Planning System: Gypsies and Travellers

Matt Western Excerpts

Wednesday 29th January 2020 Westminster Hall

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government (Luke Hall)]

Thank you, Sir George. It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Kettering (Mr Hollobone) on securing this thought-provoking debate. I will begin by touching on the comment by the hon. Member for Oldham West and Royton (Jim McMahon) about cross-party work. It is a hugely important point; it is crucial that we work on a cross-party basis and I am happy to meet him at any time to talk about these issues.

Fairness in the planning system is a matter that we take incredibly seriously. The issues raised today are not all new challenges; I have heard them raised by colleagues in past debates, and they affect my own constituency. Let me reassure colleagues that the Government are working to implement the measures we have promised in order to address unauthorised development—an issue we have talked about a lot. We have consulted on powers for dealing with unauthorised development and encampments. Some issues raised in the debate have reflected the consultation responses: concerns over fairness in the planning system; unauthorised encampments and intentional unauthorised development, particularly in the green belt; issues with planning enforcement; and, of course, the outcomes for travelling communities that we have heard so much about.

Under national planning law, national planning policies and local planning policies to guard against unacceptable development apply equally to all applicants who wish to develop. It is right to recognise that certain groups have protections in law, such as disabled people, the elderly and ethnic groups, including Travellers. Planners may also take into account the specific needs of individual groups when making decisions on development, which will be taken on their own merits. As is the case for all planning applications, planning applications for Traveller sites must be determined in accordance with the local authority’s statutory development plan unless material considerations indicate otherwise.

In 2015, we amended the definition of Gypsies and Travellers for planning purposes to remove those who have ceased to travel permanently. That was to ensure fairness and transparency in the planning system for the whole community, and to avoid any misunderstanding. Those who have ceased travelling permanently will have their needs assessed, as with any valued group in our society, and a decision will be taken on whether a site can be made available.

We have taken into consideration the responses that we received to our consultation on unauthorised development and encampments. Those responses made it clear that, in certain areas, unauthorised encampments are causing significant disruption for local residents. We have made it clear that that must be addressed. In our response, we committed to introducing a package of measures to address those issues, including proposals for stronger police powers to respond to unauthorised encampments, practical and financial support for local authorities to deal with unauthorised development, support for Traveller site provision, and support for the travelling community to improve their life chances. My Department has been working closely with the Home Office on this issue to ensure that we take a rounded approach that provides positive results for both the settled and travelling communities.

Let me address some of the concerns that were raised about intentional unauthorised development, and in particular how that is taken into account when planning permission is sought retrospectively. Planning permission should not be granted retrospectively simply because the development has already taken place. We propose to strengthen the power of local authorities to stop that happening, and we will consult shortly on a range of options for strengthening our policy on intentional unauthorised development so local authorities have stronger tools and levers to address the effects of that type of development.

[Matt Western (Warwick and Leamington) (Lab)]

I am sorry that I was not able to join the debate earlier. Does the Minister accept that this issue costs many local authorities, such as Warwick District Council, as well as businesses and the community, huge sums? Surely, a good use of funds would be to support councils to use compulsory purchase powers to buy land to set up permanent sites.

[Luke Hall]

I thank the hon. Gentleman for raising that point and sharing his local authority’s experience. I am happy to touch on that shortly, but let me turn first to the green belt, which was raised by a number of Members, including my hon. Friends the Members for Mole Valley (Sir Paul Beresford) and for Rugby (Mark Pawsey). Our commitment to protecting the green belt is as strong as it has ever been. Changes to the green belt should happen only in exceptional circumstances, and should be fully evidenced and justified through plan making. The policy is clear that once green belts are defined, local authorities should plan positively to enhance their beneficial use, such as by looking for improvements to access and environmental quality.

We have provided £1.79 million of funding across 37 local authorities to improve their capacity to respond to enforcement issues facing their area, and we are working with the Royal Town Planning Institute to overhaul the national enforcement handbook to provide the latest best practice and expertise on shutting down illegal building while ensuring that developers obtain full planning permission before a shovel hits the ground.