Planning and Infrastructure Bill

Jim Dickson Excerpts

2nd reading
Monday 24th March 2025 Commons Chamber

[Jim Dickson (Dartford) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to speak in support of this much-needed Bill to get Britain building infrastructure again. Dartford—the constituency I have the privilege to represent in this place—can serve as a poster child for the need for this Bill in its struggle to see the hugely needed lower Thames crossing built. Our community is regularly gridlocked by traffic because of the over-capacity Dartford crossing, creating near daily misery for residents. The unreliability at Dartford also acts as a significant blocker on UK growth, with huge costs through delays calculated at £200 million each and every year.

The commentator Tom Whipple recently highlighted in The Times:

“Some 36 years ago—or to put it another way, 22 transport secretaries ago—the words ‘Lower Thames Crossing’ first appear in the parliamentary record.”

It has been eight years since the former Transport Secretary, who is now in the other place, confirmed the route. Since April 2017, National Highways has run eight separate consultations, consulting for more than 400 days. The planning application eventually ballooned to 400,000 pages. Many years on, we look forward to a positive decision from the Department for Transport in May—a Labour Government finally delivering on a much-needed infrastructure project for the people of Dartford.

We cannot continue to face crucial national infrastructure taking this long to reach a decision. It is essential that we can deliver new infrastructure if we are to modernise our country, deliver services and unlock growth. We need a clearer system that has a degree of predictability for all participants, and that can move at pace while providing the right opportunities for local people to influence plans for the neighbourhoods in which they live. Part of the reason that so many consultations were needed for the proposed lower Thames crossing was the number of opportunities for judicial review. I warmly welcome the measures in the Bill to reduce such opportunities, which will ensure that cases totally without merit do not proceed.

Before I end my remarks, let me welcome the measures on nationally significant infrastructure projects. Big-ticket items are delayed again and again, leaving our constituents paying the price in higher energy bills, and in the case of the lower Thames crossing, leaving my constituents paying the price in congested roads. I encourage Ministers to think about—and perhaps to address in the wind-up—whether the Bill can be strengthened even further to speed up and streamline the process of getting critical infrastructure projects built faster, for all our sakes.

Planning and Infrastructure Bill (First sitting)

Jim Dickson Excerpts

Committee stage
Thursday 24th April 2025 Public Bill Committees

[The Chair]

Order. We are nearing the end of the time allotted for this panel. These shall be the last questions.

[Jim Dickson (Dartford) (Lab)]

Q These issues are very real for my constituents in Dartford because their lives have been blighted by congestion at the Dartford crossing, principally because the planning system has, over 15 years, failed to deliver the lower Thames crossing. I am delighted that that project now has a development consent order. In 2023, the National Infrastructure Commission wrote a review of the nationally significant infrastructure project regime. It found that delays were the result of a lack of clear policy, disproportionate consultation and the lack of a strategic approach to environmental mitigation. How much of that do you feel the Bill alleviates and addresses? It clearly needs to.

Sir John Armitt: In the circumstances, the Bill is a good first attempt to deal with those issues. As I have said, it is very complex—you are trying to trade off very different interests. That will not disappear overnight, and even with the new Bill people will seek to challenge its workings, but this is a good first attempt and, as we have both said, more needs to be done.

[The Chair]

That brings us to the end of the time allotted for the Committee to ask questions. On behalf of the Committee, I thank our witnesses for their evidence.

Examination of Witnesses

Dhara Vyas, Charlotte Mitchell, Beatrice Filkin and Christianna Logan gave evidence.

Planning and Infrastructure Bill (Second sitting)

Jim Dickson Excerpts

Committee stage
Thursday 24th April 2025 Public Bill Committees

[Gideon Amos]

Q The Liberal Democrats have sympathy for a lot of the measures in the Bill. To come back to the point about the species, I have just checked, and removing the fish disco, which was a famous feature of the Hinkley development, would cost about 3 million fish a year. Is that an expendable species? Does it not matter?

Sam Richards: The key point is not just whether a particular species matters but the mitigation measures that developers are able and allowed to take under the current framework. I am not here to represent EDF, but it proposed that you could basically pay a fishing vessel to not fish a similar species in a similar area, which would then allow the replenishment of an equivalent amount of stocks. Under the current rules, you are not able to do that strategic-level mitigation.

