National Infrastructure Projects: Devolution

Lord Bellingham Excerpts

Wednesday 9th September 2026 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

I will not make any points about the nature of Governments that can move without fear of having to be re-elected, but we have to get better at this. That is why all this work has been done since our Government came into power to make sure that we improve both infrastructure planning and the process for delivering infrastructure. We need not only to get the planning system working more smoothly but to have far better ways of making sure that the project management of these schemes is working effectively and smoothly. The first step is to get these things through planning without having years and years of hold-ups in the courts and elsewhere.

[Lord Bellingham (Con)]

My Lords, further to the question asked by the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh, are we any closer in this country to setting up a national water grid? Obviously, every reservoir that is in the planning process will be a national infrastructure project and they all give rise to a huge amount of opposition, understandably. Can we look again at the idea of a national grid?

[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

I know that my colleagues in Defra are working extremely hard on the whole issue of water provision: how do we save water when we have floods and lots of rain; how do we make sure that we have the means to do that; and how do we distribute that water better around the country? I know that the water taskforce will look at this and making sure that we work together across the planning system and the water delivery system to make this work better in the future.