Infrastructure Bill [HL]

Lord Jenkin of Roding Excerpts

Wednesday 5th November 2014 Lords Chamber

[Lord Adonis]

My Lords, the building of new towns and major urban extensions is a critical national issue in the face of Britain’s acute housing shortage. The designation of Ebbsfleet as a new town and the recent Wolfson Prize competition for a new town scheme demonstrates the enthusiasm and capacity that there is for developing the concept in modern conditions. All three of the major parties in the House are committed to new town or garden city developments, and I take these to mean the same thing, given the importance of green and sustainable development as part of any new town or urban extension.

This amendment intends to capture the spirit of the post-war rebuilding of the country that was spurred on by the original New Towns Act 1946, creating places that today are part of the fabric of our country, such as Milton Keynes, Stevenage and Welwyn Garden City. However, although previous new town legislation provided powers to deliver new towns, the towns that were built did not always conform to the highest design and quality standards. The objectives set out in this amendment update the existing legislation in the New Towns Act 1981—which has barely been used—to ensure protection for the natural and historic environments, to require high-quality and inclusive design and to contribute towards a low-carbon future. The aim is that no part of a new town will be eligible for the Carbuncle Cup, an annual award from Building Design magazine for the ugliest building in the United Kingdom completed in the last 12 months.

Developing places in which people love to live is a topic gathering increasing attention as we look to substantial new settlements. The winner of this year’s Wolfson Prize, David Rudlin, proposes a six-point “social contract” for the development of garden cities. The participative decision-making proposed in this amendment is reflected in Mr Rudlin’s winning entry, which proposes that existing towns and cities should be able to bid for new garden city status to build substantial high-quality and sustainable urban extensions. This includes not only high quality standards, but the requirements that new garden cities include major institutions of learning; that they be well connected by public transport and cycleways; and that for every acre of land developed, another will be given back to the city as accessible public space, including forests, lakes and country parks.

When my noble friend Lord McKenzie of Luton raised in Committee this issue of promoting sustainable and liveable communities in new towns, the government response was odd. The noble Baroness, Lady Stowell, said it was “absolutely essential” that good-quality design and the other key elements of the amendment—open decision-making, cultural and artistic development, and enhancement of the natural and historic environment—be built into new town development, but the Government were worried that to say so explicitly in statute would be “unhelpful”. But how can it be unhelpful to specify things that are so essential but are not in fact contained in the New Towns Act 1981? If they are not specified, that could lead to what David Rudlin calls “mere dormitory suburbs”.

When the Government say it is unhelpful to specify essential features of new towns, I believe they are confusing being concise with being brief. Being concise shows an excellent grasp of the issue, while being brief can demonstrate a lack of understanding of an issue. This amendment clearly and concisely prescribes the factors that development corporations should consider to achieve sustainable development, from environmental considerations to economic ones. The amendment is therefore helpful, not unhelpful. If the Government are to object on the grounds of brevity, I ask them: which factors set out in the amendment do they think should not always be considered when building sustainable new communities? I beg to move.

[Lord Jenkin of Roding (Con)]

My Lords, I will be brief. The two amendments—the one we have just voted on and the one just moved by the noble Lord, Lord Adonis—are starred amendments. It is treating this House with contempt to raise two serious issues at the very last moment for consideration in today’s business. I am not in the least surprised that in the previous debate only the noble Lord and my noble friend Lord Ahmad spoke. No one had a chance to consider what it was about and take advice. Now we have another one.

This is an important issue. As a former Environment Secretary, I dealt with planning matters, and have lived near some of the post-war new towns. I will not weary the House by repeating what I said in Committee about the appalling mistakes made, for instance in Harlow, which turned out to be a byword for the misery of large numbers of citizens who moved from the city centres out to a town that was full of lakes, parks and everything but failed to have any sense of community at all—certainly for decades. I do not in any way underestimate the need for substantial improvements in the system, and I like to think that in recent developments there have been considerable improvements; we have not had a repetition of those experiences.

However, these are important matters and one has to ask oneself: why did the noble Lord leave it until only yesterday to table this amendment and asking my noble friend to give a considered view of the matters that he raises in it? I say again: it is treating this House with contempt.

[Lord Adonis]

I should point out to the noble Lord that this amendment was tabled and debated in Committee.

[Lord Jenkin of Roding]

Why leave it until the last moment on Report? Why did he not put it down it a week or 10 days ago, when most of the other amendments were tabled, so that people would have a chance to look at it and consult? That is my complaint. I have great respect for the noble Lord’s ability, but sometimes he gives the impression that he walks on water.

[Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon]

My Lords, I thank my noble friend for his intervention and the noble Lord for his amendment. I feel somewhat spiritually awakened by my noble friend’s final comment about walking on water. I hope I can provide clarity on why the Government are not in a position to accept the amendment at this time.

I shall start with our common ground. I agree wholeheartedly with the noble Lord, Lord Adonis, that creating well designed, sustainable communities should be at the heart of any new development. In Amendment 86B, tabled by the noble Lord, two main objectives are proposed for a development corporation to be established for the purpose of creating a new town and for the physical laying-out of infrastructure and long-term sustainable development of the new town.

However, I do not think that prescribing the objects of a new town development corporation in detail would help to achieve that objective in a way that allowed for sufficient flexibility locally. There is much to be said for the simplicity of the current objective of new town development corporations, as indeed set out in statute: to secure the laying out and development of the new town.

The amendment proposes that sustainable development should be included in the objects of new town development corporations. Let me emphasise that the Government strongly support the principle of sustainable development. Indeed, that principle is central to the document National Planning Policy Framework, which provides a clear view of what sustainable development means in practice. We believe that creating an additional statutory definition of sustainable development could serve to reduce that very clarity.

I note that no new town development corporations have been created since 1970. However, I am clear that any future new town development corporations, as well as urban development corporations, such as the one the Government are proposing to establish at Ebbsfleet, should have a strong focus on securing sustainable development in a way that reflects local circumstances and needs. I look forward to Her Majesty’s Opposition supporting the creation of the new town at Ebbsfleet, as we seek to establish it in another Bill.

I hope that the clarity I have provided, with brevity, gives the noble Lord sufficient comfort to withdraw his amendment.

[Lord Adonis]

My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Lord for putting on record the Government’s commitment to sustainable development and high-quality design, which is of key importance.

If I may, I shall respond further to the noble Lord, Lord Jenkin. The amendments were tabled on Monday, which was the day before yesterday, so there was certainly time for noble Lords to engage fully with the issues—and, indeed, for the noble Lord to have read the Armitt report, which was published some months ago. It is not a recent document, by any means.

[Lord Jenkin of Roding]

I am sorry—

[Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon]

They say, “Once a Whip, always a Whip”. We are on Report, and no other interventions would be appropriate.

--- Later in debate ---

Basically, the current legislative provisions provide some rhetorical emphasis for good design, but they do not create the kind of priority for policymakers that could reassure us that our new infrastructure will be of the design quality which Britain needs and deserves. I beg to move.

[Lord Jenkin of Roding]

My Lords, I am very happy indeed to add my name to the amendment tabled by the noble Baroness. This is partly because I have long had an admiration for the persistence with which over many years she has pursued this objective of achieving better design for our buildings and structures in this country. She deserves our support.

I referred briefly in my previous intervention to the time when I was Environment Secretary, and as such found on my desk a number of very major projects. Not all of them would have been described as infrastructure, but nevertheless one was very conscious indeed of the enormous importance of design as a criterion for desirability and for making sure that something was going to last. Indeed, there was a view in the department at the time that if a building was really bad, it would not last more than 50 years. However, 50 years is more than half a lifetime—perhaps it is less than that now, but it was then. One needs to do one’s best to avoid those bad buildings.

One particular decision with which I have always been rather pleased—which was not infrastructure except in the broadest sense of that word—concerned what is now the Sainsbury Wing of the National Gallery. That decision turned entirely on the design that had originally been proposed, which was so memorably castigated by His Royal Highness the Prince of Wales in a remarkable speech. I must say that it made me very angry at the time, because this planning decision was sitting on my desk and yet I received no advance warning at all that he was going to say anything about it.

When I then had to deal with it, I tried to see whether he was right. I came to the conclusion that, yes, of course he was right. That design was deplorable, as the recent account published by the National Gallery itself has indicated. As a result, we got an entirely new initiative from the Sainsbury brothers, and the Sainsbury Wing is now a very considerable adornment to that part of Trafalgar Square and to the National Gallery itself, based entirely on design. I therefore attach very great importance to this.

