Planning and Infrastructure Bill

Lord Lucas Excerpts

2nd reading
Wednesday 25th June 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Lucas (Con)]

My Lords, it is a pleasure to follow the noble Lord, Lord Whitty, whose wisdom and company I enjoyed during my time on the environment committee. I am a supporter of the Bill, by and large. I am delighted to see that the policy is shifting towards “We want more bats” and away from “No bat must be inconvenienced”, but as the noble Lord, Lord Whitty, said, bats are not the problem when it comes to planning. As Members of an organisation that can spend enough money to build 50 houses on a pair of front doors that do not work, we should realise that.

I hope to use Committee to encourage the Government to take some of their ideas further. There is obvious scope for allowing trusted partners to work alongside the Government to achieve what they are hoping to do with environmental delivery plans. Many farmers’ groups are in a position to work on that sort of initiative. To rule them out, as the Bill does currently, is missing an opportunity.

What the Government are doing in throwing into doubt the whole structure of biodiversity net gain is a mistake. In biodiversity net gain, people are asked to commit for 30 years. It was a policy which evolved with support across the House, and now this Government, after merely 30 months of the policy, are throwing everything into doubt. Those people who had got themselves organised to be part of that system are wondering whether they made a huge mistake, and by the time the Government get around to sorting their ideas out, those people will have lost confidence. The Government really need to understand that having trusted partners in the private sector to deliver what they want is a plus, and they need to put themselves into a position where those partners can believe that the Government—and any Government that follow—will support them through the long-term commitments which this Government and the previous Government were expecting to be made.

I hope to persuade the Government to accelerate their work on biodiversity data. We have a very rich and capable set of players in this country, with the local environment record centres and a lot of amateur effort. But a lot of biodiversity data that is created through the planning system is not captured. A lot of planning applications go through without using the data we have. We need a better structure that is better thought through. I know the Government are working on those things internally. I hope to see that brought forward into this Bill, rather than left for some future occasion.

I really hope I will be able to persuade the Government to take an interest in those measures which would allow more use to be made of the settlements we already have. I had a Private Member’s Bill on permitted development rights, but we should also look at measures like land readjustment schemes, the London system of public transport accessibility zones, and the use of design codes to make it easy for developers to know what will be permitted, rather than leaving the whole question of design to be an uncertainty and a rather individual and personal decision at the end of things.

We should pick up on an aspect of the Government’s industrial strategy, where in various areas they are supporting the use of digital twins. There is a great deal that could be done in planning, which does not appear to be specifically part of the industrial strategy, to reduce costs, enable collaboration and enable imagination when it comes to what the layout of a new town should be and look like. The AI-assisted capability that is embedded in some of the British products that underlie this are tools that the Government should be seeking to support.

I will try to persuade them to make livestock markets and abattoirs critical national infrastructure. We need to sort things out: we are causing a great deal of cruelty to animals by not renewing our structure. Animals are having to travel very long distances to their deaths, and we can do better than that.

I will recommend a duty of candour for planning officers to go with Clause 50, so that they feel absolutely confident in telling members exactly what is, rather than feeling that they can in some way be criticised, and therefore giving them a duty to support their views.

I will urge the Government to redefine what a newspaper is. It was set out in 1881. Things have moved on, and if we are to have Clause 98 with duties to put notices in newspapers, it ought to recognise the modern world.

Echoing the national security strategy and our need to fight on home soil, I will draw the Government’s attention to the fact that we may not have termites here now but look at what is happening in France.

Planning and Infrastructure Bill

Lord Lucas Excerpts

Committee stage
Thursday 24th July 2025 Lords Chamber

Moved by

[Lord Lucas]

50: After Clause 12, insert the following new Clause—
“Livestock markets and abattoirsThe Secretary of State must, on the day on which this Act is passed, set in train the creation of a national policy statement under section 5 of the Planning Act 2008 (national policy statements) covering the development of livestock markets and abattoirs.”Member’s explanatory statement
Giving livestock markets and abattoirs the privileges accorded to national infrastructure would provide the foundations for the creation of a new network of livestock markets and abattoirs, with good communications and outside town centres, ensuring that animals could be dealt with locally and humanely and profitably.

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[Lord Lucas (Con)]

My Lords, looking at livestock markets and abattoirs as critical national infrastructure would enable a coherent response to a set of problems that have been building up for many years. In the 1970s, the UK had around 2,500 abattoirs. By 2024, it had dropped to fewer than 200. That has resulted in a rising trend in animals suffering long journeys by road, and a sharp decline in the availability of abattoirs catering for independent and local food suppliers, such as butchers and restaurants wishing to supply local meat and farmers wishing to be part of local produce marketing arrangements. We should have care for both those things. We have these animals in our trust, and to treat them badly when we could treat them better is not something we should contemplate; and we need to cater for local and individual food markets if we are to have a healthy food economy.

Abattoirs and livestock markets are difficult to site—abattoirs for obvious reasons, livestock markets because of the noise and traffic. The ideal sites for them are near major road junctions, taking traffic and noise away from towns, but such sites are difficult to get planning permission for, because the need for the sites is national but the need that the application is assessed against is purely local. That makes for a very difficult and uncertain planning process.

If we are to have a rational structure, something that really works for us as a nation, we need some clear thinking as to what should go where, not instantly but over time—the evolution of a plan that makes sense. Places with good communications outside town centres would ensure that animals can be dealt with locally, humanely and profitably. The evolution of such a structure would also have the benefit of freeing up land occupied by current sites within towns, which would be appreciated by locals as well as by the industry. Altogether, it ought to be a good thing to do, but to make it happen it needs to be thought through at a national level, not developed half-heartedly and randomly, trying to make things happen locally, because that clearly does not work. We are just seeing a process of further decline, intensification and discomfort for animals, and lack of facilities for local food producers.

Such an initiative might sensibly be combined with looking at the case for strategic, logistic and supply chain hubs, which need much the same sort of location—away from town centres and near good, strong road and rail transport—and have much the same difficulties in organising and planning, in that they are judged by, “Do we need this near Basingstoke?”, rather than, “Is this a logical part of the national structure of road transport?”. I have been looking at a particular proposal for such a hub near Popham in Hampshire, mostly because I spent a lot of my young life crawling over the railway workings at Popham, which are one of the most glorious sites for chalk downland flowers. I would hope to persuade any such development to include a similar space of bare chalk, which could be allowed to develop into a botanical heaven.

There is a need for the advantages that would come through some element of national planning, some bringing in of national considerations to siting abattoirs and livestock markets at transport hubs, so that instead of everything coming in at Southampton having to go up to the Midlands and down again to service the south of England, it could be dealt with more logically—locally, or in whatever other structure works nationally. That is something that the Government, with a good long time in power ahead of them, could reasonably contemplate giving some thought to and taking forward. I beg to move.

[Lord Naseby (Con)]

My Lords, I support my noble friend Lord Lucas. In another place I represented Northampton, and when I was first elected in February 1974 it had a very active market and abattoir, not on the outskirts but on the fringes, I suppose. That has been gone now for the best part of a quarter of a century, yet the need is still there. My noble friend is right because the nature of businesses today, as opposed to 50 years ago, has changed. The demand is there for local pubs, local restaurants and other small businesses allied to the area.

Additionally, we should never forget animal welfare—I am sure that none of us does, but it does get forgotten. Today, many animals taken to an abattoir are travelling for 50 miles, 60 miles or more. That is not good animal welfare. We have only to see, as I saw the other evening on the television, the problems with some animals not being looked after properly—the specific example was of the RSPCA in relation to dogs.

I am not sure my noble friend is totally right, though, in saying that it has to be totally national. Yes, there has to be a national strategy, and I would hope very much that it would be done in conjunction with the NFU, which has always taken a positive interest in this area. I am from the east Midlands, and I suspect we could do it equally well on a regional basis, perhaps within an overall national objective. Other things are done very successfully on a regional basis. I hope, first, that the Minister has an open mind on this and, secondly, that he has an enthusiasm to take it forward, because the principle of the amendment my noble friend has moved is, in my judgment, very important.

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I hope I have answered noble Lords’ questions and considerations and reassured the noble Lord, Lord Lucas. I kindly ask him to withdraw his amendment.

[Lord Lucas (Con)]

My Lords, I am very grateful to everybody who spoke on this amendment. The noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, gave me hope for a moment when she said that the average age of a slaughterman was 63. I am thinking through what to do after I leave this place; unfortunately, there is no slaughterhouse close enough to make that practicable.

I understand where the noble Lord, Lord Khan, and the Government are coming from. Their answer is very much the same as the one I got out of the previous Government. It is good that the Government recognise the problem but, like the previous Government, they seem prepared just to let it get worse. I really hope that out of the processes that the Minister described comes some initiative that changes the direction. As I say, I am very grateful to all who have spoken, but I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment 50 withdrawn.

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[Lord Moylan (Con)]

My Lords, we are now back on the Transport and Works Act. This clause relates to the holding of an inquiry when the powers of that Act are used. Since it will come up at some point later, it is worth reminding noble Lords, although I am sure they know all this, that for major construction works and infrastructure projects there are three methods available to a promoter for getting permission. One is planning permission from the local authority, and one—since 2008—is to go for a development consent order. When I say that there are three methods, there are really four, because there are also hybrid Bills. But there is also the intermediate thing of getting a Transport and Works Act order under that statute. In doing so, of course, one almost inevitably impinges on the property rights of others, so the possibility of having objectors and holding inquiries to examine those objectors must of necessity arise. That is the part of the Transport and Works Act that we are dealing with.

There are two things going on in the Bill, as far as I can make out. One is that it is currently the case that, if somebody raises an objection, the Secretary of State may hold an inquiry or may appoint somebody to hear the objector. However, they do not have to appoint someone to hear that objector if the Secretary of State considers that the objection is frivolous or trivial. There is a seriousness test, if you like, before the Secretary of State is obliged to respond to the objection by appointing someone to hear it or, indeed, by holding an inquiry.

One of the things happening in the Bill is that that seriousness test is being changed so that it now has to be something considered “serious enough” by the Secretary of State—no longer the very low bar of frivolous or trivial, which are terms quite well understood in legal circles, I believe, and therefore testable objectively, to some extent. Now, it becomes an entirely subjective test on the part of the Secretary of State as to whether it is “serious enough”—enough for what? No definition is offered. This moves the balance of power away from the citizen and in favour of the promoter, who is very often the Government, in a way that deserves inquiry. That is what these amendments are intended to highlight and invite the Government to comment on.

In addition, there is the question of whether the Government have to hold an inquiry or appoint a person. At the moment, in the Transport and Works Act, they “may” do so, but with the rising of the seriousness test—if that is admitted—it seems to me that, if someone passes the seriousness test, it should say “must” hold an inquiry or appoint a person on the part of the Secretary of State. After all, if it is admitted that the objection is serious enough—again, enough for what?—surely it must follow that an inquiry or a hearing should take place. If we are going to have a different balance, I am trying, not unhelpfully, to get the right balance. It would be worth hearing what the Minister has in mind here, and whether there is any give on his part.

Finally, I turn to my Amendment 53L, which relates to what is, as far as I can make out, a new power for inspectors in relation to Transport and Works Act inquiries—not planning inquiries but specifically Transport and Works Act inquiries—to impose costs on those who appear. At least in the planning realm, with which I am more familiar, inspectors can indeed impose costs on one side or the other, and in some cases on both, but only if there is some sort of delinquency on their part that has caused damage and held up the inquiry, such as a failure to provide documents on time or not turning up at hearings, which create costs for the other side.

The inspector can hold a separate costs hearing and can, and does, impose costs. I think we would all agree that that is a sensible measure to try to minimise delinquency on the part of those attending hearings. But a general power to defray the costs of the inquiry could have a chilling effect on objectors. That may be the Government’s intention—it may be that the Government want only the well-heeled to be able to appear before inquiries. If so, it would be as well to say so. But, if not, this new power needs to be either removed or very severely moderated. With that, I beg to move.

[Lord Lucas (Con)]

My Lords, I very much support my noble friend in these amendments. This is not just something that is happening in this Bill; it is also going on in the Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill, where the Government are looking at the conditions under which a parent is allowed to complain about their treatment by a local authority. There seems to be a general move to restrict individuals’ access to setting something right when they feel they have been hard done by by the state and really making it quite difficult. In the case of the Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill, there are no criteria set out for the Secretary of State. The Secretary of State can just throw the thing in the bin without giving reasons, without doing anything. I hope we will manage to change that, but it is a big change in attitude and I am really interested to know what is going on in this Government, in that they want to change the relationship between the state and the citizen in that way.

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[Lord Moylan (Con)]

My Lords, I think many noble Lords—I am one of them—have general sympathy with the Government’s ambition to remove unnecessary obstacles to the approval of infrastructure projects, which is why one has tried to be as indulgent as possible in bringing forward amendments to their clauses. But in this case, it simply will not stand. It is an entirely circular definition to say that an inquiry will be held if the objection is serious enough to merit an inquiry. It is entirely self-defining; it tells us nothing whatever. It does not tell us anything objective about the seriousness required, as one of my amendments would set out. The Government will have to come back to this because, as it stands, it is completely unsustainable.

[Lord Lucas (Con)]

My Lords, before my noble friend withdraws his amendment, I have a question for the Minister. He said the definition needs to be fleshed out in due course. Under what powers in what Act will that fleshing out be done?

[Lord Hendy of Richmond Hill (Lab)]

I thank the noble Lord for his interjection. I will write to him after this Committee and set out some more detail.

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I know that in the past there were intentions for a plan to support the installation of hydrogen refuelling points, but we have always been slow to act. There needs to be progress to get us to green hydrogen if we can for this purpose, for trucks, but I do hope that we can use the intentions that are set out here to have an assessment of how we can get to a green energy transition for HGVs rapidly so that it not only encompasses the electric charging points but hydrogen refuelling access as well.

[Lord Lucas (Con)]

My Lords, I have Amendment 57C in this group, which proposes some alternative ways of solving the same problem, so I do not propose to go into it in great depth. The point of this debate is that this is something we should be moving to find a solution to because, although it us not particularly simple, it is not particularly difficult, either.

Many of us have come across simple cross-pavement charging arrangements, which people seem to be installing ad hoc. It would be a good idea if this became something that was regularised, because we want the street to be a properly controlled environment. On the other hand, we do not want to make it expensive or difficult for an individual householder to obtain what we intend to be a general provision. But, if we are looking at a system where a lot of people have this facility, we should also be looking at how we are going to manage parking in this space. There is not much good in having an electric charging facility if someone else has gone on holiday and left their van in the space you need to charge your vehicle. An efficient use of an electric charging system is that it is used by more than one person, so how will we enable householders to allow other people to charge in that space?

Neither of these are things with instant solutions, but, if we are looking ahead to a time where we all have electric vehicles—particularly people who live in flats or other arrangements where the parking outside the building is not going to be sufficient—how will we provide that? Can we provide it in a way which is better than the one we have at the moment, where, for one reason or another, mostly because it is provided by people who have no personal interest in the facility, the prices paid by people for on-street charging are very high? If someone has installed it for their own use, they are much less motivated to charge a huge price for someone else to use it. They are much more likely to say that any margin is a good margin. So I very much hope that we can look at democratising on-street charging. I am not saying it is easy, but I am saying it is something we need to make progress with.

[Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP)]

My Lords, as the noble Baroness, Lady Pidgeon, said, my noble friend Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb signed a number of amendments in this group, so while noble Lords will know that I do not normally speak on transport, I am speaking on my noble friend’s behalf this afternoon.

I begin with the very interesting comment of the noble Lord, Lord Lucas: the efficient use of a charger would mean it being used by more than one person. I would go rather further than that and say that what we want is an efficient use of cars: them being used by more than one person. The practical reality, of course, is that most cars spend the vast amount of their time stationary, occupying public space when they are parked on the road. Coming to an arrangement is where Amendment 66, tabled by the noble Lady Baroness, Lady Pidgeon, comes in, requiring

“local planning authorities in England to publish and regularly update a three-year electric vehicle charging infrastructure plan”.

That charging infrastructure plan would ideally very much look at that car club kind of model, which could potentially free up large amounts of space in our cities to be put to much better use than simply being occupied by a stationary vehicle 96% of the time—that is the last figure I saw of the amount of time that cars are stationary.

It should be noted that my noble friend did not sign any of the cross-pavement charging solutions. I know that Caroline Russell, the Green London Assembly member, would not forgive me if I did not make the point that, whatever we say about charging across the pavement, the first priority has to be pedestrians, particularly vulnerable pedestrians. We must make sure that anything that is installed or allowed does not create even greater difficulties, on what is already a very difficult streetscape on many occasions, for pedestrians, particularly vulnerable pedestrians, with wheelchairs, buggies et cetera. I note, perhaps declaring an interest, that when I was in Camden I would regularly try not to trip over the electric cable that my boss at the time trailed out of his house and across the pavement out to his car on the street. Because he was my boss, I was not quite allowed to do anything about it.

I want to focus mostly on Amendments 64 and 67, which are about heavy goods vehicles. This is a crucial issue for the environment and for public health. At the moment, fewer than 1% of new HGVs sold are electric, and there are 500,000 HGVs in the British fleet. At the moment, they are emitting the equivalent of 20 megatonnes of CO₂ equivalent per year—the same as 2 million homes. They are also particularly bad in terms of emissions of nitrogen oxides and particulate matter, which have very significant impacts on public health. That tends to particularly strike in poorer, more disadvantaged areas—think about the homes along busy main roads, which tend to be where people who already have poorer health live. There is also the point that EVs are much quieter, which has significant public health impacts, and they are also better to drive. One of the things we have in terms of HGVs is an ageing driving population, and something that is easier to drive is a significant issue there.

I also note that the Government currently have a plug-in truck grant, with a discount for those who purchase them of up to £25,000. There is a push there, and the Government are spending money on it, but what is lacking at the moment is the general charging infrastructure, and these two amendments seek to have a programme and to make sure that when new depots and other infrastructure is being built, they are covered. I note that at the moment there is still an issue about the speed of charging, but megawatt charging is on the way. When we come to later amendments that my noble friend also signed, we also have to think about the infrastructure of distribution of electricity, to make sure that it is able to cater to that very heavy demand. I think there are very strong arguments here for a concerted, planned and organised approach. What we have now is extremely ad hoc, and in far too many cases we are seeing people literally trailing a cord across the pavement, which is a really bad idea for all kinds of reasons.

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I speak also on behalf of my other noble friend Lady McIntosh of Pickering on her Amendment 62. Both my noble friends apologise for not being able to speak to their amendments directly. My noble friend Lady McIntosh wishes to have a debate about the smaller reservoirs required by local golf clubs and farms, for example, and to set out why she is in favour of building them to serve their needs. This is currently discouraged by the de minimis rules in the Reservoirs Act 1975. The rules and safety regulations are very onerous, and disproportionate to the risk posed. While my noble friend welcomes the review currently under way, we would like to inject a sense of urgency into that review, so that changes from legislation—most likely through regulations, rather than primary legislation—can follow. I beg to move.

[Lord Lucas (Con)]

My Lords, I have Amendment 61 in this group. Its purpose follows on from what my noble friend Lord Gascoigne said: namely, that we have not built a new reservoir for a long time. The intention of the amendment is to give the Government the power to change that—to make things happen.

