communities and local government committee

Debate between Lord Herbert of South Downs and Clive Betts

Thursday 18th December 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Betts]

The hon. Gentleman’s last point is a very good one. We did not take particular evidence on it, but it does aggravate councils up and down the country. We made a recommendation that a look should be taken at how the process could be simplified. We did not go into the specifics, but boxes of documents at the Planning Inspectorate for one local plan for a relatively small district showed how complicated the process has become. At a time of spending and resource constraints, many councils are struggling to finish that complicated process. We think that the Government, the Planning Inspectorate and local government should sit down together and revise and simplify the process.

[Nick Herbert (Arundel and South Downs) (Con)]

As a strong supporter of localism and neighbourhood planning in particular, may I echo the warm welcome for the hon. Gentleman’s Committee’s report, which correctly identifies a number of the issues confronting local communities? May I also join in his plea to the Minister to pay attention to the recommendations, to respond to them constructively and as soon as possible, and in particular to deal with the problem of the loophole that is allowing speculative development applications, with developers circling villages like hawks, waiting to pounce on greenfield sites that are not in identified local or neighbourhood plans, and as a result undermining faith in the localism we promised?

[Mr Betts]

That sentiment was expressed very strongly to us when we met the 60 representatives of community groups and parish groups. We consistently heard the message that people did not feel in control of what was happening in their own areas. If there was no local plan in place, they felt completely unprotected against individual applications for developments that they felt would be unsustainable. The right hon. Gentleman gave evidence to the Committee on precisely those points and we took that very much into account in our recommendations.

Local Plans (Public Consent)

Debate between Lord Herbert of South Downs and Clive Betts

Wednesday 9th July 2014 Westminster Hall

[Nick Herbert]

The lesson to the Minister is clearly either to take public transport or to be driven around in an enormous ministerial car. Nevertheless, I am grateful to him for coming to my constituency, then to Chichester, to meet local people and to hear for himself about the problem.

My suggestions are, first, to strengthen the process of neighbourhood planning—to make it easier, not harder, for local communities, to give them more support and to make the process less bureaucratic. Secondly, we should tackle the overweening power of the Planning Inspectorate. The inspectorate is out of control and it is defying localism. People do not want orders from a quango in Bristol. If we are serious about localism, we must deal with that.

The Conservative manifesto stated:

“To give communities greater control over planning, we will abolish the power of planning inspectors to rewrite local plans.”

My hon. Friend the Member for Fylde said that if the Planning Inspectorate was not given new marching orders, hon. Members might decide for themselves that those marching orders should be given. I propose amendments to the Infrastructure Bill to send a clear signal to the Planning Inspectorate that what it is doing is undermining localism and support for local housing, and that that must stop.

[Mr Clive Betts (in the Chair)]

I thank Members for helping us get to the wind-ups on time.