Responsibilities of Housing Developers

John Lamont Excerpts

Wednesday 11th December 2024 Westminster Hall

[Robbie Moore (Keighley and Ilkley) (Con)]

I beg to move,

That this House has considered the responsibilities of housing developers.

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Pritchard. I am pleased to have secured this debate on housing developers and the challenges that my constituents face around the multiple housing developments that are currently taking place in our area.

Housing developers have a huge impact on local communities and our national potential. We are all acutely aware of the challenge of our national housing supply. It is vital to supply the right houses in the right places and to the right people, and without developers that would not be possible, but new housing also has a huge impact on local people. Done poorly, new developments can completely change the existing settlement. They can reduce access to local services and make it harder for a child to secure a school place. They may also make it more difficult to get a doctor’s appointment, or they may add to traffic congestion. Those practical effects make a huge difference to people’s lives. For towns such as Silsden in my constituency, a perfect storm of planning regulations can change the character of the local area.

From a town of a few hundred properties, Silsden has grown by hundreds of houses in just 10 years and looks set to grow even further. Given the huge power that local developers have in both urban and rural communities in areas like mine right across Keighley and Ilkley, it is vital that we regulate them and ensure that they act responsibly. We must not forget that developers are businesses and must rightly consider their profitability first, but it is beholden on this place and local councils to ensure that the desire to make a profit does not come at the expense of local people.

I want to talk through some of the challenges that my constituents face when developments take place. I will start with early consultation. It is vital, when new housing schemes are developed and initially thought through by a developer, that consultation with local people takes place before a planning application is submitted.

Since I became an MP in 2019, Silsden has seen Persimmon, Harron Homes, Countryside Homes, Barratt Homes, the Lindum group, Newett Homes and Skipton Properties all developing houses. Those multiple developments took place in one town. It is right for the local authority to look at the masterplanning associated with the whole town when looking at the collective impact and the level of services provided, and therefore work out any negative consequences of those individual developments.

The planning system currently struggles to take separate developments properly into account when consulting with the public. Proper early engagement is vital. Unfortunately, we are not seeing that in my constituency.

[John Lamont (Berwickshire, Roxburgh and Selkirk) (Con)]

My hon. Friend speaks well about the challenges in Keighley and Ilkley. On the point about consultation, residents in my area might not object to the location of a development, but they are concerned about the impact on doctors and schools. When those concerns are raised with the developer, it pushes back and says that that is not its problem, but rather a matter for the local authority and the Scottish Government. Does my hon. Friend agree that that balance needs to be changed? Developers should take greater cognisance of the impact that their developments will have on services, working with the local authority to address those concerns as part of the consultation stage.

[Robbie Moore]

My hon. Friend’s excellent intervention gets to the nub of the point that I want to make. When multiple applications or developments are coming down the pipeline, they must all be considered duly and properly by the local authority. Bradford council, the unitary authority for my area, does not do that, which is incredibly frustrating because in order to work out the negative consequences, or indeed the positive impacts, that multiple developments will have on a community, those issues all have to be considered in the round. Residents need to feel that infrastructure and services are being properly considered.

That brings me on to a point that I had planned to make later about section 106 money and community infrastructure money. All too often, a local authority awards planning consent and then enters into a negotiation with the developer to agree the section 106 moneys that must then be paid to the local community, via the local authority, to mitigate any negative effects of the development. Unfortunately, in my constituency Bradford council is not taking a sufficiently robust negotiating position with the developer to extract as much financial benefit as possible for the local community so that that money can be spent in places like Silsden, Keighley and Ilkley and properly set against any negative impacts of the development.

I will give an example. With the development on Occupation Lane on the outskirts of Keighley, it was agreed that Barratt Homes would put in play facilities for children of all ages, up to the early teens. But what did we see when the development was complete? We saw play facilities that were more suitable for one or two-year-olds. The developer did the very bare minimum, which was obviously not what the residents expected when they purchased the homes. I could give other examples.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Luke Charters (York Outer) (Lab)]

It is an honour to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Pritchard—[Interruption]—in the company of the John Deere air horn orchestra.

This debate is very important to me. I have met Persimmon, Oakgate, Banks Group, Joseph Rowntree, Taylor Wimpey, Barratt, David Wilson, McLaren and countless others. I thank the hon. Member for Keighley and Ilkley (Robbie Moore) for securing the debate. I greatly respect him as a fellow Yorkshire MP, so let me be Yorkshire, direct and bold and say that he forgets an important point: it was the last Government who oversaw the broken planning system.

That brings me to the challenges we face in York. Housing developers have struggled to build good homes over the past 14 years, but it is not for lack of trying. I am afraid to say that some councillors in certain parties have been the blockers for too long. Let me tell hon. Members a story. New Earswick was the brainchild of Joseph Rowntree. For Members familiar with model villages, it is the Bournville or Saltaire of York—a place built on the principle that better housing can be provided for lower-income families.

Recently, there was a proposal to build 14 new affordable houses. It was compliant with the national planning policy framework. No need to worry, right? Unfortunately, that was not the case. If Members want to know why, I will need to refer to one of my son’s favourite films, the 2006 animated comedy “Over the Hedge”. The plot, for those who may not know it, is about a group of woodland animals led by a cautious turtle named Verne. The problem is that Verne’s overly cautious approach has bled into the local authority’s cautious planning approach for too long. I hope Members will forgive that slightly unexpected reference, but the reason why those 14 homes were delayed for three to six months was that planning committee members from a certain party did not want to go ahead over a hedge. Families had been left waiting for months for housing—over a hedge.

Let me move on from that harrowing tale and make a slightly bold suggestion: rather than just focusing on the responsibilities of housing developers, we must focus on the role of local councillors. If committee members are homeowners, they should have to declare it as an interest. It is easy to block the homes of the future when you have one yourself.

[John Lamont]

I find some of the hon. Member’s remarks quite extraordinary. Is he genuinely saying that if concerns about wildlife, the environment or what is proposed are put forward by local residents, and particularly by the Environment Agency, they should simply be ignored in pursuit of this house building agenda?

[Mr Charters]

Absolutely not. The example I gave was—to go back to that 2006 movie—about a hedge. The power that planning committees have must be exercised with restraint. We must consider the opportunity costs. Disabled families and other families, my constituents, have been left waiting six months because of a landscape issue over a hedge.

There are a couple of practical considerations I would like to raise. The future homes standard is great, and developers have a responsibility there, but we cannot just focus on air source heat pumps. We must have battery storage linked to photovoltaics as well—that should be the new home standard. We must also have extra planning committee resource so we can properly hold developers to account. I would really welcome the Minister updating us on when the 200 new planning officers are likely to be in place. They are desperately needed in York.

Let me also touch on pre-application discussions. These are important to let developers get on and consider local need in the right way and at an early stage.