I would hope that the existence of such a power would mean that things happen anyway, but we need the ability to shift things onwards and to get out of the situation we are building ourselves into. We want to put in another 1.5 million houses but have no way of supplying them with water, particularly in some bits of the country that would actually welcome additional houses. It is important to get over whatever the blockage is and it would be a good idea to give the Government a bit of dynamite to do this.

I am delighted that Tideway has come in on budget. Perhaps the noble Lord could introduce whoever is responsible for that to whoever is responsible for the doors here.

[Baroness Grender (LD)]

My Lords, as we consider the challenge of water security, we all feel the urgency. Demand is rising, our climate is changing and not a single new major reservoir has been completed in over three decades, as we have already heard. Yet pursuing a one-size-fits-all solution rarely serves us well, especially regarding water storage and distribution. I particularly thank the noble Lords, Lord Gascoigne and Lord Lucas, for inspiring this discussion and debate.

There is consensus on building new reservoirs, but this cannot be done in isolation. Proper investment from water companies is essential, particularly in tackling leaks and improving demand management so that we use water more wisely, even as we boost supply. This is not either/or; it must be both. Yesterday, in the Statement regarding the Independent Water Commission, the full implication of the broken infrastructure that has led to so much water going to waste was laid down very clearly.

It is tempting to focus on grand, large-scale projects, but we should make space for smaller, locally led interventions that reflect the needs and fabric of our communities. Alongside ambitious infrastructure, a programme of carefully sited small and medium reservoirs, delivered in partnership with farmers, landowners and councils, can speed up progress, reduce environmental barriers and, most importantly, engage local people. We have heard not just from experts but from communities themselves that local schemes such as Slow the Flow projects, natural dams and catchment-based storage bring added benefit for flood mitigation and biodiversity, not just water supply. These nature-friendly solutions must be championed alongside larger reservoirs.

However local schemes alone are not enough. We must pair them with strategic national thinking. Regions with water surpluses should be able to support those facing deficit—a modern, integrated network for water transfer. I ask noble Lords to bear with me, because this is a little complicated. The National Infrastructure Commission, which was replaced by the National Infrastructure and Service Transformation Authority in April 2025, was praised by the National Audit Office for its proposals, which constituted a positive cost-benefit case for establishing a network of strategic transfers of water—a transfer system that enables us to balance supply across the country, smoothing out regional disparities and providing resilience against drought and flooding. The recent Commons Library briefing, Future Water Resources, highlights several proposed intercompany transfers, such as Thames Water to Southern Water—120 megalitres a day—demonstrating that active steps can be and are already being undertaken. Alongside large and small reservoirs, these transfer schemes are truly integral to future-proofing our water supply and reducing the risk of shortages.

Turning to the amendments before us, Amendment 59, in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Coffey, proposes removing the size and complexity test for new water infrastructure to focus solely on the value for money test. But, as Ofwat’s current regulations set out, that test ensures that projects do not threaten a water company’s fundamental service to customers. Given the sector’s current state, we should tread carefully before removing this safeguard. A more prudent path may be to consider government co-funding models, such as that now being used for nuclear, if projects exceed what companies can realistically deliver and are in jeopardy of providing a poor or totally broken service—or further broken, should I say—to consumers.

Amendment 61, in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Lucas, would hand powers to the Secretary of State to dictate timelines and, crucially, permit bypassing planning controls. While there is much in the amendment that we read with interest, I worry in particular about proposed new subsection (3)(b), which is a significant centralisation of power. Yes, there has been an unacceptable delay in reservoir construction, but concentrating such powers is unlikely to foster better outcomes. Proper local engagement, as we all made very clear in our Second Reading speeches, and scrutiny need to be balanced and are vital partners to each other.

Amendment 62, tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh of Pickering, aligns more closely with the objectives on these Benches. I look forward to hearing the Minister’s response to the compelling arguments that were made on the noble Baroness’s behalf.

Above all, we must ensure that interventions, whether mighty reservoirs or smaller, community-scale schemes, work for people and for nature, and are delivered with transparency, accountability and genuine urgency. I hope the Minister will clarify the Government’s support for small reservoirs and for a robust water transfer network, so that every region and every customer in every region can feel protected, valued and heard.

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[Earl Russell (LD)]

My Lords, I really appreciate this amendment being tabled and the manner and the style in which it was presented. I welcome the noble Lord’s comments and speeches in this space.

Amendment 60 requires guidance around the planting of trees on highways to be issued within six months of the Act coming into force. As the noble Lord said, this does not require great expense. We feel that it is a helpful, useful measure. I absolutely agree with the noble Lord that this is not about development versus nature. Actually, we need both, and both need to be conjoined and considered together, because we, as people who live in the new developments, who need to thrive and not just survive, need these things to work. They are better for all of us. They reduce health inequalities, they make us happier and healthier, and they make our lives more pleasant.

One example came to my mind on this: the work that was done on the upgrade to the A14 between Cambridge and Huntingdon, which opened in 2020. As part of the upgrade programme, 850,000 saplings were planted by the Highways Agency. Unfortunately, it was done in extreme heat and in poor soils, as a result of which three-quarters of the trees—roughly half a million—that the Highways Agency planted died. They are being replanted, at a cost of £2.9 million, which raises an issue about how we replant nature. Again, I do not want to go into Part 3, but there are obviously issues with trying to replicate nature or move nature from one place to another, and this is a very stark example of that.

Going beyond that, local communities really got involved in this area and I want to thank them, because people went out and planted trees themselves, cared for and nurtured them, and did a great job in trying to put right some of the mess. Some of the trees that were planted were the wrong types of trees; they did not have enough soil around them, so they dried out; the soil they were planted in was bad; the saplings were too young—generally it was not very well done and the trees that were planted were not cared for and nurtured. What tends to happen is that there is a concentration on numbers—it is a numbers game. Every party had a tree-planting commitment in its manifesto—“My tree-planting commitment is bigger than yours”—and that is not what we need. We need trees to be cared for and nurtured.

I suggest politely to the Government that they should focus not on numbers planted but the numbers in five years’ time. How many trees, five years after the planting, actually survive and are counted? If there are not enough, more planting should be done. Trees are really important. This is a valuable opportunity for the Government to look at the strategies and for us to have a broader look at how we do this. So I really welcome this amendment.

[Lord Lucas (Con)]

My Lords, I very much support my noble friend’s amendment and the speeches that have been made. Getting good guidance published makes a lot of difference. There are always reasons why a local developer or authority will not do what is best. One can hope that a big authority would have good practices; our big local authority has decided to mow all its wildflower verges in the middle of June—sigh.

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[Lord Lucas (Con)]

My Lords, I very much support Amendments 63 and 106 in this group. I will speak fearlessly to them, because my noble friend Lord Moylan has already put the WD-40 on my set of thumbscrews as a result of previous amendments.

It is entirely sensible to put solar panels in places where there is the immediate local demand for electricity when it is sunny. When it is sunny, our trains are running. To have solar panels along rail infrastructure supplies a demand which is entirely local. When the sun is out in a serious way, the rail consumes extra electricity in keeping the carriages cool, so it is an entirely sensible place to put them.

Car parks are excellent places to charge your car. They are usually next to supermarkets or other similar places that are using electricity in the daytime. If we are going to generate solar electricity, this is an entirely appropriate place to do it.

I would go further than this: I would allow local authorities to have local schemes to encourage solar on all commercial roofs and would allow them to increase the level of business rates payable on roofs that do not have solar. It is ridiculous when you stand on hills above Eastbourne and look at a couple of hundred hectares of commercial estates and there are no solar panels whatever on any of them, but they are all using electricity in the daytime. The difficulties arise from fractured ownership and lease patterns. It is not easy to do, but, if we can produce a substantial incentive that basically says to businesses, “You can either generate some solar in this space or you can pay into a fund to help us to do other things elsewhere”, and if the payment is sufficiently high, I think we will get a move to solar, and that would be a good idea.

The alternative is a large solar farm on an ancient marsh in the middle of town. That would be entirely destructive in visual terms and not at all helpful in terms of wildlife and the environment generally. It would be much better if we could have the same size of solar farm on land that is already developed and entirely suitable for it. But we have not got the right structures in place in government to enable that, and I would really like to see that changed.

[Lord Khan of Burnley (Lab)]

My Lords, before I speak to these amendments, I declare my registered interests, including shareholdings in companies involved in renewable energy. These interests are not directly affected by the amendments under discussion. I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Pidgeon, for tabling and speaking to these amendments so eloquently and passionately, and for her ongoing commitment to the UK’s decarbonisation ambitions in the transport sector.

Amendments 63 and 106 seek to mandate the installation of solar panels in the construction of new transport infrastructure and require solar panels to be provided as part of the construction of all new above-ground car parks. The Government are committed to achieving clean power by 2030, and it is clear that solar energy will be crucial to achieving our mission. The clean power action plan calls for the rapid acceleration of solar deployment, from around 18 gigawatts as of April 2025 to 45 to 47 gigawatts by 2030. This is an ambitious mission, which has enormous potential to create good jobs, protect bill payers, ensure energy security and reduce our exposure to volatile fossil fuel markets. The recently published Solar Roadmap includes over 70 actions for government and industry to take forward to help deliver this ambition by removing barriers to deployment of all types of solar.

We recognise that solar canopies on car parks have the potential to provide significant renewable electricity generation, shelter for cars and drivers, and localised power for EV charging points. This year, the Government published a call for evidence to assess the potential to drive the construction of solar canopies on new outdoor car parks over a certain size.

We are currently analysing the evidence that has been provided by the sector, and are conducting the essential cost-benefit analysis needed to understand the impact of any policy to mandate the provision of solar on new car parks. Having not yet concluded this process, it would not be appropriate at this stage to include this amendment in the Bill. However, the Government are considering this proposal very carefully and will explore ways to achieve its intention, including through future legislation, if the evidence supports this conclusion.

It is also the case that we do not currently have the evidence base to support requiring all transport infrastructure to include solar panel installation. We have not yet engaged with industry to fully understand the potential impact of this amendment, or conducted the necessary cost-benefit analysis to determine whether it would be appropriate to install solar on all the different types of transport infrastructure set out in the amendment.

The Government are committed to achieving their mission through significant solar deployment across the country. Following the publication of the road map, the solar council will be established to bring together the solar industry, the UK Government and other relevant parties. The council will work to secure, enable and accelerate the deployment of solar at all scales and identify emerging opportunities, realigning priorities and action as needed.

I hope that the noble Baroness, Lady Pidgeon, notes the ongoing work the Government are doing in this area, which must conclude before any consideration of a legislative intervention takes place. I therefore kindly ask her to withdraw her amendment.

On Amendment 68, also tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Pidgeon, the Government recognise the importance of accelerating grid connections for electricity demand projects, including electric vehicle charging, as well as for generation projects. This recognition lies at the heart of the reforms we announced in the industrial strategy, which include using the powers in the Bill to amend regulatory processes and accelerate connections for strategically important projects.

Although the Government fully acknowledge the critical role of freight and logistics in national supply chain security and decarbonisation targets, it would not be prudent to enshrine in legislation a preference for one sector, as this would inevitably mean deprioritising equally important sectors listed in the industrial strategy, such as advanced manufacturing, the wider supply chain for clean energy projects, data centres, and more.

That is why we have also announced the connections accelerator service, which will support strategically important projects across all priority sectors to accelerate their connection dates. The Department for Transport will play a key role in helping to shape the framework for identifying these vital projects.

I also take this opportunity to highlight the suite of initiatives the Government are pursuing in support of the electrification of freight, logistics and the broader transport sector. This includes our ongoing efforts in national and regional strategic energy planning. We are working to support infrastructure investment ahead of need, ensuring that we not merely react to but anticipate demand. By planning strategically, we can deliver robust, future-proofed infrastructure, and support our broader decarbonisation and economic ambitions.

Furthermore, the Department for Transport is actively encouraging stakeholders in the transport sector to look ahead, to consider their future electricity needs and to feed this information directly into our strategic planning processes. By doing so, we will create a more comprehensive and responsive energy network that is able to meet the evolving requirements of our nation’s transport system.

I also highlight the work of the Freight Energy Forum. Led by the Department for Transport, this forum brings together transport and energy stakeholders from across the country, providing a platform for knowledge-sharing and collaboration. By working closely together, we can inform future action and ensure that the sector remains agile and well-equipped for an electrified future.

I trust that the Committee will appreciate the rationale for our approach and recognise the Government’s determination to deliver balanced, strategic and forward-looking energy infrastructure for the nation. The noble Baroness, Lady Pidgeon, mentioned a number of countries, as did the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett. The noble Baroness cited the French Government in particular. The potential for solar canopies on car parks is significant, and we are looking carefully at international best practice, including what France has introduced. Before committing to any prospective policy, including mandating, we believe it right to properly engage with industry and stakeholders to better understand the impacts and see whether government intervention is needed.

Noble Lords alluded to a couple of points about deploying solar on rail lines and roads. Rail track solar could be a feasible solution, particularly in urban areas where the track is electrified, as there will already be a good connection. However, there are some current obstacles that may inhibit the deployment of the technology in all areas, such as the challenge of grid connections in rural areas and additional kit required to convert electricity from solar to usable electricity for trains, which may be expensive.

Finally, the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, talked about car parks and agricultural land. This Government are committed to a solar revolution that enhances energy security while protecting the UK’s biodiversity and agricultural spaces. Car parks indeed offer an opportunity to utilise vast spaces for solar generation, but we must engage with industry and gather a broader evidence base to overcome the potential structural and financial barriers to widespread use of solar canopies. For the reasons outlined previously, I kindly ask the noble Baroness to withdraw her amendment.

Planning and Infrastructure Bill

Lord Lucas Excerpts

Committee stage
Monday 1st September 2025 Lords Chamber

[Earl Russell (LD)]

My Lords, the amendments in this group are all on the extension of permitted development. My Amendment 77 concerns the extension of permitted development rights for low-voltage electricity networks. It intends to help this Government achieve their ambition of a clean, affordable and secure energy system by 2030.

The amendment would enable clearly defined and modest upgrades to be treated as permitted development. That includes the upgrading of electricity lines from single to three-phase, the alteration of conduct type, modest increases in pole height where required by regulation, the temporary placement of lines to facilitate works and the reinforcement of existing apparatus such as pole-mounted transformers.

This is not a revolution; it is about pragmatism. These are modest technical improvements that would make our national grid fit for the 21st century. This is not about new infrastructure on green fields. This is needed simply because our electricity network, built decades ago, is fundamentally ill-equipped for the task required of it. I am increasingly worried about the capacity of the low-voltage grid and the investment in it. This is needed to bring electricity to our homes and to ensure that we can make the transitions we need to make—having electric vehicles and installing heat pumps to help us hit our clean-power targets.

At present, these modest network upgrades face planning processes that can take months and sometimes even years, often longer than building the relevant generation plant itself. That results in higher costs and, in some cases, stranded investment. Companies across the energy sector report the same difficulties: planning bottlenecks, slow permissions and land-acquisition rules that lag behind those of gas, water and telecoms. That is not right; there should be a level playing field for these things.

Without reform, costs for paying for clean generators to turn down because the grid cannot handle their power could soar from £2 billion a year today to £8 billion by the end of the decade. These costs are absorbed by companies and passed on to bill payers, who face higher bills. We need to get this stuff done and it needs to work. It takes a series of minor but essential upgrades and technical adjustments to equipment, not new developments, and relieves them of lengthy planning processes. Nothing in this amendment would reduce safety. Electricity safety, quality and continuity regulations remain firmly in place under Section 37 of the Electricity Act 1989, which still governs overhead powerline consents. The safeguards endure. What would change is that we would no longer require the full machinery of a planning inquiry simply to raise a pole by a few feet or to replace a conductor with a modern equivalent.

The benefits are clear. First, it would speed up bureaucracy and get things moving. Secondly, it would lower costs and avoid delays. Thirdly, it would help us achieve our climate and renewable targets. Fourthly, it would provide us with security and resilience in the system and help get electricity to our front doorsteps, where we need it. This amendment would also require consultation on further measures, ensuring that where wider reforms are proposed, the public and stakeholders are fully engaged. I am not asking for a blank cheque here; this is a carefully drafted step forward. The Government have said that this Bill is central to their plan for clean power by 2030, and we agree. This amendment is modest and seeks to help unlock the arteries to make sure that electricity can be delivered.

As I have said, this is slightly complicated because it is a shopping list of very minor improvements. But it reminds me of the approach of British Cycling, which found that a number of very small incremental differences, if implemented as a philosophy, made huge fundamental strides and gains in its ability to win and achieve its goals. The same is true with these amendments. More importantly, these are reforms and changes that DNOs and wider industry bodies are calling for, and that they say they need to achieve clean power. This is about making sure that they can do what they signed up to do to help secure more investment and get things moving.

As I am opening this group, I will circle back to the other amendments at the end. I do not want to speak to other people’s amendments before they have introduced them.

[Lord Lucas (Con)]

My Lords, I have tabled Amendment 185B, and I completely agree with the noble Earl on his amendment. I have tabled amendments on permitted development elsewhere in this Bill. It is a hugely important part of getting planning right. The Government should take some courageous decisions on what delays we do not need. What do we recognise that we have to do and how do we allow people to get on with it? Getting an efficient transmission network is something we absolutely need to do.

Moving a transmission pole may upset someone locally, but it is part of a national need. That it should be delayed, that people should take huge amounts of time on whether it should be here or there or whether an extra prop to a pole should be allowed, is just ridiculous. I am very sorry that we have allowed this to accumulate over the years. I am delighted to find the Liberal Democrats in support of reducing regulation; long may this continue. This is a really constructive way forward.

I have added the idea that we ought to allow a bit more freedom for wind generation. When I grew up, it was common to see agricultural windmills—those galvanised towers with clanking blades—all over the rural landscape. They provided power of a kind, type and price which suited the local conditions.

I remember when land wind turbines were introduced, and we all thought that they would be horrid, would desecrate the landscape and that it would be miserable, but we are used to them now—they are part of everybody’s landscape, just about. If we do not overdo it, I think that we have a reasonable basis for saying that we should experiment on allowing people to put these down for local need to generate electricity where it is needed and in a way that it is needed. It will not get done unless there is a commercial requirement for it, but we should look at freeing up the restrictions that we have placed on people putting up wind turbines and ask what is really needed here. Have we not learned enough to allow us to free this up a bit?

[Baroness Coffey (Con)]

My Lords, I will speak to Amendment 94E, but I start with Amendment 77 and simply say that I completely agree with the noble Earl, Lord Russell. We are not talking about the horrific, huge pylons; these are quite simple, and it makes much more sense to make it as straightforward as possible to up the energy locally.

I say to my noble friend Lord Lucas that there already are, I think, permitted development rights for turbines to the level that he suggests. I suggest that the permitted development right is solely for a single turbine, and I note that his amendment refers to “turbines”. I would not want this to be a back door to having significant numbers of wind farms on a variety of land, if he were to press this any further.

The reason my amendment is in this group is that also has to do with permitted development rights, regarding solar. We will debate solar today under other parts of this legislation, but this amendment seeks to try to get permitted development rights for solar on reservoirs. There are certain reservoirs, some very close to London, where sometimes a bit of sailing happens but, by and large, they sit there empty. Important as these reservoirs are for the water supply that we need, this would be quite a straightforward way of allowing for a modest amount of solar extension, which may only be that which is needed for the local facility, or perhaps a little further. I would not suggest that any would have to have an automatic connection to the grid, because that would probably be exceptionally expensive. The point is that, if we are going to increase the amount of renewable energy, why not allow reservoir owners to put this sort of solar development somewhere we are not then displacing agricultural land and where it does not require the huge extensions or connections that we see today right across agricultural land all over the country?

