Business and Planning Bill

Lord Lucas Excerpts

2nd reading & 2nd reading (Hansard) & 2nd reading (Hansard): House of Lords
Monday 6th July 2020 Lords Chamber

[Lord Lucas (Con) [V]]

My Lords, the noble Baroness, Lady Thornhill, and many others have pointed out the importance of the relationship between district and county authorities when it comes to the highway. In the district of Eastbourne where I live, it will be the district council that bears the responsibility for our economic recovery in a town which is based on the hospitality industry. As my noble friend Lord Wei said, innovation and experimentation ought to be the order of the day. However, this crucially involves roads. They permeate a town and you cannot talk about the experience of visitors, let alone residents, without really focusing on what is going on with the roadways. As others have pointed out, this Bill involves the interface between the pavement and the roadway. If we have a café that is spilling on to the pavement, with pedestrians spilling over into the roadway, the district authority absolutely must have the power to set the standards of safety that will make sure that that safety can be delivered by procuring changes to what is happening in the roadway. This cannot wait on the county; this has to be something that the district council can do by its own motion, or least get the county to do in an expedited way rather than to the county’s own timescales.

As has again been suggested by others, I too hope that we will look at expanding the Bill. Where neighbouring premises, open spaces or car parks might be thrown into service in the cause of this Bill, they should not be neglected. We should also look at encouraging, particularly in a seasonal town like Eastbourne, pop-up experiences—things that are not intended to last into the winter.

Lastly, in reply to my noble friends Lord Cormack and Lord Balfe, I am enthusiastic about this way of conducting business. I think that we have seen some real improvements in the ways in which our colleagues are now better embedded in the communities they are a part of, both in working and in living, and I have seen that being reflected in the debate today. I understand that we need to see some improvements to the systems we have at the moment, but given a bit of determination and good will, they seem to be entirely without our capabilities. I for one am in no hurry to get back to the business of commuting to Westminster with all the disconnection that that generates.