Responsibilities of Housing Developers

Mark Pritchard Excerpts

Wednesday 11th December 2024 Westminster Hall

[Mark Pritchard (in the Chair)]

Order. I am afraid I will have to put a three-minute limit on speeches, because this debate is so popular and oversubscribed. For new Members and those who may have forgotten, there is a clock on either side of the Chamber to encourage you to keep to the time limit.

--- Later in debate ---

[Nick Timothy]

We are sent here not to consider anecdotes and individual case studies, but to consider legal frameworks and systems. If the hon. Gentleman wants to remove some of the systemic barriers to house building, which regulations—particularly pertaining to the environment and biodiversity—might he be interested in seeing removed?

[Mark Pritchard (in the Chair)]

Order. I remind hon. Members that interventions are part of our regular work, and it is entirely up to the speaker to take them. However, when an intervention is taken, it adds one minute to the speaker’s time slot, which takes time away from others.

[Mr Charters]

Forgive me, Mr Pritchard, but I thought that the intervention was on my point about the pre-application process, which should be welcomed on all sides. It can be really helpful to developers and local authorities, because additional resource—an independent resource that the local authority agrees to—can be brought in to provide support, enabling things to be scrutinised more closely and in due time.

I hear so much from developers about statutory consultees, and orchestrating them—landscaping, drainage, water, highways and so on—is a critical part of the planning process. But so often in the planning process, when one respondent is late, it has a knock-on effect on everyone else. We realistically must ensure that planning authorities are better at orchestrating those statutory consultees.

I would welcome the chance to meet the Minister to discuss some of these ideas further. York Outer is a unique place in terms of the concept of grey belt. I welcome recent NPPF statements. I really believe that we will be turning Tory stumbling blocks into Labour’s building blocks.

[Richard Foord (Honiton and Sidmouth) (LD)]

It is an honour to serve under your chairship, Mr Pritchard. I am glad that the hon. Member for Keighley and Ilkley (Robbie Moore) secured the debate, because this issue is vital. I will focus on the premature handover of sites from housing developers to management companies before the developers’ responsibilities are fulfilled. I will do that by giving a couple of examples from the area I represent: Pebble Beach in Seaton and Acland Park in Feniton, both in east Devon.

In Pebble Beach, construction began on a site for 220-odd homes in 2014. I saw the Bovis Homes advert on YouTube earlier, and it shows drone footage over beautiful Seaton. It is absolutely stunning. Who would not want to live there? Sadly, the experience of people who have moved to the site is that it is very much incomplete. The hon. Member for Keighley and Ilkley talked about a play area that was never finished; well, these people had a play area that was never started, despite having been pledged. The kerbs are so high that a child could sit by the road and eat their lunch off the pavement—such is the incompleteness of the construction.

There are trip hazards and blocked drains, and the site has been more or less handed over to the property management company FirstPort without the developer having fulfilled its responsibilities. That has resulted in poor maintenance and the deflection of responsibilities, with the property management company pointing at the developer and the developer pointing back at the property management company. The residents are stuck in the middle, not knowing quite who is accountable.

Last week, Liberal Democrat MPs met FirstPort and took the issue up with it. Also last week, the Business and Trade Committee met Vistry in Exeter. Vistry takes on board its responsibility as a developer, but it needs to get back to the site and fix the things it said it would. I will have to leave to another day my comments about Acland Park, which I have talked about in this Chamber before.

The key point that I would like the Minister to take away is that we cannot have a situation where property management companies essentially take responsibilities from developers, and developers are therefore not held accountable.

[Mark Pritchard (in the Chair)]

I call James Naish. [Interruption.] Yes, I called you.

[James Naish (Rushcliffe) (Lab)]

It didn’t sound like my name.

[Mark Pritchard (in the Chair)]

The Clerk doesn’t know it and I don’t know it, but I hope you know it.

[James Naish]

It is James Naish for Rushcliffe.

[Mark Pritchard (in the Chair)]

I apologise for my Hereford-Shropshire accent. Some of us from the west midlands are still in this place.

[James Naish (Rushcliffe) (Lab)]

Thank you, Mr Pritchard, for calling me to speak, whether I know my name or not. I congratulate the hon. Member for Keighley and Ilkley (Robbie Moore)—I do know where Keighley is—for securing this important debate on the responsibilities of house builders.

