Deregulation Bill
Lord McKenzie of Luton Excerpts(9 years, 10 months ago)
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“(b) must be framed so as to include all those whose work activities may pose any risk to the health and safety of any person other than the self-employed persons conducting them.”
Lord McKenzie of Luton (Lab)
My Lords, I will speak also to Amendment 3. I thank the Minister for reverting on this matter at Third Reading, as he promised to do, and for providing some important draft regulations. The issue with which we have grappled throughout this Bill is how Professor Löfstedt’s recommendations might be safely implemented—if indeed they can be—and in particular how it would be possible to deliver the recommendations that those self-employed who pose no potential risk of harm to others should be exempt from the general duties of the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974 without creating unintended consequences.
As we have asserted before, maintaining the status quo for the self-employed is the preferred approach given the minimal requirements that would fall on them in these circumstances and the risk of confusion that could follow any change. However, we accept that this is not where the Government are—hence another attempt to implement the recommendation is necessary. Certainly, the first two attempts to implement a Löfstedt approach fell short. The most recent did not have the support of the professor himself and received substantial criticism when consulted on, not least from the CBI and the EEF, and it is understood that the HSE advised that the last approach should be abandoned. The latest attempt is reflected in the government amendment and in the draft regulations, which I think were circulated on Monday.
As we have heard, this amendment provides a framework for determining who is conducting and undertaking a very prescribed description and, hence, is subject to the general duty. As we have heard, it can be determined or framed by reference to types and locations of activities or any other feature, and, crucially, by whether persons who may be affected by the conduct of the undertaking may be exposed to risk to their health and safety—a very important change.
Although our preference for any exemption from the general duty is that it should be based on everyone being in, subject to exclusions which take people out, rather than the reverse, we see merit in this government amendment. We are comforted by proposed new subsection (2A)(b), which appears to be a substantial change in the Government’s position, as I think the Minister confirmed. It brings matters back to a Löfstedt formulation and therefore we are grateful to the Minister for his efforts in bringing this about, doubtless with the steadying hand of the HSE. It raises questions of how it is to be put into practice and doubtless takes us back to issues around risk assessments, but I was pleased to hear what the Minister said about specific guidance being developed in this regard, as well as use of the existing guidance.
Although comforted, I am bound to say that we are not comforted enough. Our Amendment 2 would simply ensure that, rather than just setting out some of the potential criteria by which undertakings of a prescribed description may be determined—that is, the circumstances which bring a self-employed person under the duties of the 1974 Act—it is mandatory. So regulations determining the self-employed who retain a general duty must always include those who may pose a risk to the health and safety of another person. Indeed, why on earth should that not be the case?
Certainly that approach is what has been provided for in the draft regulations that we have seen. But they are, frankly, only that—draft—and presumably there is no prospect of them being finalised before the end of this Parliament. The Minister may wish to comment on their intended progress. What assurance do we have that the actual regulations will replicate the circulated draft? I understand exactly what the Minister said—that if he were in a position to determine that, that would be the case; it would be the basis on which the Government took them forward. However, we know where we are in the electoral cycle and, come May, who knows who will be in a position to take this forward and on what basis? Is it not the case that the Government of the day could ignore new subsection (2A)(b) in framing any regulations, undoing the good work that the Minister has achieved and reverting to a prescriptive list which bears all the flaws of the earlier version? Changing primary legislation, which could always be done, would be much more difficult.
Incidentally, in determining who is exposed to harm, the Government have discounted the employees of a self-employed person. Accepting that Section 2 of the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act would in any event impose a duty on the self-employed in respect of their employees, can the Minister tell us why that is so?
Our Amendment 3 was drafted before we had sight of the government amendment and it calls for a review of any proposed regulations to see that they are fit for purpose. This still has relevance, although we see that the draft regulations—the Minister referred to this—provide for a review of any regulations within a five-year period. Such a review would clearly be welcome.
On the face of it, the Government’s position represents a significant and welcome change. However, unless we think about locking it down more tightly in primary legislation, it may yet be wasted. I beg to move.
Lord Wallace of Saltaire
My Lords, I thank the noble Lord for his constructive comments, and I recognise that the timing creates some difficulties. I have consulted on whether draft regulations can be finalised, approved and laid before the general election, but I have to say that with the best will in the world that will not, at this stage, be possible. I cannot give the noble Lord a guarantee on the structure, nature and composition of the next Government—I am not sure that any of us can at present. That, of course, has to remain a matter of good will and of the commitment of those who have been involved from all sides in these consultations.
The duties and the question of the employees of the self-employed are covered by the general duty that the self-employed have to consider the interests of others and the risks involved. That seems to me to be fully covered here. We have moved as far as we can and the draft guidance was intended to provide an indication of where this coalition Government would be moving and where we would trust any successor Government to continue in assessing this very delicate balance between where Professor Löfstedt started, which was with the sense that we should try,
“to exempt from health and safety law those self employed people whose work activities pose no potential risk of harm to others”,
and, as he also said in his original review, to,
“help reduce the perception that health and safety law is inappropriately applied”.
That is what we on both sides are attempting to do. I felt that the Government had now moved sufficiently far to assure the Opposition that we were very much pursuing this role and that our proposals would bring Britain into line with other European countries and remove health and safety burdens from the self-employed in low-risk occupations. I hope that that does provide sufficient assurance, but I will see how far we have been able to do so.
Lord McKenzie of Luton
My Lords, I am grateful to the Minister for his response, and I entirely accept his assurance about what he sees as the way forward in circumstances where he and his colleagues were in a position to determine that. It is a great pity that the Government have come a significant way on this but we are just a smidgeon away from locking it down and making it mandatory. I really do not see the problem with doing that. If the Government are happy to provide for that in the draft regulations and happy to take those factors into account as part of their amendment, simply always making it mandatory to feature that provision in regulations seems to me to be quite a small additional step and one that could make a real difference. It is a pity that having come so far the Government cannot just close that gap.
Incidentally, in terms of the employees of self-employed people, I understand that Section 2 of the 1974 Act creates a general duty on all employers, whether they are employees, self-employed, or whatever their status is, so I am not quite sure why they are being excluded here when these arrangements are considered. Perhaps we might reflect on that. This is difficult, because I would like to test the opinion of the House, but I think that the Minister has done his utmost to provide reassurance on the record. That is where we are, and it is probably the best way to leave it today. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Lord McKenzie of Luton
My Lords, in moving this amendment, I will also speak to our other amendments in this group. In doing so, I, too, draw attention to my interest in the register. We consider that this is an integrated group of amendments that stand together, should we decide to test the view of the House. I trust that that is agreed.
The issue of short-term lets has generated considerable controversy since it has been proposed that there should be some relaxation of the London provisions, but it has also focused attention on what is now happening in the market and why the status quo cannot be sustained. Currently, the letting of residential accommodation for temporary sleeping accommodation in London for a period of less than 90 consecutive nights constitutes a change of use for which planning permission is required. Notwithstanding that there is the possibility of a fine of up to £20,000 for failure to secure permission, we know that short-term letting is extensively carried on without permission being available.
We have covered in earlier debates the problems that can arise and the issue is helpfully dealt with also by the briefing we have received from London Councils for this debate. It concerns the potential loss of residential accommodation to the lucrative short-let market, increased problems with noise and anti-social behaviour, loss of community identity, increased crime and fire safety risks, and significant challenges on continual enforcement. We know that other cities around the world are experiencing similar problems. There is clearly a market for this activity and business opportunities have been created, particularly via the internet, which are different, as the noble Lord said, from those of the 1970s. According to the Government’s own figures, there are currently thousands of London properties and rooms advertised as used for short-term lets, each potentially in breach of the law. That is an untenable situation.
The amendments that I am speaking to have the support of the noble Baronesses, Lady Hanham and Lady Gardner of Parks, and the noble Lord, Lord Tope, who have each added their names. Indeed, we have worked together across our party divides to come up with a package of measures that, building on the government amendments, would enable home owners who wish to let their homes on a short-term basis to do so unless there is detriment to the amenity of the locality and to do so within a system where there is proper notification to local authorities and where enforcement is enabled. Like the Government, we do not see this as providing new opportunities for large-scale commercial lettings. These amendments, too, are about providing safeguards for the local community.
Our amendments cover five issues. First, there must be provision in regulations for those letting properties on a short-term basis to have an obligation to notify the local authority. Our amendment is not prescriptive as to form and content and it need not be overly bureaucratic. The Minister rather set his face against that in introducing his contribution, but there is no reason why this could not be dealt with very straightforwardly via some web- based approach. It is not prescriptive, but it would give an opportunity for the local authority to gain an understanding of the scale of activity in its area. It would also aid local authorities in their enforcement role, which we know is a challenge at the moment, and of course could potentially be an encouragement to tax compliance.
Secondly, we consider the number of days in the calendar year that accommodation should be available for short-term letting should be 60 rather than 90, as the Minister recognised, with regulations enabling this to be reduced. We consider that to be a more reasonable constraint and protection on local amenity. But even that would allow a four-month back-to-back letting across a year end. The Minister simply asserted that 90 days was more appropriate. I am not sure that that assertion, frankly, carries more weight than one for 60 days.
The concept is that short-term letting should be allowed effectively for someone’s home. It appears that the Government are seeking to define that by liability to council tax. We think that that is inadequate. Would not a liability to council tax arise for somebody letting residential property on a commercial basis, for example, between tenancies? Limiting the relaxation to someone’s principal residence in London would better target the deregulations.
Fourthly, we welcome the provision that the Government are seeking to make for local authorities to disapply the regulation for certain properties or areas, but oppose this right being subject to the consent of the Secretary of State. Local authorities are better placed to make the judgment about the impact of short-term lettings in their boroughs. Surely, that must be the case. We agree that they should not be able to do this in an arbitrary manner and protection of the amenity of a locality is a fair yardstick. However, we believe that a desirable hurdle rather than one that is necessary is considerably fairer. Indeed, the necessary hurdle could give rise to substantial and fair challenges on the local authority.
Finally, there is the issue of enforcement. In their policy document of February this year, the Government stated that:
“To protect amenity and address concerns over nuisance, the Government proposes that the new flexibility should be able to be withdrawn from particular properties after just one successful enforcement action against a statutory nuisance”.
In his contribution, the Minister said that there was provision elsewhere for this to be effective, but I am not sure where it is. The Government were clear in their policy document that that was what they wanted to happen. Our amendment provides that regulation should make such provision but is potentially more flexible than the “one strike and you’re out” approach.
These amendments are designed not to undermine the Government’s position, but to strengthen the safe- guards, and also, in the spirit of localism, to recognise that local authorities and not the Secretary of State are best placed to determine whether the scale of short-term letting is destroying the amenity of their areas. I beg to move.
Baroness Hanham (Con)
My Lords, my name is also on this amendment, and I would like to draw attention to the declarations I have made in the past of being a joint president of London Councils and also a former leader and member of the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea, which will be affected by this legislation.
The noble Lord has set out very clearly the amendments that we think are necessary to make this legislation tenable. London has a particular problem. I drew attention on Report to a phrase in the policy document which said that London needed to be brought into the 21st century over the renting and letting of property. I said then and I say now that I think that London is already and has been in the 21st century for a very long time. There is enormous pressure on property in London. There is probably more renting now in London than anywhere else. There is a hugely transitory population, so that we now have great areas where we know that people are not resident. The properties are not used; they are investment properties. London has a dichotomy. It is an area where people want to live but now cannot, largely because it is getting so expensive. Where there is investment, the people who have invested in property are not from this country but from abroad. Where there is a lot of very new property on land which perhaps could have been used for local people, it is now largely empty.
The temptation to let is enormous. To make sure that there is no abuse of the proposals which the noble Lord has brought forward, we have tabled these amendments. Before saying more about that, I want to mention some other things that I am concerned about. The Government—of whom I have been a great supporter —are all in favour of devolution, of passing powers to different parts of the country and to different parts of England. We have just done it with Greater Manchester. There is more devolution. London has had devolution through its ability to put forward Private Members’ Bills to deal with the issues that affect London. These Private Members’ Bills are not put forward in isolation: they have to be put forward with the agreement of all the London boroughs. That process has been deficient, at the very least, in terms of what has happened here. I saw a representative of London Councils here today in Parliament and, as far as I am aware, London Councils has been solidly against this proposal since it was first brought forward. By definition, that includes the London boroughs.
For some reason, the Government have chosen to try to override what London wants. They may not think that London figures very greatly within this category in relation to the rest of the country. One of the rationales for making the change is to enable London to do what other parts of the country do. But London is different. It has very different pressures, as I have tried to suggest.
In these amendments we are trying, first, to query whether people really do go on holiday for 90 days. I think we would all be jolly lucky if we managed to get that amount of time off. That suggests that if people want to let for 90 days they might not be quite as altruistic as they might appear to be at first sight. Is it not reasonable to suggest that people might like to go on holiday for a lesser number of days?
Secondly, the amendments are trying to ensure that somebody will at least know that the letting is likely to take place. We have not specified what that process should be other than that people should notify their local authority that they want and are likely to let their properties on a holiday-let basis. If that does not happen and something goes wrong or difficulties occur in those properties—I think that my noble friend Lady Gardner will go into this in more detail—no one will know why or how the properties have been let, or to whom they have been let, and the local authority will have no real powers of intervention. I think that that matters. I am all for deregulation but I also think that because of the whole problem of renting in London, a little more grip needs to be kept on this.
Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon
When the noble Lord referred to the 15 and the seven, I thought, “I hope I have got my maths right”, so I am glad that we said that there were eight and seven. He is quite correct. I mentioned those authorities which did not want the review to happen and, subsequently, the seven which did not object. To clarify that point, I say that the noble Lord is quite right. I hope that I am being clear. I am being detailed in my response so, while I am not expecting it, I at least hope—and one should never give up on hope—that I shall carry the House in certain elements of what I am saying, and that there will nevertheless be clarity in covering the issues that have been raised.
My noble friend Lord Tope also raised council tax liability as a way of demonstrating residency. We believe that this provision distinguishes between private and business premises because it requires liability for council tax, which means that if a property was used as a residence, a hotel or a hostel, it would be liable for business rates. Combined with the 90-night limit, we believe that this provides an appropriate safeguard against short-term letting on an ongoing basis.
I welcome the interventions of the noble Lord, Lord Rooker, as I do those of all noble Lords. I listened to him attentively. He raised the issue of insurance. It is of course a matter for landlords to enforce, and for tenants to abide by, the terms of the lease and any insurance policies. Our amendments relate to the need to apply for planning permission and do not affect issues under an existing lease or indeed an insurance policy.
I hope that I have addressed most, if not all, of the issues raised in the hour and 10 minutes that we have had on this group of amendments. This is an important area, and I assure the House again that the Government have listened to the concerns expressed during the passage of the Bill. We believe that what is in front of us today, and what we are proposing more generally, is a balanced approach, with the objective of updating a law that would work for the benefit of ordinary Londoners wishing to let their homes in a legal way.
I hope that noble Lords will accept the reassurances that I have given again today: we are proposing amendments to seek to prevent the loss of housing stock by allowing the short-term letting of homes for a maximum of 90 days without the need for planning permission. I stress again that there are safeguards in the Bill to check that the added freedom will apply only to those people who are providing their homes and paying council tax; and we are providing local authorities with the power to apply to the Secretary of State where exceptions may be and where local amenities need to be protected.
I believe that the Government have listened and present a balanced perspective on where we are today. If I may, I end with the words of the song:
“Maybe it’s because I’m a Londoner
That I love London Town”.
I believe that what the Government have proposed does just that.
Lord McKenzie of Luton
My Lords, this has been an extensive debate. I am grateful to all noble Lords who have spoken in support of the amendments: the noble Baronesses, Lady Hanham and Lady Gardner, and the noble Lords, Lord Clement-Jones and Lord Tope. I hope they will forgive me if I do not pick up each of the very strong comments that they made.
To the noble Baroness, Lady Shields, I say simply that no one is saying that there should be no opportunity to boost family income or to use a property when someone is abroad—indeed, it might lead to interesting opportunities for tourism—but this is a question of balance and the protection of the local community as well. Just because something can be accessed digitally does not mean that you should disregard other issues, particularly around enforcement.
The Minister is right that over the months we have perhaps narrowed the gap. He asserts that the Government and he himself continue to listen, and I am sure that he does. However, I hope he will respect when I say that on this occasion they have not listened enough. I wish to test the opinion of the House.
Deregulation Bill
Lord McKenzie of Luton Excerpts(9 years, 11 months ago)
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Baroness Gardner of Parkes (Con)
My Lords, I strongly support the amendment, and I declare an interest in that I have a daughter who has multiple sclerosis and is a board member of the Habinteg Housing Association. It does marvellous work in providing lifetime homes.
The importance of this has been so stressed by so many people tonight that I do not really need to comment on it. I have other amendments to speak on and noble Lords will be tired of listening to me. However, I strongly support everything that the noble Lord, Lord Best, and other speakers have said and hope the Government will see sense on this.
Lord McKenzie of Luton (Lab)
My Lords, we should be grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Best, for moving this amendment, which we wholeheartedly support. If there were any doubt as to whether we were going to support it, praying in aid Nye Bevan just about did it for us. I welcome my noble friend Lady Wilkins back to the House and acknowledge her knowledgeable contribution on an issue on which she has campaigned over a long time. It is good that the noble Lord, Lord Shipley, and the noble Baroness, Lady Gardner, are on the same page as well.
We support the review of housing standards: a lot of good work has come out of it. However, one of the consequences, as we have heard, was that lifetime home standards and wheelchair-accessible standards have become optional extras. That is really the issue before us today. The noble Lord, Lord Best, has probed with a series of questions and I hope that the nature of those questions means that the Minister has ready and satisfactory replies to them all.
I draw the Minister’s attention to a couple of paragraphs of the housing review document. On page 6, paragraph 14, it says:
“Unlike other Building Regulations requirements the optional requirements described in the Approved Documents will not be mandatory. They will only be applicable where a local planning authority has put a plan policy in place specifically triggering the application of the optional requirement or nationally described space standard in particular circumstances. Neighbourhood Planning Bodies (and Neighbourhood Development Orders) will only be able to apply the space standard, and not optional requirements”.
Will the Minister tell us why that is the case? Perhaps more importantly, paragraph 21, which looks at applying optional requirements and nationally described standards, states:
“The first step is for a local planning authority to stipulate that an optional requirement or the nationally described space standard applies in that area. As stated already, this must be set in plan policies, which have been subject to normal Plan Examination processes. It would not be appropriate to apply optional requirements or the space standard through supplementary planning guidance, since this is not subject to a sufficient level of scrutiny”.
Have the Government moved on from that, or is that still applicable?
I have one small observation in relation to financial viability and cost. If the additional cost is £500 to £1,000, that is one or two weeks in a care home invested in a home on lifetime standards now. That obviously obviates that, going forward. I hope the Minister can satisfy us on those requirements, because it would be a great shame, given all the progress that has been made on lifetime home standards—particularly in London—if these developments were to push those backwards.
Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon
I thank all noble Lords, particularly the noble Lord, Lord Best, for raising this issue. As he is aware, we have been in regular correspondence on this issue. Before going any further, however, I would like to join the noble Lord, Lord McKenzie, in welcoming back the noble Baroness, Lady Wilkins, to her rightful place in your Lordships’ House. I, too, welcome her contribution here this evening.
The noble Lord, Lord Best, has rightly set out his concerns about the way in which the proposed building regulations’ optional requirements will operate, particularly in relation to issues of access. Let me say that the Government understand these concerns. I have written to the noble Lord with reassurances about the clause, explaining how the evidence gathering will work. I assure your Lordships that we will be issuing planning guidance shortly, to help authorities assemble evidence to use the new optional requirements. I hope that the letters that I have written to the noble Lord, Lord Best, have provided that level of reassurance, but I think it is important that I summarise some of the key points that have been raised in his questions.
Let me just put the amendment into context. In this particular context, we believe that the amendment is not needed, because Clause 31(4) is merely a general fallback power, a reserve power enabling the Government to use regulations to set out conditions for the way in which optional requirements should be used, but only if necessary. They might be necessary, for example, if the system is being misused in some way, or used without sufficient rigour; or if there are problems applying the new regulations. It could be that the guidance proposed does not have the effect expected or is not followed. The new system is based on an approach no different from how local planning authorities gather evidence to justify planning policies now. For the benefit of noble Lords, I will set out the key points about how it will work.
Optional requirements will allow local authorities to set building standards that are higher than those in the building regulations. They are a new concept in building regulations, and are widely supported following our consultation on this matter. They are an important new tool, which I am sure noble Lords will agree should be used appropriately. For the first time ever, we have put a series of housing standards into the building regulations, such as on lifetime homes and wheelchair housing. Giving these areas the full force of building regulations is a major new step that I hope will be welcomed by all noble Lords.
However, because not every new home needs to be built to such standards, and because it is costly to do so, we will let local authorities decide how to target the standards based on local needs, provided the standards do not make local housing developments unviable. The Government intend to issue planning guidance on matters to be taken into account by local authorities to work out their local needs, such as the proportion of older or disabled people. We consulted on the matters to be covered in that guidance. This will mirror the approach taken with planning guidance which supports the National Planning Policy Framework.
Lord McKenzie of Luton
I hope the noble Baroness will forgive me, but I was a little unclear as to whether she was speaking just to Amendment 47, which has been degrouped, or more generally to the raft of amendments that we will consider. If the noble Baroness is able to clarify that, it would help us to determine how we will proceed.
Baroness Gardner of Parkes
I will be happy to clarify that. There seems to have been a slight muddle in that the last amendment I had on Clause 33 was meant to be degrouped, but instead only one was degrouped. I am therefore turning this into a slightly longer and wider field because I lost the opportunity to do that on the previous amendment, which was my original intention. I hope that your Lordships will understand that.
Everything is supposed to be perfect until you do it, then you find—well, I advise noble Lords to read it for themselves. It is from Monday 2 February, in the Evening Standard. There is another whole page on the other side about the woman behind the “unhotel revolution” and pseudo hotels—so it is quite a wide issue. It is interesting that the fraud teams are being brought in to look into the whole issue. I had a reply from the treasury officer when I asked him what of these lettings would be tax free. The answer was, “Nothing, except the right to sublet a room in your own house to a lodger for a sum of £4,000 and something—less than £5,000”. That would be the only free opportunity. It is very interesting that the Serious Fraud Office attended a meeting that we had in the House of Commons in January, partly on this issue but on property in general. There is such an opportunity for fraud that it will be very interesting to know who declares what, with no one able to check on anything at all as to who is in these places, with risks of terrorism and fraud or whatever else is going on. People tell me that they find it almost unbearable, the smell of drugs being smoked in the flat above them, because it becomes so intense to have 10 people in one room. Again, are there no restrictions on how many people can fit into one bedroom? I find it hard to believe that you can have 10 people—and this is in three different flats.
I could go on and on, but I do not intend to, because it is late and the House has had a very busy time, with more to follow. I hope that the Minister will be a bit more open about things, as I am very dissatisfied that Questions for a Written Answer have simply not been replied to. I beg to move.
Baroness Garden of Frognal (LD)
I apologise to my noble friend but I think that under the rules of the House we are still on Amendment 47 and Amendment 48 has yet to be called. There has obviously been some confusion in that people are speaking to two groups of amendments. I think that Amendment 47 is still being debated.
Lord McKenzie of Luton
My Lords, we have got terribly confused tonight. I thought that we were speaking to the generality of the amendments and that that was the noble Baroness’s position. If that is the case and the noble Lord, Lord Leigh, wishes to make his contribution now, I will happily follow him.
Lord Leigh of Hurley (Con)
I thank the noble Lord. I was planning to speak to Amendment 48, so my comments are directed to that group of amendments rather than to the specifics of Amendment 47. I declare my interests both as an investor in residential property and as president—
Lord Leigh of Hurley
I think I am speaking to Amendment 48. If not, I am sure that noble Lords with much greater experience will stop me. Before so doing, I declare an interest as the owner of residential property and as the president of Westminster North Conservative Association.
Clearly, we need Clause 33 because there is a significant problem out there at the moment. Noise and anti-social behaviour from short lets are in the top three complaints we receive when canvassing in Westminster North, and there is an undoubted problem with nomadic communities which make it very hard to plan resources—for example, schooling, rubbish collection and so on. Residents not knowing who their neighbours are increases security problems and we have ended up with a situation in which Section 25 of the GLC Act 1973 is ignored. There is hardly ever any action or prosecutions on it. We have ended up in the worst of worlds where there is a thriving business that is largely underground and a black market, whether housing benefit-funded tenancies or otherwise, run by organised criminals for the benefit often of other criminals.
Having said all that, I am very much for deregulation. I served on the deregulation task force of the DTI in 1995 and would like to see something done to facilitate Londoners legally to enable their properties to be let out to tourists and others to the extent that they are away. We acknowledge that the market for short lets is strong and that people should be able to do what they want with their properties, and in the process take the opportunity to cut out these criminal middle men and try to legitimate the whole business. We need a pragmatic solution. I agree, as has been said, that one of the biggest concerns is where individual flats within blocks of flats are on short let. There needs to be an arrangement whereby leaseholders can all agree collectively on what they want to do on short lets, so that owners and occupiers are not suddenly blindsided by one or two flats being turned into short lets, where some, not all, are used for purposes for which they were certainly not intended. That has led to problems that have been commented on, particularly in the New York market.
Freeing up the market but protecting residents must be done, possibly by creating some sort of opt-in. Tenancy agreements must clearly list expectations and responsibilities. One of the major problems has been in respect of flats let without any gas safety certificates or fire-retardant furniture. Curiously, where people decide to let out rooms in their flat, as can be done, one can only imagine how that will lead to all sorts of unfortunate incidents.
Although Amendment 48 helpfully suggests that the restriction is 30 days, which is reasonable, I am not sure that the proposal requiring seven days’ notice “before each use” is practical. I just cannot imagine that it would work, and it would rather defeat the object of people wanting an immediate short stay.
I will spare your Lordships’ time in going through each of the amendments but I do not think that they are necessary. I wanted to preface my remarks by explaining that I am as fully aware as anyone of the problems and issues in the London market. When I canvass in Westminster North I see it regularly, but I believe that it is possible within the forthcoming regulations for our concerns to be resolved. I take this opportunity to encourage the Minister to come to the House with those regulations as early as possible so that we can see that they reflect the issues about which we are all so concerned.
Lord McKenzie of Luton
My Lords, I shall speak to Amendments 49A and 49B in this group. In doing so, I draw attention to my declaration in the register of interests as an owner of leasehold property. At this hour, I wish that it was not let out and was available, but there we are. These amendments would put in the Bill the right for individual local planning authorities to exclude from the deregulatory provisions of Clause 33 particular residential premises or residential premises situated in a particular area.
I thank the Minister for making time available in recent weeks for a series of meetings to seek to resolve the range of issues opened up by this clause. We are conscious that a variety of views have been pressed on the Government from Members of your Lordships’ House, operators in the market, London Councils and community groups, including the Covent Garden Community Association. As the noble Lord, Lord Tope, said, we should also thank onefinestay for spending time with us to explain the business that it has built and the steps that it goes through to seek to avoid loss of amenity in the areas in which it operates.
The concerns with the proposed deregulation have been most comprehensively described by London Councils in its current briefing. This might be summarised as the potential loss of residential properties because of movement into the more lucrative short-term let sector, increased problems with noise and anti-social behaviour, loss of community identity, increased crime and fire safety risks, and challenges of continual enforcement—indeed, the effect of “churn”, which was spoken to by the noble Earl, Lord Lytton.
Westminster Council estimates that at least 3,000 properties in its borough are being used for short-term letting accommodation. Apparently, there has been a rise of 37% in just three months in Camden. Even if not experienced across London, we recognise that these are very real problems which afflict some areas under the current arrangements, let alone any further deregulation.
It might be helpful if I restate our position. We see no objection to individuals and families letting their homes for short periods, perhaps when they go on holiday, without the need for planning permission for so long as this activity does not prevent the residential premises from intrinsically remaining their home. This is also provided that the scale of the activity does not adversely change the character or amenity of the local neighbourhood.
We have at last before us a policy paper from the Government. Like the noble Baronesses, Lady Hanham and Lady Gardner of Parkes, we regret that this has come somewhat late in the day. It is their long-awaited response to last year’s consultation. It is a pity that we do not have draft regulations but have to accept reluctantly that this is all we are going to get during this Parliament. The paper captures many of the representations we have received over recent weeks. As the Minister will doubtless explain, the intention is to limit short-term letting to 90 days in a calendar year, have clear enforcement arrangements to protect amenity and address concerns over nuisance, with the flexibility being withdrawn if there is successful enforcement action against statutory nuisance, a provision for local authorities to request the Secretary of State to agree targeted localised exemption where there is a strong community case to do so, and a requirement that the property in question must be liable for council tax. Clearly, the devil is still in the detail, but all in all the Government have moved from their starting position and we should thank them for that.
We can support the flexibility applying only to someone’s home and for a limited period in each year. London Councils is seeking a limit of 30 days a year while the Government are proposing 90. We are inclined to the view that 30 days could be unduly restrictive when taken together with other safeguards, although back-to-back periods of 90 days means that a short-term let could extend for half a year, which in our view is too long. The Minister may want to say more about how it is envisaged that enforcement will operate, but we consider that while it is not for primary legislation, there should be at least an annual notification requirement from the householder to the local authority, I think along the lines suggested by the noble Baroness, Lady Hanham, when the first short-term let commences. This need not be an overly bureaucratic process, but it would help local authorities more readily understand the scale of such activity locally and may also be used to signify a possible income tax liability. London Councils seeks a broader safeguard by requiring notification of how long it is to be presumed that each stay will last. The “one strike and you’re out” approach, which we support, would seem to satisfy the difficulty expressed by London Councils over continually having to undertake enforcement procedures.
Where we part company with the Government, and hence our amendment, is on the right of local authorities to override the new flexibility. We do not consider that this should be subject to the agreement of the Secretary of State. Local authorities are in a better position than the Secretary of State to determine what is happening in their individual boroughs and the impact on the local neighbourhood. The use of the term “strong amenity case” suggests that the bar would be set high by the Secretary of State. That is not to say that local authorities can act in an arbitrary or capricious manner. Public policy should prevent this, and in any event, regulations could include the criteria which local authorities should take into account in applying an exemption.
It seems that we are very much in the era of the Minister declaring his support for localism. It was only yesterday in an exchange at Question Time when the noble Lord said:
“I am disappointed. Certainly, on this side of the House, we believe in localism, and this is about devolving responsibility to local authorities”.—[Official Report, 10/2/15; col. 1103.]
That followed an answer given the previous day when he said:
“As we said we would, we have stressed localism and local empowerment, and we have delivered on that”.—[Official Report, 9/2/15; col. 1019.]
I suggest that this is a chance to deliver further.
There is the beginning of some convergence on the different positions, and it is to be regretted that the manner and timing of the issue means that there is limited time to resolve the remaining differences. That is why we are strongly of the view that the safeguard we need to put in the Bill is the right of individual boroughs to pursue exemptions from whatever deregulation eventually emerges. It makes them the final decision-makers.
Perhaps I may comment briefly on some of the other amendments, in particular to Clause 33. Unlike the noble Lord, Lord Leigh, I would say that if the Government had not opened the box, it might be argued that matters should be left alone, particularly as the timing prevents this Parliament seeing things to a conclusion. There may be a case for now starting from scratch and leaving this to the next Parliament, but there is no certainty of the priority it would get. Having opened up the issue, there are clearly matters to address. The extent of short-term lettings in some areas, the nuisance it causes and the difficulty of enforcement arises now. The regulation of differing levels of enforcement by individual boroughs determined sometimes by capacity issues rather than policy is not a comfortable place to be. The twilight zone in which businesses operate is also unsatisfactory, at least for those operators who want to do the right thing.
In some of the other amendments, there are references to the nature of the residential property, for example with the terms “principal and permanent residence” and “principal London residence”. Our starting position was to think that this should apply only to somebody’s principal private residence. We thought about it a bit more and if you have the protection of a limited number of days, particularly if it is 30, that does not seem to matter too much, so long as it is clearly and demonstrably somebody’s home. How many homes you can have in London is an interesting question, but we are less concerned perhaps about that precise definition of residence. However, it seems to me that we do have a convergence on some issues. It is just a great pity that the delay in dealing with some of these issues means that we cannot reach a satisfactory conclusion during this Parliament.
Lord McKenzie of Luton
My Lords, we have agreed to support Amendments 51A and 51B despite the 17th report of the Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee. We opposed the original amendments in Committee and sought a rethink from the Government, which has come in the form of a sunset clause which would bring the provisions of these clauses to an end by 31 March next year so their use would be strictly limited.
We remain unconvinced that the negative procedure accompanied by a statutory duty to consult is the appropriate procedure for establishing a UDC, but agree that there is little time left in this Parliament properly to explore and debate this issue. We are also not unsympathetic to the strong points raised by the Delegated Powers Committee. We will not, however, stand in the way of the Government for this limited period, but we wish to see a revised approach for the future. A new generation of new towns and garden cities is essential to tackling our housing crisis, and the Government’s handling of the development of Ebbsfleet has fallen far short of what is needed to address the problem.
After many years of delay the Chancellor finally announced support for 15,000 homes at Ebbsfleet in his 2014 Budget, although that figure was significantly lower than the over 22,000 homes that had been planned for as recently as 2012. Even now, Ministers have failed to make clear how they intend to support development in light of a funding shortfall of well over £1 billion. Moreover, there is no commitment, as we have heard, to ensuring a minimum number of affordable homes.
My colleague the shadow planning Minister, Roberta Blackman-Woods MP, sought to amend the Bill to update the remit of new town development corporations to ensure that they are fit for purpose for creating a new generation of garden cities, but the Government voted that down and have taken a very short-sighted approach to planning garden cities.
The TCPA has argued strongly against taking forward this development by way of a UDC, which risks confusing the real differences in the nature of the challenges of regenerating existing places and that of building new communities. We have made clear that in government we would not go down the UDC route; as recommended by the Lyons review we would support the delivery of a new generation of garden cities delivered by garden city development corporations based on updated new towns legislation. However, having given the Government their way on this issue for this limited time, we hope that they will now make progress in delivering at Ebbsfleet.
(a) by a notice fixed to the vehicle;(b) by a notice handed to the person appearing to be in charge of the vehicle at the time; or(c) where the enforcement officer is prevented from serving the notice by either of the methods in paragraph (a) or (b), by post,in respect of a parking contravention on a road in a civil enforcement area in England”
Lord McKenzie of Luton
My Lords, in moving Amendment 53, I shall speak also to our other amendments in this group, Amendments 54, 55 and 56. I am grateful for the support of the noble Baroness, Lady Hanham, and from the noble Lord, Lord Tope, on these amendments.
Local authorities as we know are precluded from using their civil parking enforcement powers to raise revenue. It is suggested that enforcement by CCTV is particularly unfair because a motorist might be issued with a ticket as a consequence of a camera. The ticket arrives at their home some time after the event when they have no opportunity to examine the location when the alleged contravention took place. However, the Government’s consultation on local authority parking last year acknowledged the benefit of CCTV in enforcing moving traffic congestion where cars use bus lanes, do not exit box junctions, and so forth.
Our amendments go further, particularly in relation to the use of CCTV around schools. This matter was addressed forcefully in Committee by the noble Lord, Lord Tope, who pointed out the nonsense of allowing CCTV enforcement for 10 metres around a school—the zig-zag lines—but not beyond. Amendments 54 and 55 would include in the Bill exemptions from the ban, some of which the Government have already conceded should be provided. This applies to contraventions for stopping at bus stops and bus lanes, school entrance markings and red routes on the grounds of safety and the needs of bus services.
It is understood the wording of our wider use of CCTV within 100 metres of a school entrance may not always be practical, depending on the configuration of the road and other junctions. For so long as the principle is accepted, however, the wording could be tidied up at Third Reading. The arguments for preventing parking on the zig-zag lines at pedestrian crossings are similar to those made in relation to school entrances. Cars parked on the white zig-zags on either side of pedestrian crossings can obscure motorists’ view of those about to cross, especially children, the visually impaired and wheelchair users. This is particularly dangerous at zebra crossings where there are no traffic lights and motorists slow down only on seeing a pedestrian starting to cross.
Amendments 54 and 55 would extend the exemption to clearways. Currently there are junctions and other parts of clearways where parking is prohibited to protect pedestrian cyclists and motorists themselves. It is unclear why the Government have chosen to exempt red routes but not clearways, given that the same safety considerations are our concern.
Amendment 66 will ensure that the provisions of Clause 39 cannot have an effect until the equalities impact assessment and a regulatory impact assessment have been undertaken. If the Government continue to argue that the former is not necessary, perhaps they would make clear why. As for the RIA, it has apparently asserted that the measures have no impact on business. However, the LGA says that it has heard directly from private companies contracted to enforce parking, which assert that it does have an impact. Do the Government refute that assertion? I beg to move.
Baroness Hanham
My Lords, I have added my support to all the amendments in this group. The anomaly between the treatment of zig-zag lines at school gates and those by pedestrian crossings is ridiculous. Both involve strong safety issues, and the Government should be able to see their way to including pedestrian crossings, at the very least. They also need to review the regulations about the amount of land taken up as a result of a school entrance. That aspect does not make sense; the amount is far too little compared with what is there at present. That is a technical matter that needs rearranging. The rest of the amendments all seem good common sense. I want to get rid of CCTV, but we cannot get rid of it completely if that will cause a safety hazard.
Baroness Williams of Trafford (Con)
My Lords, as regards the use of CCTV generally in parking enforcement, it is clear that the operational guidance on parking issued by the previous Government in 2004—that is, that CCTV should be used only where parking warden enforcement is impractical—has been largely ignored. It is now used on an industrial scale. For people such as my noble friend Lady Oppenheim-Barnes to be issued with a penalty charge way after the event is simply unfair. Independent parking adjudicators have also agreed that it is unfair. Such practices also undermine the revitalisation of high streets and shops and cross the line of public acceptability. If parking is too expensive or prohibitive, shoppers will drive to out-of-town supermarkets or simply shop online, leading to ghost-town high streets.
