Westferry Printworks Development

Christopher Pincher Excerpts

Wednesday 24th June 2020 Commons Chamber

[The Minister for Housing (Christopher Pincher)]

I think there is one thing in this debate upon which we can all agree: that my hon. Friend the Member for Dewsbury (Mark Eastwood) made a fantastic, powerful and personal maiden speech. He is right to say that, when we are first elected to this place, we sit in the Tea Room and talk to each other about the relative merits of our constituencies. He will know that, regrettably, when we turn to talking about majorities, size really does matter.

I should also like to congratulate my hon. Friends the Members for Henley (John Howell), for Bassetlaw (Brendan Clarke-Smith), for East Devon (Simon Jupp), for Heywood and Middleton (Chris Clarkson), for Rushcliffe (Ruth Edwards), for North Cornwall (Scott Mann), for Guildford (Angela Richardson), for West Bromwich East (Nicola Richards), for West Bromwich West (Shaun Bailey), for Orpington (Gareth Bacon) and for Burnley (Antony Higginbotham) on their powerful contributions to the debate.

Let me be clear: we reject any allegations of impropriety either in relation to the appeal at Westferry Printworks or more widely. Today, as my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State said, our Department has published the documents on the record regarding the Westferry decision. They are now in the public domain for the full scrutiny of Members and the wider public. Those documents show what we knew from the outset: that no improper action was undertaken by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State.

As my right hon. Friend made clear in his remarks, it is far from uncommon for Ministers to disagree with a planning inspector’s recommendation. The involvement of Ministers in the planning system is clearly guided by both the ministerial code and the guidance set out by the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government. That guidance details the duty to behave fairly and to approach matters before us with an open mind. As my right hon. Friend has made clear abundantly again and again, the reason for granting planning permission for the proposed development at the Westferry Printworks are detailed in his letter of 14 January.

[Mr Betts]

The Minister is quite right: it is not unusual for the Secretary of State or another Minister to make a planning decision, even in contradiction of a planning inspector’s recommendations. Can he think of another example where a Secretary of State has made a planning decision and then ruled his own decision to be unlawful?

[Christopher Pincher]

There are such examples. Indeed, I remember that the former Deputy Prime Minister, Lord Prescott, overruled his own Planning Inspectorate in order to build a tower like the one proposed at Westferry. The reasons for the granting of permission are fully set out in the sealed order of 21 May. As my right hon. Friend has stated, and as I will reiterate, there was absolutely no impropriety in this case. It is a fundamental legal right that planning decisions may be challenged, and it is by no means unusual for that to happen.

[David Linden]

Will the Minister give way?

[Christopher Pincher]

I will answer the question that I think the hon. Gentleman is about to ask and save him the trouble. In the last three years, there have been 26 challenges made to Ministers. Of those, 16 were withdrawn or successfully defended, eight were conceded or lost, and two are yet to be concluded.

On the question that many Members have raised regarding the meetings between my right hon. Friend and Mr Desmond, it is a matter of public record that the Secretary of State met the scheme’s proposer, the chairman of Northern & Shell, in November 2019. Ministers meet many people in the course of their duties —it has even been known for shadow Ministers occasionally to get out of the bubble and meet people—and my right hon. Friend has made it clear that that meeting was not planned. He did not discuss the case; Mr Desmond himself has said that. Indeed, my right hon. Friend advised his officials of Mr Desmond’s approach and of his own response, and at no time were his officials advising him that he should recuse himself from this matter.

I am sure that Mr Desmond is a very effective businessman, and I am sure that he is honestly and sincerely determined to see more homes built. I do not know Mr Desmond. I have not met him, but the Mayor of London has met him; he has been to dinner with Mr Desmond, yet has Sadiq Khan being arraigned before the north Croydon magistrate to answer his case? The Mayor of London took money from a Manchester tycoon who was prosecuted for putting people’s lives at risk—putting people’s lives at risk! Is the Mayor at risk of the wrath of the people’s tribunal sitting on the Opposition Front Bench? It does not appear so.

What about the right hon. Member for Tottenham (Mr Lammy), who enjoyed, apparently, a cosy Christmas chez Desmond? Will he be dragged before the Starmer “star chamber” to answer for any potential indiscretions he may have had over the turkey and the trimmings? The Leader of the Opposition, the former Director of Public Prosecutions, is remarkably silent on this matter: not a jot or tittle do we hear from him. There they sit, po-faced and prim, as if butter would not melt in their mouths, yet on housing their crimes are such that they should be blushing to the core; they should be as red in their face as they are in tooth and claw.

This House, the Gallery and the public, in so far as they are watching, can see this for what it really is: a tawdry charade to distract attention from their own party’s lamentable failure to decide the Westferry case themselves when they could have done so, and the dismal failure of the Mayor of London to build the homes that Londoners want and need. The crime, if there is one, is the failure of Sadiq Khan to build in four years what my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister built in two years—his failure to deliver more than 322 homes on TfL land when he promised to deliver 10,000, a risible 3% success rate on his pledge. The truth is that they do not like the truth; they cannot handle the truth, and it is because of that failure that they have tabled this spurious motion today.

We make no apology for our bold ambition to build the homes that this country needs. My right hon. Friend and this Government were elected on a mandate to build a million new homes in this Parliament, and that is what we are going to do. We will build more affordable homes and boost the housing supply so that it comfortably meets and beats growing demand. We were elected on a mandate to champion and take up brownfield sites, so that neglected and abandoned land can be transformed into homes for people.

Let us be in no doubt that the Westferry Printworks development would have created hundreds of new, affordable homes, which would have helped our nation’s capital. We will build and build, and build again, to back the people who need homes in this country and in London. We will build for Britain as we emerge from this pandemic. The Secretary of State stands four-square behind that commitment, and we stand four-square behind him.

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved,

That an Humble Address be presented to Her Majesty, that she will be graciously pleased to give a direction to Her Ministers to provide all correspondence, including submissions and electronic communications, involving Ministers and Special Advisers pertaining to the Westferry Printworks Development and the subsequent decision by the Secretary of State to approve its planning application at appeal to the Housing, Communities and Local Government Select Committee.

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)]

The House is suspended for three minutes