the fuzzy edges that have surrounded the question of the building safety regulator. He has whittled it down to the last elements, as to whether this is a proposal for a like-for-like transfer from one jurisdiction, if I can term departments in that sense, to another—or whether, as he had previously identified, some other morphing process was going on behind the scenes. I supported him previously in this, and I support him again in his endeavours here. This really boils down to the last element, as to whether there is a change.

One could be forgiven for suspending a certain amount of belief here. If there is going to be the process of transferring a body from the Health and Safety Executive to some other framework, known or unknown, why would one run the risk of the delays, disruption and everything else that would be involved with that if it were not for the fact that some other factor was involved? Motion X1 as proposed by the noble Lord, Lord Stunell, is a significant litmus test of what is involved. I encourage the Minister to consider very carefully whether the Government mean what they say in saying that it is a like-for-like transfer from one authority to another, or whether in reality it conceals some other paradigm shift. That is very important.

I turn to the amendment proposed by the noble Lord, Lord Young of Cookham. I apologise for the fact that his colleague has had to use my comments from a previous stage in this debate to tell him that his approach is no good. Of course, my comments were made in the context of saying that it has a technical deficiency. I was not in any way intending to suggest that the direction of travel in which he was engaged was faulty or in any other way imbued with anything other than the highest principles. He and I share a great deal of what has happened here.

Again, the noble Lord is absolutely right in proposing Motion ZC1—and I was pleased that he referred, obiter as it were, to the problem with the exceptions. What has happened here is a sort of drawbridge approach to the liability and scope of the Building Safety Act, and it is that which creates these cliff-edge approaches to who is qualified, whether their funding qualifies or excludes them, and so on and so forth. That is what has been dogging everybody all the way along the line. In reality, that delineation of the protections under the Building Safety Act is pernicious, because they are protections that any Government should apply in response to a serious and systemic failure in the home building industry to deliver adequate quality in building safety terms—and, may I say, presided over by nearly 40 years of ineffective regulatory control of building standards.

To expand a little, the Government’s resistance to anything beyond the straitjacket of parameters relating to the scope of leasehold protections seems to be governed by an entirely arbitrary approach and unwillingness even to collect data, understand implications or assess risk—I refer specially to those non-qualified leaseholders to which the noble Lord referred. My aim in all this has been to approach the matter on a much broader spectrum. The noble Lord and I shared an amendment to the Building Safety Act 18 months ago, and I think he has felt obliged to whittle it down evermore to try to get to something that he can achieve here. I absolutely applaud his persistence—but I am forced to suggest that, in the absence of any risk assessment, any government response to what may come down the road will be blindsided and ineffective. Hearing or speaking no evil does not prevent evils occurring—in this case, to hundreds of thousands of innocent lease payers, to market sectors, to valuation, to lending, to regeneration of urban areas and to new homes targets generally. I have said all this before, and I apologise for repeating it.

The noble Lord has been assiduous in his campaigning. With regard to Motion ZC1, I do not know how many leaseholders might be affected by this, but I suspect that it is actually quite a small cohort, and the Government should accept it and not allow this exclusion process or drawbridge approach to cut them off. Of course, I tried to address the whole thing on a much wider scope, but to no avail, which is why, when my words are used as a reason for denying the noble Lord the fruits of his endeavours, I have to bear in mind that I seem to have been assiduously ignored throughout this, up until today, when my words are used by the Minister against his own Back-Bencher. There is something faintly quizzical about that whole arrangement.

I hope that the Minister will at least indicate that the Government are cognisant of the serious, ongoing and growing problems arising here—to finance, to a whole sector, to hundreds of thousands, a very large number, of excluded leaseholders, and much more besides. If the Government do not recognise that, we are in for very serious problems indeed.

[Baroness Pinnock (LD)]

My Lords, the very fact that these two issues remain for this Bill demonstrates that the Building Safety Act is, sadly, unfinished business. Although the matters will not be concluded today, I can be sure that they will be raised in future legislation in this House, because they need to be resolved. Having said that, I support what the noble Lord, Lord Young of Cookham, said about non-qualifying leaseholders. It is a large group which deserves not to be neglected, and I support my noble friend’s valiant efforts in getting the regulation appropriate to the need.

[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

My Lords, first, I thank all noble Lords who have contributed to the building safety parts of this Bill, which have been complex, but it was all done in the interests of the leaseholders who are at the end of this process. The noble Lords, Lord Stunell and Lord Young, have outlined the reasons for their amendments. I hope that the Minister will carefully consider these outstanding matters. We are all mindful in your Lordships’ House that behind all the technicalities and complexities of the Building Safety Act and attempts to right its deficiencies in this Bill is a group of leaseholders, many of whom were or are first-time buyers, who have had the start of their home-owning journey blighted by the worry and concern of remediation and uncertainty over service charges. They have been let down by errors in the original Bill, which meant that the status of their leasehold determined what charges they would have to pay.

The Minister reassures us that further review of these matters will be undertaken. I hope that will be the case, and that further thought will be given by the Government, if there is to be no compensation to those who have already had significant costs, to how that might be dealt with in future.

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[Baroness Hayman of Ullock (Lab)]

My Lords, I will speak briefly to thank the Minister for his introduction regarding the two amendments that were moved by the Front Bench here. The first was in my name, relating to childcare. We thank him for listening to and recognising our concerns, and thank the Government for tabling an amendment that does exactly what we asked for; we very much appreciate that. My noble friend Lady Taylor of Stevenage had an amendment down on vagrancy, and again, we are very pleased that the Government have tabled an amendment in lieu on the Vagrancy Act. I will say only that this was promised two years ago, so in our opinion the sooner that action is taken on this, the better.

The noble Baroness, Lady Pinnock, has an amendment in lieu on RAAC. The Minister is aware, as are other noble Lords, of increasing concerns about the number of schools, hospitals and in fact other buildings that have been affected by this. It is important that there is proper information regarding the extent of the problem, and that schools and hospitals, and other organisations which have buildings that are affected have the support that they need, because this is extremely concerning.

[Baroness Pinnock (LD)]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for the detailed arguments he has put towards Motion ZB1 in my name, which I recognise have substance. However, the levelling-up Bill, which includes missions relating to education and health, means that we need to think about the quality of the public buildings provided, because they have a substantial impact on the quality of the services that are then received by those in both schools and hospitals. To have higher-quality buildings inevitably leads to better outcomes for patients, students and children.

Given that, there are two issues. One is that these are public buildings that are publicly funded, and there ought to be greater transparency for users and employees in those buildings of the state that they are in. The Minister has carefully explained the vast data collection that goes on regarding the buildings, both in the school and NHS estates. He is right—there is a vast collection of data. However, there is not transparent, easily accessible data for people who use those buildings and work in them. If, as he said, safety is paramount—I totally agree—the public need to see that there is transparency around the data on the state of those buildings.

I am asking the Minister and the Government to accede to easily accessible data concerning these public buildings because of safety concerns. That has been highlighted by the recent RAAC issue, and more and more buildings have been discovered with RAAC as a safety issue. I do not intend to press the amendment to a vote today, but I hope that the Government will consider greater publicity and accessibility of the data that they collect already so that people can see what state their buildings are in.