The point was raised about exempting the zig-zag lines on a pedestrian crossing as opposed to those outside a school. High streets, where pedestrian crossings are generally situated, are well patrolled by both police and enforcement officers. In any event, parking on a zig-zag line is not just a breach of parking regulations but incurs three points on your licence. That is why, in terms of differentiating between schools and high streets, the safety issue outside schools led the Government to think that the latter case was a suitable exception.
The first amendment in this group concerns the serving of parking tickets. There may be occasions where it is impossible for a civil enforcement officer to physically stick a ticket on to a vehicle or serve a notice at the scene of the incident. The Government are aware of this and have made provision in draft regulations to ensure that service by post is possible in such circumstances. On that basis, I hope that the noble Lord is content to withdraw that amendment.
Noble Lords are also seeking to increase the number of areas where local authorities can continue to use CCTV to enable the issuing of tickets by post. I have given a couple of examples of where the Government have made exemptions, or indeed where they have not. I think that noble Lords and all interested parties will have their own views on where CCTV should or should not be used. The Government accept that sole reliance on CCTV evidence to enforce on-street parking regulations is suitable in certain circumstances. However, if we accepted every argument for increasing the exemptions, we would be back where we started. We have given careful consideration to the list of exemptions and based our decisions on the views of those who responded to the consultation, one being on the issue of the safety of children outside schools.
The noble Lord also offers a new definition of the term “around schools”. This definition would be neither appropriate nor practical. The 100 metres specified in the amendment, or any specified distance, would be arbitrary. Within that distance, it is likely that roads will bend or side roads will branch off the school road. It is unclear how this will be dealt with. Any definition needs to be practical as well as reflect policy concerns.
Amendment 56 would make these powers subject to impact assessments before they were brought into force, which is both unnecessary and undesirable. The Government are proud of the stance they have taken to reduce the impact of rules and regulations on businesses and policymakers. Government guidance published in 2013 clearly states that impact assessments are required only for measures that regulate or deregulate business or concern the regulation of business. This clause applies only to local authorities that carry out parking enforcement, and no impact assessments are therefore required.
This whole issue is a matter of principle for the Government, not of balancing impacts. Drivers often receive a parking ticket through the post several weeks after the alleged contravention. They are given no opportunity to examine the parking location at the time the incident is alleged to have taken place, thereby making it difficult to challenge the alleged contravention. That is fundamentally unfair, and the Government strongly believe it should be remedied. I urge noble Lords to withdraw or not move their amendments.
Lord McKenzie of Luton
My Lords, I thank the Minister for that reply and thank other noble Lords who have participated in this debate. Given the hour, I shall not prolong the matter, except to say that I am still unclear as to which of proposed paragraphs (a) to (g) in Amendment 54 the Government support and which they do not. I acknowledge that my description regarding the inclusion of CCTV around schools perhaps needs to be refined, but the principle holds.
The impact assessment was not the issue. It was that parking enforcement may be a responsibility of local authorities but in many instances it is contracted to the private sector—hence the list that the noble Lord, Lord Tope, referred to. I thought that the Minister said that the issue of whether there should be an equalities impact assessment was a matter of principle for the Government. I am not sure that I heard her correctly, but it would be a rather strange explanation if she did so. I remain unclear as to why an equalities impact assessment is not to be forthcoming. However, given the hour, perhaps we should read the record and follow up in correspondence. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
The Lord Bishop of Worcester
My Lords, I support the amendment, whose importance has been ably and eloquently demonstrated by the noble Lords, Lord Low and Lord Tope. It is quite clear that the present situation is costly and complex, as has been said. I should like very briefly, given the hour, to demonstrate how in Worcester—one of the few cities in the UK that has tried to tackle the problem of pavement parking —there have been difficulties because of the current situation.
As is well known, the history of parking enforcement is complicated. Parking on pavements was made a criminal offence under the Worcester City Council Act 1985, but under the Road Traffic Act 1991 it was decriminalised, so that could no longer apply. Despite that, Worcester City Council has continued to try to tackle the problem, and in January 2014 civil enforcement officers began enforcing the most serious cases using existing traffic regulation orders. Worcestershire County Council was originally asked for a city-wide traffic regulation order, but this would have required hundreds of street signs wherever parking on pavements took place, and that was considered untenable. That simply demonstrates how difficult the present situation is. The county council suggested that the city council should look at the issue on a street-by-street basis and generate individual traffic regulation orders, but the city council thought that this approach would be untenable as well.
It seems to me that all that demonstrates the need for a national system. It is worth bearing in mind that those who are blind and disabled feel particularly strongly about this. A blind Paralympian who lives in Worcester said recently that walking down the city’s clogged-up streets is like playing Russian roulette.
Lord McKenzie of Luton
My Lords, we must all be aware of the dangers and inconvenience of parking on pavements and the risk that this can pose for pedestrians. These risks can be especially acute for those with a sight impairment or those who have a mobility difficulty and rely on using wheelchairs or buggies. The problems are compounded, too, for those who have responsibility for children and who try to navigate the pavements with prams. The consequence is that all too often pedestrians are forced to navigate busy and dangerous roads instead. For some, of course, pavement parking can restrict their right of way completely. As the noble Lord, Lord Low, said, we need to be mindful that pavements are not generally constructed to carry the weight of heavy vehicles and pavement parking can cause the break-up of the surface, adding further hazards, even when the offending vehicles are not present. This amendment seeks to address those concerns outside London by making it an offence to park wholly or partly on a verge, footway or any other part of an urban road. But this blanket ban can be overridden by resolution of the highway authority or by the Secretary of State.
We acknowledge the weight of opinion and the power of the argument which supports this approach. We share the need to address inconsiderate and dangerous parking and to seek to restore to pedestrians their right to proceed unimpeded. But at the same time, we have to recognise that there are some streets where some pavement parking may be inevitable—to maintain the free flow of traffic, to allow loading and unloading, or to allow for vulnerable passengers to be disembarked. Moreover, the premise of the amendment is that all people who park their car on the pavement are doing the wrong thing and should be made guilty of a civil offence. We do not accept that.
If we are to redress the balance and tackle the problem of inconsiderate pavement parking, how is this best achieved? We need to work through how it can be delivered in practice. We are keen to empower councils to tackle problem parking. If there are any barriers or bureaucracy preventing this we would be keen to look at ways we can change the legislation so that that is not the case. We do not think that the blanket ban is the best way to go. We consider that individual authorities, which know their areas best, are better able to determine the extent and timing of any ban. For some, an initial blanket ban may be the immediate answer, but others may want something more selective which addresses the most urgent problems first. In some cases, there will need to be liaison between authorities so that approaches are co-ordinated. We support the thrust of what the noble Lord is seeking to achieve, but we think there is another approach so, with regret, we are not able to support him today.
Baroness Williams of Trafford
My Lords, I thank all noble Lords who have contributed to the debate on the amendment. It demonstrates that there is no perfect system to allow traffic and pedestrians to move around entirely satisfactorily.
I shall start with the points made about London. Pavement parking in London is banned but people still do it. Enforcement of properly targeted local bans outside London would be more effective than a blanket ban that does not reflect local circumstances. On the more general points, local authorities already have the power to introduce footway parking restrictions where they consider it appropriate. They are in the best position to decide on local parking restrictions and need to consider all road users when taking such decisions. A national ban of the type proposed would require local authorities to remove all existing restrictions, then renew their urban areas where footway parking should nevertheless still be permitted, consult the community and erect new signage and markings. There could be a significant burden on local government.
The amendment proposes banning footway parking but would allow authorities to permit it where it is desired by simple resolution. Circumvention of the traffic regulation order—TRO—process would take away important protection for the public. The statutory TRO process requires authorities to undertake consultation and advertise their proposals before councils take final decisions. A noble Lord made the point about the TRO process being expensive and cumbersome. It is not true to say that the process is a barrier. Some local authorities make up to 200 orders a year for a variety of traffic management purposes with an average authority making between 50 and 60 orders per year.
The Department for Transport’s guidance to local authorities makes it clear that during the appraisal of their parking policies an authority should consider whether pavement parking is problematic in any part of that area. If it is, and it is not covered by an existing traffic regulation order, the authority should consider amending the existing order or making a new one. The noble Baroness, Lady Kramer, wrote to all English traffic authorities on 27 June to remind them of their existing wide-ranging powers to prevent people parking on the pavement where it is a problem.
The noble Lord, Lord Low, made a point about damage to pavements. The Government are committed to investing in our local highways, including the footways. We are providing local authorities in England with more than £3 billion over four years from 2011-15 for the roads and footways for which they are responsible. In addition, in June 2014, the Government announced that they were committed to providing just under £6 billion for local highways maintenance over the six-year period from April 2015 to March 2021. This equates to £976 million per year to local authorities for highway maintenance.
In conclusion, the Government have concerns about the burden on local authorities of managing a change of this scale, a point to which the noble Lord, Lord McKenzie, alluded, especially when those authorities have comprehensive powers to ban footway parking. I have undertaken to have a discussion with the noble Lord, Lord Low, before Third Reading but I would at this stage ask him to withdraw his amendment.
Baroness Williams of Trafford
My Lords, I should make it clear right from the outset that the measure in this Bill is about on-street parking, which is the preserve of local authorities. The issue of ANPR is totally separate and the Government are not going to regulate companies in a Bill that seeks to deregulate.
The noble Lord’s amendment seeks to introduce a new clause which would ensure that measures in the Traffic Management Act 2004 do not prevent local authorities from using an approved device in their off-street car parks. The amendment would apply to the entire Traffic Management Act. The Traffic Management Act sets out the framework for local traffic authorities to manage all aspects of their parking policies. To disapply the entire Act in relation to car parks would create an impossible situation where the legislation that prescribes how local authorities should operate is undermined by itself.
I think that the noble Lord may in fact be concerned about the specific measures in Clause 39 and is apprehensive that these will be extended to local authority off-street car parks. I can assure him again that the measures in this Bill apply only to on-street parking. The Government are not seeking to extend these provisions to off-street parking and have no plans to do so. It would be unnecessary to set out in primary legislation policy areas that the law should not apply to.
Permitting local authorities to manage their off-street car parks with camera technology is something that I know some organisations are keen to see happen. However, the Government have not set out their position on this. We have brought forward a range of parking measures designed to help local shops, support drivers and give communities a greater say on parking policies. These proposals have been established for 18 months and have been consulted on. At no point have we indicated any intention to legislate on off-street car parks.
To bring into the Bill at this late stage measures on a different aspect of parking policy would not give sufficient opportunity for people to consider their implications or to offer an opinion. We believe that this is something on which we should consult before any changes are made to the law, and I would urge the noble Lord to withdraw his amendment.
Deregulation Bill
Lord McKenzie of Luton Excerpts(9 years, 11 months ago)
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Baroness Janke (LD)
My Lords, in speaking to Amendment 30, I declare my interest as a member of Bristol City Council. This amendment seeks to restore to Bristol people the same right that people of other cities have to change their system of government, subject to conditions required by the Local Government Act. A section added in 2011 relates to local authority referendums for elected mayors ordered by the Secretary of State. Noble Lords may recall that in 2012, the Government required that the 12 largest cities in England call referendums on whether their residents wished them to introduce a system of directly elected mayors. Bristol was the only city to vote narrowly in favour of such a system.
The section removes the right of Bristol citizens to change their system of government in perpetuity. This fact was not made at all clear when they voted in the referendum. As more and more people have found out that that is the case, they are quite outraged and feel that they are being discriminated against by virtue of having supported the Government’s arguments for a mayoral system. Whatever the view is about elected mayors—and there are many—many Bristol people are astounded that they have been denied the democratic rights that other cities enjoy as to whether or not they have a mayoral system. I can believe that this was not an intended consequence of the legislation. Nevertheless, it clearly is unjust and needs to be changed.
I say, “in my view”, but this view is also supported across the political parties in Bristol and by the mayor, as he said at a recent council meeting when a motion was unanimously passed supporting change—change not necessarily from a mayoral system but change to enable the citizens of Bristol to decide themselves what system of government they wish to have.
The Local Government Act lays down clear conditions as to how a local authority may change its governance arrangements, including the need for a referendum as fully described in Section 9N. The current situation is unnecessary, unjust and discriminatory in that Bristol people should be deprived of their democratic rights to determine their own system of governance, which is the case in every other English city.
I hope the amendment will receive support and that the Minister will consider how the current situation could be redressed and restore democratic rights to the people of Bristol. I hope the House will give its support in taking this matter forward. I beg to move.
Lord McKenzie of Luton (Lab)
My Lords, we have a good deal of sympathy with the amendment, which, as the noble Baroness said, has cross-party support in Bristol. I have been in touch with the leader of the Labour group there, who confirms her support for it.
As we have heard, Bristol was one of 12 cities that had a referendum foisted on it by this coalition Government, and it is worth reflecting on the extent of that mandate. The turnout was 24%, with 41,000 voting for and 36,000 against. So 77,000 people voted and the majority was about 5,000.
We know also that central Governments have an appetite for elected mayors that is not altogether reflected at local government level. The noble Baroness was right to point out how you change your system of governance and the constraints that you have. I have a helpful briefing from the House of Commons Library, which states:
“Under the 2000 Act, any local authority wishing to establish a mayoralty required a ‘yes’ vote in a local referendum. The 2007 Act changed this, permitting local authorities to adopt a mayor by resolution. However, an authority can still choose to hold a referendum on the issue. Alternatively, authorities can be obliged to hold a mayoral referendum if 5% or more of the local electorate sign a petition demanding one … The Government may also compel an authority”—
which is what happened in this case—
“to hold a referendum. The result of a mayoral referendum is binding on a local authority.
The Localism Act 2011 permitted a referendum to be held on abolishing an elected mayor, subject to time limits; and for a referendum to be held on establishing a leader and cabinet, or on using the committee system. Four authorities have held referendums on whether to retain their mayoral system. Electors in Doncaster … and Middlesbrough … voted to retain their elected mayor, whilst those in Hartlepool … voted to replace it with the committee system, and those in Stoke-on-Trent … voted to replace it with a leader and cabinet system.
Authorities which have changed their governance arrangements as a result of a referendum can only make a further change following a further referendum”.
That is not unreasonable. It goes on:
“Where a local authority has held a referendum on its governance arrangements, a further referendum may not be held for ten years (five years in Wales). Conversely, where a mayor has been created by resolution of the council, five years must elapse before the council may resolve to abolish the mayor. However, there is no time limit on holding a referendum (whether initiated by the council or by a petition) to reverse a decision made by a resolution”.
I come to the crucial point:
“Further, where a local authority has been required by the Government to hold a referendum and voted for an elected mayor, it may not hold a further referendum at any time. Bristol City Council is the only authority affected by this: as the law stands it cannot move away from its elected mayoralty”.
As the noble Baroness has said, it is held in that position in perpetuity. That just does not seem right, and perhaps the Minister will take the opportunity to explain why the Government think it is. However, if they do see it as an anomaly and an injustice, what do they propose to do about it?
Lord Wallace of Saltaire
My Lords, in preparing for the amendment I realised that I do not fully understand the evolution of the office of mayor in British local government. I am well aware that Titus Salt, who built Saltaire, was the mayor of Bradford for several years and as the leader of the council was very much an executive mayor. One did not have to be elected to be an executive mayor. We have since separated the ceremonial function of mayor and the power-wielding function of leader. It is only the elected mayor who gains executive control and leadership, and that is something which I trust others with greater local authority experience than I have will explain to me why and how this evolved.
The precedent for introducing mayoral governance following a referendum instigated by Parliament was first set when the London mayor was established. In this case Parliament instigated a referendum through enacting primary legislation. The electors then voted for London having a mayor, and by a further Act of Parliament the arrangements were introduced. There is no provision in those arrangements for the people of London to vote that they no longer want a mayor. Indeed, I am confident that no one would want to see the end of the London mayor, given the status of this great city, although occasionally there is a little confusion abroad when the Lord Mayor arrives just after the London mayor has been there—even if some might wish to see a different mayor to the current holder of that office. But the essential point for this afternoon is that there is no provision for there to be any change in the formation of the office of London mayor unless Parliament were to agree.
The same broad precedent was followed in the legislative arrangements that led to the establishment of mayoral governance in the city of Bristol. In that case Parliament, through approving by a resolution of both Houses an appropriate order under the Local Government Act 2000, an Act passed by a Labour Government, instigated a referendum. The people of Bristol then voted for a mayor, and that form of mayoral government was then established under the Act. As in the case of the London mayor, mayoral governance in Bristol can be changed only by a further Act of Parliament. The amendment before us today would change this. It would mean that the electors of Bristol could, if they chose, have a referendum by petitioning for one. If they voted to end the mayoral model, it would end. This is indeed the position in cases where a mayor has been introduced wholly by local choice. If it is wholly local choice to establish the mayor, it follows that wholly local choice should be able to end the mayoral governance.
However, the Government believe that it would be wrong to create circumstances where a mayor is established through a specific decision of Parliament and local choice together, but could be ended simply by local choice. I am not suggesting that Bristol should for ever have a form of mayoral governance if there is popular local disillusion, but the decision to change the governance of Bristol, having been instigated in part through a decision of Parliament, should also involve some parliamentary consideration of the specific Bristol issue and not simply be a matter of wholly local choice. It should be for the next Parliament to consider whether it wants to take parliamentary action in matters like this. Meanwhile, I urge the noble Baroness to withdraw her amendment.
Lord McKenzie of Luton
Does the Minister not accept that the parliamentary component of this could be the acceptance of the amendment? There could then be a referendum and the people of Bristol would have their input at that stage.
Lord Wallace of Saltaire
I accept that if there were very strong feeling in both Houses, that would be possible, but it is the Government’s view that this would be better achieved through an Act of Parliament that could consider how recent developments in local authority governance have worked, and that would perhaps reverse the thrust of the promotion of local elected mayors for the major authorities across England and Wales.
Economic Leadership for Cities
Lord McKenzie of Luton Excerpts(10 years, 1 month ago)
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Lord McKenzie of Luton (Lab)
My Lords, we should congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Shipley, on securing this debate for us this morning, and the noble Lord, Lord Lyell, on his clear attachment to and love of Liverpool—although I am advised that he is an Everton supporter. I also look forward to the three maiden speeches we will hear today. The notion that local councils—particularly cities; and I am happy to accept the definition of the noble Lord, Lord Shipley, for that term—with strong local leadership can be a force for economic progress is, of course, not new. But moving forward on this agenda has been given impetus by what my noble friend Lord Adonis has set out in his report, Mending the Fractured Economy: the link between economic growth and the living standards of ordinary people has been broken, and this dictates a fundamental reform in order to secure more balanced growth. This converges with the recognition that the scale of spending cuts facing local authorities will most effectively be delivered by the chance to join up, reconfigure and innovate at local level.