One of the important points made by the noble Baroness in her speech concerned the very limited extent to which the criterion of design has been imported into the national planning policy statements. She said that some of them gave the impression of having been cut and pasted, because they simply took the same words. If one looks, for instance, at the National Policy Statement for Ports about this, it really does not add anything to what has been said before about other forms of development. There is nothing specifically regarding ports. From time to time, I have found myself sailing past the Felixstowe dock, which is a tremendous container port. It is actually rather a fine structure when seen from the River Orwell. Then you go further up the River Orwell and there is a perfectly lovely bridge, the Orwell Bridge. We are perfectly capable of choosing first-class designs, but it needs to be at the centre. Sharpening up the obligation to put design at the heart of the planning system and planning criteria, which the amendment moved by the noble Baroness, Lady Whitaker, would achieve, seems to me a very valuable thing to do. I support her amendment and I hope that she will continue to bang away at this issue. She has made great progress in other quarters and she needs to do it in this one as well.

[The Earl of Clancarty (CB)]

My Lords, I support Amendment 87 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Whitaker. As she said, good design is not just desirable but necessary.

The noble Baroness talked about beauty and despoliation of the environment. They are aesthetic concerns which are aspects of wider cultural concerns, themselves a significant and necessary component of good design. I would therefore go further in paragraph 5.22 of the draft licence which the noble Baroness quoted, because I think that the absence of the word “cultural” is an omission. The relevant wording might then state that “the development of the network takes account of geographical, environmental, cultural and socio-economic context”. However, I acknowledge the work that the noble Baroness and others have put in to get as far as they have with the wording as it stands.

This is not about function, operation and maintenance versus culture or design. The precise function or functions of our highways, road networks and the built environment are themselves cultural issues. For instance, if we take into consideration initiatives very different from the norm in this country such as shared space schemes, which are intended to encourage more co-operative rather than competitive spaces, it becomes more objectively clear how form and function reflect each other in a very particular cultural sense. Good design needs to be thought of as central to planning and not as an add-on, not least because there needs to be a wider discussion about what good design is and means in relation to the precise nature of the changes which we have made and continue to make to our environment.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Judd (Lab)]

My Lords, the right reverend Prelate referred to the importance attached to this issue and the strength of feeling within the church. That is significant. What was so impressive the last time this issue was being discussed, while the church played a critical part in the deliberations, was not only the size of the response to the Government’s proposal but the spontaneity and strength across the community as a whole. This was something about which people cared passionately in our society. It is hardly surprising that, in a country that is so increasingly pressurised in material terms, people take very seriously the balance that is needed for creativity, thought, reflection, and spiritual and physical regeneration.

My point is quite simple. My noble friend has said that the Minister has given assurances and that she respects him. I may also respect the Minister—and I do. However, I never understand this point. The Minister and his Government will not be there for ever. If the assurances on something which is crucial, and on which the Minister feels able to give assurances, mount, why on earth should we not put it in the Bill so that it is there as the clear expression of Parliament for future Governments as well as the present one?

[Lord Jenkin of Roding]

My Lords, I will be brief because I sense that the House wants to reach a decision. In my former constituency of Wanstead and Woodford was quite a large part of Epping Forest. I entirely share the views that have been expressed around the House, by the right reverend Prelate and others, about the extent to which this forms an enormously valuable part of people’s lives and, indeed, is part of their being.

When Winston Churchill fell ill, went into hospital and lost his job—of course, he had a job and therefore had to give up his seat—he ended that chapter of his biography:

“And so I found myself without an office, without a seat … and without an appendix. I came to rest amid the cool glades of Epping Forest”.

Of course, he became the Member for Epping; I inherited part of that constituency.

I listened to the noble Baroness with great interest because I, too, had read the Statement made by my noble friend and published in Hansard on 4 November, and I took comfort from it. However, I have to say to my noble friend that this is what worries me: a Statement, however formally issued, is not the same as an Act of Parliament. The example quoted by the noble Baroness about the particular part of the Forest of Dean, which I had not heard before, has raised doubts in my mind. Whether this or another amendment is necessary to place the intention of the Statement firmly on the statute book, it seems to me that this amendment has a good deal to say for it. I shall listen to my noble friend’s response to this debate with considerable interest.

[Lord Berkeley of Knighton (CB)]

My Lords, I missed the opening of this debate because I was upstairs at a meeting of the APPG on arts and health, at which a series of experts in mental health said how important people’s surroundings—whether they were in the East End or the countryside—were to their good health and the well oiled working of society. As someone who has the privilege of living a lot of the time in the country and working with foresters, I feel that the transcending quality that people feel the countryside, and forestry in particular, affords them is not something with which we should play fast and loose.

The noble Lord, Lord Clark of Windermere, made some very fair points in recognising what the Government probably want to do here, but I do not think that this is an area where we can take any risks. From what many Members of the House have said, it seems that there is a huge risk attached to the Bill as presently framed, and therefore I would like to support the amendment.