Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill

Caroline Ansell Excerpts

2nd reading
Wednesday 8th June 2022 Commons Chamber

[Caroline Ansell (Eastbourne) (Con)]

With average wages, education levels and some health outcomes lower than elsewhere in the south-east, and with life expectancy differing in my hometown by seven years from one area to the next, levelling up and regeneration are mission critical. Since 2010, Conservative-led Governments have not only recognised that but rowed in and invested in the potential they see in my hometown. That has most recently been manifested in the £20 million levelling-up bid that is set to place us as a premier visitor destination; in the hundreds of millions of pounds for a new hospital; and, not least, in the investment in East Sussex College to promote skills, including skills across the construction industry. I welcome this Bill, which seeks to close the gap in productivity and opportunity.

I will focus my remarks on improving the planning system, because having a place to call home sits at the heart of all our ambitions and underpins every measure of wellbeing and success. For context, 1,337 households were on the council’s housing register as of April 2022. Building the right homes in the right places and with the right community infrastructure is as vital as it is challenging.

It has got more challenging in the last year. My beautiful seaside constituency has seen a surge of new homeowners from the nearby cities of Brighton and London, and the change in commuting patterns is set to consolidate that dynamic. As the eastern gateway town to the South Downs national park, and sitting on the iconic Seven Sisters coastline, it is perhaps unsurprising that we welcome newcomers into our midst when awareness of the value of green space has never been so keenly felt, but the same essential environmental qualities make new development, at any scale, utterly constrained. The 600 to 700 new homes to be delivered per annum is a little beyond the rainbow. My local council has seemingly never been able to adequately challenge or counter this number in its local plan, which I hasten to add it is now at some pains to bring up to date.

How can new legislation provide the homes we need? In Eastbourne, the use and optimisation of existing properties and the built environment means stronger action on empty homes and commercial buildings. Although it is beyond the remit of this Bill and the presenting Department, I make a pitch for levelling up the VAT regime. With new builds at 0% and refurbishment, restoration and repurposing at 20%, we are seeing heritage buildings left mothballed and not attracting the development needed for them to be brought back to market. That is particularly key at the Debenhams site, and it is a concern ahead of the Brighton University campus removal.

I would also like to see more in the Bill on brownfield sites, including the funding for them, and more challenge on the undersupply that sees up to 1 million permissions across the UK not completed, including 1,000 in Eastbourne. As the Bill develops, I will apply the morning smell test. There is a very live, fiercely disputed local planning application for a vast housing estate on our now precious open space. As the Bill progresses, I welcome every opportunity to improve it.