As the noble Lord, Lord Heseltine, concluded in his report No Stone Unturned: In Pursuit of Growth, too many decisions are taken in London without a full understanding of their local impact. I certainly agree with that. But he asserted that local authorities have been relegated to service providers—increasingly, commissioners of services—and that local economic leadership has all but disappeared. This is too sweeping an assertion, doubtless many noble Lords here today will know of the engagement of their local council in regeneration activities and a partnership working with the local business community—driven in many instances by the support of RDAs. It belies the leadership role of the Core Cities Group over some 15 years, I believe, and in particular its work which culminated in amendments to the Localism Bill—as it then was—agreed by an all-party consensus, which allowed Ministers to transfer local public functions from central government to local and combined authorities.
As we know, a range of city deals followed, not homogeneous arrangements, underlining the diverse needs of cities—and there are more to come. Important as they are, however, it is difficult to maintain that such arrangements are transformational; step change is required if the true potential of our towns and cities is to be realised. We should remember that the Secretary of State still holds the whip hand in these deals, being required to determine whether any transfer of functions would promote economic development or wealth creation or increase local accountability.
What should change entail? It raises issues of funding, powers and coverage. Again, as my noble friend Lord Adonis has proposed, we should devolve funding of £30 billion over the next five years to combined authorities, local authorities and LEPs to cover key economic levers—housing, transport, skills and business support. Of course, how funding is devolved is important and we must not replicate the past with endless bidding processes and bureaucracy, nor allow the Treasury to strangle such initiatives.
This agenda brings with it the thirst for more taxes to be devolved to English cities. City Centred campaigns for council tax, stamp duty land tax, business rates, annual tax on enveloped buildings and capital gains property disposal tax to be devolved. It properly asserts that this would be Exchequer-neutral because central grants to cities would be cut.
We would go some way along this path by giving control over the full revenue from business rates, which we would in any event reform, to powerful new city and county regions which come together in combined authorities. It would be an incentive to do so, but we would not insist on their needing to have an elected mayor.
It is important that there is scope within the system to address the differing needs and resources of local authorities and scope for a safety net for local economic shocks. This will be especially important in the near term, given the current local authority funding arrangements, which have hit the poorest areas the most. Of course one way to devolve economic power and funding would be to relocate more civil service posts outside London.
So far as combined authorities are concerned, we can look to Greater Manchester as a beacon. It in particular has been leading the way, and we should congratulate it and indeed the Government on its new deal with the Treasury. The opportunity to promote a northern powerhouse is obviously to be welcomed. It will build on some of the existing strengths of these regions, including in science and technology, and it chimes with my noble friend Lord Adonis’s proposals for a long-term innovation strategy.
However, these opportunities are not just about big cities, however important, nor just about the north. We need to mend the link between growth and living standards across the UK, so we will propose that local authorities covering any part of the country—Norwich or Luton included—will be able to become combined authorities, again with devolution of powers and funding. We would devolve funding to all local areas that reform their LEPs and create formal governance structures across local authorities at regional level, so that every part of the country would have the chance to make its decisions over how to invest in skills, infrastructure and business.
Lord McKenzie of Luton
I am sorry, I shall wind up now. All the evidence shows that the economic benefits of devolving powers to local areas are too great to ignore. Devolving powers to cities is a start but not the end.
Deregulation Bill
Lord McKenzie of Luton Excerpts(10 years, 2 months ago)
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Lord Collins of Highbury (Lab)
My Lords, I, too, want to support my noble friend in his amendments today. I particularly want to focus on one element of regulation in relation to gambling and the Gambling Commission. I would also like to focus my remarks on what my noble friend Lord Rosser said, in the sense of asking what the Government’s view is on the role of the Gambling Commission in terms of its acting contrary to Clause 83. Is there evidence, which the Minister might want to put before the Committee, that says that this clause is required? At the end of the day, the gambling market is a unique one, where the public expect fair rules. They want independence for the regulator, because they want to ensure the rules are applied by the people operating in that market.
In the recent debate on the Gambling (Licensing and Advertising) Bill, we heard several calls that this market needs even further regulation, because it has a huge social impact, not least in terms of problem gambling—addiction—and the harm that it causes to both individuals and families. When we debated the Bill, we were focused on the need for adequate research to fully understand the consequences of our actions. That was certainly the Government’s view, and it is certainly the view of the Opposition: think before you act, and understand the consequences. This comes back to my noble friend’s view about unintended consequences, of which there were two here.
The Gambling Commission expressed a view during pre-scrutiny of the Bill, which I want to repeat. It focused on this matter of unintended consequences. It is a regulator that does understand the economic consequences. It is not a regulator that wants to ban gambling; it wants to facilitate it. In fact, the more it acts to regulate, in a sense, the more the market can grow, because this is about public confidence and public trust. This is where I believe the draft guidance, in seeking to clarify, may actually create uncertainty, which again comes back to these unintended consequences.
The Gambling Commission itself spoke about the need to be wholly independent, impartial and objective, and the need to have public confidence. It says that it does not think that the wording will impair its objectivity at all—it believes that it is acting in a way that could meet the requirements of this clause. However, as it says, if it gets confused or conflated with the promotion of the commercial interests of specific economic sectors, and it appears to the public that it is part of the commission’s role to promote the industry as opposed to permitting the industry to promote itself and grow so far as is compatible with consumer protection, the likely outcome is a reduction in public confidence and a consequent reduction in the public acceptance of gambling as a mainstream leisure activity. This clause could have the complete opposite effect of what it was intended to do. It could harm an industry that is a legitimate part of our economic activity. There are unintended consequences.
The Gambling Commission raised another point, which is important with regard to what my noble friends have said on the guidance and the fact that you could be creating uncertainty. They say that the guidance to the growth duty will be important. That is absolutely right, and it helps to develop better policy for the industry to have a real input in determining the economic impact of any regulatory change. It is very important for the industry to be clear how that should be done and to have some assurance that its views are taken into account. However, the reform measure designed to reduce burdens on an industry and foster economic growth may have the unintended consequence of the regulator and parts of the industry expending time and money on unproductive and costly delaying tactics if the guidance does not encourage speedy and transparent decisions.
I can see what is coming as regards the new regulations we had under the Gambling Bill. I can see that people entering the market may say, “We want to challenge the commission on this because it denies our ability to enter this market and our ability to grow economically”. In a sense, instead of the commission regulating fairly and being able to build public confidence, this could undermine that, which is a bad unintended consequence that the Government need to address and answer today.
Lord McKenzie of Luton (Lab)
My Lords, it may come as no surprise that I, too, support my noble friend’s amendment and express reservations about disturbing the current arrangements for the Health and Safety Executive. The very essence of the HSE’s role has positive implications for growth. It is about encouraging leadership from the top of an organisation, having effective systems, good employee engagement—key attributes for an effective business. Of course, its role in promoting safe and healthy workplaces is typically linked with higher profitability, productivity and worker loyalty. That is what the data used to show, and I believe they still do. However, IOSH states that,
“good workplace health and safety already supports growth”.
It expresses concerns that the new explicit duty could “cause confusion” and undermine the focus and judgment of the HSE. Therefore, perhaps the Minister can be more specific about the benefits to growth of these provisions being applied to the Health and Safety Executive, and about what changes to the way the HSE goes about its business the Government expect if they should be applied.
The impact assessment accompanying these proposals specifically identifies as good practice the HSE’s existing role in working with a number of trade associations and local authorities to create sector or topic-specific guidance. The HSE has of course been subject to a number of reviews in recent years, most recently that of my noble friend Lord Young of Graffham, of Professor Lofstedt, and the triennial review led by Martin Temple. Those have, in a variety of different ways, found the HSE and the regulatory regime, fit for purpose.
The blueprint for the HSE as it currently exists was set out in Lord Robens’ 1972 report, Safety and Health at Work. His vision of a goal-setting, risk-based and proportionate health and safety framework has endured. That is reflected in the HSE’s current business plan, which includes in its goals,
“drawing a distinction between real health and safety and bureaucracy and ‘overinterpretation’; making it even easier for people to understand and do what is required; devoting a greater proportion of effort where risks are highest and where we can have greatest impact; and continuing to hold to account those who expose their employees and others to unnecessary risk”.
The HSE can justifiably currently claim that it keeps the burden on business productivity to a minimum. Indeed, it effectively enhances it. It is proportionate in its decision-making and understands the business environment.
Understanding the business environment does not necessarily equate to reducing regulatory activity. Downturns in the business environment may engender a more focused approach. For example, if the North Sea sector is struggling for growth, the temptation to cut back on maintenance of the infrastructure may be strong; that has happened in the past. That would signal an environment where more, not less enforcement is needed. Conversely, the HSE is alert to circumstances where a pickup in a sector signals the need for more regulatory activity—housebuilding and refurbishment being one—where worker demand can, at least initially, outstrip available skills, so there is the prospect of more enforcement activity because of growth in the sector. I presume that the Government are content with that. We should be mindful of the risks of the growth duty undermining compliance and enforcement.
IOSH makes reference to the HSE’s enforcement management model, which uses “economic advantage deliberately sought” as a contributing factor to prosecution. How does that approach sit with the growth duty? Reference is also made to case law, in which the judgments specifically acknowledge that adverse economic effect on the business had to be accepted as a consequence of improving safety.
What discussions have the Government had with the HSE about that duty? What assessment have the Government made about the prospect of greater challenges to the HSE’s enforcement proceedings with the new duty? Is it considered that any change is required to the HSE’s enforcement management model? The health and safety system is working well in the UK. There are risks that the provisions will cause unnecessary confusion. Why fix what is not broken, where no advantage is to be expected?
We had a response to our circular from the Homes and Communities Agency; I thank it for its reply. It states:
“The HCA, when acting as social housing regulator, is classed as one of the ‘non-economic’ regulators to whom this proposed duty will apply”.
I guess that that is accepted. It says:
“Regulation of social housing has existed for approximately 40 years and is currently delivered under powers contained in the Housing and Regeneration Act 2008, which came into force in April 2010 ... The Act requires that we discharge what are termed the ‘economic regulation objective’ and the ‘consumer regulation objective’. The main way in which we deliver these objectives is by setting ‘economic standards’ and ‘consumer standards’, and regulating against these”.
It goes on to say:
“We are precluded by legislation from proactive monitoring of the consumer standards so in effect are an organisation primarily focused on our economic regulation remit”.
It sets out what its economic objectives are; that is,
“to ensure that registered providers of social housing are financially viable, properly managed, and perform their functions efficiently and economically … to support the provision of social housing sufficient to meet reasonable demands (including by encouraging and promoting private investment in social housing) … to ensure that value for money is obtained from public investment in social housing … to ensure that an unreasonable burden is not imposed (directly or indirectly) on public funds … to guard against the misuse of public funds”.
It says:
“In many respects the sub-clauses of the economic objective are mutually reinforcing. For example, Registered Providers have an excellent track record in meeting their obligations to lenders, consistent with the Regulator’s objective to ensure providers are financially viable. This is also a key factor in their ability to borrow at competitive margins and therefore invest in the supply of new homes. However, on some issues and on some providers we also need to strike a balance between encouraging investment (typically in new development) and safeguarding the viability of providers and historic taxpayer funding”—
so there is a potential conflict. It continues:
“This is reflected in our standards, the way we obtain assurance that standards are being met, and in the action we take if providers do not comply with the standards”.
The HCA has the following questions, which I pose to the Minister, about the new duty coming into effect. It asks:
“How the duty will interact with existing duties. If the duty is ‘free standing’ then we will need to consider how it is balanced against the full range of our regulatory objectives and how we balance this in our decision making”.
It also asks:
“How widely regulators will need to consider economic growth. As set out above we already have a duty to support the supply of social housing, which is a growth related objective. We would need to understand if the duty is to be interpreted in a way that goes beyond our existing objective, and if so the impact on our regulatory remit and the potential impact on resources”.
It further asks:
“Whether the duty will be about minimising burdens or alternatively about being fully mindful of economic growth implications when making decisions? In our particular sector, and again referring to our obligation to support the provision of social housing, there is a strong argument that having in place strong regulation makes the sector attractive to on-going investment and therefore growth”,
and how that will sit with the overall growth duty obligation. It also raises the point:
“Whether the duty will apply to regulatory policy design or to all day-to-day decisions and all levels of decision making in between. It is the regulator's view that application of such a duty on the micro level of individual case decisions is not straightforward and that a similar outcome can be gained from a more strategic approach”,
and asks how,
“decision making might be challenged in relation to compliance with the duty”.
These are highly relevant questions and we hope that the Minister is able to deal with them fully, either today or in writing afterwards.
Lord Wallace of Saltaire
I shall take that back, too, and we will discuss it between Committee and Report. I hope that I have managed to answer a number of questions. I recognise the concerns that have been expressed. We have a well operating system of regulation in the United Kingdom. The question of balance between good regulation, better regulation, sufficient regulation and efficient regulation is something around which a great deal of hard politics revolves. All of us who read the Daily Mail as loyally as the noble Lord, Lord McKenzie, and I do know that its constant campaign against all health and safety regulations is one end of the spectrum, but the other end of the spectrum is the overregulation that we all also have to be concerned about. That is going to be a continuing basis of politics, and this clause aims to strike the right balance.
Lord McKenzie of Luton
Does the Minister accept that his Prime Minister is also at the Daily Mail end of the spectrum?
Lord Wallace of Saltaire
I could not possibly comment. I do not begin to think that the Prime Minister accepts the Daily Mail approach to health and safety. He knows as well as everyone else that there is always a difficult balance to be struck in this area. I am well aware that there are a number of things, from his own personal experience, that the Prime Minister feels very strongly about in terms of proper provision of public services and proper regulation.
Lord Wallace of Saltaire
My Lords, we are all very conscious that we are talking about a range of regulatory bodies which, as has already been said, have different relationships with Governments. Some are entirely independent, some are agencies of departments, and that is part of the universe with which we need to deal. I have already offered to discuss this between Committee and Report and I recognise, as I have already said, the concerns which have been expressed in this debate.
Lord McKenzie of Luton
The Minister has said that there is a possibility of further discussion between now and Report, but will he nevertheless undertake to arrange for written answers to be available to each of those questions in advance of that meeting? In order to make sure that nothing slips from people’s view, it would be very helpful if he would commit to getting us written answers where we have asked for them.
Lord Wallace of Saltaire
My Lords, I shall do my best to ensure that written answers are provided to the very large number of questions that have been posed in this debate about a substantial number of different agencies. On that basis, I hope that the noble Lord will be willing to withdraw his amendment.
Deregulation Bill
Lord McKenzie of Luton Excerpts(10 years, 2 months ago)
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(a) by a notice fixed to the vehicle;(b) by a notice handed to the person appearing to be in charge of the vehicle at the time; or(c) where the enforcement officer is prevented from serving the notice by either of the methods in paragraph (a) or (b), by post,in respect of a parking contravention on a road in a civil enforcement area in England”
Lord McKenzie of Luton (Lab)
My Lords, in moving this amendment, I will also speak to our other amendments in this group—Amendments 61D, 61E, 61F and 61G. I will address the clause stand part debate in due course.
Most local authorities have adopted civil parking enforcement powers, which mean that they, rather than the police, can issue parking tickets for on-street parking contraventions and in local authority off-street car parks. This means that they have full responsibility for the design, implementation and enforcement of parking policies in their areas. The quid pro quo as the Government apparently see it is that local authorities should use these powers to seek best solutions to balance the sometimes competing needs of different road users, including cyclists, pedestrians, residents, shops and businesses.
Local authorities, as we know, are precluded from using their civil parking enforcement powers to raise revenue. The Government say that they are aware of concerns that some local authorities are being overzealous with parking enforcement, and they have focused on the use of CCTV as having insufficient regard to statutory guidance. It is suggested that enforcement by CCTV is particularly unfair because a motorist might be issued with a ticket as a consequence of a camera. The ticket arrives at their home some time after the event when they have no opportunity to examine the location when the alleged contravention took place. However, the Government’s consultation on local authority parking last year acknowledged the benefit of CCTV in enforcing moving traffic congestion where cars use bus lanes, do not exit box junctions and so forth.
The LGA disputes much of the Government’s analysis. It points out that successful appeals to the adjudicator are low, 80% of councils make no surplus on enforcement and parking surpluses that do arise are reinvested back into transport improvements. Parking controls help to ensure that businesses have access to loading bays, school entrances are kept clear and parking does not obstruct access to shops, businesses and residences.
Notwithstanding that, Clause 38 seeks to ban the use of CCTV for parking enforcement, although the Government have already acknowledged the need for some exemptions to this policy as a result of campaigning by the LGA. They have acknowledged the need to allow its use at bus stops, in bus lanes, outside schools and on red routes. CCTV is quite properly used to enforce parking restrictions where the use of enforcement officers is not practical. Outside schools is a particular case in point because motorists can move their vehicles when a traffic officer approaches. Enforcement in some instances requires constant observation over a period of time or for safety reasons.
As Clause 38 is currently drafted, and subject to the detail of any regulations, it would seem to make it impossible to enforce a penalty where the driver has fled the scene or where an enforcement officer is otherwise prevented from fixing the PCN to the vehicle or handing it to the person in charge of the vehicle; perhaps because of threats of violence. It cannot be the Government’s intention to allow such behaviour to be rewarded. At present of course, an enforcement officer can hand a PCN to a driver or send it by post when prevented from serving it directly. Amendment 61C would therefore allow a PCN to be issued by post where it cannot be issued in the manner currently provided for in Clause 38.
Amendments 61D and 61E would include in the Bill exemptions from the ban, some of which the Government have already conceded should be provided. This applies to contraventions for stopping at bus stops and bus lanes, school entrance markings and red routes on the grounds of safety and the needs of bus services. Amendments 61B, 61F and 61G have been added to our proposals for the same reasons. We propose that all arrangements for safety reasons should be covered as well as no-stopping and no-loading restrictions because these, too, impact on bus service delays.
Amendment 61F seeks to ensure that the provisions of Clause 38 cannot have effect until the proposed implementing regulations have been the subject of a regulatory impact assessment and an equalities impact assessment. As I understand it, no impact assessments have been conducted on these clauses, particularly in respect of the impact on those dependent on public transport or on vulnerable users. Can the Minister tell the Committee why this is? Will the Government now commit to producing such assessments before implementing these provisions?
The purpose of Amendment 61G is to enable those local authorities that wish to use CCTV and automatic number plate recognition in car parks in order to make it easier for users to park and pay later or to better manage space for users. It would make it easier, for example, to have pre-booking arrangements. The Protection of Freedoms Act 2012 provided for such technology in private car parks but not local authority ones. The use of such technology would depend on it being used for better space management or customer convenience. This approach follows the same basis as that on which the congestion charge operates and, so I am told, the new Dartford crossing toll. The Department of Health’s encouragement for NHS trusts to use pay-on-exit systems is in the same vein.
Since tabling these amendments and drafting most of these notes, we have seen a draft of the regulations enabled by this clause. We obviously need some time to look at these—although doubtless the Minister will offer some enlightenment—but on the face of things, it looks as though the prospect of enforcement by post is preserved for on-road contraventions, in limited circumstances when alternatives are prevented. These would appear to be more limited than in Amendment 61C. The regulations would also appear to cover some, if not all, of what is provided by Amendments 61D and 61E, but this is not in the Bill. The draft regulations do not address Amendment 61G.