Floating solar is apparently seen as a nascent technology in the solar road map, so has not really been included in this Bill. I am conscious that we have read in the press this summer that there might be a second planning Bill, but I suggest to the Government that they should carpe diem. Why do we not get on and get this sort of permitted development right? Elsewhere in the Bill, I have suggested an easier way to try to include reservoirs and large ponds. In fact, the Secretary of State for Defra, Steve Reed, has been very specific in some of the open meetings that he has had that it needs to be easier for farmers to be able to access reservoirs and have them on their land. From my perspective, this could be a double win.

The other aspect that people may not be aware of with regard to the benefit of floating solar on reservoirs is that it could potentially help boost water security. One of the things with reservoirs is that it is not just about usage and them being drained ineffectively; it is also about evaporation levels, which means that we start to see a significant reduction in how much water is available. By simply having these solar panels, we can have a physical barrier between the water and the sun.

It is suggested that it is possible that such development could boost biodiversity on reservoir sites. Any opportunity that we can take, in a mutually beneficial way, to boost nature as well as energy resilience is something that I would hope that the Government could consider.

I understand that the UK is home to Europe’s largest floating solar farm, on the QEII reservoir, and I know there has been a bit of on and off, literally, about how effective it has been. Nevertheless, it is important that we consider all opportunities to make sure, at very limited or ideally no cost to the bill payer, that we maximise the amount of energy that is directly available to us.

On energy security rolling forward, trying to get more homegrown electricity is key. That is why I hope the Government will look at this carefully and consider the benefits of permitted development rights for floating solar on our reservoirs.

--- Later in debate ---

[Earl Russell (LD)]

In this group on the Forestry Commission’s actions and duties, I will speak briefly to my Amendment 88 and in support of Amendment 93, which was tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Krebs, and spoken to by the noble Baroness, Lady Young. I support pretty much all of the amendments in this group. This has been an interesting conversation on not only the role and development of the Forestry Commission but its relationship with hosting energy, including what safeguards and protections need to happen as we go down that road and what our forests will look like in the future under climate change.

My amendment is designed to put in place some safeguards on the new powers granted to the appropriate forestry authorities for energy generation, transmission and storage on public forestry land. At the heart of all this is a balance between what we do to hit our climate and nature change duties and what we must do not to further damage our ecology and biodiversity. It is fine to make use of our forests for these things, but it must not have detrimental impacts. That is what I have tried to balance in my amendment.

The commission gains unprecedented powers to host and sell energy from renewable installations on land under its management. Yet, when I looked at Clause 28, there were no clear legal protections for most precious habitats. My worry is that, without such safeguards, we will see renewable energy infrastructure sited in ways that harm our ancient woodlands, our carbon rich peatlands and other priority habitats that the Government have a duty to protect, particularly under our 30 by 30 biodiversity targets.

I am looking for a reasonable balance between timber production and nature conservation. That reasonable balance is in the Bill, but what does it mean? It is not purely defined in the Bill, which was also a worry for me. In response to that, my amendment tries to take a pragmatic way forward. I note the issue raised by the noble Baronesses, Lady Young and Lady Bennett, about the percentages. My amendment says that no more than 2% of all Forestry Commission land and no more than 5% of any individual site could be given to energy storage and development. I will go away and look at that. At the moment, there is no cap on that at all. Noble Lords may not agree with my percentages but putting a percentage in the amendment is a whole lot better than having no percentages in there at all; however, I will go away and look at whether there is another way in which that might be done.

This issue is particularly acute in our national parks and where our national parks and Forestry Commission land co-exist; in the New Forest, that is 47%, while, in Northumberland, it is 15%. These are treasured landscapes. Energy development must be proportionate, consistent with statutory park purposes, subject to democratic oversight, not impacting on leisure facilities and making sure that our national parks authorities have some say in and control over these things. These are important matters.

My amendment does not seek to reject the role of using Forestry Commission land to help with our energy; it just seeks to put some safeguards on that. I will go away and consider my amendment. This debate has been useful for me, and I will reflect on this, but there need to be more safeguards in the Bill—of that I am still certain. I would be very happy to work with the Minister between now and Report to see whether there are ways in which we could do that together; that would be welcome.

This has already been discussed in detail but, turning briefly to Amendment 93, I have supported the Private Member’s Bill brought forward by the noble Lord, Lord Krebs, at every stage of its passage through the House. It is absolutely essential that we update our climate change legislation. In the last debate on his Bill, I said that it was the equivalent to the Government being the general and knowing what the military strategy was but failing to tell any of their own troops. The Government need to work with all these public bodies. These things are so pressing and so complicated. The Government are holding on to all this stuff and not passing the orders down and empowering others, including the public bodies. The Forestry Commission owns 5% of all public land. It needs a duty to enhance and meet our climate change and biodiversity targets; it is silly that it does not have that.

I am sorry. I am a little buoyed up having come through the Crown Estate Bill and the Great British Energy Bill, where we managed to work with Ministers and get such provisions added to the Bills. It is on my agenda to do that in this Bill; that makes sense. I would like to work with the Minister, but it is a minimum for me that a similar amendment to the ones in those Bills is added to this Bill. If the Government want to make use of forestry land for energy generation, that is fine, but with that comes some responsibilities; those responsibilities include that this duty should added.

[Lord Lucas (Con)]

My Lords, I very much approve of what the Government are doing in this clause. I think they should go a bit further. I want to illustrate this in the context of the challenges faced by southern broadleaved woodlands, which existed for many centuries as places of industry. People made things there; a lot of products came out of it. The whole biodiversity of that ecosystem comes out of a continuous pattern of use. It is interesting to see, for instance with NEP, how little biodiversity is left in the woodland when the woodland ceases to be of value. All the biodiversity there, which is considerable, has moved outside. Our woodland biodiversity is important.

The Government should be organising themselves, and the Forestry Commission, so that we can see a restoration of a commercial purpose to the southern broadleaved woodlands, particularly in England. We cannot at the moment rely on forestry. All the species that we used to grow in profusion have no big current use. Our neighbouring forest in Eastbourne was planted to beech 100 years ago. When they are felling it now, 100 year-old trees are going to firewood. There is no market now for really high-quality beech.

In the small wood that I own, oak is the main crop. We have acute oak decline coming in now. You are asked to wait 100 years for oak. If it is all going to rot away before then, there is no outlet. We really need a system that can take general wood output—branches, brash, thinnings, uneconomic trees—and turn it into something useful. The outlet available at the moment is energy.

The Forestry Commission is hugely important in this as it has a breadth of organisation and understanding, whereas the ownership of woodland tends to be extremely fragmented in the south. It can bring a lot in motivating, organising, inspiring and controlling when it comes to looking after biodiversity principles.

I am very pleased to see the direction in which the Government are moving here. My understanding is that this clause is written in a way that allows the Forestry Commission to work with partners in achieving its objectives; it does not have to do everything itself. However, I urge the Government to make one change to this: not just to look at renewable power but to look at renewable feedstocks for industry.

If we are to replace oil as the feedstock for our chemical industry, we need to go after every available source of concentrated carbon, and woods produce quite a lot of that. In looking at the powers that Forestry Commission has under the Bill—there are already young British companies using wood products to produce jet fuel and similar things—we need to add that extra aspect: not just renewable energy, but renewable feedstocks for industry.

[Lord Roborough (Con)]

My Lords, the amendments in this group speak to the vital role of our nation’s forests in delivering both environmental and societal benefits. As I begin, I refer the Committee to my registered interests, in particular as a forest owner and as a developer of new forestry and woodlands.

Turning first to Amendment 87, in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Teverson, I recognise its thoughtful intent. It seeks to ensure that public forestry resources are not disproportionately used to supply large-scale biomass operations. We are sympathetic to the amendment’s aims and to many of the comments made in this short debate. The responsible management of public woodland must prioritise environmental protection and long-term sustainability, but the picture is complex. Biomass plays a role in our renewable energy mix, and there may be cases, such as thinning or disease control, where repurposing woodland material is practical and sustainable.

This is ultimately a question of balance. I ask the Minister to outline how existing safeguards ensure that public forestry will not be placed under undue pressure from commercial biomass demand. I also note, as my noble friend Lord Lucas pointed out, that the overwhelming use of felled broadleaves is currently for home heating. Without the wood-burning market, mature forestry economics are undermined in these situations. It would be a shame to lose that incentive for managing our native broadleaf plantations and natural woodland.

Planning and Infrastructure Bill

Lord Lucas Excerpts

Committee stage
Thursday 4th September 2025 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

I come back to the point I made that if an applicant applies to the Secretary of State, a planning inspector would consider the case and then advise the Minister or the Secretary of State who was taking the decision. Planning inspectors are highly qualified and highly trained. Regarding the training of Ministers, we have access to bespoke training. I have undertaken some training. Because we have to operate within the Ministerial Code and planning propriety guidance, when we are making decisions we have a different call on us from that in local planning committees.

[Lord Lucas (Con)]

My Lords, my noble friend Lord Fuller does not need to keep the Minister on her feet. This being Committee stage, he has the right to speak as many times as he likes.

I encourage the Minister to take further the last sentiments she expressed in the context of the amendment from the noble Lord, Lord Lansley, and the words spoken by the noble Earl, Lord Lytton. It is important that we do something to increase the status of planning officials in local government. I have observed the effect that having chief scientific advisers in government departments has had on science and the way it is regarded within ministries. Over time it has had a really salutary effect. Having a chief planner, someone with that name and status, would be a good way of working back, providing status to the planning profession and making sure, as the noble Earl, Lord Lytton, said, that we get a collection of people who understand the limits of their knowledge and the advice that they are given and that the public trust them in that regard.

As a small contribution to that, I have tabled an amendment to the Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill to try to rescue level 7 apprenticeships. If the Minister was able to have a word in the ear of her colleague, the noble Baroness, Lady Smith, to encourage her to give a positive response to that, that might solve a range of problems, not only for planning but for other professions where level 7 is an important qualification. The point that my noble friend Lord Fuller made about the importance of taking people who have entered the profession at the technician level and upskilling them to professionals is an important part of a healthy society.

Lastly, I associate the qualities of determination and optimism with the Minister, but does she really believe that we will get to Amendment 135? If she is wavering in that belief, it would be a great help to noble Lords, when the Government realise they might fall short, if they could tell us so that those of us who have amendments late in the day might find an opportunity for more time with our families.

[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

To take the noble Lord’s last point first, my optimism and determination is to get to Amendment 135, but we shall see. I hope I have reassured him on the point about continuing to reflect on the issues around chief planning officers. I think I already responded to the noble Lord, Lord Lansley, on that, so I hope that reassures him.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Howard of Rising (Con)]

My Lords, Amendment 346DB in my name is a probing amendment to debate what can be done to get rid of the absurd rules relating to bats—I am resisting calling them “batty”. The legislation is complex, but that does not alter the need for something to be done to get rid of the present insanity.

There are no bats in the United Kingdom of the type that is threatened with extinction, so there is no harm or danger to them; you cannot damage something that does not exist. There are some types that are close to being endangered, but there are abundant quantities of these types in other countries throughout the world. If the existing legislation were got rid of, there would be no danger to the world’s bat population. In short, legislation to preserve bats is unnecessary.

I will give two examples of the absurdities caused by the present legislation. Your Lordships will have read of the first, which my noble friend Lord Fuller referred to—the £100 million bat tunnel built during the construction of HS2. At a time of appalling government finances, it is scarcely credible to spend £100 million in this way.

[Lord Lucas (Con)]

My Lords, does my noble friend realise that we could have had 10 front doors for that price?

[Lord Howard of Rising (Con)]

I am very grateful for the intervention. It makes the world of Alice in Wonderland look normal and sensible, and that also applies to the front door.

My second example is on a smaller scale. With the support and blessing of English Heritage, I recently purchased and pulled down a particularly ugly and inappropriate 1960s chalet-style house adjacent to Castle Rising Castle, which is a listed monument, in order to replace the horror with cottages built in the traditional local stone. This was a project for the greater good that, fingers crossed, might have just broken even. That was before the bat people got involved.

An inspection took place to check whether there was any trace of bats in the house. There was no evidence of bats, but that was not good enough for the bat people. I was made to take off the roof, tile by tile, so that a bat person could inspect each tile as it was taken off. This was despite the inspection having shown there was no trace of bats. To get to the roof in safety, the building had to be scaffolded, an absurdity for something about to be pulled down. It then took six men four weeks to remove each tile and show it to the bat person before the tile could be thrown away. Using machinery already on site would have taken one man half a day. I ask your Lordships: what sanity can there be in carrying on in this manner?

I have not even started on what the archaeologist wanted. I was made to dig down three metres, a metre below the two-metre foundations that were planned. At all stages, this had to be inspected by an archaeologist, with men and machinery having to wait for the archaeologist to find time. Your Lordships can guess what that cost.

As a country, we have managed to get to a situation where the greater good is being destroyed by the antics of minority interests, which can look at things only from their own—in many cases laudable, maybe, but very narrow—perspectives. How can any Government expect houses to be built with the enormous difficulties that builders have to contend with? I have mentioned only two. Let us start on the road to sanity by repealing all legislation relating to the preservation of the bat population. They will not disappear; they will still be around centuries after the legislation has been repealed.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Jackson of Peterborough (Con)]

My Lords, I contribute briefly to this debate to strongly support my noble friend on the Front Bench in her excellent amendments, both in respect of houses in multiple occupation and of hotels being converted to hostels.

I mention the specific case, in my own former constituency of Peterborough, of the Dragonfly Hotel in the west of Peterborough, which is a very pleasant residential area. Last November, without any consultation, the Home Office moved in 146—disproportionately male—asylum seekers. I raised the issue with the Home Office Minister, the noble Lord, Lord Hanson, earlier this year and he gave an undertaking that, henceforth, there would be better communication. Even the Labour Members of Parliament for the Peterborough area had cause to criticise the process of moving—decanting—those asylum seekers into the Dragonfly Hotel. The two Labour MPs, Sam Carling of North West Cambridgeshire and Andrew Pakes of Peterborough, said that

“the Dragonfly is the wrong hotel, in the wrong location and bad for Peterborough and nearby residents”.

There has been no indication of when it will cease to be used. They went on:

“We are a welcoming city but are playing more than our part already”.


The context of that is that there had been no attempt to speak to the Labour-led city council, adult social services, children’s services, the police or NHS primary care.

The context that we need to think about is that, hitherto, the planning process has been well recognised as a form of governance that works in this country. We have local development plans, we have county structure plans and—for those who really have nothing better to do with their time—we have mineral plans. I know that this is all meat and drink to my noble friend Lord Banner. The point is that it is a well-established idea that, where there is significant change in planning and development, particularly in urban development, there is a process of proper consultation between stakeholders and those affected. It might be informal discussions between planning officers and local residents or it might be a formal committee, but there is a process where people are invited to comment.

With any decision to significantly change and impact the residential amenity of a local area and people’s quality of life in that area, particularly where—as in the case of the Bell Hotel—there are a significant number of schools and young people in the area, there will be some legitimate concerns. No one is saying that all asylum seekers are criminals or are likely to be criminals but, when you bring forward very significant local change, you will cause concern.

I think a form of governance, a piece of primary legislation that obliges that information to be put in the public domain, is sensible and would prevent people listening to extreme points of view in pursuit of their particular political agenda. That is why I think that this amendment is sensible.

The noble Lord, Lord Teverson, can criticise as much as he likes. Let us hear the Liberal Democrats’ view on this and what they would do. It is very easy to criticise and put it on a focus leaflet in the opportunistic way that the Liberal Democrats do; it is much tougher, as this Government are finding and the previous Government found, to be in government, because politics is to choose and to make tough decisions—something that the Liberal Democrats are unfortunately not very used to.

My noble friend Lady Scott makes a very sensible point about accountability, transparency and clarity in the local community. If in future we are to avoid the social dislocation, violence and anger that we have seen in Epping Forest in the last few months, transparency will do that. It will allow people to have their say. It will allow their elected representatives to have an opportunity to properly represent them and ventilate their concerns, and I think that will be all to the good. The Government would be wise to do it, because they are now looking at some policies that we would have pursued. I think they are trying to tackle this issue in a sincere way. We on this side are offering these amendments as a way to ameliorate the issues because we know it is necessary so to do.

[Lord Lucas (Con)]

My Lords, if I may return briefly to the main subject of bats, I do not at all agree with my noble friend Lord Howard of Rising that bats are unimportant. They are absolutely part of nature. Nature in this country is hugely depleted and we need a lot more bats, but the lesson I draw from his story is that for all his huge expenditure, no bats benefited whatever. Nothing that he was made to do benefited bats in any way whatever. It is an entirely wrong-headed way of going about things. What we want is a lot more bats. If we had made my noble friend pay a few thousand pounds to make spaces for bats elsewhere in his estate, I am sure he would have done so with pleasure.

[Lord Howard of Rising (Con)]

There is no need. The castle provides a home to endless bats.

[Lord Lucas (Con)]

I think the Government recognise this both in the later parts of this Bill and indeed in what they have done with offshore wind. They recognise that offshore wind will kill a number of sea-birds and that compensation must be made for that.

What we need in this country is a lot more nature. That will take a good chunk of money. It is ridiculous to have a system that just spaffs that money away. We ought to be taking the opportunity of bats, which are pretty mobile creatures. In nature, bats live in cracks in trees. Trees fall down all the time and the bats just move home. We are worrying about bats in a completely ridiculous way. We are wasting huge sums of money and we must stop.

[Baroness Coffey (Con)]

My Lords, Clause 51 may look innocuous, but I am concerned that it is removing the effect of democracy. National democracy is imposing its will against the will of the local people. I was reflecting on when in 2013 I was on the Bill Committee for the Growth and Infrastructure Bill, now Act. The House of Commons Committee sat for seven days on a Bill of 28 clauses. This Bill went through the Commons in seven days, with 97 clauses being considered. That is why it is important that this House takes the appropriate time. Interestingly, back then the Lords sat for only five days on the Growth and Infrastructure Bill, with the Commons having done a much more thorough job, and that is something for us to think about.

On Clause 51, I was struck by what the Minister said to me on the previous group when I had specifically singled out issues that went against the local plan. The Government’s guide to the Planning and Infrastructure Bill on GOV.UK specifically says that controversial decisions should be done by planning committee and that the best way for councillors and local communities to be involved is in the creation of the local plan—I am paraphrasing slightly. Local plans are not created every four years—sometimes it feels as if they take more than four years to create, although they should not—so I was somewhat surprised when the Minister said that planning applications not in line with the local plan are not necessarily always controversial, so we should not worry about them and allow officers to make that decision. I would love to hear some examples of planning applications that are not consistent with the local plan and have not then been controversial.

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I conclude by observing that the remaining amendments in this group, which I have hardly mentioned, are destined to ensure that digital twins will be used in every relevant context.

[Lord Lucas (Con)]

My Lords, it is nice to see amity break out across the Committee after the previous group. I imagine a digital twin of the House of Lords would get to Amendment 135 by 7 pm.

