Social Housing (Regulation) Bill [Lords]

Matthew Pennycook Excerpts

2nd reading
Monday 7th November 2022 Commons Chamber

[Matthew Pennycook (Greenwich and Woolwich) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to close this debate for the Opposition. I thank all those who have contributed and echo the sentiments expressed at the outset by my hon. Friend the Member for Wigan (Lisa Nandy) about the other place. As they always do, their lordships brought a considerable amount of expertise to bear in scrutinising the Bill. As a result, it has already been improved in several important respects. I thank them, in particular our friend Baroness Hayman of Ullock, for their efforts and for the constructive, cross-party approach adopted throughout the proceedings.

It would be remiss of me if I did not also use this opportunity to pay tribute, on behalf of the Opposition, to the work of Grenfell United and the Grenfell Foundation, who have pushed at every turn for this legislation to come forward and to ensure it is made as robust as possible. Lastly, I commend the contribution of all those who have been a voice for social housing tenants over so many years, including campaigners such as Kwajo Tweneboa, ITV’s Daniel Hewitt and many hon. Members in the Chamber this evening.

There have been a number of excellent contributions in the debate. In total, I counted 10 speeches from Back Benchers, some of them incredibly powerful, and all of them in complete agreement that the Bill should proceed, and at pace. That such agreement exists across the House reflects a shared understanding that the lives of far too many social housing tenants are blighted by poor conditions, and far too many social landlords fail to treat their tenants with the dignity and respect that they deserve.

As the shadow Secretary of State, my hon. Friend the Member for Wigan, made clear, given the scale of the problem, the Opposition regret how long it took the Government to bring this legislation forward. It is now more than five years since the horror of Grenfell, more than four since the Green Paper was issued, and nearly two since the White Paper was published. Surely, time could have been found earlier to pass what is, after all, a short and uncontroversial Bill, but one of real significance for millions of social housing tenants across the country.

That criticism aside, the Opposition welcome the Bill and what it contains. We are determined to see it strengthened in a number of areas, so that standards in social housing markedly and rapidly improve, tenants are able to pursue effective redress and we can better respond to pressing issues such as the problems of serious violence highlighted by my hon. Friend the Member for Dulwich and West Norwood (Helen Hayes). We will work with the Government to secure its passage today.

As we have heard, the Bill has three distinct aspects: first, it introduces a new consumer regulation regime; secondly, it overhauls the existing economic regulatory regime; and, thirdly, it provides the social housing regulator with new powers to enforce both. The second of those parts is entirely unproblematic, and as such I will only speak to the first and the third.

The provisions that relate to the new consumer regulatory regime comprise the bulk of the Bill, and they have understandably been the focus of many of the contributions in this debate. In general terms, we very much welcome the stronger and more proactive consumer regulations the Bill provides for. There are specific issues in relation to each that we intend to raise in Committee, but we welcome changes to the housing ombudsman powers, the introduction of new duties for social landlords relating to electrical safety checks, the requirement that registered providers nominate a designated person for health and safety issues, and the measures relating to the provision of information to both tenants and the regulator.

We support the expansion of the regulator’s current fundamental objectives to include those of safety, transparency and, following the well-deserved success of Baroness Hayman’s amendment on standards relating to energy demand, energy efficiency. There would, however, appear to be a difference of opinion between the Government and ourselves on whether it may be appropriate to add additional objectives, not least the monitoring of building safety remediation works, and we will seek to explore that matter in Committee.

We very much welcome the establishment of the advisory panel to provide independent and unbiased advice to the regulator and to proactively raise wider issues affecting social housing regulation. However, we are clear that the role of the panel should be enhanced, and we will press in Committee for its composition and functioning to be revised in order that it provides a more effective conduit for the voice of tenants and gives them a greater role in shaping national policy.

Lastly, we welcome the concession made by the Government in the other place in relation to professional training and qualifications, and the resulting inclusion of clause 21. However, and here I reference the very strong argument made by the right hon. Member for Maidenhead (Mrs May), we believe the Government need to go further if we are to be certain that the Bill will expedite the professionalisation of the sector, and we will be seeking in Committee to strengthen the Bill to that end.

The provisions that relate to the regulator’s enforcement powers and strengthening them are critical to ensuring both the consumer and the economic regulatory regimes function effectively. Again, while there are measures that we will press the Government to consider—for example, giving the regulator the power to order compensation to tenants—in general terms we very much welcome what is proposed in allowing for unlimited fines for non-compliance, the deregistration of social landlords, performance improvement plans, emergency repairs in instances where a tenant faces an imminent health and safety risk, and the removal of the serious detriment test.

We support the introduction of regular inspections, and I commend Lord Best on his work in the other place to strengthen the Bill in relation to them. However, the Bill still does not set out the scope of such inspections or how frequently they should take place. We are convinced it will need tightening in Committee if tenants are to have confidence that landlords will be monitored appropriately. We also remain concerned, and this is a point that several hon. Members made in the debate, about the very real risk that the regulator will struggle to discharge its new functions given the volume of individual tenant complaints it is likely to receive once its remit has been expanded. In particular, we are concerned it will not be adequately resourced to perform its new inspections role. That is why we are convinced that the Government must consider more carefully how they can help to ensure the regulator is not overburdened—for example, by doing more to enable tenants to enforce repairs themselves—and that it has the resources it will require to carry out its enhanced role, such as by allowing it to retain the proceeds of any fines levied to help fund its work.

Before I conclude, I want to touch very briefly on an issue rightly raised by the shadow Secretary of State in her remarks, and that is social housing supply. By means of reduced grant funding, the introduction of the so-called affordable rent tenure, increased right-to-buy discounts and numerous other policy interventions, the Government have engineered the decline of social housing over the past 12 years, presiding over an average net loss of 12,000 desperately needed, genuinely affordable homes each and every year throughout that period. We fully appreciate that this Bill is not the appropriate vehicle for reversing that decline, but we are also very clear that it cannot be silent on the issue. Provisions could be included in the Bill to help to identify the precise level of need that now exists across the country for social rented homes, and to make suggestions about how a Government serious about tackling the housing crisis can meet that need. We intend to explore that in Committee because, despite the fine words in the White Paper and the usual comforting but ultimately hollow rhetoric deployed by the Secretary of State, the Government are doing nowhere near enough to deliver the volume of social homes our country needs.