Can the Minister help me in particular with a specific piece of drafting in those regulations? Regulation 9A(3)(c) looks at the circumstances where service of enforcement by post would be permitted. It refers to,
“where the civil enforcement officer has begun to prepare a penalty charge notice for service in accordance with paragraph (2)”.
What does,
“begun to prepare a penalty charge notice”,
mean in this context? Does the officer have to actually get his machine or pencil out of a bag for a written enforcement notice? Does he just have to appear and look at the number plate of the vehicle in contemplation of doing something or does he actually have to press the button on the notice? This might seem frivolous but it is important that these things are clarified otherwise the scope for argument, litigation and adjudication will be endless.
We welcome the Government’s response, so far as it goes, in listening to the concerns and the LGA’s campaign—however, it is not enough. I beg to move.
Lord Bradshaw (LD)
I believe that these provisions are ill thought through and extremely damaging to local government and local governance. At the same time as the Government are beginning to concede powers—to Greater Manchester, as we read this morning—these provisions are taking away a power which is essential for local government to keep its roads free. Those roads are becoming increasingly congested and increasingly badly maintained.
The law relating to bus operation is that the traffic commissioners who license buses provide that they do not run early or more than five minutes behind schedule. It is extremely difficult for bus operators to keep within the present limits with the present level of enforcement; it would be completely impossible if we got odd people having five minutes to pop in to get the paper and impeding the traffic. That has a large-scale effect. For example, in Oxford, which I know well, the congestion at one stage got so bad that in one of the park and rides they had to put extra buses in and extra drivers. Of course, they got no more revenue, because they were taking the same number of people, who just happened to be sitting in congested areas. I am not talking only about bus lanes; these appear to be covered in the proposed regulations. I am talking about the fact that a large number of buses do not use roads that have bus lanes; the vast majority—I think about 60%—travel along ordinary roads, which are protected in places at least by double yellow lines. I honestly believe that this is not a subject that the Government should be involved in.
There is very little evidence that surpluses are being frittered away or used by councils to subside luxuries. I accept that in Kensington and Chelsea and in Westminster a couple of councils make a profit, but we cannot argue from the particular to the general. A piece of evidence that I have from one local authority shows that actually a very small fraction of people contest their parking fines and a much smaller proportion of them are upheld by the parking adjudicator. Nobody likes getting tickets because they have been watched by CCTV but most people accept that they have done wrong and will have to pay the fine, which is mitigated to 50% if people pay promptly. It is quite impossible to think that the police have resources to do that sort of work; it has to be done by CCTV, and if local authorities can afford to employ parking wardens it is probably at the expense of spending money on something else. I cannot understand why, in this day and age, technology is not brought to bear on problems. This is not spying on people; it is picking up illegal parking that is obstructing the highway for the ordinary person.
The regulations talk about zig-zag lines outside schools. I know what they are like; they go for about 10 yards either side of the entrance. That is not the problem. If you go almost anywhere you will find a line of cars outside schools and, for that matter, outside hospitals, which is very long and creates huge safety problems. Many headmasters ask local authorities to bring the enforcement ban or some sort of TV equipment to control the problem, because many people who park in those places are just selfish or lazy—or perhaps both. I do not believe that we should pander to that sort of thing.
With this clause, we need to go back to the drawing board and take some advice from people who really know what they are talking about, not relying on something conjured up in Whitehall, probably by somebody who really does not understand the problem.
Lord Gardiner of Kimble
My noble friend is always extremely persuasive. Clearly, the record of these discussions will go back to the department.
In his amendments, the noble Lord seeks to place in the Bill the list of exempted areas where local authorities can continue to use CCTV to issue tickets in the post. The department does not think that it would be expedient to set the exemptions in primary legislation. It is conceivable that exemptions could be increased or reduced in the future, so it might be more desirable to include them in secondary legislation. Everyone will have their own view on what is the right balance for the use of CCTV, whether that is in parking, as your Lordships are debating today, or more widely. The Government have given careful consideration to the list of exemptions and, in particular, have reflected the views of those who responded to the consultation.
The noble Lord, Lord McKenzie, also seeks to introduce a requirement for impact assessments to be carried out for the provisions. As I am sure he will know, the Government have been clear in their determination to reduce the impact of rules and regulations on businesses and policymakers. Indeed, the Government’s Better Regulation Framework Manual, which was published in July 2013, states that impact assessments are required only for measures that regulate or deregulate business or concern the regulation of business. This clause applies only to local authorities that carry out parking enforcement, so we believe that no impact assessment is required.
Lord McKenzie of Luton
Will the Minister remind me what the criteria are for an equality impact assessment?
Lord Gardiner of Kimble
I think that I might need a little assistance on that, but I will return to it.
The noble Lord also suggested the insertion of a new clause that would prevent the measures in the Bill from affecting off-street parking. However, the measures in the Bill already apply only to on-street parking, so we consider that the noble Lord’s suggested new clause is not necessary.
I should also reply to my noble friend Lord Bradshaw on the issue of traffic flow. Local authorities will still be able to enforce parking. Indeed, the great majority of authorities do this without the use of CCTV. As I said, in those areas where traffic flow is vital, the Government have provided for CCTV to continue.
I promise to write to the noble Lord about equality impact assessments.
Lord McKenzie of Luton
My Lords, I thank all noble Lords who have spoken in this debate. I shall first pick up some points that the Minister made. I understand his definition of when someone begins to prepare a parking ticket. I suspect that CCTV evidence will need to be brought to bear on that decision on more than a few occasions.
Let me revert to the noble Lord, Lord Bradshaw, who said that the amendment was damaging to local government and took powers away from local authorities. With respect, that is not what the amendment was doing. What is taking the power away from local authorities is the clause in the Bill. The amendment was seeking to ameliorate the impact of that. In that sense, I guess that it is a middle position between the two extremes of the coalition—those who do not want the clause at all and those who, if it has to be there, want to make it work in a better way. The arguments for not having it there at all are not insignificant.
Lord Bradshaw
I am sorry to interrupt. There is a woeful lack of solid evidence to support what the Government are proposing. The Minister, in replying, referred to parking penalty charge notices and all the work given to the adjudicators. In one borough, which I shall not name, 45,771 tickets were issued in a year. Of those, 358 were referred to the parking adjudicator and 65 were upheld. So we are talking about 65—one and a half a week—against the local authority issuing nearly 1,000 a week. It is preposterous that this sort of evidence is used by the Government to make these proposals. I beg the Minister to go away and convene a meeting between the people who support the Bill and those who actually have to work it. Seriously, this will cause chaos to bus services and parking enforcement—and probably a general feeling, once again, that the Government are out of touch with people.
Lord McKenzie of Luton
My Lords, I do not at all dispute the adjudication figures. I probably used the same briefing as the noble Lord. We have a common understanding of the data and the Government have more to do in justifying what they are doing here.
The issue around schools is clearly very important. The point has been well made that it is nonsense to say that TV cameras will be able to be used along a very short stretch of road. Our amendment would widen or retain the opportunity to use CCTV in those circumstances. The noble Baroness, Lady Hanham, asked who was complaining about parking charges. I hesitate to say, but she might wish to take a taxi ride in Luton and it will not be long before she gets someone bending her ear about parking charges and enforcement. I suspect that that situation is not unique to where I live.
There is a localism argument in all this, although I know that depending on where people are on a proposition, they either grasp the localism mantra or they do not. We debated something just last week when those who are now on the localist wing were arguing for a very much centralist approach. We have all probably been on one side of that issue or another.
The Minister said that I was trying to introduce a new clause related to off-street parking enforcement; was that the point he was making? The point about Amendment 61G, which was suggested to us by the LGA, related to the opportunity for local authority car parks to have the benefit of the same use of technology as private car parks so that it can be used to improve management of those car parks—to enable people to park and pay afterwards, for example. Those are the sort of arrangements that make more efficient use of car parks—as I said, the Department of Health hospital trusts are encouraging that—which was the purpose of my clause. Perhaps the Minister might reflect on that.
My noble friend Lord Rooker, as ever, made a challenging point, in this case about the difference between somebody getting done for speeding on a motorway and somebody getting a parking ticket when they are stationary. These provisions apply only for stationary vehicles—for obvious reasons which the Minister I think dealt with. If people are motoring at 40, 50 or 60 miles an hour, you need some form of evidence to be able to justify a penalty, and CCTV is the obvious option. I do not think that the Government, to be fair to them, are seeking to change that in these regulations. But where I challenge the Government, and where I would certainly align myself with most of the Benches opposite, is that I do not think the Government have justified the very narrow use of CCTV that would result from this clause. At the very least it should be widened to cover all of those areas focused on safety, for example bus usage and the efficiency of the bus service. What they are doing is very restrictive and, I believe, unacceptable. One way or another, it needs to change.
Lord Tope
I do not think the noble Lord has quite withdrawn his amendment yet. Before he does so, I could perhaps help with Amendment 61G—which I certainly support—which refers to the use of an approved device in car parks. As I understand it, the Protection of Freedoms Act 2012 provided for the use of CCTV and automatic number plate recognition in private car parks but did not do so for local authority car parks. If that is the case—I believe that it is, and that is the reason for the amendment—I do not understand the logic for it. Why is it permissible in a privately owned or managed car park but not in a local authority one? I suspect, or would like to believe, that that was simply an omission when the 2012 Act was passed and that this is the opportunity to correct it.
Lord McKenzie of Luton
I am grateful to the noble Lord for his support on that particular amendment. I do not believe we can get an answer this afternoon as to why that distinction was made when the provisions were introduced but it is certainly important that we get it. We will obviously need a lot of follow-up on this area of debate, but in the mean time I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Lord Holmes of Richmond (Con)
My Lords, I support the amendment tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Low, and already spoken to. I feel nervous about standing between two noble friends. Luckily, I am not right between them, so I feel safe at the end of the Table. Also, it is a pleasure to be speaking to my noble friend the Minister. Two hours ago we were speaking on sport and now we are on parking. We should all bow down in awe at the extent of his knowledge and the range of expertise demonstrated in just one afternoon.
We all know very well that there are three subjects never to be discussed in polite conversation. I would certainly add a fourth, parking, to that. It raises temperatures—sometimes justifiably and sometimes the solution is actually in the hands of the person holding the steering wheel at that particular moment. Looking at the amendment, the situation is clearly set out and has worked not just perfectly but incredibly well in London since 1974. It has not impacted on the economic, social or cultural success of this great city. I would never say that what is good enough in London is good enough everywhere, but it is a very useful case in point to consider.
As a guide dog user, I obviously have a particular interest in this. In many cities and towns that I go to, trying to walk along the pavement is impossible. One steps out to avoid one car then realises that there is a second, third and fourth car and one is walking down the centre of the road while the cars are on the pavement. What a curious world one has entered there. It is almost as if pink flamingos are used as mallets for croquet and we are all diving down rabbit holes when we have reached a change of roles to that extent.
It is not just about visually impaired people, though—it is about the very nature and essence of inclusion. If you have a pushchair or pram, or you are walking with friends or family, if you have toddlers or if you are on a mobility scooter, if you are a pedestrian you should be able to access and enjoy the environment on the pavement. The clue is really in the name, “pavement”; it is not a carriageway. The Americans get it quite well—it is a sidewalk, not a side road or a side car park. That is where we should aim to guarantee everybody free, unimpeded access along the pavements, not just of London but across the entire nation. As we have already heard, there is a very clear local element here. Politics is nothing if it not only listens but acts locally. This amendment offers the right local solution to enable unimpeded access of the pavements up and down this nation.
I turn to the economics of it. Pavements are not designed for cars. Unsurprisingly, they crack and the tarmac sinks and they become not only unsightly but dangerous for pedestrians. Between 2006 and 2010, £1 billion was spent on pavement repairs as a result of parking. That figure does not even cover the costs that we can all only think about of people who have had to bring claims against local authorities for having been injured on pavements that have broken down as a result of people parking on them. Again with reference to the local agenda, that is why it is hardly surprising that 78% of local councillors believe that there should be prevention of pavement parking, as is the case in Greater London.
There is an economic argument and a social argument, as well as a legal argument. It would be good if my noble friend could strongly consider the wording set out in this amendment.
Lord McKenzie of Luton
My Lords, this is an important amendment, and we should thank the noble Lord, Lord Tope, for moving it on behalf of the noble Lord, Lord Low. As the noble Lord, Lord Tope, said, we all signed up to the Private Member’s Bill, which has stalled at the other end but is due for a Second Reading in January.
Under the existing legislation, it is illegal to drive on pavements and footpaths, but there is no specific prohibition against pavement parking. The ambiguity in the law means that most local authorities struggle to enforce restrictions, in contrast to London, which has operated a separate system since 1974. I understand that there are also exemptions in place in Exeter and Worcester. As the campaigning charity, Living Streets, said in written evidence to the Transport Select Committee:
“Inconsiderate parking can cause a major barrier to many vulnerable road users. It is clear that the current legislative situation relying on police enforcement isn’t working”.
Of course, there are some areas where parking on the pavement is unavoidable, and there are other legitimate reasons why it might sometimes be necessary—but all too often parking on the pavement obstructs access to pedestrians, forcing them to navigate busy and dangerous roads instead. Some 74% of adults report being forced to walk on the road because the pavement was being obstructed by cars and other vehicles. For some, pavement parking can effectively extinguish their right of way altogether. I refer to elderly people, people with buggies and those with disabilities. For them, cars that block the pavement can be a serious restriction on their freedom of movement.
I know that the measure proposed today has the support of the Guide Dogs UK, Age UK and several other organisations referred to by the noble Lord, Lord Tope. Banks of parked cars can also force cyclists to swerve into dangerous traffic flows, which can be especially dangerous on narrow roads. Pavements are not designed to bear the weight of cars, as the noble Lord, Lord Holmes, just said, let alone heavier goods vehicles; over time, they can become degraded, posing additional challenges for pedestrians and costs for local authorities.
The reality of the problem is not in contention, I suggest. In 2006, the Transport Select Committee said that the then Government,
“must grip the problem of pavement parking once and for all and ensure that it is outlawed throughout the country … rather than relying on the use of individual Traffic Regulation Orders on specific streets and local Acts to impose”,
a fine. Last year, the Transport Select Committee called for reform to end,
“a confusing patchwork approach across the country”,
and for a clarification of the rules for loading and unloading by haulage companies, and action to rectify the long-standing problems over poor signage. It is important that, even as the Government try to move towards allowing more diverse road signs from local authorities, common national standards can be agreed on this issue.
The status quo brings challenges for drivers as well as pedestrians and cyclists. The British Parking Association and the RAC Foundation all support the calls for change. Inappropriately parking vehicles can interfere with traffic flows for other road users, causing jams and congestion, and drivers are often unsure about restrictions—and which, if any, are in place. Given the growth in congestion on many of our roads, these problems are likely to be magnified in the years ahead.
The Government also seem to be in agreement, on the principle at least, that pavement parking is a problem that needs to be addressed. The amendment gives the Minister and the Government ample opportunity to do so. I urge them to take it.
Lord Gardiner of Kimble
My Lords, I first thank the noble Lord, Lord Tope, for speaking to the amendment; I am most grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Low, for tabling it.
The Government recognise entirely the importance of making the local environment convenient, safe and attractive to walk in, and of keeping footways in good order. I do not think anyone could have failed to be struck by all that my noble friend Lord Holmes of Richmond has said. However, as I think the noble Lord, Lord McKenzie, acknowledged, part of the dilemma is that there are indeed some streets where pavement parking may be inevitable, whether to maintain free passage of traffic, to allow loading and unloading or to allow the setting down of passengers in certain situations. I am afraid that I can think of instances when I have parked on a pavement for an elderly relative to get out safely, which I think was legitimate; it was not in London, either. There are therefore issues with a blanket ban, as the amendment is drafted, that are problematic.
Local authorities already have many powers to ban pavement parking; I have a list of them and they are quite considerable. However, I agree with my noble friend Lord Deben on this occasion. Local authorities are in the best position to decide on local parking restrictions and need to consider all road users when taking such decisions. A national ban of the type proposed would require local authorities to remove all existing restrictions, then to review their urban areas for where footway parking should nevertheless still be permitted, consult the community and erect new signage and markings, which would of course impose a burden on local government.
The amendment also proposes banning footway parking but allowing authorities to permit it where desired by a simple resolution. Circumvention of the traffic regulation order process would take away an important protection for the public. This process requires authorities to undertake consultation and advertise the proposals before councillors take final decisions. The Government’s guidance to local authorities makes clear that, during the appraisal of their parking policies, an authority should consider whether pavement parking is problematic in any part of its area. If it is, and is not covered by an existing traffic regulation order, the authority should consider amending the existing order or making a new one. Indeed, my noble friend Lady Kramer wrote to all English traffic authorities on 27 June this year to remind them of their existing, wide-ranging powers to prevent people from parking on the pavement where it is a problem.
Given the significant issues in managing a change of this scale, and the fact that authorities already have comprehensive powers to ban footway parking, I will ask the noble Lord to withdraw his amendment. However, before that, I want to emphasise that I am not asking the noble Lord to do that because the Government do not understand or accept the concerns that have been expressed. Indeed, the Government consulted the Disabled Persons Transport Advisory Committee on this. Although that body favours having no parking on the footway, it recognised that there would need to be exemptions from the national ban and that issues arise from this.
Although I am sure all noble Lords in the Committee will have every sympathy for what is intended, there are issues, which is why I ask my noble friend to withdraw his amendment.
Deregulation Bill
Lord McKenzie of Luton Excerpts(10 years, 3 months ago)
Grand CommitteeRead Full debate Read Hansard Text Read Debate Ministerial Extracts
“(5) Within one year of the passing of this Act, the Secretary of State shall lay before each House of Parliament a report setting out the effect of the Government’s policy of reducing the qualification period for right to buy on the number of affordable and council houses which have been replaced on a like-for-like basis.”
Lord McKenzie of Luton (Lab)
My Lords, this is a modest amendment that requires a report to each House of Parliament to set out the effects of the policy of reducing the qualifying period for eligibility for the right to buy from five to three years. In particular, it seeks information on the impact of this reduction on the numbers of affordable council houses that have replaced those sold. While this amendment focuses on replacement on a like-for-like basis, I acknowledge that the Government’s commitment relates to a one-for-one replacement.
As I made clear at Second Reading, we believe that people should have the right to own a home, and have come to support the right-to-buy programme as one mechanism to facilitate this. We are considering these issues when home ownership has declined to its lowest level in 30 years, and when we have a housing crisis in the UK because for decades we have failed to build sufficient homes to meet demand. The consequences of this are now being widely felt by millions of working people who are unable to afford the house that they want, and their children and grandchildren face the prospect of never being able to do so.
As Michael Lyons stressed in his latest report, building more homes is not just about home ownership. There is a need to provide homes for social and affordable rent so that those on the lowest incomes can have a decent home, too. His report specifically identified that local authorities should have a key role in commissioning and building social housing, and acknowledged the continuing commitment of housing associations to this end. Of course, the sale of a council house does not of itself add to or diminish the stock of housing in the UK, but how the proceeds of sale are applied and the extent to which that adds to the housing stock are of crucial importance. These things need to be considered in the near and longer term. Evidence provided to the Lyons commission suggested that about one-third of the properties sold under the right to buy are now privately rented, many at rent levels above applicable housing benefit levels.
