Localism Bill

Earl Cathcart Excerpts

Tuesday 12th July 2011 Lords Chamber

[Lord McKenzie of Luton]

My Lords, we have Amendments 148ZZA and 148ZZZBA in this group, but they are consistent with the amendment moved by the noble Baroness, Lady Greengross, which we support. They have been proposed to us jointly by Shelter, the TCPA and the National Housing Federation. These amendments would help to ensure that local authorities produce a robust and public assessment of housing needs to inform local plans. Amendment 148ZZA requires housing needs to be addressed in the local development scheme, while under Amendment 148ZZZBA the LPAs must regularly survey their areas and publicise the results.

Local plans must integrate land use planning, housing strategies and delivery. While the national planning policy framework, when it appears, may help to promote this objective, we think that this issue is too important to leave to regulations and guidance. All local authorities should be required to undertake a strategic assessment of housing need and demand to provide the necessary evidence to inform the development of housing strategies and planning policies for their areas—the points raised by the noble Baroness cover this—and the needs of an elderly population that is growing older.

The information should be key to determining the amount of housing required, including affordable housing and housing specifically designed for people with care and support needs and in allocating a sufficient amount of land to meet and identify housing requirements. Bodies such as Shelter, the TCPA and the National Housing Federation have welcomed a more localised approach to planning and see the reforms to the planning system as an opportunity to allow local people to play a more active role in shaping development in their area by helping to shape local plans and hold their local authority to account.

In order to enable local people to play a more active role, it is vital that they have access to data that give them as full a picture as possible of the housing situation in their area and enable them to assess their local authority’s performance. Through local authorities setting out clearly in the local plans how they plan to address housing need, local people will be far better placed to hold their local authority to account on the success that they have achieved. Without clear aspirations being set, local people are likely to find it difficult to assess how well their local authority is performing.

The importance of providing access to good local data was outlined in the Conservative Party’s Open Source Planning paper, which sets out that in developing their local plans, councils will be expected to ensure as a minimum,

“the provision of good data by the local planning authority to the electors in the neighbourhoods, so that they can develop their vision for their community on a well-informed basis … this will need to include analysis by the council of the likely need for housing and for affordable housing for local people in each neighbourhood”.

The introduction of more consistent data sets will also allow local authorities greater opportunities to increase integrated working across areas such as sharing back office staff. That would be particularly useful in some areas of local housing planning, but varying data sets would make the practicalities of joint working more difficult. This will help to deliver the aims of a more localised system by ensuring that local people are able to play an effective role in shaping local plans and holding their local authority to account while enabling local authorities to work together more efficiently.

In Committee in the other place, the Minister stated that the Government would require from local authorities,

“an absolutely clear, transparent, robust numerical assessment of housing need”.—[Official Report, Commons, Localism Bill Committee, 17/2/11; col. 637.]

However, he argued that Section 13 of the Planning and Compulsory Purchase Act 2004 already outlined the necessary duty. In fact, with respect, Section 13 does not consider a critical element of housing need, or other needs, which is a forward projection of future need and demand. In the absence of such a clear duty, it would be easy for some local authorities to look narrowly to immediately presenting housing need and to avoid responsibilities, especially to the next generation and to the wider housing market. It is on that basis that I propose these amendments and support the amendment of the noble Baroness, Lady Greengross.

[Earl Cathcart]

My Lords, forgive me if I am wrong, but I thought that all councils were already required to make a housing needs assessment under the existing PPS3. If that is the case, I am not sure what the amendments will add other than to make councils do their job better.

[Lord Best]

My Lords, I give qualified support to Amendment 148 in the name of my noble friend Lady Greengross and to Amendments 148ZZZA and 148ZZZBA tabled by the noble Lord, Lord McKenzie. My support is qualified because the words,

“the local planning authority must”,

are not popular in local government circles. I would find it hard to be entirely supportive of extra obligations being placed by central government on local authorities, but I am supportive because noble Lords are absolutely right that collecting local data on housing markets and making them available, not least to any neighbourhood preparing a neighbourhood plan, as well as to the local authority preparing its local development plan, is more than just good practice; it is essential if housing providers are to meet local needs and demands.

To take the example of the area of interest to the noble Baroness, Lady Greengross, if the local authority’s assessment shows that many thousands of family houses are occupied by one older person or an elderly couple, with the certainty that all those occupiers will grow older in years to come, clear signals can be given to private house builders and housing associations that there is a big market for attractive, manageable, economical apartments that are tailor-made for older people to buy or rent.

I give full backing to the intention behind these amendments and hope that their objective of getting local authorities to do what they should can be fulfilled, not least through the national planning policy framework, even if that objective is not accomplished by a new obligation on local authorities.

--- Later in debate ---

[Earl Cathcart]

My Lords, I agree with the sentiments of what everyone has said so far. We must revitalise town centres. We have all learnt from the mistakes of out-of-town shopping, with its free car parking. In Fakenham, in Norfolk, when a new shopping centre opened about 15 or 20 years ago, within six months, 26 town-centre shops shut. That was very sad, and it is very difficult to get them back again. The other mistake made is that too many councils charge for town-centre car parking. That is daft. If you want to encourage people to use the town centre, make it as easy as possible for them to pop in there, go to the bank and then go into the butcher, baker and candlestick maker without any car parking charges. That is an irritant. Those who charge are being very shortsighted.

[Lord True]

My Lords, if my noble friend wants to come to our high street, he can have 30 minutes of free parking. The Mill Road story, to which my noble friend referred, is extremely interesting. Unfortunately, the Tesco Express, which was its original focus, was successful. There are defects with all the amendments before the Committee; I hope that my noble friend will not feel that all of them have to be addressed.

I was very encouraged by what was said in the other place. One difficulty is that not everyone has the same view of vitality. My predecessor as leader of my council from another party said that he would be delighted if he heard that a Tesco was opening in his area, because it would bring people to that shopping area. We must address head-on the nature of the retail multiple and the manner of the high street. Can my noble friend assure us that before we finish examining the Bill, when we have seen the national framework, Parliament will give local authorities real power to deal with the problems which my noble friends, Lord Cotter and Lord Greaves, and the noble Lord, Lord McKenzie, raised? That is all I ask for at this stage, not a detailed commitment. I hope that my noble friend can give that assurance.