To conclude, the Bill is long overdue but wholly necessary and we are pleased it will progress today. Those currently living in poor-quality, badly managed social housing need a better deal. Just yesterday, I received an email from Nicola, a constituent living in Woolwich whose landlord is a member of the G15 group of London’s largest housing associations. She felt she had no other choice than to contact me as her MP because for nearly two weeks she has had water pouring down her walls and over her plug sockets, without any meaningful action on the part of her landlord. As we have heard in the debate, cases like Nicola’s are not a rarity, but an all too frequent occurrence. The Grenfell community know more than anyone that poorly managed and underregulated social housing can have fatal consequences. Only last week, as my hon. Friend the Member for Salford and Eccles (Rebecca Long Bailey) mentioned, details were published about the death of two-year-old Awaab Ishak following prolonged exposure to damp and mould in the social home his family rented in Rochdale. We must overhaul the regulation of social housing to protect the health, safety and wellbeing of tenants across the country because everyone has a basic right to a decent, safe, secure and affordable home.

We will work constructively with the Government on the Bill, but we will also do everything in our power to further strengthen it because tenants deserve the most robust piece of legislation that this House can possibly deliver. For today, we welcome its progress in the hope that it will mark a turning point in the protection, empowerment and de-stigmatisation of those living in England’s 4 million social homes.

Private Rented Sector White Paper

Matthew Pennycook Excerpts

Thursday 3rd November 2022 Commons Chamber

[Matthew Pennycook (Greenwich and Woolwich) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to wind up this important debate on behalf of the Opposition. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Brighton, Kemptown (Lloyd Russell-Moyle) and the hon. Member for Dover (Mrs Elphicke) on securing the debate, and I thank the Backbench Business Committee for allowing time for it.

I also thank my hon. Friends the Members for Stockport (Navendu Mishra), for Vauxhall (Florence Eshalomi), for York Central (Rachael Maskell), for Putney (Fleur Anderson) and for Westminster North (Ms Buck), and the hon. Members for Harrow East (Bob Blackman) and for North Devon (Selaine Saxby), for their excellent contributions and powerful case studies. Collectively, they highlighted both the particular challenges facing private renters and how these challenges vary across the country, and that, irrespective of geography, there is a need to overhaul the private rented sector and to better regulate both short-term holiday lets and excessive rates of second home ownership as a matter of urgency.

I put on record our thanks to all the organisations that have made the case for rental reform over so many years, including Generation Rent, Crisis, Citizens Advice, the Joseph Rowntree Foundation, Shelter, Z2K, the New Economics Foundation, the Law Centres Network and various renters unions, as well as all the private renters who bravely shared their experiences publicly and the journalists who provided them with space to tell their stories. Their collective efforts have been integral to ensuring this issue is kept firmly at the top of the political agenda.

Labour strongly supports fundamental reform of the private rented sector, and we have called for it for many years. Regardless of whether they are a homeowner, a leaseholder or a tenant, everyone has the basic right to a decent, safe, secure and affordable home. Yet as this afternoon’s debate has reminded the House, millions of people renting privately live day in, day out with the knowledge that they could be uprooted with little notice and minimal, if any, justification.

On an individual level, the lack of certainty and security that is now inherent to renting privately results not only in ever-present anxiety about the prospect of losing one’s home but, for those at the lower end of the private rental market who have little or no purchasing power and who are increasingly concentrated geographically, as my hon. Friend the Member for Westminster North said—there is an equalities dimension to this, too—a willingness to put up with often appalling conditions for fear that a complaint will lead to instant retaliatory eviction. That is why some of the worst housing standards are to be found in the private rented sector and why, despite the existence of many good landlords and a steady, if glacial, improvement in conditions overall, one in five private rented homes still does not meet the decent homes standard and one in 10 has a category 1 hazard posing a risk of serious harm.

For tenants forced to live in such substandard properties, whether they wake up every day to mould, vermin or dangerous hazards, what should be a place of refuge and comfort is instead a source of daily unease and, in many cases, torment and misery, which takes a huge toll on their physical and mental health.

Far too many tenants are evicted each year from a private tenancy without due cause, which is why so-called no-fault section 21 notices are a leading cause of homelessness in England. This broken system can no longer be tolerated, not least because the numbers affected have risen markedly over recent decades, as the hon. Member for Harrow East said.

This House last legislated to fundamentally alter the relationship between landlords and tenants in 1988, when I was just six years old—I suspect you were not that much older, Mr Deputy Speaker. The private rented sector has changed beyond recognition in the more than three decades since. Some 11 million people now rent from a private landlord. As well as the young and mobile, the sector now houses many older people and families with children, for whom greater security and certainty is essential for a flourishing life.

To ensure private renters get a fair deal, we need to transform how the sector is regulated and finally level the playing field between landlords and tenants. That is why, with important caveats, Labour welcomed the proposals in the White Paper when it was published in the summer. We unequivocally support the proposed ban on section 21 evictions. There is no justification for such notices, and they should have been scrapped long ago. We support the introduction of minimum standards in the private rented sector through the extension of the decent homes standards, although we have real concerns about how it might be enforced in practice given that it is not an enforceable standard in the social rented sector, where it already exists.

We recognise that landlords will need recourse to robust and effective grounds for possession in circumstances where there are good reasons for taking a property back, for example, because of antisocial or criminal behaviour. However, we want assurances that such grounds cannot be abused unfairly to evict tenants and that they will be tight enough to minimise fraudulent use of the kind we have seen in Scotland.

We welcome the proposed limit of rent increases to once per year, but we take issue with the inadequacy of the proposed measures in their ability to address unreasonable within-tenancy rent hikes of the kind that are likely to increase markedly once section 21 is scrapped and with the absence of any measures to tackle illegal evictions, a point that has been raised by my colleagues.

Labour would go further in several important respects, introducing a more comprehensive new renters’ charter, but we do want to see all 12 of the proposals set out in the White Paper translated into primary legislation as a matter of the utmost urgency. I cannot emphasise enough the need for that urgency, a point we have pressed time and again with successive Ministers, to no avail. There is a desperate need for the Government to act quickly, because the problems inherent in a sector that for far too many renters has always been characterised by insecurity, high rents and poor conditions, have become acute in recent months, as those renting privately struggle to cope with the impact of high inflation and rising prices.

As hon. Members will know, and as we have heard this afternoon, in many parts of the country rents in the private rented sector are surging and the costs involved with moving are soaring. With the Government having decided, once again, to shamefully freeze local housing allowance, millions of hard-pressed tenants are now being stretched to breaking point, with the risk of mass arrears and evictions that entails. What is so frustrating for Labour Members, and for those outside campaigning for renters’ reform and for private tenants themselves, is that instead of introducing legislation that we could have fast-tracked through this House to address this looming winter crisis, all we have, despite years of promises from successive Conservative Administrations that they would enact renters’ reform, is the White Paper and a vague promise, one that I had from the Minister’s predecessor just last week, to introduce a Bill at some point during the more than two years that remain of this Parliament.