[Jim Dickson (Dartford) (Lab)]

Q Very many new homes have been built in my constituency over the past decade. Unfortunately, residents believe—and I think it is undoubtedly the case—that that has put a huge strain on local infrastructure, which has not kept pace. Do you feel that the Bill provides the opportunity to ensure that we have the right infrastructure—the medical facilities, the schools, the affordable homes—as we build the many more homes that will be built in Dartford and other parts of the country over the next period? Does the Bill give us the framework to ensure that that happens, unlike what has happened previously on infrastructure and homes being built together?

Jack Airey: The existing framework for doing that is the section 106 system and the community infrastructure levy system. I am not sure whether the CIL applies in Dartford, but in my mind that provides a fairly effective method of doing this in a way that does not make development totally unviable, while extracting enough value to provide some contribution to the community. I do not think there is anything in the Bill that really focuses on this—I could be proven wrong—but I think the existing system works okay.

It is really difficult to do this and it does not always work. Rightly, communities always want the right amount of infrastructure. This might relate to other comments I might make: we rely on the planning system to do so much heavy lifting to deliver all sorts of things that everyone wants, and we try to prioritise everything and end up prioritising nothing. We could have a system where we extracted more from developer contributions and that went to community infrastructure, but that would come with a trade-off, probably around provision of affordable housing and things like that. That would be a sensible debate to have if that is what your constituents want, but it is also quite difficult politically.

[David Simmonds (Ruislip, Northwood and Pinner) (Con)]

Q It is worth noting that less than one in 10 planning applications goes to committee at all, so it is hard to argue that it is a particularly heavy democratic burden. One of the things that we heard is burdensome in the evidence earlier today is the pre-application process. I would be interested in your view about what can be done to ensure that there is meaningful and useful pre-application discussion. In particular, I am mindful of the amendment that the Minister tabled yesterday on nationally significant infrastructure projects, which removes quite a number of the requirements for consultation.

Some of the large energy infrastructure projects have described having large pipelines of potential projects, some of which were very speculative and others of which were quite close to the spades in the ground stage. How can we ensure that what emerges from the Bill guarantees meaningful and proper consultation, so that the receiving community really understands what the impact will be and, where there may be local objections, people have a really detailed understanding of what the benefits will be in order to persuade them to be more supportive of the proposals?

Jack Airey: Is your question specific to nationally significant infrastructure projects, or does it relate to the TCPA as well?

Planning and Infrastructure Bill (Third sitting)

Jim Dickson Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 29th April 2025 Public Bill Committees

[Matthew Pennycook]

As hon. Members will be aware, last week the Government announced that we will reform the pre-application stage for nationally significant infrastructure projects to remove the statutory requirement for applicants to consult. Although the Government are committed to consultation and the value that early and constructive engagement plays in developing high-quality infrastructure schemes, feedback on Second Reading and since the Bill’s introduction has shown that the status quo is not working. Evidence indicates that the statutory requirements, which are unique to the NSIP regime and not found in any other planning consenting regime, are now creating perverse incentives.

Rather than driving better outcomes and improving infrastructure applications, statutory pre-application procedures have become a tick-box exercise that encourages risk aversion and gold plating. The result is that communities suffer from consultation fatigue and confusion, with them having to cope with longer, ever-more technical and less accessible documentation. The arrangement also actively disincentivises improvements to applications, even if they are in the local community’s interests, because applicants worry that any change will require further repeat consultation and added delay to the process.

As the Deputy Prime Minister and I set out on Second Reading, we would not hesitate to act boldly if a compelling case for change was made, to ensure that the NSIP regime is firing on all cylinders to deliver on our ambition for building the homes and infrastructure needed to grow our economy.

[Jim Dickson (Dartford) (Lab)]

Does the Minister, like me, recall the evidence we heard last week from the chair of the National Infrastructure Commission? A report written by the organisation in 2023 said that one of the reasons for the extravagant delays to nationally significant infrastructure projects was “disproportionate consultation”. My constituents are acutely aware of that issue because they have had to wait more than 15 years for the lower Thames crossing to be consented, partly as a result of the very disproportionate consultation that Sir John Armitt referred to. Does the Minister agree that the clauses and amendments he is proposing will provide a significant change to the speed at which NSIPs take place, which will benefit those who are currently suffering as a result of the lack of infrastructure in their area?