I want to speak briefly to highlight the fantastic work of one of my constituents, Sarah Postlethwaite, who is a senior planning ecologist. In March this year, in her own time, Sarah conducted a detailed audit on the implementation of ecological planning conditions in her home village of East Leake. I have a copy of her report here, and it makes for fascinating reading. She looked at 11 built-out sites from the past decade, and the headline figure is that the overall compliance rate for ecological planning conditions was 9.5 out of 36 conditions, or a meagre 26%.

At one development by Persimmon Homes, which had 294 homes built out, there was an inadequate number of bat and swift boxes, which were badly installed and/or in inappropriate locations. It was also not possible to determine whether the promised meadow grassland and flowering lawn mixes had been sown appropriately. At sites by other developers, hedges were removed, despite commitments to retain them. Grassland areas were not created as required, and sustainable drainage systems were not fully built, despite people occupying nearby houses.

I acknowledge that time has passed since the audit was completed earlier this year, but I thought it would be useful to highlight the bottom-up work taking done by constituents such as mine who are keen to see house builders deliver on the conditions that are agreed when planning permission is granted. I commend Sarah’s work, which was reported by the BBC and which, as a result, secured apologies from both Barratt Homes and Persimmon Homes. Miller Homes said it was finalising its ecology measures at the time of reporting.

I sympathise to an extent with the position of local authorities that have neither the resources nor the expertise to hold developers to account, as they would wish. None the less, councils need to take their enforcement responsibilities seriously and to be appropriately financed and resourced, so that we can make sure that developers meet their ecological and other varied and important commitments; if not, swift and effective remedial actions should be taken. I would welcome hearing more from the Minister on how we empower councils to do that.

[Mark Pritchard (in the Chair)]

I am afraid that we are down to two minutes each for the last two speakers. I call Olly Glover.

--- Later in debate ---

[Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)]

First, may I say that it is a pleasure to speak in this debate? I thank the hon. Member for Keighley and Ilkley (Robbie Moore) for setting the scene.

The UK is screaming out for new homes for large families, small families, single people and first-time buyers. I am fortunate to have a first-class working relationship with numerous developers in my constituency, and I think that that makes a difference. Whether it is Fraser Homes, Hagan Homes, Dunlop Homes or Rock Developments, I support them and they support me. In the constituency of Strangford, they have helped transform the towns and provided forever homes to so many people.

I want to see urgency in the planning process, which clearly is not there. There is an issue with the adoption of roads and footpaths. In Northern Ireland, we insist on developers providing a bond. Should they go bust, that bond can be used to finish the roads, footpaths or drainage system. But as costs have risen, as they clearly have, there is a need to have a bond that is satisfactory. That is the first thing.

The subject of snag lists comes up all the time. When residents move into their newly developed house, they want it all to be perfect, but suddenly it is not perfect, because there are snags that need to be addressed: cracks in the walls, unfinished woodwork, plumbing, electrics and perhaps subsidence. Communication is a large part of addressing those snags, so developers need to tighten up in that regard.

An effort must be made with buyers and third-party organisations to ensure that processes are done and that local planning, the Department for Infrastructure back home, private developers and purchasers—

[Mark Pritchard (in the Chair)]

Order. I call Gideon Amos.

--- Later in debate ---

[Robbie Moore]

As Members of Parliament, I often think that our role is to be both problem solvers and place makers. That is why today’s debate has been so important.

I thank hon. Members for their contributions. The common themes have been obvious: early consultation is really important, as well as addressing the challenges around multiple developments and their cumulative impact on wider communities. We also talked about section 106 and community ownership moneys and the importance of the quality of build when it comes to place making. It is right that we get the right homes built in the right locations, designed around the need that has been identified.

We have been joined by the farmers protesting outside Parliament, whose noise has been coming into the Chamber. The hon. Member for York Outer (Mr Charters) rightly said that he welcomed the John Deere orchestra. I only hope that all Government Members are listening to the reasons why those farmers are here today.

[Mark Pritchard (in the Chair)]

On behalf of right hon. and hon. Members, I thank the broadcasting and sound team for an excellent job this afternoon.

Question put and agreed to.

Resolved,

That this House has considered the responsibilities of housing developers.