Digital twins offer such an ability for local councils and their officers and members, and members of the public, to really get to grips with a plan. Otherwise, you are presented with something static that is really hard to change. It is just, “Shall we push it through or shall we retreat?” With a digital twin you can adjust, look at different ways of doing it and absorb comments as they come through, at a really low cost, and arrive at a much more evolved, much better, solution at the end of it.

I urge the Government, given that digital twins are part of the industrial strategy, to use this as an example to develop the Government’s role as a partner/customer, as a way of helping new small businesses and technologies cut their teeth and get a worthwhile first contract or two out of the way, and not to stand back but be part of the development of a strong new British industry. There is an opportunity here to do that, particularly with the Government’s new town programme. I really hope they take it.

[Lord Cromwell (CB)]

My Lords, I endorse completely the speeches by the noble Baroness, Lady Miller, and her supporters. She introduced it engagingly and comprehensively. I have therefore scribbled out most of what I was going to say. She has done the Committee a double service in that respect.

A common difficulty for those citizens who wish to examine or question a development proposal is the scarcity of information, expertise and resources they have, often when up against a large professional development company. Planning authorities have the same problem, and the risk of very expensive and protracted discussions and inquiries to get to grips with the proposed project. Some applications that I have seen seem almost designed to overcome planning authorities and public resistance through the sheer volume and number of boxes of paper that arrive, within which people have to try to find where the bodies are buried.

If such projects were obliged to produce a digital twin model, as the amendment proposes, not only would we have a more equitable process but it would also save a great deal of time, resources and money. I could say a great deal more, but I will not because we all dread the phrase, “My Lords, a lot of good points have been made” and I shall not repeat it. I genuinely shall not. I support these amendments, and I will now sit down.

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Moved by

[Lord Lucas]

113: After Clause 51, insert the following new Clause—
“Planning decisions: termite-resistant wood(1) A local planning authority may not consent to the development of new-build homes if any wood used in the construction is not termite resistant.(2) Wood is “termite resistant” if it is—(a) a species of wood that is recognised as being naturally resistant to termites such that the risk of consumption by termites is acceptably low, or(b) sufficiently treated so as to resist satisfactorily consumption by termites.(3) “New build homes” has the same meaning as in subsection 138(5) of the Building Safety Act 2022.”

[Lord Lucas (Con)]

My Lords, I do not know if the Minister has spent much time looking at the maps of the advance of termites across France. It is a gentle horror film, if she likes such things. They have reached Paris. There are now extensive provisions in French law for dealing with termites, for checking your house for termites before you sell it. It has become a very serious economic problem for them. As with eight-toothed bark beetle and other pests, it will doubtless make its way across the channel at some moment. It is very much headed in our direction.

Termites are not susceptible to the same pesticides as we use to control woodworm, because they function in a different way and occupy a different part of the wood. It therefore seems sensible, given that we are likely to get this thing, for us to make preparation for its arrival and not leave our entire housing stock vulnerable.

Indeed, if we were to make preparations before the termites arrive, we would have a set of people who are used to combating them and dealing with the pesticides involved, and an industry that is not building houses that are vulnerable to them. I therefore very much recommend this provision to the Government, although I appreciate that it may not actually require an amendment to the Bill. I beg to move.

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[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

My Lords, I am very grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Lucas, for tabling Amendment 113. He is right that I was not intimately acquainted with the procedure of termites in France. However, I do now know far more about the house longhorn beetle than I have ever known, and I will continue to look at this issue.

The noble Lord may have been in the Chamber on Monday when we were discussing wood being used in construction. I mentioned an office development I visited, which is just across the river from Parliament, and which makes extensive use of wood in its construction. We will see more of that; wood is a good building material and developments such as that are good uses of wood. It is therefore very important that we take these matters extremely seriously.

The noble Lord’s amendment seeks to prevent planning authorities from granting planning permission for new-build homes if timber construction products specified at planning stages are not termite resistant. Fortunately for us, termites are not endemic to the UK. Even though an infestation was recorded in the 1990s, that was subject to a successful eradication programme.

While I appreciate the noble Lord’s intention, the Building Regulations, rather than the planning system, are the appropriate way of establishing minimum legal requirements in the design of new building work. The sanitary arrangements we have in place to regulate timber imports allow us to remain vigilant. The Government take the view that mandating termite resistance in any wood used for construction materials in new-build homes would be a disproportionate measure, leading to an increased cost for developers and consumers, and adding to local planning authority burdens. However, if a threat were to emerge, guidance on timber products for new development and suitable wood treatments could be included in Approved Document A, which accompanies the Building Regulations for structure.

I hope I have given some reassurance to the noble Lord; nevertheless, I ask him to withdraw his amendment.

[Lord Lucas (Con)]

My Lords, I am very grateful for that reply, even though I had hoped for something more positive. I did take out of that, given the caution that the Minister expressed about raising costs for housebuilders, that the rumours of a change to the landfill tax are probably erroneous. I beg leave to withdraw my amendment.

Amendment 113 withdrawn.

Planning and Infrastructure Bill

Lord Lucas Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 9th September 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Teverson (LD)]

My Lords, I want to make two brief points. I was delighted to add my name to the amendment in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Gascoigne, because it includes community gardens and allotments.

My first point is that I agree about allotments. Down in Cornwall, I have been involved in growing schemes, in which communities come together on common ground to produce mainly vegetables and sell the surplus to the local community. These are fantastic schemes which are very sociable and bring people together. One of our objectives in the far south-west was to allow every community to have access to a growing scheme, so that is moving on, if you like, one stage further from allotments.

My second brief point is again a reflection from the far south-west. There is somehow often an assumption that people in rural towns have easy access to green and blue spaces. If that is true anywhere, it would be in Cornwall. Believe me, I am never more surprised than when I find out that families in what we might describe as low-income, deprived areas do not get outside major town boundaries, and so areas of green space within all urban areas are incredibly important.

I hope the Minister will take note of both those observations.

[Lord Lucas (Con)]

I very much support the amendments in this group. I am lucky enough to live in Eastbourne, where Mary Ann Gilbert started a branch of the allotment movement in 1830. I think we have more allotments per head than any other town, and there is still a three-year waiting list. These things need planning in, and that is why I support these amendments. You cannot rely on random happenstance or a generous builder to do it; it has to be part of the way we see and develop our towns and cities, particularly if we are going in for new towns.

This is enormously important for nature. People’s experience of nature is what happens around their homes. If there is not much nature there, they do not grow up with a love for or an interest in it. If they do not grow up with a love for or an interest in it, they end up not wanting to pay for it and are happy to trample on it if there is some supposed benefit of that for humans. Building in a real understanding of nature begins with the design of our towns. That is why these amendments are so important.

[Baroness Coffey (Con)]

My Lords, my noble friend Lord Lucas, who has just spoken, is absolutely right that starting with perhaps good intentions but firm foundations is absolutely critical to make sure that we have nature at the heart of every community as we develop the 1.5 million new homes that the Government intend to deliver before the end of this Parliament.

I particularly commend the amendments tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Willis of Summertown. There has rightly been a reference to blue space. I actually came up with the concept in the Environmental Improvement Plan 2023. There are a few factors behind that, relevant to what other noble Lords have mentioned today. Perhaps it is about rivers; it is certainly about sustainable drainage and thinking about how the ponds in new estates can be truly made into environmental oases.

One of the big inspirations was when I visited the Canal & River Trust, where we discussed its activities in Birmingham. As we know, there are more canals in Birmingham than there are in the entirety of Venice, yet the interaction between residents there and their canals was minimal. People would often be living in pretty high blocks, without any exposure to nature. There was an opportunity to think about how we develop what you have, and about the fact that, in certain cities—Birmingham not being the best example—there is a complete desert of parks, while there are plenty of other cities that have designed parks in over the years. Instead of relying on an NPPF that can literally be changed at the stroke of a pen by a Minister from one reshuffle to the next, it is vital to make sure this is set firmly in legislative considerations.

Proposed new subsection (b) in Amendment 121, tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Miller of Chilthorne Domer, would make sure that green spaces are maintained. There is nothing worse than such places not being properly looked after. We see it already with areas not being watered, and so things end up dying, which is not inspiring for anybody.

The noble Lord, Lord Crisp, referred to social prescribing. I intended to speak to that in later groups, but what he said was right. As has already been pointed out eloquently, the science is there. The noble Baroness, Lady Willis of Summertown, has set this out comprehensively. I first met the noble Baroness when she was director of science at Kew gardens, and we had some wonderful back and forth exchanges.

There are a couple of things worth considering. My noble friend Lady Fookes is right to talk about regulation, but I am worried we end up overregulating and almost missing the point—literally not seeing the wood for the trees. I intend to speak more on that in group 6.

The noble Baroness, Lady Young of Old Scone, branched out into considering trees. It would be very helpful to have that paper from the Woodland Trust shared. Communities are about setting roots, but we do not want tree roots literally uprooting homes. That is an important factor for councils to consider. I commend the long-standing policy of Liverpool City Council, which plants lots of trees in planters underground. Then, when the trees mature, the council lifts them out of the ground, takes them off to a park and replants them there, so they are not damaging the infrastructure that has been designed to facilitate the rest of the neighbourhood. It is also vital that trees do not block light or interfere with telecommunications and the like.

Having heard this in both Houses, it is really important that the Government proactively consider how this matter comes back on Report. I know that if it does not go through this time, we will come back again when we get to the next local government Bill about community empowerment. We know from all the protests, rightly, that communities value this sort of infrastructure and want it to be developed. It is about the one thing that most communities agree on around development, which is why it is important that we get amendments appropriately tabled by the Government at the next stage.

Planning and Infrastructure Bill

Lord Lucas Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 9th September 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord in Waiting/Government Whip (Lord Katz) (Lab)]

My Lords, I thank the Deputy Chairman of Committees. Just to confirm, we will be going to target this evening, so I urge brevity from everybody in making speeches, so that we can make progress and get through the business.

[Lord Lucas (Con)]

I am tempted to make a 10-minute speech in response to that. If the Government decide they want to go to such a ridiculous length, it really is for the Government to—

[Lord Katz (Lab)]

I apologise. I should have added that it was agreed through the usual channels, with the Front Benches, that that would be an appropriate way to arrange business.

[Lord Lucas (Con)]

My Lords, I accept that it has been agreed by the usual channels, but this is a revising Chamber and we are supposed to be looking at a serious Bill and taking its provisions seriously. If the Government want to get through 20 groups today then it will take the time it takes. None the less, when it comes to Amendment 135G, I shall be brief.

The main reason I hear for planning processes taking longer than they should is that planning authorities take longer than they should. The Government should have the power to do something about that, and that is what my amendment seeks to achieve.

[Lord Jamieson (Con)]

My Lords, I begin by thanking the noble Lord, Lord Teverson, and my noble friend Lord Lucas for bringing their amendments to the attention of the Committee. They have raised a number of important points, and I look forward to hearing the Minister addressing both noble Lords’ concerns.

I turn to the amendments in my name. The purpose of Amendment 135HZG is to reduce costs and delays in the planning system by putting beyond doubt in legislation the principles that currently rely on case law. Where planning permission has already been granted and remains extant, decisions on subsequent planning applications relating to detailed matters, whether determined by an officer or a committee, should not reopen issues that were settled in the original planning permission. This matters because uncertainty in the system not only increases costs for applicants but creates unnecessary duplication of effort for planning authorities and applicants. Greater clarity will enable both sides to proceed with confidence, efficiency and speed.

Amendment 135HZH, in my name and that of noble friend Lady Scott of Bybrook, is a probing amendment intended to test whether the planning system provides sufficient certainty once a permission has been granted and to explore how necessary changes prompted by new national legislation might be handled without reopening matters that have already been settled. The principle of finality is essential, particularly where significant work has already been undertaken and applications are well advanced. This amendment invites the Government to consider whether clearer statutory guidance on finality could help improve efficiency and reduce delay.

Finally, Amendment 185SE, tabled in my name, aims to provide clarity to the planning system, so that project delays are minimised where legislative changes necessitate modifications to an already approved permission—for instance, as we discussed earlier today, legislation that might require solar cells on all new homes.

In such circumstances, such modifications should be deemed to have planning permission in principle. It is vital, because projects can be significantly delayed and costs increased, and developers are required to seek fresh planning permissions simply to comply with new legislation that has come about after they receive their original planning permission. By ensuring that those modifications are covered in principle, we can safeguard progress while maintaining the integrity of the planning system.

If we are to achieve the Government’s objective of 1.5 million new homes, the planning system needs to deliver. These three amendments are guided by the same underlying principle. Clarity and certainty in planning law reduce unnecessary delay, avoid wasteful duplication and allow both applicants and authorities to focus their energies on what should be their priority, which is delivering high-quality developments of high-quality homes that support our residents and our communities.

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[Baroness Thornhill (LD)]

My Lords, I will speak to my Amendment 134 with a butchered, watered down and much shorter version of my speech than the one I was going to give, so forgive me if it is not quite up to my usual standards.

This amendment seeks to reverse the decision of previous Governments to give permitted development rights to allow the conversion of non-residential properties into dwelling houses—in other words, to get back to where we were, when they would have had to apply for planning permission. The incremental changes were brought about over 10 years ago. Now, there is loads of evidence, including the Government’s own, that this is failing, and on three main grounds. Given that, in future, with more working from home, there are likely to be—and there already are—a lot more empty office blocks, we feel that this needs to be looked at fully and seriously before our town centres and business centres are hollowed out.

First, on quality, there is no doubt that many of these conversions are substandard. Indeed, in my own borough, Watford, there is a case study of a small factory that had been made into several flats with no windows. This happened with PDRs. The case was brought to government—with a body of other things, obviously—and made the previous Government include that such dwellings should have windows.

Secondly, and close to our hearts—I am looking at the noble Lord, Lord Best, here—we have lost loads of affordable housing. Had planning permission been collected, we would certainly have had more. Indeed, the LGA reckons that we have had a loss of 28,000 affordable homes. Think how many could have been housed off the temporary accommodation list had we had those homes.

Thirdly, it rides roughshod through local plans and policies, and the design, sustainability and accessibility that have been worked up with local councils and communities to build the places that they want to see.

Amendment 134 is not anti-housing; it is pro quality housing. The amendment was drawn up by the LGA, and many councils and development partners have contributed. Some 39 organisations and many individuals have signed an open letter to the Government—I heard only today that Mayor Burnham has added his name to the letter—to ask them to seriously consider rescinding PDRs. This shows the strength of opposition. In opposition, several government Members, including the Minister, had strong feelings and concerns about PDRs. My question is very simple: what has happened? I will listen carefully to the Minister’s response. I beg to move.

[Lord Lucas (Con)]

My Lords, I am delighted to find that I take exactly the opposite point of view to that of the noble Baroness, Lady Thornhill. I see permitted development rights—as in my Private Member’s Bill, and as in my amendments to this Bill—as having a large potential to contribute substantially to housing expansion. Like the noble Baroness, Lady Thornhill, I shall curtail my remarks in the hope that what the Minister says will be so enlightening that I shall not need to ask her further questions.

My amendments propose a targeted set of expansions to permitted development rights to boost uptake and delivery by methods such as: removing unjustifiably onerous restrictions, including those concerning the ability to convert commercial buildings in areas of outstanding natural beauty, or the inability to extend upwards on pre-1948 buildings of no defined heritage value, or buildings postdating an arbitrary date; clarifying the wording of prior approval conditions to remove vagueness, which leads to a lack of consistency in decision-making between LPAs and more uncertainty in their application to, for example, natural light, flood risk or transport impacts; and removing the subjectivity currently allowed for within external appearance conditions for upward extensions, which are regularly used to refuse or frustrate upward extension in classes A and AA to AD and which act as a strong disincentive for the use of these permitted development rights by SME developers and housebuilders.

Instead, the local design code-based conditions in my amendments would provide certainty and consistency to decision-making, permitting the combined use and application of class MA and classes A and AA to AD, to maximise the development potential for existing buildings to deliver new homes.

Design codes are hugely important in this. Mandatory local design codes, already supported by the NPPF, are essential to make permitted development rights work at scale. They would replace subjective judgments on external appearance with rule-based certainty, define acceptable height, density, daylight and amenity standards to reduce the risk for developers, and be capable of delivery via a public/private model with some costs recovered through planning fee reforms, which could target PDR applications.

Reforms would bring consistency, reduce risk and make PDR a viable route to delivery. Local design codes would improve outcomes and boost developer confidence and certainty in the uptake and use of PDR. PDR allows for greater numbers of conversions and extensions of existing buildings to provide new housing and sustainable urban environments. This would help to reduce the demand and strain of granting housing developments in less sustainable greenfield locations.

Together, the amendments that I suggest would unlock new housing capacity in the most sustainable and accessible locations and benefit smaller building firms, while still maintaining quality and control over the urban environment.

[Baroness Warwick of Undercliffe (Lab)]

My Lords, I will speak briefly in support of the noble Baroness, Lady Thornhill. With the Government’s ambition to increase the supply of social and affordable housing and the reforms to improve the capacity of the planning system, now seems the right time to reform PDR. The Government have rightly made the quality and safety of housing a priority, but conversions to PDR are not subject to the same standards compared to developments going through the full planning system.

The Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors, in its report on the impact of extending permitted development rights on public authorities and communities, found that the quality of office-to-residential conversions was significantly worse than those which had been brought through the planning process. Other than the nationally described space standards and requirements around natural light, there are no minimum standards for these converted homes relating to safety, facilities, communal space, or connection to amenities.

It is essential that the housing that is developed is the right housing to meet local needs and make a positive impact on the lives of residents. It is necessary to make it a viable solution for addressing the housing crisis. At a minimum, conversions should meet the healthy homes principle brought forward by the Town and Country Planning Association’s Healthy Homes campaign. I hope that the Minister will be able to respond positively to these points.

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As I have already explained, we acknowledge the concerns around the quality of residential units that have been created through permitted development rights. We would therefore not want to make changes to the rights that could remove or weaken some of the protections currently set out in the rights. Overall, changes to permitted development rights come forward in secondary legislation, as I have explained, as amendments to the permitted development order, generally following on from public consultation. That ensures that the views of the public, including those who would benefit from the rights, are taken into account. Of course, we will continue to keep permitted development rights under review, and we are grateful for the views that have been put forward in this regard and the discussions that have taken place this evening.

[Lord Lucas (Con)]

I am grateful for the answers that the Minister has given, and I will think hard on what she said. I certainly understand what she said about the way of dealing with these things not being through the Bill. However, I urge the Government to remember that lots of small improvements—as the Minister has pointed out in terms of the last 10 years of permitted development rights—make a difference. They nourish the small end of the builders’ market and give some balance to the domination of housebuilding by the big housebuilders. It is really important that that end of the market works well.

[Baroness Thornhill (LD)]

My Lords, I will make a quick comment. Article 4 directions are actually a very challenging process; the Secretary of State really gives you a hard time about it and you usually have to justify covering a larger area. The problem with PDRs is they are all over the place and that makes an Article 4 direction a little bit more difficult.

I would like to challenge a fundamental misconception. The Minister talked about the 113,000 homes that have already been created. The misconception is that they would not have happened anyway. I am sure some of them would not, but the majority, if they had gone through the planning process, would have had things suggested, altered and improved to pull up the standard. But, of course, it would not have happened quite as quickly.

