Business and Planning Bill

Lord Blencathra Excerpts

Committee stage & Committee: 1st sitting (Hansard) & Committee: 1st sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Monday 13th July 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Cormack (Con) [V]]

My Lords, I sat in your Lordships’ Chamber last Monday and heard every speech on Second Reading. Two things came across to me powerfully: the second I will deal with later, when I speak to my Amendment 28. First, I want to address a few remarks to my Amendment 20 and, as it is so short, I will read it for the benefit of your Lordships. Line 7 on page 5 of the Bill says:

“The Secretary of State may publish conditions for pavement licences.”


We should probably change that “may” to must”. I have added the words:

“and in doing so must take into account the needs of the disabled, including the blind and the partially sighted.”

It came across in speech after speech last week that there was real concern on this issue—a concern most graphically expressed by my friend the noble Lord, Lord Low of Dalston, who has just spoken, and my noble friend Lord Holmes of Richmond, who introduced this series of amendments.

t is one thing to aspire to a café society, which is very pleasant. It is entirely reasonable that we should spill out on to the pavements, if it is safe and suitable to do so. But it is essential that the needs of the disabled —including the blind and the partially sighted—are properly recognised. I very much hope that when the Minister comes to reply, we will have an assurance from the Government that this matter will be explicit and on the face of the Bill. If it is not, I will seek to reintroduce an amendment next week on Report and, if necessary, divide the House, but I am confident that that will not be necessary. I hope that this debate will be brief, and unanimous that on this issue, in those immortal words, “something must be done”.

[Lord Blencathra (Con) [V]]

My Lords, I will speak to Amendment 21 in my name, but begin by referring to the recommendations of the Delegated Powers Committee, which I have the honour of chairing. It was critical of these conditions, which are legally enforceable but not subject to parliamentary scrutiny. The committee’s report last week said:

“In the absence of cogent reasons for not requiring mandatory conditions to be imposed through regulations, we recommend that the power to impose legally enforceable conditions in Clause 5(6) should be exercisable through regulations and that the negative procedure would afford an adequate level of parliamentary scrutiny.”


However, today I am requesting simply that we apply it to the national condition relating to space on pavements for disabled people, because the guidance is absolute nonsense which would not survive proper parliamentary scrutiny.

This is nothing to do with my noble friend the Deputy Leader, or the Minister, who did not invent this guidance published by the Government on 22 June. Paragraph 4.2 refers to

“the recommended minimum footway widths and distances required for access by mobility impaired and visually impaired people as set out in Section 3.1 of Inclusive Mobility”.

Paragraph 2.2 on page 5 of Inclusive Mobility says that:

“Someone who does not use a walking aid can manage to walk along a passageway less than 700mm wide, but just using a walking stick requires greater width than this; a minimum of 750mm. A person who uses two sticks or crutches, or a walking frame, needs a minimum of 900mm, a blind person using a long cane or with an assistance dog needs 1100mm. A visually impaired person who is being guided needs a width of 1200mm. A wheelchair user and an ambulant person side-by-side need 1500mm width.”


So, if I read this correctly—and I apologise to the Minister if I have got it wrong—rather than one simple instruction to café owners to keep a space of 1,500 millimetres, there are six different widths by which they might be guided.

Some noble Lords are old enough to remember two ancient television programmes. I can imagine a Benny Hill sketch—or something like that wonderful “Fawlty Towers” episode in which John Cleese keeps moving his diners from table to table—whereby a café owner sets out his tables at 700 millimetres and sees someone with a walking stick coming and moves them out to 750 millimetres, then I come along in my chair with my wife beside me, and he moves them out to 1,500 millimetres, and closes them back to 1,100 millimetres when my noble friend Lord Holmes comes along with Lottie, his guide dog, or the noble Lord, Lord Low, comes along with his white stick.

These guidelines are unworkable. We must have one simple rule: a minimum of 1,500 millimetres in all cases. That would also go some way towards aiding social distancing.

[Baroness Thomas of Winchester (LD) [V]]

My Lords, I am bowled over by the research done by the noble Lord, Lord Blencathra.

I am pleased to support the amendment moved by the noble Lord, Lord Holmes of Richmond, and the other amendments in this group. People who do not have mobility problems or sight impairment might wonder why there are so many amendments about accessibility. The answer is simple. So many of us who use wheelchairs or, in my case, mobility scooters, or have a sight impairment, have all had experience of obstructed pavements, which make journeys extremely hazardous.

As my noble friend Lady Pinnock said from these Benches, we support what the Government are doing in the Bill, but there is detail which must be addressed, and I hope that I am pushing at an open door. I too note the national guidance for local authorities over pavement space, but guidance is unenforceable by its very nature, so how much notice of it will be taken by an enthusiastic café owner trying to maximise table space, for example? We need something much more explicit in the Bill, and I urge the Minister to table a suitable amendment on Report if he is not going to accept any of the existing amendments.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Deputy Chairman of Committees (Baroness Henig) (Lab)]

I have received a request to speak after the Minister from the noble Lord, Lord Blencathra.

[Lord Blencathra [V]]

My Lords, it would be churlish of me not to intervene at this stage and thank my noble friend the Minister most sincerely for his excellent concession in saying that these national guidelines will now be subject to parliamentary scrutiny via the negative resolution procedure. I chair the Delegated Powers Committee. This is an excellent and very welcome concession.

We make laws in two ways in this country, or we should do—Acts of Parliament and statutory instruments—but in the past few years we have seen a worrying trend of guidance having legal force and a new invention, which we will come to in a Bill very shortly, of something called “protocols”, which are legally enforceable. These are just clever euphemisms for what should be regulations. I am delighted that my noble friend the Minister will put these on a statutory basis. I also look forward to his amendment next week in time to set minimum guidelines for access on pavements.

In the meantime, I thank my noble friend most sincerely for this excellent change of heart today.

[Lord Greenhalgh]

I thank my noble friend for his comments. Of course, I noted the points about the need for a minimum access requirement.