In seeking this report, we are looking to hold the Government to account for the commitment made when their reinvigorated right-to-buy programme was introduced. The Solicitor-General in the other place,
“guaranteed, for the first time ever, that receipts from additional local authority sales—that is, sales above the level forecast prior to the change—would be used to help to fund new homes for affordable rent, on a one-for-one basis”.—[Official Report, Commons, Deregulation Bill Committee, 6/3/14; col. 276.]
This commitment applies to the reinvigorated programme generally, not just to changes in this clause, and requires some decoding. It is accepted that it is one-for-one, not like-for-like, and it would appear—perhaps the Minister can confirm this—that it is based on the Government’s analysis at national level that, should it have the relevant proceeds, and with the application of those receipts limited always to 30% of the cost of new provision, a one-for-one test could nationally be satisfied. Can the Minister throw any light on the distributional aspects of this approach and the extent to which the allowance works only because of a mismatch between locations where proceeds arise and where they can be reinvested? What assumptions have the Government made about the type of properties sold and those replaced? Because the right-to-buy proceeds could be applied to only 30% of the cost of replacement provision, local authorities will be expected to borrow the balance and fund from affordable rents. They have to sign agreements with the Government to this effect, so how many councils have entered into such agreements with the Government or the HCA? How many have not? Are the Government aware of any councils that would be precluded from undertaking such an agreement because of their borrowing cap? What is the Government’s definition of affordable rents for this purpose? Has any estimate been made of the additional housing benefit or universal credit cost that will arise from the requirement to charge such rents to benefit from the replacement arrangements?
One of the difficulties in all this is how to be clear about the baseline—the forecast level of sales prior to the reinvigorated programme. Is it correct that the baseline is set in terms of revenues garnered, not units sold, so that the Treasury always gets its money first? Will the Minister provide an analysis, year by year, of the baseline so that there can be some clarity as to the additionality that should provide the Government’s one-for-one commitment? It is understood that the Government’s guarantee does not extend to tenants accessing the preserved right to buy for those council homes that transferred into housing association ownership. The National Housing Federation briefing asserts that because housing associations entered into agreements about the split of proceeds of sale before the reinvigorated programme, they receive only a small proportion of the sale proceeds, with the lion’s share going to local authorities and not always used for housing. It says that 92% of housing associations that it surveyed declared that they would not be able to replace homes sold via the preserved right to buy. What plan do the Government have to facilitate replacement of homes sold by housing associations in that manner?
The National Housing Federation has given us figures for 2012-13, stating that 5,944 local authority homes were sold but that only 3,634 new homes had been started to replace them. For that and the subsequent year, how many homes have been sold and what are the related proceeds? How many of those have been treated as attributable to the reinvigorated process, and therefore how much is available for replacement homes?
Three other amendments focused on resources for social housing are grouped with this one, and I shall outline our position on them when they have been spoken to.
This is an important issue. Given the Government’s change in policy we need at least in these circumstances to review what is happening, hence the requirement for a report. I beg to move.
Lord Best (CB)
My Lords, I propose a cluster of three new clauses in the group, all concerned with the desperate problem of this country’s acute shortage of homes that are affordable to those on average incomes and below. Amendment 40 relates to right-to-buy discounts and seeks not to undermine these arrangements but to make them more productive. Amendment 41 seeks to apply more of the receipts from right-to-buy sales to the provision of new homes. Amendment 42 attempts to enable councils to borrow prudentially more funds to increase housing supply.
These proposed new clauses do not represent earth-shattering proposals that will solve the nation’s acute housing problems. Other more dramatic changes are needed to achieve really significant results, but this trio of amendments would enable councils to play a bigger role once again in meeting this country’s crying need for more and more affordable new homes.
I declare my interest as president of the Local Government Association. I am grateful to the LGA for preparing these amendments and, as always, for valuable briefings.
Clause 29 endeavours to make the right to buy more attractive by reducing the time from five to three years that a tenant has to live in a council property before being able to buy at a big discount. Discounts can be as much as 70% of value, so tenants can buy a home for 30% of what it is worth, subject to maximum discounts of an index-linked £100,000, now £102,700, in London and £75,000, now £77,000, elsewhere. These nationally set figures are very much back-of-the-envelope stuff. They do not recognise that the housing market outside London is not uniform. Levels of demand and house prices in Bradford and Burnley are not as the same as in Bedford or Brighton. Indeed, house prices are not even the same across London.
Amendment 40 would mean councils setting their own discount levels, based on local markets. It would place a maximum 60% on discounts. It would avoid giving away publicly owned assets on extravagant terms. It localises decision-making, in keeping with the Government’s general disposition towards the devolution of responsibility to local government.
Critics of the amendment could worry that some local authorities, which believe that the right to buy has already removed too many properties from their stock of affordable homes, will reduce discounts to the point where no one wants to buy. Some councils will certainly point out that a large proportion of RTB sales lead to the first buyer selling on to buy-to-let landlords. Sadly, this can mean the same previously rented home being re-let at twice the earlier rent, often increasing the housing benefit. Worse, the private tenants may be people requiring intensive housing management and support, which is not available from the private landlord. In extreme cases, I hear of families evicted by the council for anti-social behaviour returning to the estate, into former right-to-buy properties, costing the taxpayer twice as much, but without the restraints on behaviour that could be exerted for council tenants.
There are also the problems for the purchasers themselves. Those buying flats can discover a few years down the line that they must pay large sums towards major repairs and replacements of lifts, external cladding, roofs and so on, turning their asset into a liability.
Amendment 40 puts these arguments to one side and avoids the accusation that it could be used to undermine right-to-buy sales. It would require discounts to continue at levels that will still attract buyers. It would stop local authorities being forced to spend more than is necessary to encourage sales, and would prevent unwise tenants being tempted by the sheer scale of the discount from making an unwise purchase. It would substitute localised decision-making on an issue that requires local knowledge, for the distant regulation of RTB discounts by Whitehall.
Amendment 41 follows from that. It would seek to capture 100% of the sale proceeds—admittedly after they have been greatly depleted by the discount—to be recycled for local housing purposes. The importance of this measure is not hard to see. At present, the Treasury takes a 25% slice of proceeds from right-to-buy sales. Last year, from a total £877 million, the Treasury took £237 million. If that extra money had been recycled into the housing revenue account and used for new homes, it would have made a very helpful difference at the local level. Councils which have done the sums have estimated that they could have improved their housebuilding performance by some 30%.
Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)
My Lords, I think we all agree we need to build more houses and it is part of the puzzle over the last 20 years and more that successive Governments have been committed to doing this and have not been succeeding. Certainly, my own observation in Bradford is that one of the problems is a shortage of skilled labour for building. I am quite happy that the housing association that has its headquarters a good 10 minutes’ walk from my house in Saltaire now has a very good apprentice scheme to train plumbers, builders, electricians and others in sourcing its own maintenance and building. That is a model I hope others are planning to take forward. We are all conscious that we need to build more houses and aware—and this answers one or two of the questions raised by the noble Lords, Lord McKenzie and Lord Best—that we do not necessarily need to build the houses in the same areas where houses are being sold off as the population is shifting. We have different sorts of housing needs and requirements in different areas. Population has shifted towards the south-east and areas of heavy immigration require more housing than areas without much immigration, which now often have surplus housing stock. I have just been in Hull, for example, which does not suffer from a shortage of housing at present.
The noble Lord, Lord McKenzie, asked a number of questions. I do not have all the figures to answer him but I will make sure he gets the answers to all his questions as soon as possible, and of course well before Report. I am told by officials that many of the figures which he asks for are publicly available, so there should be no problem in that respect, but I do not have them immediately to hand. I noted his comments about houses that have been sold under right to buy and which are now privately rented. In some parts of England, there are some problems of that sort.
I think that the noble Lord, Lord Best, suggested that the discounts were enormous and immediate but the discount scheme, as he knows, is progressive and one gets the higher rates of discount only after renting a house for considerably longer than three, five or 10 years. The longer that someone has been a tenant the more discount they get, starting at 35% discount on a house and increasing by 1% each year to a maximum of 70% of the market value. It is not a short-term renters’ paradise, as I thought he was almost beginning to suggest.
The baseline for right to buy was set in April 2012, when the policy was reinvigorated, and it does not change year by year. I assure noble Lords that the Government are committed to keeping this reinvigorated right-to-buy scheme under review, including the impact of the change in the qualifying period from five to three years. The Committee may be interested to read the impact assessments for this clause that were published in January 2014, which is available on the parliamentary website, and in March 2012, at the time of reinvigorating the policy, which provide important context. When this Government reinvigorated the right to buy, they included an important measure guaranteeing for the first time ever that receipts from additional local authority sales—that is, sales above the level forecast prior to the change—would be used to help fund new homes for affordable rent on a one-for-one basis, not a like-for-like basis.
Lord McKenzie of Luton
While it is on my mind, is the test—the baseline—the originally anticipated numbers of sales of units, or is it anticipated sales proceeds?
Lord Wallace of Saltaire
I think that it is the units rather than the baseline being the proceeds of sales, but I will check with the officials and come back on that.
We publish quarterly and annually on right-to-buy one-for-one starts on-site and acquisitions, so the figures are available. I will make sure that they are circulated and put in the Library. Since the reinvigoration, there have been more than 12,600 additional local authority right-to-buy sales and, as the noble Lord, Lord McKenzie, said, councils have already reported almost 3,700 starts on-site and acquisitions of replacement homes for affordable rent. Councils have three years from the date of receiving the additional receipts in which to use them. This gives councils adequate time to leverage in additional funds and build up enough receipts to produce robust economies of scale.
The Government also publish annual statistics on preserved right-to-buy sales in England, which strike a balance between the needs to monitor the effectiveness of the policy and not to place unnecessary burdens on housing associations. As housing associations are independent organisations and stock transfer agreements are private commercial contracts, we do not mandate what those associations do with receipts that they receive from preserved right-to-buy sales. In practice, any surplus receipts retained, after costs and compensation for lost rental income, are likely to be used to support new build and other public benefits. Where receipts are shared with councils, it is our expectation that associations will work with them to develop replacement homes.
Lord Stoneham of Droxford
Before the noble Lord, Lord McKenzie, responds, may I apologise to the Committee? I meant to declare my interest as chair of Housing & Care 21 but failed to do so. I would like to put that on the record.
Lord McKenzie of Luton
My Lords, I thank the Minister for his reply and the noble Lords, Lord Best and Lord Stoneham, for their contributions to this debate. I look forward to receiving the figures in due course from the Minister. I was not quite sure whether in his response he was saying that the Government are currently meeting their one-for-one guarantee. It would be helpful to know if that is the Government’s position.
Lord McKenzie of Luton
In which case, when is it expected that the Government will meet that guarantee?
Lord Wallace of Saltaire
I have not chosen between soon or shortly, but we very much want to move on that. It takes time. As I said, local authorities have three years to replace, and we are already two years into this new scheme. We are, of course, frustrated by the length of time it takes to build new homes. That is part of a long-standing story under successive Governments which we continue to push forward with.
Lord McKenzie of Luton
I thank the Minister for that. I was also not sure whether he had accepted the thrust of my amendment, which was that the Government would produce a report. Could he respond to that?
Lord Wallace of Saltaire
My answer was that the Government already produces a large number of statistics which, in effect, form the basis of the report for which the noble Lord is asking.
Lord McKenzie of Luton
I take that as a yes. I thank the noble Lord, Lord Stoneham. I think we are on the same page in recognising the scale of the housing crisis which faces this country and the need for more social housing in particular, and for a one-for-one replacement policy.
We have debated the issues in the three amendments from the noble Lord, Lord Best, extensively from time to time in recent years. We share with him a strong desire to do more to produce more and better social housing, particularly housing for rent, though we are not able to follow him specifically on every aspect of his three amendments.
Where Amendment 40 is concerned with setting discounts locally, it discusses setting them at a level which will encourage right-to-buy take-up. That raises an interesting question of where the policy should be focused between facilitating and encouraging. Presumably, it would depend on the need for investment into the social housing sector, and there has to be a balance in these matters. I do not resile from my party’s position on managing the country’s overall level of debt. Our priority is not a wholesale lift of the cap.
Notwithstanding that, we should recognise the important role that local councils can and should be enabled to play in tackling the housing crisis—as the Lyons report put it, to return to their historic responsibility to build affordable housing. We note that there is some scope for a rise in output even on the current basis, but that would be modest compared to historic output. In the 1960s, I think that about 200,000 units a year were produced.
We recognise that councils have a long record of sound economic management and borrowing prudently—a point that the noble Lord made—but early removal of the overall cap will be difficult for any Government. The Lyons report recognised that. The report suggested that there is an opportunity to provide additional capacity without exceeding total borrowing if there is more active management from the Treasury of the overall borrowing headroom. Lyons suggests, for example, that councils should be able to apply for more borrowing headroom by demonstrating: a viable business plan and asset management strategy in the context of new contracts for housing delivery and a single pot of funding for housing investment; costed plans for investment in new housing that relate to their housing strategy and make full use of partnership opportunities; that new homes will be additional to those which would be delivered by others; and compliance with prudential rules with expectations about rent levels and reinvestment in their existing stock. The Treasury would be able to make a decision on a case-by-case basis against an understanding of the overall level of borrowing planned, to ensure that total borrowing did not exceed the current provision.
The report also points to the alternative models by which councils can invest in homes—by using land, by entering into joint ventures, by some of the imaginative work which the LGA has done on the municipal bonds agencies. There are other opportunities there, but we cannot go the whole way with the noble Lord in reducing the cap as he wants to.
I hope that debates such as this will continue to help us focus on the absolute need to address the housing crisis across the private sector, the local authority sector and housing associations. I look forward to receiving the Minister’s data in due course; I take it that they will come in the form of the requested report. In the mean time, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Lord Lexden (Con)
My Lords, I would like to comment briefly on this amendment. I apologise to the noble Lord, Lord Best, for not being here at the start of his remarks.
There may be grounds to believe that this is an issue more of access than of supply. According to Leonard Cheshire, 10% of the British population have mobility issues and 2% use a wheelchair, but no British region has fewer than 19% of homes with disabled-friendly front doors, and London has 36%. There appear to be reasons to believe that the homes exist but that disabled people are not living in them.
I would like to touch briefly on research by the highly regarded organisation, Create Streets, which has shown that, in an urban environment, the results of lifetime homes standards requirements tend to be fewer houses and more flats, which is the opposite of what most people in this country want. If the issue is one of access rather than supply, might it not be better to require local councils to ensure an adequate supply of new homes and of new disabled-friendly homes and to take responsibility formally for ensuring that disabled people are housed in the right homes?
Lord McKenzie of Luton
My Lords, I put my name to this amendment but there is not much else left to say, so I shall be brief. Like the noble Lord, Lord Best, we welcome the work on standards and the inclusion of these matters in building regulations. We are grateful to Leonard Cheshire for its very helpful briefing. We welcome the fact that the lifetime homes standards and the wheelchair accessible standards have been recognised in building regulations, but like Leonard Cheshire and noble Lords who have spoken, there is a concern that those standards are optional, and that, moreover, a hurdle has to be gone through for a local planning authority to be able to require those as a planning condition. My noble friend made a telling point about the capacity of local planning authorities to address those issues.
I conclude on one point: this is not only a quality-of-life issue, although it is very important at that level; it has economic ramifications. Unsuitable accommodation means the likelihood of more trips and falls, more visits to the A&E and hospital, and more cost. I hope that the Minister can assure us that there is a way through this process to address the real concerns that have been raised today.
Lord Wallace of Saltaire
My Lords, I thank noble Lords who have taken part in the debate. As I came in, I was thinking that I have mixed views on housing standards. I first became aware of housing standards because of Parker Morris, when a number of houses in the Yorkshire dales were being condemned as back-to-earths which were not suitable or up to Parker Morris standards. Nowadays, those houses that remain would be regarded as extremely environmentally friendly and valuable; they were indeed beautiful homes. I once sat in on a violent argument between someone who lived in one of them and a particularly modernist Liberal councillor who believed that the Parker Morris standards were the absolute minimum and that any house that did not meet them should be immediately demolished.
On the other hand, having with my wife delivered to a large number of houses on the other side of the Aire from Saltaire just before the local elections this spring, with road names such as Cliff Rise and Steep Avenue—one house had 41 steps up to the front door—I recognise that accessibility is an issue with new housing. As I was listening to the debate, I reflected that if I wish to get out of bed in the middle of the night, in our house in Saltaire there are 15 steps down to the bathroom, whereas in my house in London there are five steps down to the bathroom, which, for someone approaching middle age, as I am, is much easier. The question of suitable and unsuitable accommodation is one which we all need to be concerned about.
First, this is not a dumbing down. As there is in much of the Bill and much government legislation at present, there is an inherent tension between local autonomy and central direction. I must say to the noble Lord, Lord Tope, that no Government can ever say that they understand in full the consequences of what they propose. We do our best to conduct impact assessments, but we are never entirely sure where we will be—especially after the High Court has had a go at our provisions in a few years’ time.
The optional requirements are intended to allow local authorities to set higher requirements for development than the building regulations minimum. They are a new concept in building regulations, and we are enabling local authorities, as a condition of granting planning permission, to require a developer to meet a higher building regulation requirement than the national minimum.
Lord Rooker
I can give advance warning—it would be nice if we could have the answer before we start the debate on the next amendment, because it is a fundamental issue. The time it takes for a local authority to change its local plan is enormous, and it is a huge cost as well. All I am asking is whether it is a requirement based on what he has just said in relation to this particular amendment. It ought to be straightforward to get an answer to that—yes or no—from his officials.
Lord McKenzie of Luton
My noble friend is absolutely right. I think the consultation document makes it very clear that it has to be part of the planning process for planning authorities to be able to impose it as an optional requirement.
Lord Wallace of Saltaire
My Lords, I reform that. If the local authority already has a standard, it can passport this on, keeping the standard without a need for a new policy. If it wants a new policy, it will have to have a plan policy. Does that begin to answer the question the noble Lord has raised?
Baroness Andrews
My Lords, far be it for me to improve or elaborate on anything that my noble friend has said. I just want to pick up a couple of points in the context of the code for sustainable homes.
That code has been in place since 2007. People are quite clear about the benefits. It has led to improved standards and to efficiencies. That is acknowledged by bodies such as the Environmental Audit Committee and the Local Government Association and many good public authorities. It is familiar, it is quite elaborate—that is true—but on the other hand, people know how to respond to that and how it benefits them. It has led to great energy efficiencies. Will the Minister tell me what the problem is that will be solved by removing the code?
The noble Lord, Lord Rooker, has quoted extensively from the BRE. It has probably provided us with similar briefings. The briefing points out that the new arrangements will mean that, in the future, energy performance set through the building regulations will be lower than many local authorities currently require, with the need for a special application to use optional regulations. This takes us back to the previous debate, and the shift in process and relationships, and in how things are decided, who gets to decide them and on what basis. He is right: of course there is a tension between national standards and localism. We are five years into this Government and it is about time some of those tensions were resolved. It is causing real issues at local level.