I am going to end on a slightly tangential anecdote that shows that we really need to look at this. The people in the house next door to me have informed me that they will be erecting a 12 metre by 20 metre single-storey building in their garden directly adjacent to mine. They do not need planning permission. It is half the size of the garden and they are allowed to do that. If I want to erect a fence to cover the hideous wall of brick that I am going to be looking on instead of a beautiful garden with mature trees, I will have to apply for planning permission. Therefore, I think it is time to review the whole set-up, but particularly office to residential. I wish to withdraw my amendment.

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[Lord Fuller (Con)]

My Lords, I rise to speak in support of Amendment 135 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Coffey, and declare an interest in that the sponsor of her amendment, Richard Bacon, was the Member of Parliament for South Norfolk, where I represented the council for many years; it is worth putting it on record that he devoted the greater part of his parliamentary career to pursuing the importance of self-building in our nation. Self-building is not just the right thing to do because it is going to deliver more homes; it enables striving families to build a house of their dreams. Of course, they do not actually build it themselves. Self-building is not about getting all the tools; it is about procuring and possibly designing a home for you to live in for the long term—the basis of community and empowerment in that sense.

I welcome the amendment, not least because we have sleepwalked into a situation where a small number of national housebuilders have created for themselves a substantial monopoly, not just in the building of homes but in their design. Local distinctiveness and vernacular have been lost. A bungalow that has gone a bomb in Barnsley is built in Bunwell, 200 miles away, yet it is the same design language. We need distinctiveness. The logical conclusion, the spirit of what this amendment seeks to achieve, is that not only do we give those wanting to build their own home or procure their own residence the chance but local authorities can be very distinctive about making sure that we are capturing the correct need for those people who have the wherewithal to do it—not just the casual want, as was the original case and has now been tightened up.

[Lord Lucas (Con)]

My Lords, I have Amendment 135H in this group. This is another of my attempts to help the Government make the way that housing is delivered slightly more efficient. I live in Eastbourne, and Eastbourne Borough Council has a long-standing partnership with a modular house builder called Boutique Modern, which has produced some very effective houses in the town, looking quite different from one another because it is easier to customise the outside of those modular homes; but the structure, what is happening inside, is the same. It is produced in a factory. It is daft, when you are producing identical goods, to have to go through type approval for them as if they were being built on the ground.

You have a design, which has passed all the tests and been approved by the Buildoffsite Property Assurance Scheme, I suggest—though it could equally be some other body—then you avoid all the processes and costs associated with whether it is an acceptable design for a place for someone to live in and can concentrate on how the site is laid out and what the building looks like. That makes a really effective way for people to build and procure their own houses, to go with my noble friend’s excellent amendment.

I urge this on the Government as a way in which they can make another small improvement that will, over time, decrease the cost and increase the rate of housebuilding.

[Lord Lansley (Con)]

My Lords, I want to say a word or two about self-build and custom housebuilding, in support of my noble friend Lady Coffey—although I also want to ask a question about the precise terms in which her amendment is phrased.

I declare an interest, in that my nephew is seeking to build his own family home and has been on the register in Tandridge for a number of years now. He has received nothing from Tandridge by way of an offer of any plot anywhere, although he is entirely eligible, including being a locally connected person and so on.

I remember that we discussed this during the Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill—I remember talking to Richard Bacon about the provisions. My noble friend is absolutely right: we put a regulation-making power in with the objective of trying to ensure that the development permissions that were granted for self-build and custom housebuilding were genuinely for that and not for something else. The question to Ministers is whether, at this stage, they will use this power and how they will they use it.

The phraseology in my noble friend’s amendment, in so far as it says that only the specific development permissions that are referred to are to be treated as meeting a demand, may have the benefit of excluding some things that should not be treated as such but may have the disbenefit of excluding some things that should be treated as such, including people who bring forward their own plots for this purpose that do not form part of a wider development. It is rather important that we bring in what should be part of development permissions that meet demand for self-build and custom housebuilding and exclude those that do not and get the structure of it right.

Where we need to think more, if I recall correctly, is about what we do in relation to local planning authorities that have persistent unmet demand on that basis for self-build and custom housebuilding. There is an enormous potential benefit here. Look at other similar countries that have very large numbers of self-build and custom housebuilding. If the Government are looking for an opportunity to add to the extent of building, and indeed to support small housebuilders, this is absolutely the right territory to be working on.

To return to a familiar subject for me, the use of national development management policies in relation to decisions on planning applications for people who wish to build for themselves may well be one of the routes that the Government might like to consider for taking this issue forward.

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We recognise the opportunities offered by modular construction. That is why we and the British Standards Institution published a publicly available specification for residential properties in April this year. It offers greater clarity to the insurance and warranties market and supports delivery of quality homes. We may have some more work to do on insurance and warranties here, but I think we can get there. The industry is very keen to move this on and we are happy to work with it to do that. For all these reasons, I kindly ask the noble Baroness to withdraw her amendment.

[Lord Lucas (Con)]

I am grateful to the Minister for her answer. I welcome her to 10 September.

[Baroness Coffey (Con)]

My Lords, I thank noble Lords who have spoken—my noble friends Lord Fuller and Lord Lansley, and also the noble Lord, Lord Best. In response to my noble friend Lord Lansley, I am very conscious that perhaps there is a proper definition that can deal with this, so I will reflect on that and see what I can work through. He is absolutely right in saying that national development management policies are the way forward.

I inferred from what the Minister said that it is early days, and we will see where it goes. There is a group of willing people who want to get on. This is designed to make it as straightforward as possible for people to have homes. I know she supports that outcome, and I hope I can potentially work a little more with her and the noble Lord, Lord Best, in order to make that a reality. On that, I beg leave to withdraw my amendment.

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[Baroness Coffey (Con)]

My Lords, Amendment 135A may perhaps look a little innocuous, but it is actually critical in considering how Part 3 of the Bill will work. By the way, I did not determine where this appeared in the Bill; that was done by the clerks.

It has arisen due to evidence given by the chief executive of Natural England, who was asked by the Environmental Audit Committee in the House of Commons to address Part 3 of the Bill. I appreciate this is before the Government backtracked and made a number of changes to try and address the significant number of concerns, which have not been fully alleviated, in regard to the potential for environmental damage.

I am very pleased to set out this suggested amendment to the planning Bill, which would, in effect, put into place what was said by the chief executive of Natural England—the body being allocated all this power not only to create but to deliver the increase in biodiversity in compensation for the development the Government want to see.

Marian Spain, when asked about these powers being given to Natural England—it will be tasked with writing, delivering, monitoring and reporting on EDPs—responded by saying that developers will be able to choose not to pay the levy if they do not have the confidence in the relevant EDP, and also that planning authorities can refuse to grant planning permission to developers if they are not convinced that the EDP would work. That is not what is in the Bill today, but the chief executive—the accounting officer—of Natural England has said to Parliament that this is what the Bill is doing. This amendment, in effect, puts that into place.

She specifically said that, in terms of not choosing to pay the levy, there is a risk that developers could not have confidence in the EDPs. This is worrying. It means that, if developers promote a new scheme through the planning system, they will not know whether or where an EDP will land or what environmental features it will cover. They do not actually know if levies will be mandatory or voluntary or how much the levies will be. They will not know whether the local authority considers an existing EDP to be ineffective. Developers would need to navigate the added very real risk that planning permission is refused because a planning authority does not trust that an EDP is being or will be delivered properly.

As a consequence of what the chief executive has said, it seems that the planning authority would need to police the progress and effectiveness of EDPs in their local authority areas. That was not in the Government’s impact assessment and may not be the intention of the Government at all. I say to the Minister that the very person who will deliver exactly what is left out in Part 3 of this Bill is saying that is the case. Frankly, if it is the case, and that is what the chief executive has told Parliament, then this will be exceptionally worse than the status quo for developers.

Developers can already access strategic solutions for nature that are competitively brought forward by a range of actors, including landowners, charities, Natural England itself and private companies. These alternative solutions will be crowded out by EDPs, and we will get to that more substantial debate next week in Part 3. At the same time, there is a risk that planning permissions will be held up because local authorities will not trust that an underfunded, unscientific, non-locally led EDP will actually be delivered.

I have greater concerns about the whole concept of Part 3. However, what I think is good is that, by my amendment, we can put back in exactly what the chief executive of Natural England says this legislation is supposed to do. That is why I am moving this amendment.

Speaking to my noble friend’s amendment on planning information, it is a very straightforward amendment, and I support my noble friend. It is basically saying, “We are looking at biodiversity, we need to know what it is, why don’t we get it all ready and we can share it with the developers, so we can know what the basic part is”. I am sure my noble friend will explain it far more eloquently than I have tried to do in those 15 seconds. With that, I beg to move.

[Lord Lucas (Con)]

My Lords, I have two amendments in this group. Amendment 135F is basically saying, “Look, we are generating a lot of quality biodiversity information within the planning system, but we are not capturing it”.

As a previous Government—this Government are too, I believe—we were committed to restoring biodiversity in this country from a very unfortunate, low level. To do that well, we need really good data. There are a number of potential sources of that data, but the great majority of the quality biodiversity data—that which can absolutely be believed because it has been collected by people who are qualified and has been properly checked and done carefully—is generated by the planning system.

But the majority of the data collected by the planning system never finds itself going anywhere else. We have a system in the country of local environment record centres, where this data should be deposited; it is not. This is what I want the Government to do. I know there are those within the Government who are working in this direction, but they are in Defra not in MHCLG, so what I would like MHCLG to do is to say, “Yes, it is important that we collect this data; we will mandate that”. When it is created as part of the planning system, it should find its way into the national data record. This is not something that would impose huge costs, because the data will almost always be in an easily accessible format. If you are applying for planning permission, and you have done a biological survey, you have to say where you found what. That is basically all that is needed for the environmental record centres. What we need to do, though, is get the data flowing.

The other side of this is—within the limitations of the Bill—my second Amendment 253A is saying that we ought to be using this data much better than we do. We create things and make decisions without accessing the best possible data that we already hold, and we ought not to do that. We ought to be making the best possible informed decisions when it comes to biodiversity; otherwise, we will do stupid things that damage the environment even further. The best possible data—the best possible decisions. That requires that, when we are taking a decision which affects the environment, we go and get the best available data. Again, the planning system is central to that. There ought not to be an application within the planning system which does not use the best data. My amendment asks that we put that right.

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The proposed amendment would take this further and require Natural England to gather information that is not specifically relevant to the environmental feature that the EDP is intended to address. In practice this would add further cost to Natural England when drafting EDPs, which would then be passed on to developers through the levy. Broadening the scope of information required from EDPs risks drawing focus away from their targeted focus on specific environmental features. With that explanation, I would kindly ask the noble Lord to withdraw his amendment.

[Lord Lucas (Con)]

My Lords, I am grateful for that answer by the noble Baroness, but she did not go as far as I hoped on my first amendment. I know that there is a lot of information being gathered as a result of the biodiversity net gain process. I am comforted that the noble Baroness appears to assume this will continue, because it has been a matter of doubt, given the recent consultation. But the problem is not that it is not generated; it is generated, but then nothing happens to it. It is locked up within that particular planning application; it never gets into the national records.

What I would really like to see coming through as planning policy is that where this information is generated, it must find its way into the national database because otherwise we lose it—it is inaccessible. We do not know what was found. We cannot draw on this information to take other decisions; we are depriving ourselves. Having generated this information and people having paid for this information, it then just disappears. That cannot be the right way of doing things. We must have a planning system which contributes to the national understanding of our biodiversity. The information that we gather as part of planning surely must become part of the national biodiversity database. That is something I would really like to pursue with the noble Baroness, if she will allow me to write to her further.

[Baroness Coffey (Con)]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for her reply and, indeed, all noble Lords for speaking. I do not want to get into the whole Part 3 debate; we will be debating that next week. I say to my noble friend Lord Fuller that this is based on evidence given to the Environmental Audit Committee on 30 June of this year by the chief executive, Marian Spain, rather than the chairman, Tony Juniper, over a year ago. I thank my noble friend Lord Lansley for giving me confidence—it was in the right place, after all—and for providing the clarity. The key point right now is that what the Minister has said tonight contradicts what the chief executive—the accounting officer—of Natural England told Members of Parliament about the effect of the Bill. I am going to read more carefully tomorrow what the Minister has said: I am not suggesting in any way that she is misleading the House either, but I think there is a problem. Putting this amendment in has got the outcome that I would like to see but perhaps not that of the Government. With that, I withdraw the amendment.

Planning and Infrastructure Bill

Lord Lucas Excerpts

Committee stage
Thursday 11th September 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Lansley (Con)]

I make one suggestion to the Minister, if I may. One way of achieving the objective that many of us seek for chalk streams would be to include specific reference to them in footnote 7 to the National Planning Policy Framework. That would carry through very successfully into many other decisions.

[Lord Lucas (Con)]

My Lords, I very much hope that, when considering how to implement what I hope will be agreement with these amendments, the Government pay close attention to the need to gather much better data than they have at the moment. The financial strictures on the Environment Agency over the last couple of decades have meant that its water quality monitoring is a long way short of what it should be.

I take this opportunity to praise my brother, Tim Palmer, for what he and other farmers on the River Wylye in Wiltshire have done to create their own farmer-owned laboratory to monitor water quality and to take action which has considerably improved it.

There is a lot that can be done, but you cannot take decisions on how things are going to affect rivers unless you are collecting good data, and that is not happening at the moment. If the Government work with farmers to collect better data, they will find that they get better results from this and other aspects of their environmental policy.

The other aspect I want to raise is this. Please can we end the snobbish definition of chalk streams that seems to have crept in during the last Government? I put in a plea for the Lottbridge Sewer, which is Eastbourne’s chalk stream. These little chalk streams that occur in odd places around the hill and the escarpment are important parts of the natural tapestry of life. They need protection just as much as the Test or Itchen. The definition of a chalk stream should be water type and water quality, not whether or not I can catch a big trout in it.

[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

As ever in your Lordships’ Committee, it has been a very interesting and wide-ranging debate on this group of amendments. I thank noble Lords for tabling amendments on the important topics of the protection of rivers, wildlife and animal welfare.

I will pick up a couple of general points. The noble Lord, Lord Blencathra, mentioned the Environment Agency’s dataset assessment. I will reply to him in writing, if that is okay, because I do not have the latest update.

The noble Baroness, Lady Parminter, said that I had said there was a chalk stream in Stevenage. I hope I did not say that, because that would not be accurate. There is a chalk stream just outside Stevenage, in the village of Aston, in East Hertfordshire. I think I remember commenting that I visited there with Feargal Sharkey a few months before the election. We had an interesting discussion with Mr Sharkey about chalk streams. It is not technically in Stevenage—it is just outside our borough.

Amendments 146, 147 and 148 all seek to add new requirements on strategic planning authorities in relation to the protection of rivers and streams, notably chalk streams. I point out to the noble Lord, Lord Lucas, that I am not responsible for the definition of “chalk stream”, but I am sure it is not just to do with how big the trout are that you can catch in them; there is a much more scientific method of defining chalk streams. I reaffirm the Government’s commitment to restoring and protecting chalk streams. They are a source of national pride. As one of Britain’s most nature-rich habitats, they support some of our rarest wildlife, from chalk salmon to trout, and are home to beloved and endangered species. There are just 260 chalk streams in the world and, as one noble Lord commented, 85% of them are in this country, which we can all be proud of.

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Moved by

[Lord Lucas]

158: After Clause 52, insert the following new Clause—
“Planning: duty of candourAfter section 8A of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990 (The Homes and Communities Agency) insert—“8B Planning: duty of candour(1) A local planning authority who have the function of plan-making and determining applications for planning permission or permission in principle shall, in its interactions with applicants and those who make representations in connection to such applications, operate with a duty of candour.(2) A local planning authority operates with a duty of candour where—(a) in general, it acts in an open and transparent way with respect to its decision-making process in preparing and approving the development plan for its area;(b) in general, it acts in an open and transparent way with respect to its decision-making process in determining whether a planning application should be approved, and in making determinations in connection with the approvals process of such applications;(c) where it has made a decision, including with respect to the approval or otherwise of a planning application, the acceptance or otherwise of submissions or representations with respect to a planning application, or in connection with other activities inherent in the processing of a planning application, it outlines the reasoning for that decision in a way that is—(i) publicly accessible,(ii) written in clear language,(iii) consistent with the Nolan Principles on Standards in Public Life, and(iv) in accordance with national planning policy guidance.(3) An officer of a local planning authority shall, in their interactions with elected members of the authority, operate with a duty of candour in respect of their professional obligations.(4) An officer of a local planning authority operates with a duty of candour where they explain, clearly, accurately and in accessible language, what the rights and duties of the local planning authority are in respect of any application, potential application or development plan matter, regardless of the policies or preferences of the elected member concerned.””

[Lord Lucas (Con)]

My Lords, if I may I will start by being grumpy in the direction of the noble Lord, Lord Lansley, and others. This is Committee, and it is inappropriate to say, “Before the Minister sits down”. Saying that, as a Back-Bencher, suggests that allowing us to speak again is in some ways a concession on the part of the Minister. In Committee we can speak as many times as we like, whenever we like. That is a right which I do not see much exercised today, but we really should preserve it. On Report we are restricted; Committee is a free-for-all. It is important for getting to the bottom of things that we assert our right as Back-Benchers to speak when we wish to, and do not act as if this is a concession by the Government or Ministers.

Anyway, to turn to my amendment, my object here is to see whether we can make the planning system work better and improve the flow of national planning policy into decisions taken on the ground by imposing a duty of candour on the system. At the bottom end, the duty of candour is a strengthening of the power of officers because it removes from them the pressure to bend their advice to what they think will please the members of their authority, or maybe the public beyond that. It gives them a duty to be straightforward, honest and open about what things actually are. It is a considerable help to an official in dealing with members that they know they have to be clear—that they cannot say things just because they will get it in the neck from members if they do not say what members think they want.

Similarly, it helps members in their dealings with the public if the public know that the members are under a duty of candour to say things as they are, rather than trying to pretend that things are difficult or duck awkward decisions. In addition, operating the system in such a way that everybody knows that it has to be open and truthful, and that what is said is the way things are, is a great help to the public in dealing with change, which is naturally often unwelcome, and understanding how that fits into the development of the country as a whole.

Everybody I have talked to is committed to us having more houses. We want the Government to succeed in their ambitions, but it is often painful when it comes down to individual decisions, as the last group of amendments has demonstrated. There are always reasons not to do something. Having a system that we trust, and really understanding how it works, must be helpful, and having a duty of candour would make a difference to that. I beg to move.

[Baroness Coffey (Con)]

My Lords, I thank my noble friend Lord Blencathra for signing my Amendment 185. This amendment was originally in a separate group but, for the benefit of the Committee, I put it into what I would call the odds and sods group—I am not suggesting that any of the amendments are odd or, indeed, that any noble Lords are sods. Nevertheless, this is about addressing a particular situation where it is right that Members of Parliament should be calm, considered, important consultees on any nationally significant infrastructure projects that are proposed in their constituency. Many constituents fully expect Members of Parliament to have opinions on such matters. I appreciate that, at times, many Members of Parliament will say that they have no say on planning because it is a matter for the council. Well, of course, with NSIPs, it is different: it is a matter for the Secretary of State, who may delegate. It is therefore important that Members of Parliament have, in effect, an automatic right to participate in the examination.