[Florence Eshalomi]

On urgency, figures from the Local Government Association show that the ending of a private rented tenancy is the most common reason for homelessness, with this being responsible for 37% of homelessness between January and March this year alone —in those three months. Does my hon. Friend see that this urgent crisis needs solving now?

[Matthew Pennycook]

I absolutely agree with my hon. Friend on that, and I will come on to say why I think the situation is particularly urgent and what has happened in terms of the delay that has been caused. It is not good enough that the Government have taken so long to make progress on this issue. It is not as though they have not had ample time to legislate, even accounting for the impact of the pandemic. It is now well over three years since the Conservative Administration of the right hon. Member for Maidenhead (Mrs May) promised to abolish section 21 no-fault evictions. In that time, not only have hundreds of thousands of tenants been evicted through a section 21, but more than 45,000 households have been threatened with homelessness as a result of being served such notices. As my hon. Friend just mentioned, the figures released so far this year suggest that possession claims resulting from them are increasing markedly as the cost of living crisis intensifies.

Faced with a phenomenally difficult winter, private renters cannot wait until 2024 for the Government to act. I say to the new Under-Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, the hon. Member for Kensington (Felicity Buchan), whom I welcome to her place, that every extra month the Government delay bringing forward the renters’ reform Bill they have promised means thousands more private renters suffering. The Government must act, and they must act now. If they introduced emergency legislation enacting the proposals set out in the White Paper, Labour would support it and work with the Government to ensure it made rapid progress. But it is the Government alone who control the business of this House and only they can ensure the necessary legislation is given the priority it deserves. As I have put to Ministers before and sadly suspect I will have to do so again, it is high time the Government stopped talking a good game about private rented sector reform and finally got on with delivering it, because private renters have waited long enough for the protections that they deserve and that they rightly expect.

--- Later in debate ---

[Felicity Buchan]

I hear my hon. and good Friend, and I will do everything I can to facilitate that.

I hope that all Members present today recognise that this Government are committed to reforming the private rented sector in a fair and balanced way, abolishing no-fault section 21 evictions and strengthening and clarifying landlords’ rights when seeking possession.

[Matthew Pennycook]

Will the Minister give way?

[Felicity Buchan]

I am sorry, but I have been told that I need to conclude.

The Government are committed to giving tenants the security and peace of mind they need to settle down with confidence and make their house a home. We are committed to empowering tenants so that they can make informed choices and raise concerns, and to supporting responsible landlords. As I said at the outset, we stand by our manifesto commitments to abolish no-fault evictions and to ensure that landlords have rights to repossess when that is required. We published the White Paper in June and we are discussing it with interested parties. The consultation on the decent home standard closed on 14 October, and we are reviewing the responses. We will publish the next steps in this extremely important sector in due course.

Section 21 Evictions

Matthew Pennycook Excerpts

Tuesday 25th October 2022 Westminster Hall

[Matthew Pennycook (Greenwich and Woolwich) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure, Ms Nokes, to serve with you in the Chair.

This has been an important and timely debate because, as we have heard in the many excellent contributions this afternoon, the problems inherent in a sector that for far too many renters has always been characterised by insecurity, high rents and poor conditions, have become far more acute over recent months, as those renting privately struggle to cope with the impact of high inflation and rising prices.

I start by congratulating my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, Walton (Dan Carden) on securing the debate and on the characteristically powerful way in which he opened it. He always speaks with strength and clarity on behalf of his constituents and he did so again today, making a powerful case that overhauling the private rented sector in Liverpool and across the country is a matter of the utmost urgency.

I also thank my hon. Friends the Members for West Ham (Ms Brown), for Wirral West (Margaret Greenwood), for York Central (Rachael Maskell) and for Hammersmith (Andy Slaughter), as well as the hon. Members for Strangford (Jim Shannon) and for Bath (Wera Hobhouse), for their excellent contributions. Although there are common problems and solutions, I am always mindful of the fact that there are different “geographies” of renting and challenges that are specific to certain parts of the country. The debate usefully highlighted that point.

Doubtless it was not the choice of my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, Walton, but when I read the title of this debate late last week it struck me as somewhat odd, given its implicit suggestion that the merits of ending section 21 evictions are still essentially being contested. While there are, of course, those who remain resolutely opposed to reform of any kind, the reality is that there is now a broad political consensus on the need to ban these so-called no-fault evictions. It is obvious why such a consensus exists. As things stand, and as we have heard again today, landlords can evict tenants, after giving as little as two months’ notice, at any point after their fixed-term tenancy has come to an end. They do not have to give a reason for doing so, or even have one.

As a result, large numbers of private renters live day to day in the knowledge that they could be uprooted with little notice and minimal justification, if any. With the threat of summary evictions hanging over them, a significant proportion of those people concentrated at the lower end of the private rental market, who have little or no purchasing power, have to put up with appalling conditions for fear that a complaint will lead to an instant retaliatory eviction. Far too many tenants are evicted each year using a section 21 notice, which is why it is a leading cause of homelessness in England. Abolishing section 21 no-fault evictions is therefore long overdue and will give private renters much-needed security in their homes.

The available evidence also suggests that scrapping section 21 is likely to provide private renters with greater certainty and control over their lives without any corresponding detrimental consequences—unintended or otherwise—or disruption. I draw the attention of the hon. Member for Thirsk and Malton (Kevin Hollinrake) to research carried out by Shelter into the impact of the effective abolition of no-fault evictions in Scotland, following the introduction of new private residential tenancy agreements there in 2017. It found that the measure had no discernible impact on either the size or functioning of the private rented sector there, or on increased levels of homelessness.

[Kevin Hollinrake]

I add my thanks to the hon. Member for Liverpool, Walton (Dan Carden) for bringing forward the debate. He raised some good points at the start of his speech, which we should consider.

The hon. Member for Greenwich and Woolwich (Matthew Pennycook) might be interested to know that, in the past year, UK rents have risen fastest in Scotland. If he was including me among the people who do not want any reform, then he should not: I absolutely do want to see reform. I would like to see property rental standards that landlords must adhere to, and reforms of the section 21 process, but just not the abolition we are talking about today.

[Matthew Pennycook]

I deliberately did not assign to the hon. Gentleman a blanket position of “no reform”, but I think that, on this point, he is fundamentally wrong. We need reform, on section 21 and more widely; I will come on to that point.