--- Later in debate ---

[Ellie Chowns]

I addressed those points in my comments. I am not disputing the fact that there are individual cases in which huge amounts of time have been spent. In response to the comments from the hon. Member for Glasgow East, I am not dismissing the evidence from the witness he referred to, but I have offered evidence from a report that looked at the whole spectrum of applications from 2011 onwards, which says that the representation of nature and community in pre-application requirements is not the underlying causal problem.

These issues are really complex. There is always a tendency to pick a particular example where the situation has clearly been problematic. I am not disputing the fact that some change may be needed. My argument is that it seems excessive to bring in a blanket policy and shift the pendulum too far away from the opportunity to use the pre-application consultation process to resolve issues that might clog up the process later on, because the requirement for meaningful consultation has been removed. Planning applications will always be contested, but these measures take it too far and sweep aside the rights of communities and organisations representing nature to have their voices heard, as well as the opportunity to resolve conflicts before they reach a legalistic stage.

[Jim Dickson]

Is the hon. Member aware that Cavendish, the organisation that produced the report, is a company that undertakes consultations? It might just be in its interest to make the case that consultation is not at fault for the delays. Does she agree that the five separate consultations over 15 years that were required—or not required, in my view—for the lower Thames crossing were excessive?

Planning and Infrastructure Bill (Sixth sitting)

Jim Dickson Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 13th May 2025 Public Bill Committees

[Gideon Amos]

I rise to support the thrust of clause 44. For a very long time, we Liberal Democrats have called for local authorities to be free to set their own fees for planning applications, so we welcome the approach.

I seek a couple of clarifications from the Minister. Does clause 44 refer to planning applications and not to listed building consent? I think we all share a desire to keep listed building applications free of charge, so will the Minister let us know about that in due course? Local authorities are struggling for funding. In my own Somerset council, £2 out of every £3 of council funding is spent on care for adults and children, leaving £1 out of every £3 provided by council tax for everything else, including planning, housing, enforcement and environment, so funding is crucially needed.

Somerset council has asked for the freedom and flexibility to set its own planning fees. One challenge it faces, in common with other planning authorities and planning departments, is the market rate paid to professional town planners, who frequently find that the level of remuneration in councils is worse. Will the Minister confirm that local authorities will be free to set salaries above the market rate to attract planning officers in circumstances when the market conditions make that necessary? The Minister may not wish to answer all my questions now, but I hope that he can address them at some point.

[Jim Dickson (Dartford) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Ms Jardine. I fully support what the Government intend to do in this clause. Those of us who have worked in local authorities or have supported the development industry over many years will know that there are many occasions when statutory deadlines are not hit, reports do not go to committee at the right time to enable consent within an agreed timescale, and reports have to be deferred because they have not been written well enough by an overstretched planning department.

I have a couple of questions for the Minister about the arrangements that will be introduced through this legislation. Will there be a backstop for local authorities that do not put a regime in place? Will he consider allowing local planning authorities and developers to agree bespoke fees for applications to be determined on a shorter timescale? Is the use of planning performance agreements, which are currently in common use, affected by the new legislation? What performance management arrangements do the Government want local authorities to put in place to justify the fee changes?

[Paul Holmes]

I welcome what the Minister has to say about this clause. In common with other hon. Members who have spoken, we welcome the general gist of permitting regional variation to planning fees as a general principle. In theory, that will create opportunities for local planning authorities to set their rates at a level that works best for them. How will the Government ensure consistency and fairness in planning fees across different local planning authorities, particularly for developers operating in multiple regions? Does the Minister have any thoughts on that?

In considering the need to support local planning authorities, what support will be provided to them to accurately calculate cost recovery levels and comply with consultation and reporting requirements? Given the ever-changing and growing costs to local planning authorities, which we all recognise, how frequently will they be allowed or required to review and update their planning fees?

--- Later in debate ---

[Jim Dickson]

Just before I speak to the amendment, I will say that I fully support what the Government are doing here. As a former member of a local authority, I have seen good training, but in other contexts I have also seen very poor training for planning committee members. I know that most local authorities have a scheme in place, which is obviously welcome, but it is variable. Having some national guidance and trialling it in legislation is extremely important.

My point on the amendment is that accessibility is vital. I hope it will appear in guidance that the Department produces further to the legislation. We might wish to see a whole range of other considerations in that guidance, too, but I hope this one will be in there. Perhaps the Minister will reassure us that these important issues will be included in guidance. He might make the case that it is much better to have them in guidance because it can be changed regularly, rather than in primary legislation, which is changed via a much more torturous process. It would be interesting to have the Minister’s insights on the full range of the guidance.