The other thing—this came up for me when I used to be an MP—is that it is not always straightforward when modifications to NSIPs are made once consent has already been granted. That part of the process tends to just fly by with very little awareness but can be hugely significant. There is limited resource for MPs compared to, say, councillors, who can access their council officers in local authorities. For me, this would be a helpful check in both ways: first, being guaranteed not only to be notified of the original application and being able to speak at the various examinations but also to be made fully made of subsequent changes. I am very conscious that noble Lords may suggest that this is a barrier; it is not. It is about empowering the rights of local communities through the inclusion of their Member of Parliament.

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I hope that, for the reasons I have set out, noble Lords will not press their amendments.

[Lord Lucas (Con)]

My Lords, I am very grateful to the Minister for his comprehensive reply.

The common theme between the amendments is empowering officials to do their job well. I will pick up an example from the noble Lord, Lord Mawson. If an official in the local hospital is only looking up the line to someone in the health department, it is very hard for them to take into account the needs of other aspects of the community.

If there is something in law or secondary legislation—whatever it is, I look forward to seeing it—that the Government produce that says, “You must consult, you must talk to these people and you must take them into account”, that empowers the official to do so. It does not make it happen, but it sets out a structure where we can communicate properly between silos. We can get things done as a community and not in little bits.

I am sure that we can all think of examples of where things would have been done much better if the community had been involved. In fact, we do not need to look much further than our own front door. I do not know whether the noble Lord, Lord Mawson, has a lot of experience with construction, but when I took one of my friends who is in the industry through the front door and asked him how much he thought it cost, he was at about a 50th of what it was. We were not involved; the community was not consulted. This has been done to us; we were not part of that decision. The same applies to our “HMP Westminster”-style enclosure. I therefore really encourage the noble Lord, Lord Mawson, to work with my noble friends Lord Hayward and Lord Forsyth to see whether we can get our own mechanisms to be rather better than they are.

[Lord Mawson (CB)]

My Lords, I have commented on the door and had conversations with various people around the House, which was very fascinating as a parable of this problem.

Christine Gilbert was a very good local authority leader who understood the limitations of the state and understood that just the processes and systems alone would not get us there. Something else needed to happen in which the local authority, the NHS and the normal players were obviously key partners. It was about the people and relationships; the machinery was not going to get us there, and she understood that as a very capable leader.

[Lord Lucas (Con)]

I also felt that the Minister’s reply to the noble Lord, Lord Teverson, was good, but I would be grateful if he could send him and us a link to the guidance that he referred to so that we can check through it and understand how it works before Report. In the case of my amendment, I await the Hillsborough law. If it can do what Amendment 158 is setting out to do and a lot more across government, it will make a huge contribution. For now, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment 158 withdrawn.

Planning and Infrastructure Bill

Lord Lucas Excerpts

Committee stage
Monday 15th September 2025 Lords Chamber

I therefore believe that these activities in support of local and community energy through the local power plan will provide the framework needed to support the growth of the sector in years to come. For these reasons, I kindly ask the noble Earl not to press his amendments.

[Lord Lucas (Con)]

My Lords, there is a lot of opportunity in the context of this Bill to mandate that new towns be preferred as sites for data centres, because the excess heat can be used in the district heating scheme.

[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

The noble Lord, Lord Lucas, makes an important point about reusing the energy created by data centres, which we are exploring. It is very important that the new towns task force has a chance to do its work. They will be subject to the planning process, just like all other applicants, when they put them forward. But, as I said, we are aiming to protect grades 1, 2 and 3 agricultural land, and I hope that other areas come forward to site the data centres. They are very important; we cannot do without them, that is for sure, so we need to consider very carefully where they might be sited, and the land use framework will give us a good indication about that.

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[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

Of course, we all hope there will not be a loss, but we must always have provision in place for that. I know that there is ongoing discussion with Sir Michael Lyons and others in the taskforce about how the financial details and programme work, so it is probably best if I reply to noble Lords in writing on that issue.

In relation to the points about capacity, which were very well made, again, discussions are going on with Sir Michael Lyons about how we make all this happen. We have already allocated £46 million to planning, but we will continue to have those discussions with the taskforce about what the delivery mechanisms are to be. That said, I hope that the noble Lord has had some reassurance and that he will agree not to press his amendments.

[Lord Lucas (Con)]

My Lords, in respect of my noble friend’s Amendment 195A, and reading the words in the Bill, I would be really interested in the Minister helping me understand what places limits on the last words on page 123 of the Bill. Would it be open to a development corporation, for instance, to do an Ireland and say that any business moving its headquarters to the area of the development corporation would pay half the tax rate current in the United Kingdom?

[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

It is not my understanding that there will be fiscal devolution powers in that way, but I will take that back and write to the noble Lord if I am wrong.

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Moved by

[Lord Lucas]

207: Clause 98, page 134, line 23, at end insert—
“(A1) In section 7 of the Acquisition of Land Act 1981, after the definition of “local authority” insert—““local news publisher” has the meaning prescribed to it in Schedule 2ZA.”(A2) After Schedule 2 of the Acquisition of Land Act 1981, insert—“Schedule 2ZALocal news publishersDefinition of local news publisher
1 The term “local news publisher” means—(a) a business that—(i) has as its principal purpose the publication of original, local news content, where such material—(A) concerns issues or events that are relevant in engaging the British public in public debate and in informing democratic decision-making,(B) is reported and published in the United Kingdom,(C) is published, online or in print, no less than once every 31 days, and(D) is subject to editorial control,(ii) is legally resident in the United Kingdom,(iii) possesses at least one director who is legally resident in the United Kingdom,(iv) employs on a salaried, freelance or voluntary basis at least one journalist,(v) is not funded or operated by a government, political party or legislative institution,(vi) is subject to a code of ethical standards—(A) which is recognised in this schedule, and(B) which is published or administered by an independent regulator,(vii) has in place publicly available policies and procedures for handling complaints and resolving editorial inaccuracies and mistakes transparently, and that these policies and procedures are reasonably accessible to the public,(viii) maintains editorial independence from political parties, organisations that engage in lobbying or advocacy, and advertisers, and(ix) can demonstrate strong connections to the locality in which it operates.2 It is not relevant to the definition whether publication of such material as described in paragraph 1(a)(i) is done so with a view to making profit.3 Material is “subject to editorial control” under paragraph 1(a)(i)(D) if it meets the like definition set out in section 41(2) of the Crime and Courts Act 2013.4 For the purposes of paragraph 1(a)(v), “government” means— (a) the Government of the United Kingdom, or the government of the devolved nations, or local, municipal and regional governments within the United Kingdom, or any departments, agencies, corporations or subsidiary bodies thereof,(b) the government of a foreign nation, whether recognised by the Government of the United Kingdom or otherwise, or any departments, agencies, corporations or subsidiary bodies thereof, or any devolved administrations, local, municipal or regional governments therein, or(c) any other body or international movement holding itself out as the legitimate government of a foreign nation, and/or any departments, agencies, corporations or subsidiary bodies thereof.5 For the purposes of paragraph 1(a)(v), “legislative institution” means—(a) the Parliament of the United Kingdom, or a constituent house or committee thereof, or any officer thereof,(b) the devolved legislatures of the devolved nations, or a constituent house or committee thereof,(c) the legislative assembly of a local, regional or municipal authority, such as the London Assembly, or a constituent house or committee thereof, or any officer thereof, or(d) the legislative assembly, local, regional, municipal or national, in or of a foreign nation as described in paragraphs 4(b) or (c).6 Further to paragraph 1(a)(vi)(B), the following organisations are considered valid independent regulators for the purpose of recognition as a local news publisher—(a) IMPRESS, and(b) the Independent Press Standards Organisation (IPSO).7 The Secretary of State may, by statutory instrument, amend paragraph 6 to add or remove organisations.8 A statutory instrument containing regulations under paragraph 7 not be made unless a draft of the instrument has been laid before and approved by a resolution of each House of Parliament9 Any statutory instrument issued to effect the Secretary of State’s authority under paragraph 7 must—(a) be laid before Parliament for 60 days before enactment, and(b) in the event that an organisation is to be delisted, be published and transmitted to the organisation at issue in such a way as to entitle them to make representations to the contrary.10 A local news publisher is advantaged in demonstrating strong connections to the locality in which it operates under paragraph 1(a)(ix) where it—(a) is owned and operated by or within its community;(b) can demonstrate a high level of local readership;(c) employs a large number of locally resident journalists;(d) can demonstrate a positive relationship with its readership.11 Where an authority is required under this Act to publish a notice with a local news publisher, as in section 11(1)(a), it is required to give preference to local news publishers that—(a) can demonstrate high local readership comparative to other local news publishers in its locality, or(b) can demonstrate low financial burden to access for customers in its locality.””

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[Lord Lucas (Con)]

My Lords, in moving my Amendment 207 I will speak also to my Amendments 208 and 209. I am grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Wolf of Dulwich, for adding her name to these; I am sorry that she cannot be here today.

Clause 98 refers to newspaper notices. The purpose of requiring notices in local newspapers is to inform the public. Most of the public now get their local news from sources other than traditional local newspapers. As the Government accept the need for notices—as evidenced by Clause 98—and we are looking at a system that costs the public purse around 50 million quid a year, I hope that they will agree that the notices that they are requiring and paying for should be placed where people will read them.

My amendments propose a much-needed update to the 1881 definition of a newspaper, which is what rules these notices at the moment, to allow local councils to place public notices in relation to planning and infrastructure with trusted, professional and widely read online local news outlets. That was what the 1881 legislation achieved in its day—it made sure that these notices were placed where people would read them and in publications that they could access and trust. We need to move that on a bit.

The local news industry has undergone a deep transformation with the rise of online news and the decline of printed papers. Last year, more than half of traditional regional dailies had a circulation of below 5,000 copies. Comparatively, the average local independent online news outlet attracted almost 500,000 unique users. Across the UK, digital outlets established in the past decade or so are connecting with growing audiences; I would name the Bristol Cable, the Waltham Forest Echo, the Manchester Mill, the Greater Govanhill in Glasgow, VIEWdigital in Belfast, and many others—including, of course, my local Eastbourne Reporter.

There have been countless calls in recent years to review the public notices system to support the regeneration of local news, including by the Digital, Culture, Media and Sport Committee’s Sustainability of Local Journalism report and the House of Lords report The Future of News, published less than a year ago.

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[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Lucas, for tabling these interesting amendments, which relate to the publicity of notices on compulsory purchase orders. I cannot help thinking that there is a solution to this, but perhaps not exactly this one. We have to have a think about this. Like the noble Baroness, Lady Scott, I support local news publications. I am one of the sad local government geeks who always turns straight to the public notices, not just because I want to see what my own council is doing—now that I am not there anymore—but because I want to see what the next-door councils are doing as well.

Local newspapers are an important part of the way that information is shared, but they also play an important role in supporting democracy, communicating with our residents and being a signpost to all kinds of events that are going on locally. I know that they have been through a very tough time recently. In my area, if we did not have the paper edition of the newspaper, we would probably not have an online paper either—the paper is produced online but also produced as a paper copy. It is not delivered anymore but you can pick it up in a supermarket, so it is an important part of our local life.

The amendments of the noble Lord, Lord Lucas, would reform the Acquisition of Land Act 1981 and constrain acquiring authorities in the type of local newspaper that notices of making and confirmation of compulsory purchase orders must be published in. The type of local newspaper would have to meet certain quality and readership criteria, including possessing at least one director legally resident in the United Kingdom, employing at least one journalist not funded or operated by a government, political party or legislative institution, being subject to a code of ethical standards and demonstrating strong connections to the locality in which they operate.

The legislation currently requires acquiring authorities to publish notices of the making and confirmation of CPOs in newspapers circulating in the locality of the land included in the relevant CPO, but it does not prescribe the type of local newspaper. The Government consider that the requirement to publish notices in newspapers is an important part of the CPO process. Acquiring authorities are already motivated to ensure that notices are well publicised, because that helps them to avoid legal challenge.

However, these amendments would constrain and place unnecessary burdens on acquiring authorities when attempting to comply with the requirement to publish notices. The amendments would make it more difficult for authorities to navigate the process, increase the potential risk of legal challenges, which would result in additional costs, and delay decision-making and the delivery of benefits in the public interest. The amendments would therefore complicate and delay the CPO process further, which is contrary to the Government’s objectives.

It would be helpful if the notices could be published in a bigger font. I believe that the noble Baroness said that it is usually size 6, but it is more like size 2 in my local newspaper. Something I find helpful is taking a picture of them on my phone and then expanding that.

For all the reasons I have given, I kindly ask the noble Lord to withdraw his amendment.

[Lord Lucas (Con)]

My Lords, I understand what the Minister said about the quality criteria I put in the amendment. I included them for discussion.

However, I do not understand her willingness to restrict the publication of these notices to 1881-style newspapers. Why? Surely the purpose of publishing these notices is that they get noticed. Therefore, the Government should say that they will create a website on which all such notices will be placed, and people will know to go there to find them. They could be sorted by locality or whatever. It would cost a few hundred thousand pounds a year, rather than the £50 million a year we are paying at the moment. They would all be available there, and people would know where to go. What they are currently doing is paying £50 million for people to have to pay even more to buy the newspaper, just to see the public notices page.

Local newspapers used to be vibrant, argumentative and full of interesting journalists. Now, you are lucky if they have one journalist. Mostly, they include just reprinted press announcements and syndicated competitions. If these notices are meant to get into the press where people will notice them randomly, they need to be much more widely distributed. Alternatively, if they should be publicly available, so that the people who know that they are of interest can find them, they should be on a government website. The Government are paying a lot of money for no value with the current system.

I would be interested to know—if not now then in writing—whether the Government’s intention is that notices are to be published so that interested people can find them, or whether it is more important that people can find the notices at random. If it is the former, I will bring back an amendment on Report to seek to create a government website instead of the newspaper requirement. If it is the latter, I will try to table a simplified version of this amendment. I would be happy to receive an answer in writing. For now, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment 207 withdrawn.

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[Lord Berkeley of Knighton (CB)]

My Lords, I will be even swifter than the noble Lord, Lord Randall. There are some good ideas in these amendments. If we can protect bats in the belfry and great crested newts in the pond, why can we not do the same for swifts? They are such wonderful birds.

I am also interested in Amendment 225, because I have witnessed, very distressingly, quite a few birds smashing into windows and glass on my small farm in mid-Wales. To see these beautiful creatures lying on the ground, either stunned or dead, is very upsetting. Any efforts we could make to protect our dwindling bird population from crashing into buildings is to be supported.

[Lord Lucas (Con)]

My Lords, I speak from a building that is full of moths—but I have never tried eating them.

I approve of Amendment 227GA, in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett of Manor Castle; it goes to the root of the fact that we must find ways of living with and closer to nature. It ought to be slightly more detailed, so that I am allowed to exclude mice, but the overall principle—that we provide for wildlife living alongside us—is right.

Although I have had provision for swifts for the past 15 years, it has never had a swift in it—principally, I think, because there are probably not enough insects for the swifts to live on. We therefore need to provide a full habitat and not just a nesting place. Swift bricks sound far too much like an easy exit for the Government that will allow them to say, “Tick. Don’t need to do anything more”. I very much hope they can be tempted in the direction that the noble Baroness has outlined for them.

I also hope that they will do something about birds crashing into glass. It is simple: there are technical solutions, and we can live with them. We ought not to do this to birds. Just change the rules and, over time, we will do much less damage.

[The Earl of Caithness (Con)]

My Lords, I support my noble friend Lord Randall’s amendment, but I ask the Government not to accept it. I do that for two reasons. First, swifts are not the only migratory birds to come back on migration. Secondly, I believe that if the Government conceded to swifts, they would be able to say, “We’ve done something, we’ve pleased the environmental lobby and now we need not do anything more”. That is a typical reaction of government. I am therefore more attracted to Amendments 225 and 227GA.

The noble Baroness, Lady Freeman of Steventon, reminded us that 30 million birds in the UK get killed on migration. In America, the figure is up to 1 billion, and in Canada it is over 40 million. In this country, cats do not cause as many bird deaths, but they are responsible for a significant number. Therefore, we need to look at this subject much more holistically.

On the question of migration, a huge problem was identified by the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, when she discussed the convention centre in Chicago. I would like to add a PS to her story about 1,000 birds in a single night. Since some people have done the simple remedial work of applying small white dots and a two-inch grid pattern to the surface of windows, there has been a 95% reduction in fatalities during the migration period. That is a bonus for the environment and biodiversity that we should aim for.

I will mention one thing that other noble Lords have not mentioned: the planting around buildings. It has been proven that birds get very confused by some types of hedging and trees. When that is reflected in the glass, it disorientates the birds. Although we are all pressing for more trees, shrubbery and greenery, we need to be very careful that we are not building in bird deaths in the process. I hope that the Government will take a holistic look at this and do something that benefits biodiversity and the birds.

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[Baroness Neville-Rolfe (Con)]

My Lords, I support the general thrust of the amendments in the name of my noble friend Lord Roborough.

The focus of Natural England is bureaucratic and precautionary, as we heard from my noble friend Lord Caithness. We need to find a way around the freezing of housing developments by Natural England under its nutrient neutrality rules. This is a real growth killer in those areas. My noble friend Lord Roborough has tried to find an immediate remedy in some of his amendments; I encourage the Minister to look at them and perhaps come forward with some further amendments to this important Bill. I remind the Committee that page 6 of the Explanatory Notes says that the Bill

“intends to speed up and streamline the delivery of new homes and critical infrastructure”.

My worry is that Part 3 gives Natural England the power to bring about the opposite.

[Lord Lucas (Con)]

My Lords, I have had a number of conversations with developers over the course of the past month or two. Their universal conclusion is that Part 3 makes it much harder to build houses. It adds huge levels of risk and uncertainty. It tears up the arrangements that they were half way through making—in order to get things done and deal with the environmental impact of housebuilding—and substitutes them with a regime where they just will not know what is happening. It will be really difficult to make commitments because so much could change if an EDP is imposed and because of the timescale of imposing an EDP. What will the consequence of an EDP be? It will make the whole business anti-business.

I really hope that the Government will take the chance of a change in the Secretary of State to look at this aspect of the Bill and say, “Even if it’s a good idea, we need to take it slowly and carefully, and we need to make sure that people can rely on it”, because, if you are setting out to build houses on any scale, you are taking a long-term decision. You need to know how the landscape will be for years in advance.

[Lord Cromwell (CB)]

My Lords, the Minister has kindly organised meetings with Natural England. I have been to two of them, in fact; I was late to one but, for the first one, I was there almost the entire time. One rather excited official from Natural England described what is going to happen as the most exciting thing that had happened in his career. I am not surprised—I mean, all its Christmases are coming at once. It is getting to have a role at the heart of planning and development; to design schemes across the country; and to run the authoritative model to determine where, how and when EDPs will be implemented. I have noticed several references tonight to the Soviet Union, an area with which I have worked extensively. I had exactly the same thought when I read this Bill. This is real Gosplan in action. The idea of some apparatchik sitting at his computer in Westminster and saying, “Bang—we will do that over there”, is absolutely what went wrong with the Soviet Union.

