National Planning Policy Statements: Climate Change

Baroness Thornhill Excerpts

Thursday 3rd December 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Greenhalgh (Con)]

My Lords, there is a tremendous commitment to the objective that my noble friend—well, not my noble friend; sorry, I am not good on the protocol yet, but I consider the noble Lord a friend, even though I cannot say so. The Prime Minister set out his ambitious Ten Point Plan for a Green Industrial Revolution. It covers clean energy, transport, nature and innovative technologies. There is a real ambition in this Government to ensure that we meet our climate change commitments, and we will continue to work on delivering that plan. It is no good having a plan unless you implement it.

[Baroness Thornhill (LD)]

I too am a vice-president of the Local Government Association. The White Paper proudly proclaims to be sweeping away red tape and simplifying requirements for environmental assessment and mitigation. How will the Minister guarantee that this deregulation will not lead to a rollback of environmental standards? What will be the role of the local authority—if at all—with regard to monitoring and enforcing new standards when they eventually arrive? They do not appear to be involved in the drawing up of them, according to what I can read in the White Paper.

[Lord Greenhalgh (Con)]

My Lords, that is a misrepresentation of the thrust of the planning reforms. We need to engage with communities. The idea of the planning reforms is to ensure that engagement happens up front and that it works within a framework to make sure that we get sustainable development and that we also hit the objectives that we have set as a Government.