Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Mark Reckless and Brandon Lewis

Monday 15th December 2014 Commons Chamber

[Brandon Lewis]

That is a very good point. It is important for local authorities and developers to ensure that the infrastructure is there to support housing development, and authorities will seek to do that as part of the planning process and, indeed, as part of their own local-plan process. That is another example of how important it is for local authorities to have local plans in place.

[Mark Reckless (Rochester and Strood) (UKIP)]

If Medway council had acted properly in approving the building of 5,000 houses in a bird sanctuary at Lodge Hill, would the Minister have needed to write to the council offering his guidance on the need for an evidence base to be submitted to him by 12 January?

[Brandon Lewis]

The hon. Gentleman has stood in the House in the past and argued in favour of that development, but he has now changed his position. He and I have not had a conversation about the matter, and I think that that is the right approach, given that it involves a quasi-judicial planning process and the application is still live.