A lot of rude words have been said about Natural England tonight, many of which it deserves. My only real encounter with it was when I tried to put a catchment scheme together up the river—noble Lords may remember the days when we had environmental programmes that were still open. I was looking at doing one of those. The Natural England person said to me, “You know, it sounds like a lot of work, and it’s awfully complex. Are you sure you really want to do it?” These are the people who will be designing EDPs across the country and inflicting them on us. In our debate on the next group of amendments, there will be this question: why is it written as though Natural England is the only solution for all time? Why can it not be more general? I will leave that for others to talk about in the next section.

Two things came out of my latter meeting with them. One was that—noble Lords may or may not be aware of this—if you are a developer, you have to do biodiversity net gain, BNG. That is additional to the levy that you are going to be paying. I just think that everybody should be aware of that.

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Young of Old Scone (Lab)]

The noble Baroness might not thank me when she hears what I am about to say. I signed up in support of this amendment without realising that we were talking in exactly opposite directions about what the desired effect should be. I believe this is a probing amendment. I was very pleased when the Minister, in her response to the previous group, said that she believed that it should be another public body. For the avoidance of doubt, we should have that in the Bill.

I do not see this as something we would want to do frequently. It would be useful to know the Minister’s thinking about why this provision is in the Bill. If Part 3 is about taking a strategic approach to landscape-scale conservation and nature restoration, it is important that there is some controlling mind organising all this. I do not think it can be the Minister; it has to be Natural England. If there is any delegation from Natural England to another public body, it should be at the behest of Natural England, not the Minister. It would be extremely useful to know why this is in the Bill in the first place and to get at least a requirement that another public body is designated. Perhaps the Minister will outline the circumstances envisaged in this amendment.

[Lord Lucas (Con)]

My Lords, my amendments in this group are also of a probing nature, but I say first how much I support the amendments tabled by my noble friend Lady Coffey. I had the privilege of being the Whip in this House for the Minister of Agriculture in the last years of John Major’s Government, at a time when BSE was rampant and the Countess of Mar was active on the Back Benches. I know which I was more frightened of.

MAFF in those days was a shell of a department because almost all the powers and money ran through Europe. One of the problems of BSE was that MAFF could do nothing because it did not have the direct control to do anything. As my noble friend said, this would all work better if there was first-line democratic control of what was happening here, not by statute to Natural England but by a decision of the Secretary of State to Natural England, so that the ultimate decisions and accountability stayed with the department. That would make for a much healthier, more effective department.

On this business of delegation, Amendment 328A asks whether, if we are to designate organisations, it could be a national park. That is my question here: is it the Government’s intention and is there scope within law to make a national park a designated person under this clause? If I understand the way this clause is intended to work, that would be a sensible arrangement, and I would like to know whether it is possible.

I turn to Amendment 333A. I entirely understand what my noble friend is saying in her Amendment 333, and it is merely a convenient place to put my question. Should not the EDP delivery include a role for land managers as trusted partners? Look at the difficulties that Natural England has in making sure that its SSSIs are in good order. As a resident of Eastbourne, I live in the middle of a collection of SSSIs that are in very bad order; they are supposed to be chalk grassland but are actually knee-high brambles. There is real difficulty for an organisation such as Natural England to make so much happen on the ground. If it could have long-term relationships with trusted partners who are embedded in a particular bit of the countryside, it would be in a much better position to get things done.

Farmers are generally, although I know not universally, keen to deliver on local environmental priorities and to allocate 10% or so of their land for nature recovery, as long as legislation and policy allow this to be delivered profitably. Private sector organisations such as the Environmental Farmers Group—I declare an interest that my brother is one of its directors—have already developed catchment-scale environmental transition plans that dovetail with the proposed EDPs. Such existing delivery structures, alongside farm clusters and catchment partnerships, should not be ignored. We already have this sort of partnership structure with national nature reserves—Elmley and Holkham are the ones I think of, being a southerner, but there are doubtless others—that are really well run by private estates.

Clause 76(3) will provide Natural England with the power to pay others to deliver EDPs, but it is sparse on detail. It would be helpful to know the criteria to qualify for acting on behalf of Natural England and what opportunity organisations could have in the process of preparing and delivering an EDP. Clause 59 will require a consultation on a draft EDP, but that is very late in the process. Consequently, Amendment 274, which is in the next group, would require Natural England, during the preparation of an EDP, to ask for expressions of interest from persons or organisations who can demonstrate their suitability for delivering the EDP. That would assist Natural England in meeting its obligation, under Clause 57(2), to explain why its measures are appropriate and what alternatives have been considered.

In addition, proposed new paragraph (d) in Amendment 311 to Clause 71, which is rather later in our groupings, aims to encourage consideration of delivery by landowners and managers in the local area, given that this would lead to better outcomes for nature and the local area. Clause 86, which allows the Secretary of State to designate a person to replace Natural England in using the Bill’s powers, seems very wide-ranging, without limitations or clarity as to the nature of the designated person. Given that Natural England is committed to working with trusted partners in its strategy, it seems relevant to extend this relationship into legislation and to define the criteria for the appointment of trusted partners, which is currently lacking. The Corry review recommended that:

“Criteria would need to be developed to ensure that a consistent approach is taken for how autonomy is earned and then recognised and retained”.


Amendment 333A seeks to embed the role of trusted partners in EDP formation and delivery and to define the criteria for appointment. I fully understand that there may be other ways of doing it, but it is important that such trusted partners should be a core part of the strategy.

--- Later in debate ---

I cannot see, under Clause 53, a single new dwelling house being unlocked, delivered and occupied in the rest of this Parliament if we go down this path. This will stop development, not unlock it. Once again, I find myself unexpectedly agreeing with the Chancellor when she identifies all this well-meaning but counterproductive regulation that is holding back growth and holding back getting roofs over people’s heads. Can the Minister say what timescale she has in mind for completing the processes envisaged by Clause 53, so that we at least start getting these homes built? If it is not in this Parliament then what are we doing here?

[Lord Lucas (Con)]

My Lords, I have Amendment 253 in this group. I very much hope that the Minister will be able to give me some comfort as to the Government’s intention towards the private schemes—after all, the Minister and I were both involved in the Environment Bill when it was going through. We set up a system where people were making 30-year commitments to look after a piece of land properly, and now the whole system appears to have been turned on its head. No one knows what its future is, nor whether they should be going ahead with the schemes that they have put together to provide the biodiversity net gain where it cannot be provided on the site.

One farm owned by my local council is entirely suitable for restoration of the best quality chalk grassland, but the scheme is dead in the water. Nobody knows what the Government’s intentions are. Will this be viable? When we get EDPs, will everything be undermined by Natural England doing it itself? Will there be a role for the private sector in this area? Nothing is certain any more.

When you set out to get people involved for 30 years, there really ought to be an understanding on both sides of the House that the 30 years should be respected and that we should try to keep things stable for that length of time. Can the Government give me, and the people I find myself talking to, a real understanding of what their intentions are with respect to all that the private sector has done to date and might do in the future? What direction are we setting out in and what comfort can the Government give that it is worthwhile for the sector continuing to do what it has started to do? I should be very grateful to hear.

[Baroness Parminter (LD)]

My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Lucas, for his amendment. We cannot think about EDPs in splendid isolation. It is important that we as a Committee look at the wider context, including biodiversity net gain, that the EDPs will slot into. In that regard, it is incredibly important that, before we get to Report, the Government make clear their response to the consultation that they launched on biodiversity net gain, which closed before recess. If the Government were to decide to significantly change biodiversity net gain for the smaller sites that are up for grabs, it would have hugely detrimental impacts for the environment. It is important for us to know that before Report, so that we can then think about other amendments we might wish to bring forward.

Planning and Infrastructure Bill

Lord Lucas Excerpts

Committee stage
Wednesday 17th September 2025 Lords Chamber

Moved by

[Lord Lucas]

242B: Clause 55, page 92, line 1, at end insert—
“(2A) In the five years following the coming into force of this section, EDPs may only apply to nutrient neutrality, and other matters which the Secretary of State determines are appropriately dealt with at the scale of an EDP. (2B) After the period of five years following the coming into force of this section, provisions may be made that concern wildlife and other more local concerns, but the Secretary of State may not make more than five such EDPs in any year.”Member's explanatory statement
This amendment seeks to ensure that the EDP process has time to bed in in uncontroversial areas, and that its further development is not rushed.

[Lord Lucas (Con)]

My Lords, responding to the noble Lord opposite, I draw the attention of the House to paragraph 4.31 of the Companion. Committee stage is a conversation; it is a free for all. Members may speak when they want and as often as they want. The point is to get to the root of the issues that we are discussing. We are here to do a job, not to stick to a timetable. If that takes us again past midnight, that is what we are here for. The point is to get through it, so that we conclude the arguments and can be much briefer and more formal on Report. This phrase “before the Minister sits down” is not a Committee phrase. We have the right to speak at any time. We must hold to that right, because that is the core of us doing our job well in this place.

The amendment proposes that we take the question of environmental delivery plans at a gentler pace, and that we start by applying them in circumstances where the concept obviously works. Things that operate on a large scale, nutrient neutrality, water problems and other such issues are landscape-scale problems that need landscape-scale solutions. However, as we heard on the last day of debate, matters such as species are much more difficult to deal with.

We have a huge amount of uncertainty at the moment. From talking to the developer community and listening to them, I know that they see the Bill as paralysing development for the next five years. The Bill is meant to accelerate development, but as we have it at the moment it does the exact opposite. It creates so much uncertainty on how Part 3 will work, what it will feel like and how it will develop. Natural England has huge powers, and there are lots of big sums of money going this way and the other, but no one knows how it will happen. No one really understands how Natural England has the capacity to manage something of this scale—or even of this type—and what sets of behaviours to expect from it. We are setting ourselves up for five years of stasis, five years of not getting anywhere, because it will take that long for the system to settle in.

There is a better way to do this: to pace things, pilot things and do the easy bits first, and to make an early announcement of where the pilot EDPs will be, so that people can get their heads around it, and have large and open discussions about this. The provision that we are looking at is supposed to last a long time. There is no point in this being done in a constricted and partisan way—it will just break open the next time we have a change in Government. Everybody who wants to be involved in this is being asked to commit over long timescales. We politicians must adjust ourselves to that; we must run this in a way that allows people to have confidence in the politics over a long time.

The Government’s behaviour on biodiversity net gain is not a good sign of where they are in this space. I urge them to have wide discussions and involve people who are of obvious quality and depth, and who are likely to be there and involved in the discussion in years to come. In particular, I urge them to involve people from opposition parties; it should not be the Conservatives’ choice of who to involve but the Government’s, rather like how my noble friend Lord Gove appointed the current chair of Natural England. They are not a natural Conservative supporter but someone who, because they were not a natural Conservative supporter, has lasted and commanded the respect of this Government. We want something that will run through—long-term thinking, long-term commitments and long-term relationships to build confidence. Amendment 242B says, “Let’s take it that way. Let’s take it slowly and carefully, let’s take people with us, rather than have some big and uncontrolled explosion.” I beg to move.

[Lord Teverson (LD)]

My Lords, I will speak to my Amendments 271 and 272. In response to the Minister, one way of quickening these procedures, and getting rid of the risk of a Member speaking for a long time while withdrawing an amendment, is actually for the Government to accept a few of the amendments. Altogether, I think we have probably tabled some 400 amendments, many of which seem to be common sense. However, we seem to have had ministerial resistance to absolutely everything so far, which I do not think is a particularly good sign. However, I shall give the Government a chance because my amendments should obviously be accepted.

Even more seriously, Clause 58(2) starts quite promisingly. It says:

“In preparing an EDP, Natural England must have regard to”,


and then lists

“the development plan for the development area … the current environmental improvement plan … any Environment Act strategies”—

which, I am pleased to say, would include local nature recovery strategies. However, at the end of the subsection, it says

“so far as Natural England considers them to be relevant”.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Lucas (Con)]

My Lords, I am very grateful to the Minister for her reply to my amendment. Would she be prepared for me to open a discussion with her officials on the subject of my amendment? We need to do something to increase developers’ understanding of what it will be like under the new regime. If we are to get development going, we need to have the confidence generated.

[Baroness Hayman of Ullock (Lab)]

Of course. To all noble Lords, I say that, between Committee and Report, my noble friend and I are very happy to sit down and discuss amendments or any concerns further with officials.

[Lord Lucas (Con)]

I am grateful for that, but I am not surprised; that has been the way the noble Baroness has conducted herself through all her time as a Minister.

I wanted to go back to one of my earlier amendments on biodiversity data. Since she has her colleague, the noble Baroness, Lady Taylor, sitting next to her, might she have a conversation about unblocking the flow of biodiversity data generated in the course of planning permissions and getting that through to the local environment record centres, so that it is available to become part of the scientific information, which Natural England can draw on in making an EDP? Her department, or parts of it, and Natural England are active in this area. I would really like to know that this is an area where the Government are determined to make progress.

I am encouraged by the Minister’s nodding. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment 242B withdrawn.

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[Lord Randall of Uxbridge (Con)]

My Lords, my Amendment 285A commits to a new clause, which would require Natural England to undertake a baseline biodiversity survey for an EDP, very much along the lines that the noble Baroness, Lady Young of Old Scone, has just said, and would require the Secretary of State to consider this when determining whether an EDP passes the overall improvement test. I am very keen on biodiversity. My noble friend Lady Coffey referred to me as a twitcher. I take that not entirely well, because “twitcher” is slightly derogatory. I would like to be called a birder, and that is reflected in my coat of arms where there are four examples of a particular species which she will probably know from her reed beds at Minsmere: the bearded reedling, which of course is more commonly known as a bearded tit.

The reason for this biodiversity baseline is so that, as the noble Baroness said, you can find out what is happening now. The previous information may be out of date. It is important for the future condition of the area and to see whether the EDP is working, and it would highlight risks. In the interests of time, I will leave it there to hear what the Minister says on this.

[Lord Lucas (Con)]

My Lords, I support the amendments from the noble Baroness, Lady Young, and my noble friend Lord Randall. First, turning to baseline data and coming back to earlier discussions in Committee, I know that work is going on to improve what we have by way of baseline data, and I have been involved in extensive discussions with the local environment record centres and others. I would really appreciate being given an understanding, either now or by letter, of what the Government’s intentions are by way of giving momentum and a sense of determination to taking our current system and moving it on to the point where we gather all the environmental information, which we collect into one place, both that generated by the planning system and the extensive environmental data generated through high-quality amateur systems, and use for the benefit of understanding what is going on in local ecology.

It is all very well to do a baseline survey—it is traditional around us to do them in February—but doing proper baseline to really understand what is going on in an area requires presence throughout the year over a period of years. We have that data. We are collecting it. The world is full of seriously good amateur natural historians putting in a lot of work for free, and we are not taking advantage of that. We do not even use it to monitor the condition of SSSIs. Where the Government intend to go on this and how they will pick up on the discussions currently taking place and take them forward are important to understand before we get to Report. I will write to the Minister on that subject.

Secondly, when it comes to such things as water quality and nutrient neutrality, I am afraid that the monitoring system run by the Environment Agency has been run down to such an extent that we really do not have a good picture of what is going on in the average river catchment. As I have said before in Committee, my brother, Tim Palmer, is involved in the efforts that the Wylye Valley farmers are making. They have created their own laboratory. They are doing their own measurements, working with the Environment Agency, producing a much better quality of baseline data, and understanding where the problems come from and what can be done to deal with them.

High-resolution data makes it possible to resolve problems. The sort of stuff we have as the general flow from the Environment Agency just leaves us puzzling. Again, I very much hope that the Government will find themselves able to work with all the resources, interest and determination that are out there in the farming and other communities to get the data better and not just think that they have to pay huge amounts to environmental consultants to do it through the usual methods. There are better ways of doing these things by opening up. I hope that is the direction the Government will take.

[Lord Fuller (Con)]

My Lords, on the face of it, I welcome government Amendment 245A and the amendments from the noble Baroness, Lady Young of Old Scone, because it is clearly right that the public should understand what the sequence proposed might be.

My noble friend Lord Lucas has stolen some of my thunder in identifying that some of the research can take place only at certain times of year which, if it is a particular time window, may be, say, 11 months away, and there is this temporal longevity which may happen over many seasons. It is really important that, as part of that requirement for laying out the sequencing, we get an understanding of what timescales may be needed, because my concern is what happens at the point at which an EDP is first mooted and that sequencing process starts. What assurances can the Minister give that, because the process may take several years, it will not, in effect, impose a moratorium on any development while we wait for the sequences and processes to go through? These were laid out in the helpful diagram from the noble Lord, Lord Krebs, and the bits before.

It is important that government Amendment 245A which, as I say, I welcome, should be coupled with the anticipated timescales. It might be implicit in the amendment, but it would be helpful if the noble Baroness could make it explicit that sequences and timescales are in there and whether that applies to a moratorium in the meantime.

Planning and Infrastructure Bill

Lord Lucas Excerpts

Committee stage
Wednesday 17th September 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Cromwell (CB)]

My Lords, I start by confirming my support for all three of the amendments in the name of the noble Lord, Amendments 253, 296 and 297. However, I caution the use of “non-native”; it is the invasive aspect that is the problem. What could be more English than a rose? What could be a more typical English fruit than an apple? Both of them originate from central Asia—they are not natives. However, I entirely take the point about invasive species.

Amendment 60, already debated, referred to guidance on planting along highways. There was much discussion about trees and wildflowers. I enjoyed reading what type of tree the noble Lord, Lord Moylan, might represent, which might repay people who want to look it up in Hansard. One plant that grows along our highways which was not mentioned in the earlier debate is ragwort, the bright yellow flowering plant seen everywhere alongside our highway network. Through lack of enforcement of existing legislation, this invasive plant has become a menace to the environment, animals and agriculture, and action to control it is long overdue. Once it has flowered, ragwort produces seeds that, like dandelions which people may be more familiar with, come with a downy parachute which means they float far and wide on the breeze across the countryside and into farmland, where they take root, produce more seed, and so on.

Ragwort is poisonous to livestock, and it is not advisable for people to touch it with their bare hands, although I spend many unhappy hours pulling it up myself with my own bare hands, as I am sure many other Members do. Grazing animals leave it alone while it is growing, but where a field is cut for hay or silage, as is the case on many grassland farms, it gets incorporated into the bales, animals cannot detect it, and they are poisoned by it. Finally, areas set aside for environmental benefits, such as margins for wildflowers, quickly become choked with ever-expanding stands of ragwort.

So much for the biology; what about the law? Ragwort is what is called a notifiable weed, and landowners and occupiers have a legal obligation to control and remove it, particularly if it is spreading, causing a nuisance, or posing a risk to livestock. The Weeds Act 1959 and the subsequent code of practice on how to prevent the spread of ragwort outline these responsibilities. Failure to comply can lead to legal action, and/or the relevant authorities can issue a clearance notice requiring action to be taken to remove it. Unfortunately, this has not been enforced for many years.

As part of my research in tabling this amendment, I asked a Written Question about notices or prosecutions in the last 12 months. I was informed:

“In the past 12 months, no notices in relation to ragwort control have been served to National Highways, and there have been no prosecutions under the Weeds Act 1959 or the Code of Practice”.


I would bet that we could go back a lot more years than the last 12 months and the result would be exactly the same.

That is not good enough. Defra and the Environment Agency need to enforce the existing law and regulations. The Bill will create new areas of land controlled by a quango. This amendment specifically identifies this problem plant and requires that at least in the development of new infrastructure, proper controls are carried out, and—my favourite theme—enforced where necessary. That would be a start.