That research for Shelter is telling because the predictions made by landlord groups in Scotland prior to the introduction of PRT agreements, including that they would kill the sector entirely, have ultimately not come to pass. We should have that at the forefront of our minds when vested interests in the English sector warn of the dire consequences of renters reform.

We in the Opposition still appreciate that good landlords may still harbour concerns about how reform will impact them. We recognise that when section 21 evictions are finally abolished, landlords will need recourse to robust and effective grounds for possession in circumstances where there are good reasons for taking a property back—for example, anti-social or criminal behaviour. We also share the sector’s concern about how ongoing delays in court proceedings could impact on a landlord’s ability to make use of such grounds. However, it is a welcome sign that most landlords and landlord associations now appreciate that greater security and better rights and conditions for tenants are the future of the lettings sector.

When it comes to reforming the private rented sector, scrapping section 21 evictions is obviously not the end of the matter. Among a wide range of necessary measures, we need action on standards to address the shameful fact that one in five private rented homes does not meet the decent homes standard, and one in 10 has a category 1 hazard posing a risk of serious harm. We need changes to landlord-to-tenant notice periods and a national register of landlords. We must make it illegal for landlords and agents to refuse to let to renters claiming benefits, and we need effective measures to address unreasonable within-tenancy rises.

Those go alongside other reforms that are desperately needed. As my hon. Friend the Member for York Central will know, we have argued for many months in the Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill Committee that the Government must act with far more urgency on the growing short-term and holiday lets sector. That is why Labour has made clear that, in Government, we will introduce a new renters’ charter, a new statutory decent homes standard, and take action on short-term and holiday lets.

Thankfully, there is significant consensus across the Chamber on the need to reform the sector more fundamentally, and a number of the measures that I have just outlined were in the White Paper published by the Government earlier this year. The problem is that, as things stand, not only do we not have any firm parliamentary timeline for a renters reform Bill, but, given the disarray within Government, we do not even have the certainty that one will ultimately come forward in this Parliament or, if it eventually does, that it will contain all the proposals set out in the White Paper. As such, I would like to use the opportunity presented by this debate to ask the Minister two simple questions to which private renters following our proceedings will expect answers.

First—as many hon. Members have asked today, and as I have asked many times without receiving a satisfactory answer—when do the Government plan to finally introduce a renters reform Bill? It was in the Conservative party manifesto, so presumably the Government intend to have it secure Royal Assent before the end of this Parliament. However, the Minister must appreciate that private renters facing a difficult winter cannot wait until 2024 for the Government to act. If they introduced emergency legislation, we would support it, but private renters deserve at least some assurance today that the Government will make that a priority.

Secondly, can the Minister confirm that if and when it is finally published, the promised renters reform Bill will contain all 12 of the proposed reforms set out in the White Paper? The last piece of legislation that fundamentally altered the relationship between landlord and tenant in England was the Housing Act 1988, but, as my hon. Friend the Member for Hammersmith rightly made clear in incredible detail, the private rented sector has changed beyond recognition in the more than three decades since that legislation was put on the statute book. It is simply no longer possible to regard its role as primarily a residual tenure for those temporarily unable to access owner occupation or social housing.

Some 11 million people now rent from a private landlord. As well as the young and mobile, the sector now houses many older people and families with young children, for whom greater security and certainty is essential to a flourishing life. At the end of the day, that is what we need to be thinking about here—not the price of housing or the commodification elements involved in the sector. To ensure that private renters get a fair deal, we in this place need to transform how the private rented sector is regulated and level the playing field between landlords and tenants.

As hon. members have said, it is now well over three years since the Conservative Administration of the right hon. Member for Maidenhead (Mrs May) promised to abolish section 21 no-fault evictions. In that time, over 45,000 households have been threatened with homelessness as a result of section 21 evictions, and the figures released so far this year suggest that possession claims resulting from them are increasing markedly as the cost of living crisis intensifies. It is high time that the Government stopped talking a good game about renters reform and got on with legislating for it, and the Minister needs to make it clear this afternoon that they will do so.

--- Later in debate ---

[Andrew Stephenson]

We are in strong agreement that we need to act. It has not been mentioned too many times today—[Interruption.] Well, the hon. Gentleman will remember that the December 2019 manifesto was soon followed by a global pandemic, when the Government took swift and decisive action to protect tenants across the country, so we have taken action. However, we were unfortunately unable to pursue other legislative priorities included in the manifesto with as much speed and vigour as we wanted. We are making significant progress, though. As the hon. Gentleman will know, the White Paper was published in June and some of the consultations that came under it closed only earlier this month.

[Matthew Pennycook]

Just to clarify—I think it might be helpful. I think the Minister said it is the Government’s intention to introduce a renters reform Bill in this Parliament. Will he give us a firm commitment today that the Government intend to make the necessary parliamentary time available to get that Bill on to the statute book by the time this Parliament ends?

[Andrew Stephenson]

I thank the shadow Minister for that remark. It is very much the priority of the Government to introduce the Bill and provide parliamentary time for it to proceed. Obviously, the Government’s policies can change, but, in today’s speech, the new Prime Minister underlined his commitment and the new Government’s commitment to the Conservative party’s 2019 manifesto, which included commitments in this area. I am sure that, whether it is myself or another Minister in post, this will remain a priority for the Government and we will want to bring forward the legislation in good time so that it can go through all the stages before the next general election.

We know that landlords need certainty, too. If a tenant needs to leave a tenancy, we will increase the amount of notice they must give. This will ensure that landlords recoup the costs of finding a new tenant and avoid lengthy void periods. The new system will be simpler for tenants and landlords to understand, enabling them to exercise their rights and fulfil their obligations. We are striking the right balance between improving security for tenants and ensuring that landlords continue to feel confident to invest in the market.

Good landlords play a vital role in providing homes for millions of people across the country, and we want to reassure them that the new system will continue to be a stable market for landlords to invest and remain in. No one will win if our reforms do not support landlords as well as tenants.

It is only right that landlords should be able to get their properties back when their circumstances change or tenants break the rules. We will reform the grounds of possession so that they are comprehensive, fair and efficient. We will streamline the possession process, removing unnecessary restrictions on landlords seeking to recover their properties, introduce a new ground for landlords wishing to sell their property and allow landlords and their close family members to move into a rental property. This, alongside the existing grounds for moving in, will give landlords confidence that they can get their property back if their circumstances change.

