Localism Bill

Lord Jenkin of Roding Excerpts

Tuesday 19th July 2011 Lords Chamber

Tabled by

[Lord Jenkin of Roding]

148ZZC: Clause 100, page 79, line 20, at end insert—
“( ) In section 209 (liability: interpretation of key terms) after subsection (8) (regulations may make provision for a person not to be treated as a developer in specified circumstances) insert—
“(9) CIL regulations must provide for an exemption (or a partial exemption) from liability to pay CIL in respect of a development where the person who would otherwise be likely to pay CIL in respect of the development is already required to make payment of a sum or sums under a planning obligation under section 106 of TCPA 1990 which is or are applied towards—
(a) existing infrastructure (within the meaning given in section 216(1)), or(b) other existing local infrastructure or matters relating to that infrastructure.””

[Lord Jenkin of Roding]

Not moved.

[Lord Bassam of Brighton]

My Lords, with the leave of the House, perhaps I may say that today’s list has a target set at Amendment 170CD—

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Whitaker]

My Lords, my Amendment 148AZZC relates to what the noble Lord, Lord Greaves, has been saying, which I generally support, but is much narrower. It reflects concerns shared by the Royal Town Planning Institute and relates entirely to the purpose of setting up a neighbourhood forum, and hence making a neighbourhood plan.

At Report in another place, the Government amended subsection (5)(a) of new Section 61F so that an organisation can be designated as a neighbourhood forum if,

“it is established expressly for either or both of the following purposes—

(i) furthering the social, economic and environmental well-being of individuals”—

I abbreviate a bit—and,

“(ii) promoting the carrying on of trades, professions or other businesses”.

There was very little discussion of the government amendment in the other place.

The purport of “either or both” is that the neighbourhood forum and any consequent neighbourhood plan could be set up purely with the sole purpose of carrying on trades, professions or other businesses. There is no reason for that not to be one of the purposes, but government guidance and most ideas of planning take account of economic, social and environmental aspects of sustainable development. A neighbourhood plan should surely not address one activity alone.

The Government may want to think again and adopt something along the lines of my amendment, which makes it clear that the purpose of the neighbourhood forum is to further the social, economic and environmental well-being of the residents, including carrying on businesses if need be, but would not allow this at the expense of the other factors.

[Lord Jenkin of Roding]

My Lords, I have five amendments in this group and will deal with them extremely briefly, because they are really all addressed to the same issue. I do not find at all clear the relationship between a neighbourhood area that may consist wholly or largely of residential properties and one that has an established business in it. My noble friend has tabled a very important group of amendments to establish that there can be neighbourhood business areas. That is certainly a very considerable advance. But when one is dealing, as one does in Schedule 9, with definitions of bodies that can be neighbourhood areas and areas that they can cover, can that include a neighbourhood area with a business? Can they form a neighbourhood area? Is all that in fact now covered by government Amendment 148AE, which comes in a future group? I and others are not at all clear on what will be the interaction where there are combined communities of businesses and residences. Those must cover a very large part of the country, which might form themselves into neighbourhood areas. I get the impression that the Bill has been designed on the assumption that they are all going to be residential properties, when of course they are not. They may well be small businesses as well. It would be very helpful if my noble friend could indicate how these can work together and form a neighbourhood area.

I disagree with my noble friend Lord Greaves—we are moving into an entirely different area here. Quite a lot of local plans have developed around the country, and I will not weary the Committee by reading out a list of them. It seems important that if one is going to have all this new bureaucracy to try to surround this whole area, which is what we are getting in the Bill, the question is whether it can be made to work as successfully as quite a lot of the local plans have been working. I entirely support the amendment moved by my noble friend Lord True, but if my noble friend on the Front Bench can give us some indication of how the various components of what a neighbourhood plan would be can work together, that would be extremely helpful. A number of bodies outside will read her words with very great care.

--- Later in debate ---

Debate on whether Clause 101 should stand part of the Bill.

[Lord Jenkin of Roding]

My Lords, when I put down this clause stand part debate, I might have anticipated that the previous group would cover a great deal of the ground that I want to refer to, so I shall be extremely brief. I shall begin with a bouquet to my noble friend on the Front Bench. It is very helpful that she has sent us in her document her letter to the noble Lord, Lord McKenzie of Luton, of 13 July setting out the purpose and thrust of the many government amendments which have been tabled. However, that is the end of my bouquet, because the fact that, on this part of the Bill alone, my noble friend has tabled well over 30 amendments illustrates what I have been referring to during the passage of the Bill; that is, that the Government are trying to micromanage the whole process. I remember hearing my right honourable friend the Secretary of State proclaim that the localism legislation would be the end of top-down micromanagement. I just wonder how it has all crept into this Bill in the way that it has.

I shall say two things about this. The first is that I have been sent a large number of amendments by the Local Government Association, which is as appalled as I am by the extent of the detailed bureaucratic interference by central government. It has asked me to table a list of amendments—I have 40 of them. I simply said, “I am not going to waste the time of the House by tabling these amendments. I will send the list of the amendments to my noble friend, so that she can see what they are getting at”.