Planning and Infrastructure Bill

Lord Bellingham Excerpts

Committee stage
Thursday 11th September 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Berkeley (Lab)]

My Lords, I support Amendment 147 on chalk streams. I was brought up in the Chilterns and I have been studying some of the streams there for a very long time. As other noble Lords have said, they are the most wonderful bits of the countryside, with clear water—which comes and goes, but it is usually there.

I became involved in this when I opposed some of the work that HS2 was doing in trying to drill a tunnel underneath the chalk stream near Amersham. The Chiltern Society, which led the opposition, was very keen that HS2 put some boreholes down to check what the ground was like and make sure that drilling a tunnel close to underneath a chalk stream would not have any adverse effect on it. Of course, HS2, being the rather arrogant organisation it often was, said, “It is not necessary. We know everything that is going to happen there and it is all planned for. We won’t have any special protection apart from the normal tunnel construction”.

Of course, HS2 was wrong and when the tunnel got to underneath the stream just west of Amersham, contamination started, water levels dropped and there was a lack of water supply in some places. It said, “Oh dear”, and did nothing about it. It is all right now—I think it has all been solved—but my point is that if this amendment had been on the statute book 10 years ago, the local people and the experts would have had much more credibility in attacking a government organisation trying to build a tunnel than has happened so far.

There are probably many other examples and noble Lords have mentioned some, but it is important that we map these chalk streams and make sure that they are looked after, because they are very special.

[Lord Bellingham (Con)]

My Lords, I speak in favour of Amendment 146, on which I am a co-signatory, and Amendments 147 and 148. I will be brief because we have already heard from three noble Lords who have made very powerful contributions—the noble Lords, Lord Blencathra and Lord Berkeley, and the noble Viscount, Lord Trenchard. We heard also from the noble Baroness, Lady Parminter, whom I know worked very closely on this agenda when she was chief executive of the CPRE 20 years or so ago.

As the noble Lord, Lord Blencathra, pointed out, 85% of chalk streams are in the UK and they face multiple threats, including the good example we just heard from the noble Lord, Lord Berkeley. Very few meet good ecological standards, and we are seeing a series of irreplaceable habitats being put at grave risk.

Planning and Infrastructure Bill

Lord Bellingham Excerpts

Committee stage
Monday 15th September 2025 Lords Chamber

Last but not least, to respond to the increasing unease in this country about food security, at the same time the Secretary of State should be required to make an assessment of any increased risks to our food security which are the result of the implementation of the provisions of the Bill. At only nine meals from anarchy, this issue deserves much closer scrutiny. We cannot and should not be complacent. I beg to move.

[Lord Bellingham (Con)]

My Lords, I support this amendment, which my noble friend has proposed with a very powerful argument indeed. He is not asking for a stop to housing or these other developments; he is asking for an audit so we have the information to hand.

I want to make just three quick points. Quite often, when it comes to housing, there is not a choice as to where the housing goes for obvious reasons. Most new housing developments will be adjacent to existing settlements; they will be adjacent to towns, villages and often, inevitably, they will be put on really good, grade 1 agricultural land that will get gobbled up. To some extent, that is accepted.

On food security, my noble friend made a very good point about the historic context and raised briefly the Ukraine war. One of the lessons of the Ukraine war is the fact that we cannot take our food security for granted. He touched on solar arrays, and I suggest to the Minister that, in building out solar arrays, we indeed have choice. We do not have so much choice over housing, but surely we have choice over where we put these solar arrays.

I just wanted to tell the Minister what is going on in part of my old constituency of North West Norfolk. There is a large wave of planning applications for solar arrays along the A47 corridor between Swaffham and Dereham. Much of that is going to take in grade 1 or grade 2 agricultural land. The serious worry I have is that we are not talking about willing seller, willing buyer—or willing farmer, willing buyer. We are talking about tenant farmers who are going to have their livelihoods taken away. We are talking also about some farmers who may have holdings adjacent to larger landowners who are putting their land forward for this development. The companies in question proposing the developments have come forward with a threat of compulsory purchase. We are moving away from the willing seller, willing buyer concept—at the same time putting at risk a huge amount of really good agricultural land.

The Minister should look at this amendment in the spirit in which it has been drafted. We are not trying to order the Government what to do. My noble friend is not trying to stop these developments. Of course, he wants some of them modified, but we need to have that information. We need to have a proper audit, so I support this clause wholeheartedly. I very much hope that the Minister will realise that the potential damage to our farming communities is huge—damage is being done already.

We have sites such as warehouses on industrial estates—go around any new industrial estate; you will not see a single solar panel. Look at a modern school or hospital; a new hospital is to be built in my old constituency, and there is no provision there for solar panels on what are to be flat roofs. Yet down the road, we are going to see the demise of really first-class agricultural land. The Minister needs to get a grip of this and, above all, have information to hand, so that we can be properly informed in future, so I support my noble friend.

[Lord Fuller (Con)]

My Lords, I rise very briefly to support Amendment 214. My noble friend nearly said that we are no more than three meals away from societal breakdown, but we are—and, in the hierarchy of needs, food in the belly is the number one requirement. Land is the principal resource that provides bread, beer, biscuits, as well as broccoli, and they are not making land anymore.

I am concerned, because the land use framework that has been proposed by the Government contemplates that fully 9% of our farmland will be used for non-growing purposes. Your Lordships will have heard me say before, in respect of solar panels particularly, that it is beyond careless to allow the best land to be consumed for non-farmland purposes before the worst land is exhausted. Last year, the national wheat yield was down 20% on account of wet weather. This year, there is an impairment in many areas on account of the dry weather. The weather changes, but we cannot be careless about our food supply.

The better news is that we have recently heard encouraging noises from former Defra Ministers who belatedly realise that the risks of food security are greater than they have ever been. It is noteworthy that, while we no longer have a Minister for Agriculture, we have a Minister for Food Security, and I think we should all welcome that, provided that the title of food security flows through into recognising the importance to national security, ensuring that the greatest proportion of the food in this country can meet our needs.

I had a commercial meeting this morning with one of the UK’s largest participants in the agricultural supply chain in this country. Its agricultural director gave me what I felt was a stunning statistic, and I will relay it to noble Lords. He said that, over the last 30 years, the amount of arable farmland in this country has diminished by 30%. I questioned him: “You mean 1% per year, each year, for the last 30 years?”, and he said, “Yes, we used to count on a 15 million tonne a year wheat harvest, now we’re lucky to get 12”. These are big reductions with large consequences, so I enthusiastically endorse Amendment 214. If we are going to have a Minister for Food Security, doing this arithmetic is going to be an essential part of her task—how else can she benchmark her success? I think the amendment is fully in tune with the direction this Government are going in.

Had it been my amendment, I would have probably asked for the data to be embellished by an assessment of the underlying agricultural land quality—the ALC, or agricultural land classification—so that we could work out not just the number of hectares that are lost but how they apportioned between the best and most versatile land versus the lower ranks. I wonder whether the noble Lord might consider enhancing the amendment with agricultural land classification, if he sustains it on Report. Otherwise, I give it my full support in Committee.