The vast majority of tenants abide by the rules, but landlords have told us how difficult it is to act when they are unfortunate enough to have an antisocial tenant. Antisocial behaviour causes misery to a tenant’s neighbours and the wider community. Where a tenant’s behaviour cannot be addressed in the property, we will support landlords to end the tenancy. In cases of criminal or serious antisocial behaviour, we will reduce the notice period, with landlords being able to make a claim to the courts immediately. We will explore prioritising those cases in court so that communities do not have to suffer for longer than necessary. We are working across Government to develop guidance for landlords on identifying and addressing antisocial behaviour, and we welcome further input from hon. Members on what we can do to further support landlords with antisocial tenants. Alongside that, we will continue to listen to landlords who provide much-needed accommodation for the thousands of students across the UK every year, to ensure that the sector continues to work for those in higher education.

Hon. Members here will agree that going to court should be the last resort when all other avenues have been exhausted, but sometimes it is unavoidable. Court proceedings can be costly and time-consuming for landlords, which is why we are working with the Ministry of Justice and His Majesty’s Courts and Tribunals Service to streamline the process and ensure that the most serious cases are prioritised. Alongside that, we are reviewing the bailiff process. It is currently the biggest source of frustration and delays for landlords, and we want to make sure that it is as efficient as possible.

Removing section 21 will help millions of tenants, but we understand that many are facing real pressures with the cost of living now. That is why the Government have provided over £37 billion-worth of cost of living support this year to those who need it most. We have also announced unprecedented support to protect households and businesses from the high cost of energy. The energy price guarantee and the energy bill relief scheme are supporting millions of businesses with rising energy costs. That is in addition to the £400 discount already announced through the energy bill support scheme. We have boosted investment in the local housing allowance by nearly £1 billion since 2020, and we are maintaining housing allowance rates at that increased level this year. Those most at risk of homelessness are able to access discretionary housing payments, alongside £316 million-worth of financial support through the homelessness prevention grant.

Finally, several hon. Members have raised the issue of the poor quality of some private rented homes. Most landlords and agents treat their tenants fairly and provide good-quality, safe homes. However, that is not always the case. Too many of the 4.4 million households that rent privately still live in poor conditions, paying a large proportion of their income to do so. Poor-quality housing undermines renters’ health and wellbeing, and we are determined to act. More than one in 10 privately rented homes have serious health and safety hazards that we need to address, as mentioned by the shadow Minister. We have strengthened local authorities’ enforcement powers by introducing financial penalties of up to £30,000, extending rent repayment orders and introducing banning orders for the most serious and prolific offenders, but we intend to go much further.

I hope that all Members here recognise that the Government are committed to reforming the private rented sector in a fair and balanced way, abolishing no-fault section 21 evictions and providing more clarity for landlords when seeking repossession. We are committed to giving tenants more security, meaning that they can stay in their communities and put down roots. In that spirit, I thank the hon. Member for Liverpool, Walton for his thoughtful speech, and hon. Members across the Chamber for their contributions. Delivering a fair deal for renters through these reforms remains a priority for this Government, and I look forward to working with hon. Members to deliver on that agenda.

Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill (Twenty Sixth sitting)

Matthew Pennycook Excerpts

Committee stage
Thursday 20th October 2022 Public Bill Committees

Brought up, and read the First time.

[Matthew Pennycook (Greenwich and Woolwich) (Lab)]

I beg to move, That the clause be read a Second time.

As we are approaching the end of this Committee’s life, I will take the opportunity to thank the Clerks, Doorkeepers, Hansard reporters and House staff for facilitating our work over what I must say has felt—I do not disparage the Committee in saying this—like a lot longer than four months. We are, thankfully, near the end. This is a simple, straightforward and, I hope, unproblematic new clause for the Government, so I do not need to detain the Committee long in speaking to it.

Despite the strong arguments made by the Opposition at the time—I recall them personally because I served on the Bill Committee—the Government were determined to include within the Housing and Planning Act 2016 provisions requiring local authorities to sell higher-value council homes as they fell vacant, and to remit the income generated from such sales to the Treasury to fund the extension of the right to buy to housing association tenants. The sections of that Act that required local authorities to make a payment in respect of their vacant higher-value council homes came into force on 12 May 2016, but the consequential determinations were never made.

Having, one assumes, finally appreciated the severe impracticalities of the measure, as well as, one hopes, the social consequences of further reducing England’s already depleted social housing stock, the Government announced in their 2018 social housing Green Paper that they would no longer require local authorities to make higher-value-asset payments. In the words of that Green Paper, the sale of high-value homes

“should be a decision to be made locally, not mandated through legislation”

as they had previously felt was necessary.

However, in addition to making it clear that the Government would not bring those provisions of the 2016 Act into effect, the 2018 Green Paper said that the Government would look to repeal the relevant legislation, “when parliamentary time allows”. Yet, with four years having passed, and all manner of legislation having been taken through the House during that time, the Government have still not repealed those provisions.

New clause 67 simply seeks to have the Government finally implement the decision that they made and outlined in the 2018 Green Paper, and thereby undo the mistake that they made six years ago.

Mr Hollobone, we both know that Ministers have been clearly told to resist all amendments to this Bill, however sensible they might be, but I hope that the Under-Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, the hon. Member for North East Derbyshire, might see, on this occasion, the soundness of the new clause. I do not think that there is any credible or justifiable reason why this Bill cannot be the legislative vehicle to undo the provision, which the Government have decided should not have been in the 2016 Act. However, if he will not do that, will he please tell us when and how the Government intend to do what they committed, in 2018, to do?

[Lee Rowley]

As the hon. Gentleman anticipates, I will not be encouraging the Committee to accept this amendment, although I understand the points behind it, which the hon. Gentleman has already articulated. In the spirit of his brevity, I will seek to be so, too.

The Government have made a number of commitments previously and stand by those commitments. As the hon. Gentleman has indicated, the provisions laid out in chapter 2 of part 4 of the Housing and Planning Act 2016 have not been brought into effect, and there is no intention of doing so. The provisions lack a regulatory framework to underpin the policy, so there is no risk of local authorities being subject to them before we are able to legislate in the future.

The Government remain of the view that legislation will be brought forward, but do not believe that the Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill is the best vehicle for that, as it does not largely address social housing. We therefore wish to focus on the measures within this Bill, while recognising that there will be no change to the status quo—the reality for local authorities around the country—on this matter. We will bring forward further consideration of this point in due course.

