"My Lords, I am in the rather frightening position of agreeing with Amendment 48 in the names of the noble Baronesses, Lady Pinnock and Lady Bennett of Manor Castle—no doubt they are as concerned about my support for them as I am. However, they have raised some very good points …..." Lord Blencathra - View Speech
"My Lords, I support Amendments 53, 54 and 55 but express some concern about Amendment 52. My noble friend Lord Moylan is absolutely right to call for an impact assessment before local authorities go overboard with removing non-electric car spaces in an obsessive drive for electric vehicle charging points. There …..." Lord Blencathra - View Speech
"My Lords, contrary to my noble friend, I support Amendment 62—in part. The “in part” is because I do not want climate change to freeze out biodiversity, which is ultimately far more important for local authorities, which have specific biodiversity duties but no legal climate change responsibilities. The other reason …..." Lord Blencathra - View Speech
"I take the Whip’s comment with a slight pinch of salt—albeit not on my mushrooms. The amendment refers to mushrooms, and I am citing an example of mushrooms because it is relevant to the debate. If we were working normal hours, my remarks would probably be shorter, in view of …..." Lord Blencathra - View Speech
"My Lords, I will comment briefly on these amendments. The Government may say that if you stop these conversions of hotels, where will we put the people? The noble Baroness, Lady Pinnock, asked the same question. That is a fair question. The answer is to use all spare military accommodation, …..." Lord Blencathra - View Speech
"My Lords, in view of the speech by the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett of Manor Castle, saying that she is opposed to the measure, I feel it is my turn to stand up and say that this is a very sensible amendment. Based on my time in Natural England, I …..." Lord Blencathra - View Speech
"I am grateful to my noble friend for giving way. When I looked at the figures last year, I found that 1.1 million homes were approved that were not built. That is quite a few hundreds of thousands...." Lord Blencathra - View Speech
"My Lords, I strongly support Amendment 119 and agree with the excellent case set out by my noble friend Lady Neville-Rolfe. My support comes from two cases in my constituency some years ago, caused by the forerunner of Natural England. I think it was the Countryside Commission at the time, …..." Lord Blencathra - View Speech
"That is in the sentence that I am just about to say.
The Secretary of State’s obsession with net zero is now leading to the destruction of some of our finest British countryside, with the imposition of massive solar farms on some of our finest productive land. We would not …..." Lord Blencathra - View Speech
"My Lords, I speak on these amendments not with any great authority on them but because I had some experience of a heritage village being destroyed to create a reservoir when I was Member of Parliament for Penrith and The Border, a huge constituency in the north of Cumbria including …..." Lord Blencathra - View Speech