[Lewis Cocking]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Ms Jardine.

I have a few questions for the Minister. I am pleased to see this clause. When I was leader of Broxbourne council, we changed the council constitution to do exactly what the Government are trying to do here. I want to know how many local authorities will be affected, because I know that many of them already have mandatory training for planning committees in their constitution.

What I have not seen in the Bill is how often council officers will be required to carry out the training—will it be once per term of office, which means once every four years, or annually? I cannot seem to find any detail on when elected councillors will be required to do the training. I would like the Minister to comment on what he envisages as a workable interval. Obviously the training has to be timely, because there are always changes to the national planning policy framework and local plans, but not too exhaustive, so that councils can still make planning decisions.

The Minister speaks about speeding up planning decisions. I would not want councils to fall into the trap of not having enough people with the right certificate, and the right training at the right time, to carry on their quasi-judicial function of planning. I should be grateful for the Minister’s comments.

Planning and Infrastructure Bill (Seventh sitting)

Jim Dickson Excerpts

Committee stage
Wednesday 14th May 2025 Public Bill Committees

[Olly Glover]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Dr Huq, and thank you for your ongoing generosity to those of us who continue to learn how Bill Committees work.

Lib Dem amendment 122 would require the production of infrastructure delivery plans by local authorities and accompanying funding to meet the requirements of those. I note the comments of other hon. Members about taking into account the administrative burden on local authorities; we need to strike the optimum balance here, but I shall explain why I think infrastructure development plans are of merit and need to be mandated.

For those not familiar with IDPs—to use yet another dreaded acronym—I should say that they are developed during the local plan-making stage and serve as an important part of the evidence base and quality of those local plans. They identify and schedule the infrastructure needs for a community, including social, physical and green infrastructure, all of which are needed in addition to houses for the high quality, well-functioning communities we all wish to see.

The planning policy team at the local authority writes to all infrastructure providers to ask them to identify what infrastructure will be needed to accompany the development that the local plan is proposing. That becomes a list, which is tested through a viability assessment and local plan examination. Once the plan is adopted, and at the point where planning applications are submitted, planning officers will use the IDP to help to secure infrastructure—through direct delivery, financial contributions or indeed a mix of the two. IDPs are therefore an important part of both securing infrastructure and tracking the progress of its delivery.

However, at present IDPs are not compulsory and are not specified in the national planning policy framework or the Government’s planning practice guidance. Local plans are supposed to be reviewed every five years, although many are not, and by extension IDPs may be updated only infrequently. We think Government should compel local authorities to produce infrastructure delivery plans so that communities get the necessary infrastructure to create the well-function communities that we need to transform our country.

[Jim Dickson (Dartford) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Dr Huq. As we have seen, there are very many amendments to this part of the Bill, which speaks to the fact that it is one of the most important parts of the legislation the Government are moving through. It is absolutely necessary that it should happen, but I want to make a quick point about infrastructure that is pertinent to this amendment.

As the Minister knows, and the Committee may know, I represent Ebbsfleet Garden City in Dartford: a new community that has arisen from no homes in about 2015 to around 5,000 now, and is due to be 15,000 by the middle of the next decade. We have seen with Ebbsfleet Garden City the importance of social and physical infrastructure being built alongside homes. Generally, the corporation there has done a good job in making sure that there are schools, recreation areas, community spaces and medical facilities; the timing has not always been brilliant, and sometimes the growth of the homes has outstripped the provision of infrastructure, but that infrastructure does eventually get delivered.

It is extremely important that the Minister gives an assurance, in line with what the amendment, I know, is seeking to do. I do not know whether the precise format that the amendment suggests is the right way to do it, but it is vital that we see that social and physical infrastructure grow at the same time as the housing.

[Lewis Cocking]

Does the hon. Member agree that nothing in this Bill makes developers build the social infrastructure that he is describing, which many communities desperately need, first—or at all?

[Jim Dickson]

The hon. Member is helping me to make my point. The only difference I have with him is that I know that the Government intend to ensure that infrastructure appears at the same time as homes and the Minister will provide reassurance on that. It is vital that that happens, via either a development corporation with those powers, or the spatial development strategies that we are discussing. Let us ensure that we do build the physical and social infrastructure at the same time as homes, with the examples of generally good development we see in Ebbsfleet Garden City reproduced elsewhere, as the Government meet their ambitious plans to build 1.5 million homes during this Parliament.