--- Later in debate ---

[Matthew Pennycook]

I welcome that response from the Minister, and particularly his clarification that there will be no change to the status quo. However, I am slightly puzzled because I cannot think of a Bill better placed to deal with a housing and planning provision in a previous Act. The Minister says that such legislation is forthcoming. There is no sign of when that is, or what it might be. I think that we may return to this at a later stage, but I will not divide the Committee on it this morning. I beg to ask leave to withdraw the motion.

Clause, by leave, withdrawn.

New Clause 68

Review of Permitted Development Rights

“(1) The Secretary of State must establish a review of permitted development rights under Schedule 2 of the Town and Country Planning (General Permitted Development) (England) Order 2015 (as amended).

(2) The review should include an assessment of:

(a) the past effectiveness of permitted development rights in achieving housing targets;

(b) the quality of housing delivered under permitted development rights;

(c) the impacts of permitted development on heritage, conservation areas and setting;

(d) the estimated carbon impact of the use of permitted development rights since the expansion of permitted development to demolition;

(e) the relative cost to local planning authorities of processing permitted development compared to full planning consents;

(f) potential conflict between existing permitted development rights and the application of national development management policies;

(g) the impact of permitted development rights, or other policies in this Bill designed to deliver streamlined consent, on the efficacy of levelling-up missions.

(3) The Secretary of State must publish a report of the recommendations made by this review no later than twelve months after this Act comes into force.”—(Matthew Pennycook.)

This new clause would commit the government to carrying out a comprehensive review of permitted development rights within 12 months of the Bill securing Royal Assent.

Brought up, and read the First time.

Question put, That the clause be read a Second time.

--- Later in debate ---

Brought up, and read the First time.

[Matthew Pennycook]

I beg to move, That the clause be read a Second time.

The proceedings of this Committee over the many months of its existence clearly detail the unwillingness of Ministers to address the issue of inadequate funding, which is the root cause of many of the challenges local planning authorities face. However, the Government have conceded that those authorities have performance and service quality issues that need to be addressed, and they have committed to developing a planning skills strategy for local planning authorities as a result—an issue I will return to when we discuss new clause 71. With a view to making the planning system more effective at a local level, new clause 70 seeks to probe the Government on a proposal included in their 2020 “Planning for the future” White Paper, as well as older studies such as the Building Better, Building Beautiful Commission’s final report and the Barker review of land use planning—namely, making it a requirement that each local planning authority appoints a chief planning officer or place-maker.

In the immediate post-war decades, the corporate and strategic influence of planners in local government was institutionalised in the senior position of the chief planning officer. However, despite planning being a statutory function, a combination of factors over recent decades has led to a situation where only a minority of councils now employ a head of planning who is a member of the senior management team and reports directly to the chief executive. Analysis undertaken by the Royal Town Planning Institute suggests that one in 10 local authorities does not fund a head of planning role of any kind. That progressive downgrading of the status and prominence of planning officers within local planning authorities, entailing a loss of skills capacity and the dilution of planning as a strategic function, has had a detrimental impact on planning outcomes, including in terms of design standards and quality.

Placing a duty on local planning authorities to appoint a chief planning officer, as provided for by new clause 70, would help ensure not only that councils attract professionals with the necessary high-quality expertise on creating places, connecting communities and spatial planning but that the spatial implications of other local authority functions are properly considered when it comes to planning decisions and local plans, thereby making the system more effective and ensuring that all aspects of place-making are properly considered at a corporate level.

[Rachael Maskell]

This is a really important new clause. York no longer has a chief planner, which means that planning decisions are often delayed and that the challenge is not brought to developers that are trying to bring forward their plans for fear of litigation. That is a serious consideration for local authorities, which is why this is such an important new clause.

[Matthew Pennycook]

That example perfectly illustrates the pressures that planning departments are under. There is a general resourcing issue. We know that applications can be delayed by months, if not years, because of a lack of staff. When planning officers move on, applications and all the knowledge around them can be delayed.

There is a wider point, in addition to those general resource pressures, which is that employing chief planning officers with the necessary skills, who sit at an appropriately senior level within the local authority, would have a number of benefits and would help the Government implement the new measures and the burdens they are placing on those authorities through this Bill. As the Minister will know, the Scottish Government introduced legislation in 2019 that requires each planning authority in Scotland to have a chief planning officer, and new clause 17 would achieve the same outcome in relation to England. We believe inserting such a requirement into the Bill would not only assist local planning authorities in implementing the new planning and regeneration measures it contains but would help improve the overall functioning of the planning system, and on that basis, I hope the Minister will give it serious consideration.

[Lee Rowley]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for this new clause, yet unsurprisingly we will be asking him to withdraw it, too. I understand the sentiments behind it. I think we would all agree that we want a planning system that works and is effective, efficient and expedited where possible, and that appropriate consideration should be given at local level to ensure that placemaking is at the heart of what it does, but this particular new clause is, in my view, too prescriptive. This almost takes me back to my pre-parliamentary days when we were doing organisational design within individual companies. The one thing that we had as a principle was that organisational design needed to be flexible between different organisations, depending on their needs and requirements at the time and the areas that they needed to focus on.

Of course planning should always be a focus, but it is another question whether we need to put formal lines between particular officers and the chief executive, if there even are chief executives in certain local authorities—there are not all the time—so there is a secondary level of conversation about whether it would be section 151 officers or would be dealt with elsewhere. But I do not want to get too lost in the weeds. Although I accept the sentiment of the hon. Gentleman, I do not think it is proportionate to mandate these kinds of elements. I absolutely agree with him that local councils should discharge their responsibilities adequately, carefully and expeditiously. I hope that they will do that. We will continue to consider, in the Department, what we can do to ensure that that happens. But on this occasion, I hope that the hon. Gentleman will consider withdrawing the new clause, given that I do not think it is necessary.

[Matthew Pennycook]

I thank the Minister for that response. I take on board and appreciate the point that he makes about proportionality and whether this new clause is too prescriptive in that regard. I hope that he at least sees the concern that we have tried to highlight with the new clause, which is not only, as I said, the general issue with skills capacity but the status of planning officers within local authorities as a whole and whether that has an impact on planning outcomes. I hope that, given what I have said, the Minister will go away and give the issue some further consideration, not least in terms of what we will come to shortly, which is the skills strategy that the Government are outlining, but I do not intend to press the new clause to a Division. I beg to ask leave to withdraw the motion.

Clause, by leave, withdrawn.

New Clause 71

Comprehensive resources and skills strategy for the planning sector

“(1) The Secretary of State must, within 12 months of this Bill securing Royal Assent, publish a comprehensive resources and skills strategy for the planning sector.