The BRE, which is expert in sustainability, has stated that:
“Over 75% of the sustainability requirements currently covered by the Code will no longer be covered by any UK standards or regulations”.
Is that factually correct? I would like to know if that is the case. What might that 75% include? How will that be compensated for in the new arrangements? In short, I would need to be convinced that whatever is coming forward will have the universal nature of the code for sustainable homes, that it will be as accessible and as easily applied, and that it will have the impact that the code can have in terms of efficiencies. What is going to happen to energy bills and to energy efficiencies within the home? I do not think that the House would want to proceed with this clause unless we could be certain that we knew the answers to those questions, and that we could say to people outside this House that the energy situation and their energy bills would get better as a result of these changes.
Lord McKenzie of Luton
My Lords, we have heard two very powerful presentations from my noble friends. It is not my nature to be helpful to the Minister, but I want to put one matter to him. The bit of briefing I received suggested that the particular provision in the Planning and Energy Act 2008 would stay in being until the zero-carbon homes policy was in place and that that would effectively replace it. That itself raises a couple of questions. The first is whether the zero-carbon homes policy would cover all the protections that my noble friends have said would be lost once we delete this provision. Secondly, how can we be assured that there will be an alignment—if that is the right way to go—and that the zero-carbon homes policy will come in at the same time as the ability to require higher standards disappears? There is a fundamental issue about whether the zero-carbon homes policy equates to what could be achieved under this provision. If it does not, the sort of losses that my noble friends Lord Rooker and Lady Andrews have identified become very real and pertinent.
Lord Wallace of Saltaire
My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Rooker, often raises difficult issues for Governments, and I give all credit to him for the attention he pays to this. It is an entirely proper role for a Member of the House of Lords to look with deep suspicion at government proposals and to make sure that the Government can provide the rationale for them. Perhaps I can assure him that Oliver Letwin spoke on this on the Floor of the House and it was discussed in Committee, so it has not been entirely ignored by the House of Commons.
Lord McKenzie of Luton
Given that we are not expecting the zero-carbon home policy to be included until late 2016, there is a lot of water to flow under the bridge between now and then. Would he accept an amendment which put in the commitment not to repeal the provision in the 2008 Act until the zero-carbon home policy was in place?
Lord Wallace of Saltaire
I thank the noble Lord for that interesting suggestion. May I consider it and consult? Perhaps we can also discuss that off the Floor, between Committee and Report.
Lord McKenzie of Luton
My Lords, I shall speak also to Amendments 36B, 36C and 36D. This amendment would effectively give to individual London boroughs the right to override any relaxation of planning requirements for short-term lets which the Secretary of State might introduce. It would further make it clear that local authorities could deny any relaxation in respect of residential premises which were not the sole or main residence of the lessor.
The Government’s proposals to deregulate the position are proving to be, understandably, very contentious, as noble Lords will have seen from their postbag. We are supportive of those people who want to rent out their homes when, for instance, they go on holiday and want to make a bit of extra money. Although it may not be a mainstream activity where I live, we should not stand in the way of someone doing a house swap as part of their holiday plans. It is difficult to see why someone should be required to obtain planning permission in such circumstances. However, there is a distinction in our minds between infrequent letting in these circumstances and those who want to operate a short-let business. For those who do, and thereby materially change the use of a property, it is reasonable that they submit a planning application.
The arguments against a wholesale deregulation of the position for London have been well made. The specific problems caused by short-term letting have been fully set out in a range of briefings. London Councils says that deregulation of short-term lets will diminish the supply of permanent accommodation for those living and working in London, because if owners can charge significantly more for short-term lets, there will be general upward pressure on rents. The Camden case studies exemplify this. The survey of London boroughs has identified widespread concerns about the problems caused by extensive use of residential accommodation, which include increases in noise and anti-social behaviour, increasing fear of crime, the loss of community identity and reduced focus on fire risks.
The British Hospitality Association and others remind us why Section 25 of the Greater London Council (General Powers) Act 1973 is there in the first place: to ensure that housing is available and affordable for London residents. This, sadly, is an ambition which is increasingly difficult to fulfil. They claim that some other major cities—Paris, New York and Singapore—are looking to tighten their legislation in this regard at a time when the UK is moving in the opposite direction. Will the Minister tell us whether that is the case? The Bed & Breakfast Association expresses concerns that short-let businesses are largely unregulated, are enabled by technology to operate partly offshore and are careless of their responsibility regarding public safety.
Those who support some deregulation include Onefinestay, which says that it has pioneered a business which enables visitors to cities to stay in private homes while the owners are out of town. It argues that householders can top up their income, while tourist spending gets spread to local economies outside the usual hotel zones. It makes the point that such activity is not about scarce residential property being converted wholesale to other uses, it is about occasionally renting a home when you are not around, or even renting a room in your house while you remain in residence. In some ways, it might be argued that this is, de facto, the current position, because enforcement of the current planning requirements is limited. The London Councils’ briefing suggests that overall, it is less than 50%. Has anyone has been prosecuted for letting out their home for a couple of weeks while they have been away without getting planning permission?
The fact that London boroughs might effectively police the current position by where they draw the line on prosecutions does not make it altogether comfortable. What do we conclude from all this? It would be appropriate to deregulate in circumstances where the short-term let was in respect of a residential premises which was, and continued to be, the sole or main residence of the person letting the property. There would need to be careful definitions of sole or main residence—to preclude, for example, circumstances in which the owner was working abroad but expected to return to the property, but that should be well within the competence of parliamentary counsel. That would remove the nonsense of somebody having to get planning permission each year to let their home when they go on holiday, or, indeed, rent out a room for a few weeks and remain in residence.
It should also provide a degree of comfort from concerns that such arrangements will be uncaring of the neighbourhood and the local environment, because those letting the property will be returning to live in it. Further, it would remove the strain of boroughs having to look aside from such perfectly acceptable arrangements and determine not to prosecute. If the Secretary of State’s powers to deregulate are narrowed in this way, it might be said that no further safeguards are needed.
However, as the Bill provides an opportunity for the Secretary of State or the local planning authority to disapply the deregulatory change to particular types of residential premises or particular areas, we need to consider whether that is fair. Given that the Secretary of State in the first instance can set the circumstances in which the short-term let is facilitated, it would be reasonable and a localist approach to empower individual boroughs to disapply the deregulation. They know their areas better than the Secretary of State, and that is what our amendment provides. I beg to move.
Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon
As a previous Whip to the noble Baroness, I know that when she asks questions one needs to be quite detailed in one’s response. Let me again assure the noble Baroness that I will write to her specifically on that element. I am sure officials have also made note of her quite specific question. My noble friend Lady Hanham also raised the issue of curtailing the role, or asking why the Secretary of State would retain this role. As I have already said, we will work with local authorities in London on how regulations covering the role of the Secretary of State would work.
I am just looking through the number of specific fines from local authorities. Again, I have touched on some of them. I do not have the detailed breakdown of how many people have been pursued by which authority, but I have requested that from officials and will write to all noble Lords in that respect. I trust that I have covered most if not all of the questions. For anything pending I shall, of course, review the contributions made by all noble Lords, which I welcome, not least because of the experience across the board. I reiterate that the Government recognise that this is an area where there will be considerable interest and we wish to ensure that we get the change right. Therefore, I welcome the contributions that have been made in Committee today.
I reassure noble Lords that the Government will be working closely with all interested parties in London, including the local authorities and the hospitality industry. The Government want to ensure that the measures brought forward meet householders’ aspirations of temporarily letting out their homes or spare rooms, while retaining the key purpose of Section 25 which is keeping London homes for those who live permanently in London. We believe that these reforms benefit those Londoners who wish to supplement their income by making their homes or spare rooms available. It offers an alternative to hotels and guesthouses—as the noble Lord, Lord Mawson, mentioned—and further supports the wider tourist industry. It also helps those temporarily working in the capital or searching for a place to live by expanding the pool of competitively priced accommodation on offer. I beg to move that Clause 34 stands part of the Bill and I urge the noble Lord, Lord McKenzie, to withdraw his amendment.
Lord McKenzie of Luton
My Lords, I thank the Minister for his very full reply and thank all noble Lords who have contributed to the debate on this amendment. I was slightly comforted by the Minister’s direction of travel. My understanding is it is likely that what is proposed is a narrower deregulation than might originally have been assumed from looking at the Bill. Whether it is narrow enough is something we need to look at with reference to genuine householders. I do not think that necessarily required a short-term let to be in respect of the householder’s property—that is it was their sole or main residence. That could impact on our position a little. I am not sure if we heard when at least the draft regulations are going to be available. The Minister prays in aid affirmative procedures. We have all done that and we know that is really only a marginal opportunity to influence the outcome of the regulations.
The Minister set his face against there being a right for London boroughs to take a different view and not follow the Secretary of State on the deregulation. That does not necessarily sit easy with those of us who are paid-up localists—normally including the noble Lord, Lord Tope. I think all noble Lords who spoke, including the noble Lord, Lord Tope, the noble Baronesses, Lady Donaghy and Lady Hanham, and, perhaps with respect to a lesser extent the noble Lord, Lord Mawson, share the analysis. It is just a question of where that takes us in terms of a solution.
The noble Baroness, Lady Hanham, made the point that central London in particular is a magnet for these operations and it does not necessarily apply to London as a whole. I do not think the survey that London Councils did—or maybe it was Camden—covered all the boroughs of London. I do not think there was 100% return, so it will be interesting to know what a wider spread might mean.
Clearly there is great concern about this provision. The Minister has helped to allay some of that concern this afternoon, but we need to have more detail before Report so we can determine which way we are going to proceed on this. Having said that, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon
My Lords, this amendment would enable the Secretary of State to provide financial assistance to an organisation providing advice, information and training concerning residential licences. Importantly, this would allow such assistance to be made available where advice is provided in connection with the law concerning park homes.
The Mobile Homes Act 2013 introduced significant changes to the law on park homes and marks this Government’s commitment to provide proper protection to park home owners, while ensuring that those site operators who run a decent and honest business can prosper without the heavy burdens of red tape and bureaucracy.
As noble Lords are aware, the sector is small—about 85,000 homes on 2,000 sites in England. The law applying to it is unique and complicated. Many homeowners are older people and some are vulnerable. They are often hard to reach. It is also fair to say that many of them have suffered exploitation at the hands of unscrupulous operators. Homeowners often lack basic understanding of the law and their related rights. Not surprisingly, therefore, a source of concern in the past has been the lack of available, accurate and independent advice on the rights and responsibilities of the parties to a residential park home contract. This is why the Government commissioned the Leasehold Advisory Service, known as LEASE, in 2013, following the introduction of the Mobile Homes Act, to provide free initial advice on park home law.
LEASE has for many years provided advice to the residential leaseholder sector and it has been funded to do so by the Secretary of State by way of grant aid under powers in Section 94 of the Housing Act 1996. Those powers were not available to fund LEASE in respect of its park home functions because Section 94 is only available to fund advice in respect of residential tenancies. The tenure arrangement for park homes means they are residential licences. The amendment would enable the Secretary of State in future to pay grant aid to LEASE, or any other organisation, in connection with park home advice, in the same way as he can in respect of leasehold advice. Therefore I beg to move the amendment.
Lord McKenzie of Luton
My Lords, my noble friend Lady Andrews has put a compelling case, setting out our concerns with these proposals and building on the recommendations of the Delegated Powers Committee. It is a great pity that something of this nature and substance has been sprung on us at such short notice.
The Minister has gone through a whole range of potential responses and has touched on some quite tricky legal issues about the relationship of the consultation proposed and what that means for the hybridity process, and why, in a sense, we can ignore the matter.
When I saw the memorandum for the first time yesterday—it may have been this morning—what struck me was all the stuff explaining that the affirmative process was cumbersome, too difficult to organise and unpredictable in terms of time. That cannot be right. The affirmative process—these arrangements—is government management of business. I have never known that to be argued before as a reason for delay. As my noble friend said, we do not want to be part of anything which consciously disrupts the progress of the planning process on important regeneration, but we are entitled to insist on due process, a due process which has been in place for a very long time. The Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee identifies real concerns that this is about a specific issue concerning Ebbsfleet and that this is driving what would be a very substantial change in our processes.
I have already given notice that we will oppose this government amendment, so it is not worth my saying much more.
Deregulation Bill
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Lord Wallace of Saltaire (LD)
My Lords, perhaps I should start by saying that the point which has just been raised by the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh of Hudnall, will be dealt with later on today, so we will return to that question.
The purpose of Clause 1 is to remove the requirements of Section 3(2) of the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974 from self-employed persons except those on a prescribed list of activities. The effect of Clause 1 will be to exempt self-employed persons from the requirements of Section 3(2), except those conducting undertakings prescribed by the Secretary of State in regulations.
As things stand, Section 3(2) imposes a duty on every self-employed person to protect themselves, and others, from risks to their health and safety, regardless of the type of activity they are undertaking. This means that duties are currently imposed on self-employed persons who undertake activities with little or no risk of harm to themselves and others. For example, a dressmaker, accountant or academic conducting commissioned research, as I used to do, working at home currently has duties under this section.
This proposal emanates from an independent review of health and safety legislation undertaken by Professor Ragnar Löfstedt in 2011. He recommended that self-employed persons be exempt from health and safety law where their work activities pose no potential risk of harm to others. One of the cases for doing so, he said, is so that Britain follows a similar approach to other EU countries—a comparison that may be welcome to some and possibly not welcome to others. The Government accepted this recommendation and a clause was included in the draft deregulation Bill.
In 2013, the Bill was subject to scrutiny by a pre-legislative scrutiny Joint Committee chaired by the noble Lord, Lord Rooker. Evidence presented by interested parties suggested that the clause, as originally drafted, could be confusing for self-employed persons to assess whether the law applied to them or not. The clause was therefore amended in the light of this evidence to make it clearer to the self-employed when the law will apply to them and when they will be exempt.
As a result of the change, only those self-employed persons conducting an undertaking prescribed by the Secretary of State in regulations will continue to have duties under Section 3(2). Undertakings will be prescribed if one of the following four criteria is met: first, there are high numbers of self-employed in a particular industry and high rates of injuries and/or fatalities—for example, in agriculture; secondly, there is a significant risk to members of the public—for example, in fairgrounds; thirdly, there is the potential for mass fatalities—for example, in the use of explosives or other dangerous equipment; fourthly, there is a European obligation to retain the general duty on self-employed persons—for example, in construction.
I hope that by now all noble Lords will have had an opportunity to consider a draft of the prescribing regulations, which has been produced in light of these four criteria. I am sure we can all agree that those self-employed undertaking work in the building industry should remain within the scope of health and safety law. Under the draft regulations, noble Lords will see that this will indeed continue to be the case. Builders, for example, will not be exempt under this proposal. Similarly, gas fitters and boiler engineers for obvious reasons will not be exempt. The risks posed when working with gas are recognised to be high and so the duties owed by a self-employed person who undertakes these activities will be maintained.
The draft set of regulations for the prescribed undertakings has been designed to strike a careful balance between the need to free self-employed persons from the perception that health and safety law places unnecessary burdens on them while still providing important protections in the law to those who require them. The Government have also tabled an amendment accepting the recommendation of the Delegated Powers and Regulatory Reform Committee to change the parliamentary procedure for these regulations from negative to affirmative. This will allow Parliament fully to scrutinise the regulations.
To ease transition to the new system and minimise familiarisation costs, the prescribed list relies on existing legal definitions, where possible. The clarity of the definitions in the list of prescribed undertakings in the draft regulations was the subject of an eight-week public consultation during the summer. The responses are being analysed by the HSE and will be published shortly. The draft list is available on the HSE website, and to assist the House, I will place a copy in the Library today. I hope that this will help in our discussions.
Further to aid the transition, the Health and Safety Executive is producing guidance targeted at self-employed persons and others to assist them in understanding the proposed changes to the law. It will also signpost them to existing guidance which explains in practical terms what self-employed persons need to do to comply with the relevant law. There is, for example, extensive guidance made publicly available by the HSE about managing health and safety in construction. This provides additional information about the definition of construction work, which is one of the activities intended to be prescribed. Detailed guidance exists for a majority of the other prescribed activities and, where it does not, the Health and Safety Executive will ensure that additional guidance is produced to support this legislative change. I beg to move Amendment 1 and propose that Clause 1 should stand part of the Bill.
Lord McKenzie of Luton (Lab)
My Lords, I rise to speak to our intention that Clause 1 should not stand part of the Bill. This is grouped with the government amendment and I can say that, should the clause survive, of course we accept that the affirmative procedure should be supported. However, I give notice that, notwithstanding the grouping, we reserve the right to vote separately on the clause stand part debate.
We have a first-class health and safety system in the UK which is respected around the world. At its centre is the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act, now in its 40th year. The system is built around the principle that those who create risks are best placed to manage them, and without being complacent, it is an approach which has hitherto saved countless people from being killed, injured or made ill by work. As we have heard, Section 3 of the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act currently places a duty on all employers and the self-employed to ensure, so far as is reasonably practical, the health and safety of others.
We should therefore be alarmed at what is now being proposed in Clause 1 of the Deregulation Bill, which seeks to exempt millions of the self-employed from health and safety legislation. This move springs from a recommendation made by Professor Ragnar Löfstedt, which was to exempt the self-employed who,
“pose no potential risk of harm to others”.
Such an exemption was proposed notwithstanding that it is generally accepted, including by Professor Löfstedt and the Health and Safety Executive, that the duty on the self-employed in these circumstances is limited, that little would be saved in terms of cost and time, and indeed in precautions undertaken, if such an exemption was introduced.
The professor also advanced the argument, as we have heard, that the exemption would help progress perceptions of a heavy-handed approach to health and safety for the self-employed, although scant evidence was provided to support the contention that this is a real problem. Indeed, the Engineering Employers’ Federation has refuted the view that self-employed people see health and safety as a burden and that they feel threatened by inspections and prosecutions. However, if there are these misapprehensions, surely the right thing to do is to challenge them, as the HSE is doing through its myth-busting panel rather than pare back the limited requirements which actually apply.
It was also proposed that this would bring us into line with Europe. However, international experience is varied, and more than half the countries of the EU include the self-employed in their health and safety legislation. Some that do not have stricter negligence laws which can be applied to those who put others at risk. Any suggestion that the UK’s health and safety system is creating an anti-competitive regime for the self-employed would not seem to be supported by what is happening. Self-employment actually grew by nearly 400,000 in the four years to 2012.
The HSE’s formulation to meet the Löfstedt recommendations was consulted on in 2012 and, despite receiving support from only a minority of consultees, was included in the draft Deregulation Bill which went before the Joint Committee. However, this attempt has proved problematic, with the Government eventually concluding from the pre-legislative scrutiny—rightly, in our view—that it would have been too confusing as to who was exempt and who was not. Given the minimal requirements on the self-employed who pose no risk of harm to others, it would have been logical at this point to hold on to the status quo; that is to say, although Professor Löfstedt arguably had a point, seeking to address it caused more problems than it solved.
