Growth and Infrastructure Bill

Lord Greaves Excerpts

Tuesday 22nd January 2013 Lords Chamber

[Lord Greaves]

The Minister said several times that the purpose is to increase the efficiency of the appeal system or of appeal-handling in pursuit of economic growth. I am not sure what the direct correlation is between the efficiency of the appeal system and economic growth, except that decisions might be taken more quickly. Is the phrase, “increase the efficiency of appeal handling”, a euphemism for more applications being passed and therefore not going to appeal at all? Is that what is behind all this?

[Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon]

The short answer to the second question is no. This is about making things more efficient. I am sure that anyone involved with the planning process would welcome greater efficiency. If a decision is more efficient—if it is quicker—it makes the planning process more in line with requirements and, ultimately, saves costs for all involved. I commend the changes because they are simply making something more efficient. To anyone involved with the public or private sector, increased efficiency is always a welcome development.

[Lord Greaves]

I agree entirely with that. Whatever you are doing, doing it more efficiently is a good idea. However, I do not understand what the allocation of costs—increasing the costs on local authorities and increasing the number of cases where costs are allocated—has to do directly with efficiency. I said earlier that, in my experience, the Planning Inspectorate has not always been the most efficient organisation in the country. However, my perspective is that that is not because the Secretary of State could not get his costs back at the end of it all or that more costs might be allocated to other people in the process but that, as a bureaucracy, the Planning Inspectorate was not very efficient. Either it did not have enough people working for it or those people were not working sufficiently efficiently. The long delays that there were in planning appeals—there still are in some cases, although it has very much improved—do not suggest that the Planning Inspectorate has always been the most efficient organisation in the world.

What on earth has that got to do with the Secretary of State being able to take money off local authorities following the end of an appeal?

[Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon]

As I said, from my experience of life, whether in business or the public sector, it helps growth because things progress that much more quickly. My noble friend also raised a point about added costs for local planning authorities or developers. On the contrary, no local authority or developer will face an award of costs if they behave reasonably. It is in everyone’s interest that all parties behave reasonably at all stages of the planning process. If anything, making these changes will prevent delays, drive good behaviour and therefore reduce unnecessary expense and delay for everyone.