(2) The strategy published under subsection (1) must—

(a) include an assessment of the effectiveness of local planning authorities and statutory consultees in delivering upon their existing duties and functions,

(b) include an assessment of the additional resource required for local planning authorities and statutory consultees to carry out new responsibilities and duties established by this Act,

(c) set out a funding strategy for a minimum five-year period that meets the assessed resource need under paragraph (2)(b),

(d) include an assessment of the skills and capability of the planning sector and statutory consultees to carry out new responsibilities and duties established by the Act, and

(e) explain how the Secretary of State intends to address the skills and capability needs of the planning sector as set out under paragraph (2)(d).”—(Matthew Pennycook.)

This new clause would commit the Secretary of State to publishing a comprehensive resources and skills strategy for the planning sector within 12 months of the Bill securing Royal Assent and would specify what such a strategy should include.

Brought up, and read the First time.

[Matthew Pennycook]

I beg to move, That the clause be read a Second time.

Me again, Mr Hollobone. New clause 71 is in my name and those of my hon. Friends the Members for Nottingham North and for Coventry North East. As I made clear just now, the Government have promised to bring forward a planning skills strategy for local planning authorities, and the commitment to do so is set out in the policy paper that accompanies the Bill. We believe that a strategy to address the skills gap is essential to improving the planning system and we support the Government’s efforts in this area. Not only is there an existing problem—as we have just discussed—when it comes to skills shortages within local authority planning departments, but, as we have discussed in many previous sittings, the Bill will require the implementation of entirely new processes; an increase in planning staff with specific specialist skills such as design; and improved capabilities, not least in terms of a mastery of digital and geospatial data and technologies. Therefore, additional pressures are coming down the line as a result of this legislation.

However, the commitment included in the policy paper accompanying the Bill refers only to a planning skills strategy rather than the

“comprehensive resources and skills strategy”

proposed in the 2020 “Planning for the future” White Paper. We believe that that is problematic. As we have debated on numerous occasions during this Committee’s proceedings, there is a clear need for additional resources for local planning authorities—a need that the many new burdens and duties provided for by the Bill will only serve to render more acute. We therefore believe that the Government were right in the 2020 White Paper to commit to a more comprehensive strategy that encompassed both skills and resources. New clause 71 would place a duty on the Government to publish that more comprehensive strategy within 12 months of the Bill securing Royal Assent and would specify what such a strategy should contain. I look forward to hearing the Minister’s response.

[Lee Rowley]

This is an interesting new clause but one that I ask the hon. Gentleman to withdraw. I think we share the underlying objective, which is to ensure that our planning system is well resourced, well managed and well executed, but there is the general question of whether we need to legislate for these things, and my view is that we do not need to legislate in the depth that he suggests. I hope he will take some assurance from the fact that this has been discussed several times in my short period in post, including as recently as yesterday, when I spoke to the chief planner on this matter. We continue to consider it in what I hope the hon. Gentleman would think is the detail it deserves. However, I hope he will withdraw the new clause, because I am of the view that the issue does not require legislation in order for the discussion to continue.

[Matthew Pennycook]

I appreciate the Minister’s response. The new clause was probing, as he will have seen, and I therefore do not intend to press it to a vote. I am reassured that he has already discussed the issue—several times, I think he said—in his short time in post. I hope he will take away the points that I made. We think we need a skills strategy, and I urge him to think about how planning departments in local authorities might be better resourced to do what they need to do. I beg to ask leave to withdraw the motion.

Clause, by leave, withdrawn.

New Clause 72

Local consent for onshore wind projects in England

“(1) The Secretary of State shall within six months of this Bill securing Royal Assent remove from the National Planning Policy Framework the current restrictions on the circumstances in which proposed wind energy developments involving one or more turbines should be considered acceptable.”—(Matthew Pennycook.)

This new clause would commit the Secretary of State to revising the National Planning Policy Framework within 12 months of the Bill securing Royal Assent to remove the onerous restrictions it currently places on the development of onshore wind projects by deleting footnote 54.

Brought up, and read the First time.

[Matthew Pennycook]

I beg to move, That the clause be read a Second time.

[The Chair]

With this it will be convenient to discuss new clause 82—Onshore wind planning applications—

“(1) The Planning Act 2008 is amended in accordance with subsection (2).

(2) In section 15 (generating stations), leave out subsection (2)(aa).

(3) Before Chapter 2 of Part 3 of this Act comes into force, the Secretary of State must publish a statement of the Government’s plan to revise national planning guidance to support local planning authorities to grant onshore wind applications below 50MW.

(4) For the purposes of subsection (3), ‘national planning guidance’ includes—

(a) the National Planning Policy Framework and any subordinate, subsequent or successor guidance for local planning authorities;

(b) the Planning Practice Guidance on Renewable and Low Carbon Energy;

(c) the National Planning Policy Statement for Renewable Energy Infrastructure.

(5) No later than one month after this Act comes into force, the Secretary of State must publish a report setting out the Government’s plan to encourage and support community energy projects.

(6) The Secretary of State must lay a copy of the report in subsection (5) before both Houses of Parliament.”

[Matthew Pennycook]

I tabled new clause 72 some time ago, with a view to pressing the Government to remove the de facto moratorium imposed for many years on the development of onshore wind. The growth plan, published late last month, committed the Government to doing just that, by bringing onshore wind planning policy into line with planning for other forms of infrastructure. As hon. Members know, most of the measures set out in that growth plan have been junked as part of the humiliating mini-Budget U-turn, but having seen no evidence to the contrary—the Minister might disappoint me again in this regard—we assume that the decision to remove onshore wind planning restrictions is one of the few to have survived the cull. Even if that is the case, it remains unclear how the Government intend to deliver on that commitment, so that this cheap form of renewable energy generation can be deployed more easily across England. New clause 82 probes the Government on that point.

Three categories of onshore wind project are needed in large numbers: first, projects that are larger than the 50 MW threshold for nationally significant infrastructure projects; secondly, projects that are below that 50 MW threshold; and, thirdly, smaller community energy projects. Each is addressed specifically by new clause 82. Proposed new subsections (1) and (2) would unpick the 2016 regulations that removed onshore wind in England from the nationally significant infrastructure projects process set out in the Planning Act 2008, meaning that proposed onshore over 50 MW could secure consent through the development consent order system. Subsections (3) and (4) would require the Government to set out in a written ministerial statement how national planning guidance will be amended quickly to enable local authorities to determine applications for onshore wind projects below 50 MW. Finally, subsections (5) and (6) would require the Government to bring forward a plan clarifying how smaller community energy projects will be supported.