Lord Wallace of Saltaire
My Lords, I suspect that most young, self-employed people get their information about these things off the computer or iPad. I hesitate to suggest that inspectors should visit them in their homes to check that they are doing things correctly. That suggests a level of state intervention in personal lives and activities that I hope the noble Lord would be strongly opposed to and perhaps the Labour Front Bench would not wish to propose. As I have stressed before, we are talking about the balance between acceptable risk and necessary regulation, and about the balance between the burden of regulation and the perception by people who wish to set up their own businesses or work on their own of the amount of regulation they face and the potential risks to themselves and others who may visit them.
Lord McKenzie of Luton
As we are in Committee, I will make a few comments. On the issue of perception not being irrelevant, surely the way to tackle perceptions or misperceptions is, for example, to do what the HSE does through its myth-busting arrangements and panels to make sure that there is proper information and education. To pander to misconceptions and weaken health and safety protections is completely the wrong way to go. I say to the noble Lord, Lord Curry, that we are not just talking about perceptions here. In this clause we are talking about actual diminutions in health and safety protections. This goes a long way beyond what Professor Löfstedt recommended. He said that we should change the rules for those self-employed who pose no risk of harm to others. In this clause we are way beyond that. The Minister said that whether the law is there or not people will still act sensibly. Some will and some will not. However, he has not effectively answered the point: why should woodworkers, furniture makers, metalworkers and maintenance fitters, for example, be outside health and safety provisions both as regards their own protections and their responsibility to others?
I fundamentally agree with the noble Lord, Lord Deben, who said that the risk of all that is that it will create greater complications than anything that it solves. The noble Lord, Lord Stoneham, said—or I took him to say—that we should not proceed with this until we know what the detailed regulations are, and it appears that we will not know those for some time. What has not been answered effectively is why, having originally accepted Professor Löfstedt’s recommendations, the Government now wish to go way beyond that. That is what they are doing with this clause: they are weakening health and safety protections which have stood the test of time for 40 years.
Lord Curry of Kirkharle
Perhaps I may respond to the points made by the noble Lord, Lord McKenzie. I was in contact with Professor Löfstedt in the past week. He has seen the wording of the Bill and appears to be very content with it. Perhaps I may respond to the comments of the noble Lord, Lord Deben. The Health and Safety Executive will carry the information that the noble Lord requested, so any self-employed business could very soon find out from the executive whether or not it is exempt.
Lord McKenzie of Luton
With great respect, I do not think that that is Professor Löfstedt’s position. He circulated his original advice; we know what that is and why it could not be implemented.
Lord Wallace of Saltaire
I hesitate to suggest that we should call Professor Löfstedt to the Bar to explain what he may or may not have said; he is in Sweden at present and we will have to wait until he comes back. The decision that the Government took to produce a list of activities rather than occupations that would be covered by health and safety regulations, leaving others outside, was in order to provide greater clarity. I stress that it is intended to cover activities conducted by self-employed persons rather than being occupation-based.
The self-employed person in any profession who conducts one or more of these activities will remain within the scope of the law. Where a self-employed person falls exempt under this proposal, it is considered that other enforcing authorities would be better placed to deal with transgressions. Many other laws and regulations apply to these activities. There are also other means of redress available in civil law to those who suffer harm as a result of a self-employed person’s activities, and in some circumstances in criminal law: for example, gross negligence.
I also remind noble Lords that we tabled Amendment 1 to ensure that the list, which is now available in draft and is, I hope, in the Library, will be subject to parliamentary scrutiny under the affirmative procedure —so we will be able to return at that point to make sure that we have the boundary that we are now arguing about right. As drafted, it was subject to the negative procedure, but now there will be a further opportunity in Parliament to debate the exact list of high-risk activities before it comes into effect.
Deregulation Bill
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Lord McKenzie of Luton (Lab)
My Lords, I will speak on housing and, like my noble friends, against the folly of Clause 1 and its changes to the Health and Safety at Work Act. Clause 29 reduces the qualifying period for the right to buy from five to three years. We know that this is part of what the Government have labelled “reinvigorating the right to buy”. It has been accompanied by secondary legislation that increased the maximum percentage discount for houses sold to 70%, and increased the cash cap to £75,000—£100,000 in London—which in future is to be uprated by CPI.
We want to see people enabled to purchase a home, and we support the right to buy. However, housing is in crisis in this country, and especially affordable housing. Last year the Government built the lowest number of homes for social rent for more than 20 years and since records began. Section 106 agreements have been watered down, the capital budget for affordable housing has been cut by 60%, and the affordable rent model is anything but affordable. If recent reports are true, the Government are in panic over the prospect of yet a further fall in housebuilding as the general election looms. The Government’s favourite scapegoat to blame is the planning system, but can the Minister confirm that some 9,000 sites with full planning permission have not yet started building?
Therefore we will press the Government on their declared replacement policy. The formulation which they adopt is that they would use the receipts from additional—note, not all—right to buy sales to replace every additional home sold. We will wish to probe in Committee exactly what that means and how it would work in practice. It does not appear to cover sales under the preserved right to buy, which is to the detriment of the finances of housing associations.
We can see the merit of rationalising technical housing standards and their inclusion in the main building regulations, albeit with scope to deal with local circumstances. The Minister will be aware of the briefing from Leonard Cheshire which welcomes proposals to incorporate lifetime homes standards into building regulations, but expresses concern that they will potentially be optional. We will wish to be reassured that this is not the case.
We should be proud of our health and safety system in the UK. Over 40 years it has helped save countless lives and protected many from injury and ill health. Since this Government came to office there have been three reviews of its scope and operations — that of the noble Lord, Lord Young of Graffham, of Professor Lofstedt, and the triennial review. Each in its way has concluded that the system and the HSE is fit for purpose and doing an effective job.
We oppose Clause 1 not on ideological grounds, nor because our instinct is to resist any weakening of health and safety requirements, and nor because we believe that there is still a lingering antipathy to its cause in some higher reaches of government. We oppose it because whatever minor benefits the clause might bring are more than outweighed by the confusion and uncertainty it will engender.
The position at present is very clear. Under Section 3(2) of the 1974 Act every self-employed person is required to conduct their undertaking to ensure that,
“so far as is reasonably practicable … he and other persons … are not thereby exposed to risks to their health or safety”.
What could be fairer or more decent than that? Yet the Bill will restrict the requirement to those engaged in prescribed undertakings expressed by the Minister in another place to be “high-risk” activities. Notwithstanding that there is only a draft list of prescribed undertakings thus far—although an HSE consultation with a list commenced just today—Oliver Letwin proclaimed in another place that I think about two-thirds of people who are self-employed will no longer be covered by the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act. Why is that something to be proud of?
The Government, as my noble friend Lady Donaghy said, point to Professor Lofstedt as the reason for doing that, but that was not his recommendation. He recommended that an exemption should apply to those self-employed who have no employees and who pose no potential risk of harm to others. Even then, he acknowledged:
“The actual burden that the regulations currently place upon these self-employed may not be particularly significant”.
That point was reinforced by evidence from IOSH to the Public Bill Committee, where Richard Jones made clear:
“To our mind, the proposed exempted group … is not overly burdened by health and safety at the moment”.—[Official Report, Commons, Public Bill Committee, 25/2/14; col. 5.]
As the TUC points out, there is no need to make any change, because anyone who is self- employed but does not pose a risk to themselves or others cannot be prosecuted. They have no need to do a written risk assessment.
The HSE was clear that the best basis for any exemption should be to allow it only to those who would not be expected to put others at risk at any point in the normal course of their work and only if they did not work in certain prescribed industries. Paragraph 18 of the 2013 impact assessment states that,
“we explored the possibility of being wholly prescriptive and making a comprehensive list of the occupations, industries, or combinations thereof that would be covered by the exemption … However, discussion with sector experts within HSE made it clear that within occupations and industries there are many exceptions and atypical cases. Relying exclusively on such an approach would therefore risk unintended consequences”.
What is the huge burden that offending legislation imposes on the self-employed, and which holds back the advance of entrepreneurial zeal? The HSE’s original assessment was that the risk assessment would take—15 minutes a year. Annual savings for the new and existing self-employed would be about £500,000 a year—in aggregate, that is—but there would be upfront familiarisation costs of nearly £2 million. All of that, therefore, for the self-employed to save a quarter of an hour a year and on average less than 50p. The figures for today’s updated assessment tell the same story.
However, the proposition for exemption now in the Bill has greater health and safety risks. The HSE made it clear that some of the occupations proposed to be exempt have injury rates statistically higher than the average for all occupations. These, it said, include motor mechanics, furniture manufacturers, animal care occupations, metalworking, and maintenance fitters. That is a deeply flawed and dangerous position for the Government to take.
First, in framing the exemption using a prescribed list approach, we know that some who operate in risky businesses in a risky way will fall within the exemption. Secondly, even if the exemption could be phrased in a narrower way, the estimated savings are tiny. The prospect of exemption for some will provide another spur to the encouragement for individuals to declare a self-employed status—bogus or otherwise.
There is scope for huge confusion about whether someone will be exempt or not, particularly among the self-employed, who might typically get their information through informal channels and in circumstances when Ministers are talking up the scale and scope of exemptions. There could be confusion for those who take on an employee for part of a year, or whose activities are partly within a prescribed undertaking and partly outside. I hope that the Government will reflect and draw back from Clause 1.
Local Audit and Accountability Bill [HL]
Lord McKenzie of Luton Excerpts(11 years, 6 months ago)
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The Earl of Lytton
My Lords, this amendment is a further attempt to remedy an issue concerning parish polls. I declare my interest as president of the National Association of Local Councils, which has a particular interest in this. The background to this is already recorded in the Official Report of 26 June. On that occasion I was very gratified to receive not only the general support of the Committee but recognition from the noble Lord, Lord Wallace of Saltaire, that there is a problem that needs addressing.
Since then, accompanied by the chief executive of NALC, I have had an extremely useful meeting with the noble Baroness, Lady Hanham, and her departmental officials, and I am extremely grateful to her for that opportunity. I was encouraged by her very positive stance on this, as well as the great care with which her officials had obviously looked into the whole matter.
To summarise, parish polls are a very important way in which matters of interest can be aired and views sought, but they are governed by some fairly archaic legislation, which is more than 40 years old and contained in Schedule 12 to the Local Government Act 1972, and they are open to abuse. The issues are fourfold. First, incredibly minimal requirements are necessary to trigger a parish poll, which I have referred to in the past. Secondly, although it has to be on a parish matter, “parish matter” as a term of art is nowhere defined. Thirdly, once triggered, the costs incurred by the principal authority in conducting the poll are recoverable from the parish. While these may not be great in the overall score of things, in proportionate terms for a parish budget, they are pretty significant. Fourthly, there is no obligation to act on the poll, regardless of its outcome. Indeed, a number of polls have had very poor turnouts and inconclusive or even contradictory outcomes, as was outlined in the report by Action with Communities in Rural England.
This problem can only get worse. In Grand Committee, it was made clear that the Bill might not be the place for such an amendment. I understand that and the reasons for it. Yet it does affect parish finance and has a clear bearing on the way in which a parish is held to account. Equally clearly, there is a dimension of audit, although usually long after the event, as a check that the expense has been properly incurred.
The effect of the amendment would simply be to give the Secretary of State the power to amend by order the provisions of the 1972 Act. It does not of itself change anything in the Bill. The main change in this amendment compared with the previous version is in the five words at the end of proposed new subsection (1),
“with implications for parish finance”.
That was my way of trying to get round the issues to do with the scope of the Bill in terms of financial accountability and audit, which I explained in more detail in Grand Committee.
I am not hopeful that the amendment will prove acceptable. My purpose is to get on the record a firmer commitment to do something about this. The questions really are, if not here and now in the Bill, by this amendment, can something not be done at Third Reading, perhaps with—dare I say it?—a tweak to the Long Title of the Bill; I say that in the knowledge that we will shortly be dealing with a tweak to the Long Title. The best solution would be to accept something along the lines of this amendment in the context of the Bill, because it will be the quickest way of actually achieving something rather than expending powder and shot on trying to find some other parliamentary workaround to deal with what is, after all, not really the biggest of nuts to crack and which should not require a huge hammer to deal with.
Public money is at stake. If my amendment is not acceptable, and there is no tinkering with words that will make it so, perhaps the Minister could undertake to use reasonable endeavours to see if the Commons, with its wider powers over the scope of Bills, could be persuaded to do something. I believe, and have to accept, that the regulatory reform procedure is of no help here. The fall-back position, as I understand it from Grand Committee, would be for a Private Member’s Bill to be brought forward in a future Session, but at the cost of a further delay. If that is the only way forward, although it seems an awfully long-winded way of achieving something that really should be fairly uncontroversial, so be it. I would be happy to offer any assistance or activity on my part that could bring that forward. Perhaps the Minister could give an indication of whether, in that fall-back event, such a single-issue Bill would, in principle, receive government support and, more crucially, time to see it through. I beg to move.
Lord McKenzie of Luton
My Lords, we are sympathetic to the position adopted by the noble Earl, Lord Lytton, As my noble friend Lord Beecham said in Committee, the noble Earl has explained the archaic regime that exists at the moment for parish polls, the small numbers involved in calling a poll, the fact that the poll is not binding and the financial cost being recoverable for the parish. I would have thought an effort to address that would be well worth while. Indeed, the noble Earl’s amendment suggests that there should be an order-making power inserted into the Bill. Obviously, once the amendment itself has been accepted, it is presumably within the scope of the Bill; otherwise it would not be on the Marshalled List.
I do not see why it cannot be done. Maybe the wording needs to be changed. If the Government are reluctant to pick this issue up because they think that there are broader issues involved and it needs to be dealt with in some different way, perhaps we could hear that. However, if there is sympathy for the noble Earl’s proposition, and we are just looking for a parliamentary process to facilitate that, why not an order-making power?
Baroness Hanham
My Lords, we, too, are sympathetic to this amendment, and I am grateful to the noble Earl for having brought it to the attention of the House. We all recognise that parish polls are a way for local people to achieve something they want that is relevant and appropriate to the area over which they have authority. The noble Earl made it clear in Committee that sometimes that area extends to the European Union, which seems rather beyond the competence. We accept that there are concerns about the threshold for polls being called. I am very grateful to the noble Earl for coming to spend a bit of time with us, and we have had an opportunity to talk about it.
The way in which the noble Earl has constructed this amendment just about puts it within the scope of this Bill, but it is not wide enough for all that needs to be done. We believe that the scope can be made wider in the other place. We need to look at that carefully and will come back to it. I hope very much that we will be able to say that we will take that up and see it dealt with in the other place. If we cannot, then we are in the sort of territory that the noble Earl has talked about—a Private Member’s Bill or a hand-out Bill. I assure him that the Government are supportive of what he has said, and I give an undertaking to the House to take this away and look at how we can get it implemented in the best and quickest way. I hope that the noble Earl will be willing to withdraw his amendment.
Lord Wallace of Saltaire
My Lords, these amendments refine the provisions in the Bill that enable existing inspectorates to co-operate with an inspector, appointed by the Secretary of State, to inspect a best-value authority under Section 10 of the Local Government Act 1999, as amended by this Bill. Clause 33 and Schedule 10 to the Bill give a similar power to the Secretary of State’s existing power to ask for an inspection of a best-value authority. This is intended for use as a last resort in very serious cases, such as the ongoing intervention in Doncaster.
Paragraphs 2, 25, 36, 38, 54 and 72 of Schedule 12 amend existing legislation to enable existing inspectorates to co-operate with such a corporate governance inspection, as they sometimes do at present. The relevant bodies and inspectors are Ofsted, the Care Quality Commission, Her Majesty’s Chief Inspector of Constabulary, Her Majesty’s Chief Inspector of Prisons, Her Majesty’s Inspector of Probation, and Her Majesty’s Chief Inspector of the Crown Prosecution Service. The amendments to each of these paragraphs of Schedule 12, which take the same approach in each case, achieve this policy intention more cleanly. They remove the provision suggesting that a chief inspector may be appointed under new Section 10 as an inspector by the Secretary of State to inspect a local authority. This is because it is unlikely that it would be the chief inspector himself or herself who would undertake the inspection. Instead, it simply states that the chief inspector—or the commission, in the case of the Care Quality Commission —may do anything they think appropriate to “facilitate” such an inspection. This could include releasing staff to form part of an inspection team. All these amendments allow bodies to co-operate; they do not compel them to do so. We believe that these amendments simplify and clarify our approach without significantly affecting the impact of the Bill. I beg to move.
Lord McKenzie of Luton
My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Lord for that explanation. I was puzzled by what the substantive difference was between some of the clauses in the Bill and those that replaced them, but I believe the noble Lord’s explanation has helped me in that regard and I am happy to support his amendments.
Lord Beecham
My Lords, we have spent some time debating the requirements on local authorities to comply with the code of practice. I suppose this is our last opportunity to comment before Third Reading and the eventual passage of the Bill to the House of Commons. It is an opportunity to reiterate the problems that many of us envisage in the Government’s approach.
I suppose we ought to be grateful to the Government for clarifying the Title of the Bill, but the Title is almost irrelevant to the substance with which councils will have to contend. The further accretion to the Secretary of State of powers to direct individual councils is not a concession from the original proposition that a direction can be given to all councils. In replying to this short debate, will the Minister indicate exactly how the Secretary of State intends to go about giving his directions, whether to individual local authorities or to categories of local authorities? Would he envisage doing so after consultation and, if so, with whom: individual authorities or the Local Government Association?
Who else might the Secretary of State involve in the consultation process? For example, before making any direction, would he consult the local print media, which he purports to be most concerned about? How would he do that, particularly if he is issuing a general direction? Has the Secretary of State consulted at all, with anybody, about this proposal, thus far? It would be interesting to know whether he has had meetings with, for example, the Newspaper Society, if that is the correct name of the outfit in question, assuming that it has time to indulge in such consultations while the Leveson report remains undetermined.
There is a fundamental problem with the Government’s approach, which largely depends on what I have described —accurately, I think—as an obsession of the Secretary of State and has very little to do with the reality on the ground. I had the opportunity today of a brief conversation with representatives of the National Union of Journalists who were ensconced in Portcullis House. I do not know whether any other Members of your Lordships’ House were invited to meet them, but they stressed again their opposition, as members of a union that represents journalists both in local government and in the print media—
Lord McKenzie of Luton
I wonder whether my noble friend can help me before he leaves this subject. I refer to the change in the Title of the Bill, for the reasons that were outlined. By tweaking the Title further, as we have just discussed, might there be a way of facilitating the desire of the noble Earl, Lord Lytton, in respect of parish polls? Does my noble friend think that that could that be accommodated by changing the Title of the Bill?
Lord Beecham
I certainly do, but it would be more relevant to know whether the Minister will accept that point. In a moment or two, I shall give him the opportunity to make his position clear.
As I said, the National Union of Journalists, representing journalists across the piece, feels very strongly that the Government’s stance on this is entirely unjustified. Having said that, it would be remiss of me not to point out to the noble Lord, Lord Tope, that the NUJ has great reservations about the amendment that he moved. However, I will be interested to hear what the Minister says in reply before the debate ends.