Town and Country Planning (Border Facilities and Infrastructure) (EU Exit) (England) Special Development Order 2020 (SI 2020/928)

Lord Thomas of Gresford Excerpts

Thursday 11th February 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Thomas of Gresford (LD) [V]]

My Lords, it is always a pleasure to follow the noble Baroness, Lady Wheatcroft, and to listen to her fight on behalf of the villages around where she lives in Kent. Perhaps I can move a little further north.

Prior to 1 January, Holyhead port carried 1,200 lorries a day, inbound and outbound. The consequences of the ending of the transitional period are that traffic has been reduced by 50% at present, and that Stena Line has moved one of its ships to the Dublin to Cherbourg service. The Government say that this fall-off is temporary only—teething troubles—and that we can shortly expect the transit of lorries to resume its previous volume.

Meanwhile, the Conservative Member of Parliament for Warrington South has said that the proposed Appleton Thorn inland border control point will deal with 350 lorries per day, inbound and outbound, with only 69 parking spaces available on the site. He pooh-poohs concerns voiced by the local Liberal Democrat councillors, Judith Wheeler and Sharon Harris, that figures previously released suggested 700 vehicles per day using this facility and that they would use Barleycastle Lane for access, which is not wide enough for two lorries to pass each other.

Given the normal flow at Holyhead of 1,200 vehicles and trailers a day, how can this site cope with the expected traffic? Do some of these lorries simply disappear into the wilds of north-west Wales? The proposed site to deal with Holyhead-Ireland traffic is more than 100 miles and a two-hour drive away from Holyhead. Where, incidentally, is the traffic from Northern Ireland to Liverpool to be dealt with?

I am a frequent traveller in the proposed area since Appleton Thorn lies on the route from north Wales into Manchester and is at the junction between the M56 and the M6, if you are going north to Scotland. I know only too well that the junction of the Liverpool-Manchester motorway, only two motorway exits further on over the Warrington viaduct, is an area which frequently snarls up. I am an expert on the rat-runs around that junction. Perhaps that is why the site chosen has been deserted by the large Shearings coach company. I cannot expect the Minister today to pass any opinion on the suitability of the site, but I would welcome a definitive undertaking to provide up-to-date information on what the current travel figures from and to Holyhead, and those forecast for the future, are. That is the sort of information a proper planning application would provide. I also want a definitive statement on the expected capacity and use of the Appleton Thorn site.

This one site and its problems illustrate how inadequate the preparations have been for Brexit, and for the problems involved in placing the border with Northern Ireland in the middle of the Irish Sea. I do not believe that the process outlined in this measure, with temporary planning permission granted by the Secretary of State, is a satisfactory solution at all, particularly having regard to the minimum consultation requirements it contains. This procedure, used only once, as my noble friend Lady Randerson said, is not appropriate for this type of huge development, with such an impact on the surrounding countryside. I am sure the Government’s response will be, “What else can we do?” I hope that the people of Holyhead, and the people of Appleton Thorn and Warrington, will take full knowledge of the absolute failure of this Government to look after their interests.