[Lord Lucas (Con)]

My Lords, I would like to speak on behalf of the Cinnabar moth, a very handsome creature which is nourished on ragwort. Ragwort is an ordinary part of the downland scene. It is an entirely natural, native plant in its right place. I agree that it can become a pest in some other places, but our downland is grazed by horses. They have the sense not to eat the thing, and we do not make hay out of it.

It is a plant that, in its ordinary place, you can work your way around. It is where someone leaves a field derelict, and it becomes a sea of yellow and the seeds are drifting everywhere, that something needs to be done about it. I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Cromwell, that we should be better, but we should not be too frightened of ragwort. It is not hugely disastrous for agriculture or livestock, in my experience of it.

[Lord Cromwell (CB)]

I invite the noble Lord to spend a series of weekends with me and my family pulling up ragwort across the organic grassland, which we bale for organic dairy farmers. After that, he may consider that ragwort is fine in his backyard but that, for those who are trying to feed the nation, it is a serious problem. Our livestock do leave it alone—he is quite right that they have the good sense to eat around it—but once it is baled and dead, they eat it.

[Lord Lucas (Con)]

The prospect of spending weekends with the noble Lord, Lord Cromwell, seems well worth some ragwort pulling.

I also sound a note of caution in respect of the amendments tabled by my noble friend Lord Roborough, as they are drafted, particularly Amendment 296. Animals such as the grey squirrel and the muntjac come and go as they please; you cannot eradicate them from an area. You can try pushing them back, but we are stuck with them until we develop a national solution. You should not penalise an EDP because it happens to be infected by them.

Also, are we referring to the list that is generated by retained EU regulation 1143/2014 when we are referring to invasive non-native species? This list consists mostly of things that are troublesome in much warmer climates. A lot of things that cause problems for us, such as sycamore, would not be included at all.

I am cautious. It is hard to eliminate invasive species from waterways. Unless you control the whole waterway and have a really integrated, careful and expensive campaign over several years, it is very difficult to do more than just reduce. By and large, we should learn to live with these invaders. I say this as a lifelong botanist. We have; we enjoy and celebrate the thousands of plants which have come to live here, mostly courtesy of gardeners, and which play a small part in the native flora.

There are very few plants that cause a huge problem in terms of invasiveness. Animals can be difficult. Insects are difficult but really hard to control. Anyway, when it comes to the flora of this country, we should recognise what we mean by “native”. If we go back to the ice ages, you are talking just about birch and a bit of Scots pine. The ice ages crushed the European temperate flora against the Alps. As a result, we have a really depleted flora in Europe compared with China or North America, which both had southern refuges that their flora could get to. You really see that in the case of forestry; we have 30 woody species in this country. Every year or two, a disease threatens another of them. I am starting to lose my mature oak trees to acute oak decline, having lost a lot of ash and all the elm.

A healthy temperate woodland has hundreds of species in it. That a few are finding their way back from gardens, diversifying and getting us back to a level of diversity that we ought to have is to be celebrated. Instead of this fuss about what is non-native, let us celebrate the immigrants. Surely the party opposite agrees with that.

[Lord Cromwell (CB)]

Without referring back as far as the ice age or taking as long as that to talk about it, my amendment relates specifically to one plant. Is the noble Lord suggesting that we do not apply the existing legislation? That is what my amendment seeks—merely to apply the law as it stands now through enforcement, not to create new law.

[Lord Lucas (Con)]

My Lords, where it is troubling serious agriculture, yes, we should enforce.

[Lord Inglewood (CB)]

My Lords, on the grounds of “it takes one to know one”, it is worth noting that this is a debate that we are unlikely to have in the next Session of Parliament—old-style hereditary Peers’ contribution to the governance of this country.

I will talk briefly about invasive species. I declare an interest as a landowner in Cumbria. It has always seemed to me that the real problem in dealing with the ones that are pests, of which we can all think of a number—Himalayan balsam, Japanese knotweed and so on—is that those of us who want to see them rolled back have never managed to capture the hearts and minds of the country. It is no good just doing it yourself, as I think the noble Lord, Lord Lucas, said. I suggest to the Government that they should think in terms of trying to enrol the nation on this particular crusade.

I say this because my contributions towards our local red squirrel group may be endangered, although I hope they will not be, by reduction in support for my agricultural enterprises, because there is less money going round. There might be ways of incentivising those involved in land management, possibly with a little financial contribution as part of a wider package, to make some of these things happen. I will leave it at that, other than to say that if anybody wants to see an extreme example of a reservoir with a whole group of invasive species in one place, they should travel by train from Preston to Manchester and look out the window. They all seem to be there on the verge of the railway line.

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[Lord Sentamu (CB)]

I say to the noble Lord, Lord Lucas: does he want to accept these invasive plants? What about Japanese knotweed, which is in the schedule of wildflowers and illegal to perpetuate? Once it takes root, it is very difficult to get rid of. If it is cut, tiny things will spread. Is he still in favour of Japanese knotweed?

[Lord Lucas (Con)]

My Lords, I have managed to eliminate Japanese knotweed successfully several times. It requires a bit of time and a bit of glyphosate.

[Baroness Hayman of Ullock (Lab)]

I have also got rid of Japanese knotweed—I have not had much success with Himalayan balsam, though.

I thank the noble Lord, Lord Roborough, for Amendments 253, 296 and 297, and the noble Lord, Lord Cromwell, for Amendment 253B. I will consider these together because they all relate to invasive non-native species and the nature restoration fund. The Government recognise the impacts of invasive non-native species on our native species and ecosystems. As the Minister for invasive non-native species, I appreciate the noble Lords’ intentions in tabling these amendments, but they do not align with the targeted nature of the nature restoration fund.

However, I reassure noble Lords that I have a particular bee in my bonnet about how we best tackle invasive non-native species, because they can have a devastating impact on our native biodiversity. Himalayan balsam means that nothing grows at all, and it wrecks riverbanks. However, it is about not only what is here at the moment and how we manage it but how we stop more invasive species coming in. That is a huge challenge. While I am on that subject, the noble Lord, Lord Lucas, asked about the list—it is retained EU law, but we have been reviewing and amending it in order to tailor it to UK circumstances.

Amendment 253 would require Natural England to take action to eradicate the invasive non-native species that could negatively impact an EDP’s environmental features. The legislation already allows invasive non-native species control to act as a conservation measure, where this would support the action of Natural England to materially outweigh the impact of development on the relevant environmental feature. However, we should recognise that it might not always be the best option in terms of environmental impact, value for money and delivery considerations, such as the need to secure the overall improvement by the EDP end date.

Requiring action to eradicate invasive non-native species, regardless of these considerations, could delay EDPs, increase costs, and limit the ability to secure positive environmental outcomes. With these amendments, the Secretary of State would be required to revoke an EDP—even one delivering effectively for nature—because of the presence of a single grey squirrel, which does not make sense in the bigger picture. Making EDPs contingent on mandatory eradication in this way could also make them unviable. On the grey squirrel question, the noble Lord asked about the sterilisation programme. To confirm, the programme is ongoing, and is being supported by Defra.

Amendment 253B, tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Cromwell, seeks to require bodies exercising powers relating to an EDP to ensure that legal obligations under the Weeds Act 1959 are “publicised, observed and enforced”. The Weeds Act grants powers for the Defra Secretary of State to serve landowners with a requirement to remove the weeds specified within the Act, and ensures that landowners retain responsibility for their own land, instead of public bodies needing to act.

EDPs are a targeted tool to address the impact of development on specific environmental features. Introducing a broad obligation for Natural England, and others exercising responsibilities relating to EDPs, would expand the scope of EDPs, and risk diverting focus from their core purpose. The noble Lord, Lord Cromwell, and others discussed ragwort. I assure the noble Lord that there is nothing in this legislation that would preclude Natural England or others from taking action in line with the Weeds Act, such as reporting the presence of ragwort where this is encountered, or from appropriately removing such weeds where Natural England, or delivery partners, are delivering conservation measures on the ground. With these explanations, I hope that the noble Lord, Lord Roborough, will withdraw his amendment.

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[Baroness Hayman of Ullock (Lab)]

I am very happy to.

[Lord Lucas (Con)]

My noble friend should know better than to say “Before the Minister sits down”—really.

When this project gets going and we start to see how Natural England is balancing its own activities against involvement with the private sector and farmers and others, how is Parliament going to be informed as to what is going on? How will information flow to us as to how Natural England is fulfilling its role? The Minister had some very fine words in her replies, but how can we butter some parsnips with them?

[Baroness Hayman of Ullock (Lab)]

Clearly, we want to make it work. As I have said, Defra will be monitoring it closely and reports will come out on it, and I am absolutely certain that I will get questions.

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[Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP)]

My Lords, I shall speak chiefly to the amendments in the Green group’s name in this diverse but very important group. I will briefly mention Amendment 345, already powerfully and poetically spoken to.

In the discussion, we heard so many sad stories of the trees we have lost. As a Save Sheffield Trees campaigner, it made me think of two magnificent specimens in Sheffield: the Chelsea Road Elm and the Vernon Road Oak in Dore, where communities had to make enormous efforts—including risking life and limb and arrest—to save those trees. The amendment would create a mechanism to make sure that those efforts could be put towards more constructive activities, rather than defending what is already there.

I shall speak chiefly to Amendment 346 in my name, which calls on local authorities to report on land contamination, raised by the noble Baroness, Lady Hayman, in both groups. My amendment raises Zane’s law. I have essentially tabled it before, to the Building Safety Act and the Levelling-up and Regeneration Act, when they were passing through the House. The whole campaign for Zane’s law has developed significantly since then. This is a probing amendment, because a lot has happened since we last discussed this, when the Minister was then sitting beside me on the opposition Benches and expressing interest in the issue.

It also offers the Government a suggestion for at least a partial way forward. This is a very urgent issue, which has been acknowledged. Recently, in July, the Mayor of London backed a Zane’s law, pushed very much by London Assembly Member, Zack Polanski. Just a few days ago, a motion moved by the Fire Brigades Union at the TUC conference, also backed by the NEU, Unison, Unite and the CWU, called for a Zane’s law.

There have been many new noble Lords since the last time we discussed this in this House. Zane’s law is named after the seven year-old Zane Gbangbola, who died in February 2014 during flooding of the River Thames at Chertsey in Surrey. Zane’s parents, Kye and Nicole, know that he was killed by toxic hydrogen cyanide gas from a former waste dump. His father was left paralysed by that gas. That is not what the inquest says, but everyone knows that is the fact. Indeed, I note that Zane’s parents recently had a meeting with the Prime Minister to discuss the Truth About Zane campaign and to see what could be done to finally get the record set straight.

This is about an issue that directly affects many people. In June, I held a Zane’s law summit here in Parliament, acknowledging that current UK regulations on contaminated land are grossly inadequate and a threat to the safety of many, particularly given climate breakdown, rising sea levels, increasing rainfall and flooding. That summit heard from campaigners around the country on very significant issues. The case of Zane is about a historic landfill which was closed off many decades ago. There are ongoing, immediate landfill issues which are not being properly dealt with, and which Zane’s law would deal with more broadly.

I have to acknowledge and give all credit to the Government that the then Environment Secretary, Steve Reed, came to the summit, where he said that the Government knew that there needed to be more transparency about contaminated land and that they would publish a new state of contaminated land report in spring next year. One thing I am looking for from the Minister today is a report on how that is going—a reassurance that progress is being made. The Secretary of State said at that meeting that the department is developing a land remediation pathfinders scheme to provide financial support to councils to remediate land that is contaminated. With this amendment, I hope to hear from the Minister about what progress is being made. Of course, we have seen a change of personnel in her department since then, but I would like to hear what is happening.

I also want to raise a further issue, which has been raised with me. I will understand if the Minister wants to write to me about it. As the pressure and the campaign for Zane’s law grow, I am hearing reports that landowners might be selling what they know to be contaminated land, even if it is not properly identified and fully understood, and trying to basically dump it before further action is taken. Does any agency or institution have a duty to record, report or interact when there are such disposals or purchases? We know that there is a big issue coming; how can we ensure that innocent buyers and communities do not get dumped with land like this?

I come now to Amendment 346A, tabled by my noble friend Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb, which fits more closely in this group, dealing as it does with trees. As the noble Baroness, Lady Grender, said, we are going backwards in terms of biodiversity and on issues around trees and so on. According to the State of the UK’s Woods and Trees 2025 report, roughly 40% of our ancient woodlands, the UK’s most biodiverse temperate habitat, are being damaged by plantation forestry, making their restoration a priority to meet the Government’s 2030 nature recovery targets. Here is a truly shocking figure: in 2023, 6 hectares of damaged ancient woodlands were restored, but the target for the year was 5,000 hectares—so six hectares versus 5,000 hectares.

Crucially, this amendment would create a duty for the appropriate forestry authority—in many cases, this will of course be the Forestry Commission—undertaking any planning or development function relating to forestry land, or taking any part in any exercise in such functions, to prioritise achieving the targets under Sections 1 to 3 of the Environment Act 2021 and targets in the environmental improvement plan, as well as following, of course, their duties under the Climate Change Act 2008. This would ensure that the Forestry Commission took all reasonable steps to contribute to the legally binding targets for nature recovery and climate mitigation and adaptation.

I think that I have previously debated this issue with the Minister. The Forestry Commission’s current legal remit is outdated. Its primary duty, as established in the Forestry Act 1919, is to promote timber production, so that is the job it is being given. There is only a vague conservation duty, which was added in 1985, a very long time ago. That 1985-added duty lacks clarity and enforceability and does not align with the UK’s environmental targets. We need to do this simply to protect nature and to act on the climate. If the forestry estate is open to renewable development through the Bill—and eventually the Act—it is vital that its decisions do not undermine irreplaceable habitats. Updating the Forestry Commission’s remit is timely, necessary and, as we know, widely supported by the public and the conservation sector.

[Lord Lucas (Con)]

My Lords, I have the last amendment in this group. I very much support my noble friend Lady Coffey on her ponds amendment. We are short of ponds in the landscape, generally, and they should not be hard to create. I like the idea of wild belt, but I am not convinced that we can compel anyone to create a natural environment in this country. We lack the natural systems that would maintain a natural environment. Anything in this country has to be managed, but to have places set aside for nature and properly managed seems a much better concept than a green belt. It is much easier for people to enjoy and much easier to look after.

My amendment says that we should recognise that construction and demolition activities cause disruption to nature, much as we recognise that wildlife can cause disruption to growing crops. The Government have recognised this in relation to wind farms; they accept the damage to wildlife that wind farms cause. What we do causes damage to nature. If I was to put on my house a bird box and a bat box, there would not be a single month in the year when I could repaint my house without some risk of disturbing wildlife. We need to take a realistic attitude to this, which I hope is what my amendment does.

[Lord Blencathra (Con)]

My Lords, I rise to address the amendments in this group. There are some important amendments here, some that raise interesting concepts and some that are apparently sexy but may be difficult to implement. Biodiversity is vital to preserving our ecosystems, which in turn provide clean air, water and food. It holds significant cultural, aesthetic and economic value, supporting industries such as tourism and agriculture. I thank my noble friend Lady Coffey for moving the amendment in the name of my noble friend Lord Grayling concerning biodiversity.

Amendment 335 seeks to ensure that a biodiversity audit is incorporated into the planning application process or application for development. I recognise the potential merit in integrating biodiversity considerations at this stage in the planning process and I keenly await the Government’s response. I agree entirely that, as far as EDPs are concerned, one must do an audit at the beginning to know what one has before one can say later whether it has improved, got worse or stayed the same—I hope that the Government will correct me if I am wrong—but I think that my noble friend’s amendment may refer generally to planning applications, where a balance has to be struck. I can see the benefit of doing an environmental audit beforehand, when it might speed things up and cost less, but doing it afterwards might also speed things up and cost less. I would like to know what the Government’s thinking is.

I understand that, before I joined Natural England, about eight years ago it reached out to HS2 and said, “We know that you’ll be doing a lot of work on the route. You may come across some biodiversity problems. Talk to us in advance and we’ll see if we can sort it out”. I understand that Natural England was told, “Pooh, pooh. We don’t need you involved in this. We know what we’re doing”. By not involving Natural England in the early planning stage, HS2 hit the bat problem, which is when it invented the £110 million tunnel. So there can be merit in getting nature bodies and the developers involved with Natural England early in the planning stage.

Amendment 336 calls for transparency in offsite biodiversity mitigation decisions. If the amendment were to pass, the Government would be required to publish a statement setting out the scientific basis for that decision. Government accountability is a principle on which Members on both sides of the Committee agree and I thank my noble friend for his contribution and my noble friend Lady Coffey for moving the amendment.

I also thank my noble friend Lady Coffey and the noble Baroness, Lady Grender, for their amendment contributions. These amendments seek to provide important protections for potential wild-belt areas and their associated ecosystems. I particularly like my noble friend’s amendment on ponds. It is an excellent idea and, if the Government do not accept it, I would like to hear a good reason why.

On heritage tree preservation orders, I can tell the Committee that on 27 September 2023 I was driving back from Newcastle along the Hadrian’s Wall road—well, my wife was driving and I was sitting in the passenger seat, giving my usual expert guidance on how to drive, as men often do. She said, “We’ve driven past this gap for years. Why don’t we go and look at it?” I said, “Well, you can go if you like. I’m not going to try to stagger up there. It’s about to rain”. That night, a few hours later, those swine cut down the tree. It grieves me that I did not try to stagger up to look at it. The Sycamore Gap tree was iconic. The word “iconic” is not in the amendment, but the tree, although it was not of cultural significance, was of iconic significance. I like the concept of the amendment. My only worry is that the definition seems rather wide and that it lands it all on Natural England, which is not geared up to do this.

If this amendment were to pass, I suspect that, within one month, Natural England would have a million letters from people saying, “You must ledger this tree, that tree and that tree”. It could not just say, “Thank you very much, it’s all in the register now”, and tick the box; it would have to investigate every single one, it would have to see whether it was genuine or not and, no doubt, there would have to be a review process, as people would demand that a tree be taken off the list or added to it. So, I like the concept and I agree with the noble Baroness, Lady Young, that something must be done, but I also agree with the noble Baroness, Lady Hayman, that we need to do it properly and find an easy way to do it that protects all the right trees, but not at a huge bureaucratic cost.

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In conclusion, I hope the Government are listening. There clearly are cross-departmental discussions about these matters at the moment. It seems to me that the behaviour and performance of the regulators is crucial to this and the way in which they operate the habitats regulations is going to define whether we can really get these major infrastructure projects off the ground as soon as possible. I very much look forward to a constructive debate.

[Lord Lucas (Con)]

Not for the first time I find myself entirely in agreement with the noble Lord, Lord Hunt of Kings Heath. I therefore do not need to take a lot of time on my amendment in this group, which originates with Catherine Howard of Herbert Smith Freehills Kramer and her Project Nutcracker and is intended to address the problems caused by three legal cases—People Over Wind, Sweetman I and CG Fry—and provide a hook for statutory guidance aimed primarily at addressing the customs and practice of the statutory nature conservation bodies.

[Baroness Young of Old Scone (Lab)]

My Lords, I do not know where to start on this one. I must admit that, if I had had the neck of the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, in my hands this morning after reading the Telegraph article, he would no longer be here to press his amendment tonight.