Business and Planning Bill

Lord Blencathra Excerpts

2nd reading & 2nd reading (Hansard) & 2nd reading (Hansard): House of Lords
Monday 6th July 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Blencathra (Con) [V]]

My Lords, I congratulate my noble friend the Minister on his excellent opening speech, especially the announcement on wheelchairs and pavement access. He will make a worthwhile contribution to this House.

The Bill generally is welcome although I have a few concerns about some issues. First, as chair of the Delegated Powers Committee, I can say that it will consider the Bill on Wednesday morning and aims to report later that day, allowing a very tight window for Peers to table amendments on Wednesday on any of its recommendations if they so wish. It is a pleasure to see for a change a Bill with Henry VIII clauses all limited to changing merely the dates and which are all affirmative. However, the committee will be interested in the amount of guidance that may be given without parliamentary oversight and the apparently new concept of conditions which will have the force of law but no parliamentary approval.

I appreciate that the Government need to move quickly—there is no point in legislating for an open-air cafe society when the one week of English summer is over— but, on a personal note, I was concerned that the non-obstruction provisions in Clause 3(6) did not mention keeping sufficient space on pavements for wheelchairs and children’s pushchairs to pass; nor is it specifically mentioned under the condition in Clause 5. My noble friend the Minister, the Deputy Leader, may say that this is common sense and that local authorities are bound to make that a condition. Not so—not because they are hostile to wheelchair users but because we are never thought about. Every time I have been in Paris in past years I often cannot get through on the pavement because of the tables and chairs, not to mention the thousands of electric scooters cluttering the pavements, which we will soon have too. The carnage in Paris will be repeated in London. People are apologetic, jump up and move the tables but it never crosses their mind that there would be an obstruction problem for certain pavement users when the tables were set out. The same would have happened here— not out of malice or disrespect but because of sheer thoughtlessness.

I was going to move an amendment in Committee to put this in the Bill, but I congratulate my noble friend and the Government on introducing this national condition. I hope that my note to his department last week threatening to move the amendment had a role to play.

I am also concerned about the possibility of 24/7 construction. For six years I suffered the noise of massive construction works carried out near Marsham Street. The last two years were not so bad as they fitted out the inside, but the first two years were pure hell as massive power hammers demolished the old buildings, with 100 decibels of noise from 8 am until 6 pm. Of course, we must get construction working flat out to catch up but there must be limits to protect local residents. It would be odd if Heathrow has to close for almost seven hours at night and has noise limits but construction sites could carry on regardless.

I am further concerned that 24/7 construction work near special wildlife sites such as SSSIs could be damaging to the species affected. I declare my interests as in the register. Local authorities must check what conditions on construction near these sites were imposed to protect the wildlife there when the application was granted, and not diminish those protections now.

In conclusion, I suggest that where there are no residents for 300 metres, construction can go on 24/7. However, where there are residents living closer than 300 metres, noisy outdoor construction should be limited to a maximum of 7 am in the morning until 10 pm at night. That is an extra five hours a day work time in residential areas. All internal and quiet work could continue 24/7. With these provisos, I support the Bill.