To meet our emissions reduction targets and the predicted increase in demand for electricity in coming decades, as the decarbonisation of our economy advances, there is a pressing need to increase our onshore wind capacity rapidly. The Climate Change Committee recommended the installation of between 22 GW and 29 GW by the end of this decade. As Labour Members will continue to argue, doing that at pace would have the added benefit of reducing bills, creating good jobs and bolstering our energy security.

I hope that the Minister will engage thoughtfully with the new clauses, and perhaps provide the Committee with some answers as to how the Government intend to implement the decision set out in the growth plan in respect of onshore wind.

[Lee Rowley]

The hon. Gentleman has received some assurances since he tabled new clause 72. The Government have looked at the issue again, and I am grateful for his acknowledgment of that. I am afraid that I will disappointment him. I completely understand and accept the importance of the issue, while acknowledging that it is a sensitive one in certain parts of the country. I accept that the Committee has been in existence for many months, debating many important things, but given the salience and importance of this policy issue to our broader national discourse, I suggest that it be considered more broadly than simply in this Committee. We will bring forward further information about our continuing commitments and intentions in this area in due course. However, that is not something I can do in Committee.

[Matthew Pennycook]

The Minister is determined to disappoint me in our exchanges, but I accept that he feels unable to opine on the Government’s intentions regarding the onshore wind that they have committed to allowing via the planning system and the various routes that I have mentioned. I hope that the situation will be clarified at a later stage. I beg to ask leave to withdraw the motion.

Clause, by leave, withdrawn.

New Clause 73

Duty with regard to climate change

“(1) The Secretary of State must have special regard to achieving the mitigation of and adaptation to climate change when preparing—

(a) national policy or advice relating to the development or use of land,

(b) a development management policy pursuant to section 38ZA of the PCPA 2004.

(2) The Secretary of State must aim to ensure consistency with achieving the mitigation of and adaptation to climate change when exercising a relevant function under a planning enactment.

(3) A relevant planning authority when—

(a) exercising a planning function must have special regard to, and aim to ensure consistency with, achieving the mitigation of and adaptation to climate change, and

(b) making a planning decision must aim to ensure the decision is consistent with achieving the mitigation of and adaptation to climate change.

(4) For the purposes of subsection (3), a relevant planning authority is as set out in section 81 (a) and (b) and (d) to (j).

(5) For the purposes of subsection (2) a relevant function is a function that relates to the development or use of land.

(6) For the purposes of subsection (3) a planning function is the preparation of—

(a) a spatial development strategy;

(b) a local plan;

(c) a minerals and waste plan;

(d) a supplementary plan; or

(e) any other policy or plan that will be used to inform a planning decision.

(7) For the purposes of subsections (3) and (6) a planning decision is a decision relating to—

(a) the development or use of land arising from an application for planning permission;

(b) the making of a development order; or

(c) an authorisation pursuant to a development order.

(8) In relation to neighbourhood planning, a qualifying body preparing a draft neighbourhood plan or development order must have special regard to achieving the mitigation of and adaptation to climate change.

(9) For the purposes of this section, achieving the mitigation of climate change shall include the achievement of—

(a) the target for 2050 set out in section 1 of the Climate Change Act 2008, and

(b) applicable carbon budgets made pursuant to section 4 of the Climate Change Act 2008.

(10) For the purposes of this section, achieving adaptation to climate change shall include the achievement of long-term resilience to climate-related risks, including—

(a) the mitigation of the risks identified in the latest climate change risk assessment conducted under section 56 of the Climate Change Act 2008, and

(b) the achievement of the objectives of the latest flood and coastal erosion risk management strategy made pursuant to section 7 of the Flood and Coastal Water Management Act 2010.”—(Matthew Pennycook.)

This new clause would place an overarching duty on the Secretary of State, local planning authorities and those involved in neighbourhood plan-making to achieve the mitigation and adaptation of climate change when preparing plans and policies or exercising their functions in planning decision-making.

Brought up, and read the First time.

[Matthew Pennycook]

I beg to move, That the clause be read a Second time.

It is fitting that new clause 73 is the last that I will move, because it deals with an issue that I care deeply about. I have been at pains, throughout our more than 20 sittings, to highlight that from our point of view, the Bill is a missed opportunity to fully align the planning system with our climate mitigation and adaptation goals.

The Committee has discussed climate change in debates on several amendments, but not in any great detail. Runaway global heating is by far the most significant challenge faced by the country and the world, so I return to the subject to try once again to convince Ministers to amend the Bill to improve how the planning system responds to the climate emergency.

As I have argued, although there are exemplary English development schemes, they are notable exceptions, and it is patently obvious that the planning system in general is not playing its full part in responding to climate change. Indeed, in numerous important respects, it is actively hindering our ability to mitigate and adapt to global heating. The Labour party’s strong view is that more must be done to ensure that the planning system contributes effectively to the delivery of our emissions reduction targets, and that new development produces resilient and climate-proofed places. That view is shared by the Climate Change Committee; its 2022 progress report recommends that

“Net Zero and climate resilience should be embedded within the planning reforms that are expected as part of the Levelling Up and Regeneration Bill.”

We take that view because it is clear that existing duties and requirements, which set out how the planning system should help to achieve net zero, are not producing the required results.

The national planning policy framework requires planning to

“shape places in ways that contribute to radical reductions in greenhouse gas emissions”.

In addition, local planning authorities have a statutory duty under the Planning and Compulsory Purchase Act 2004 to include in local plans policies to ensure that development and use of land mitigates and adapts to climate change. They also have powers, under the Planning and Energy Act 2008, to require new developments to source a proportion of their energy requirements from renewable and/or low-carbon and local sources, and, under the Neighbourhood Planning Act 2017, to prioritise measures to tackle climate change at a plan-led level as a strategic priority.

Despite that plethora of duties, requirements and powers, the planning system regularly throws up decisions that are seemingly incompatible with the need to make rapid progress toward net zero emissions by mid-century. To give the Committee a topical example, the Planning Inspectorate recently told West Oxfordshire District Council to remove from the area action plan for a new garden village at Salt Cross requirements to demonstrate net zero operational carbon on site through ultra-low energy fabric specification, low-carbon technologies and on-site renewable energy generation, on the basis that they were not justified or consistent with national policy.

It is clear not only that Ministers have never prioritised the issue of how the planning system can drive climate action, but that the duties and requirements in legislation are insufficiently robust and fail to consistently shape the decisions of local planning authorities, or of the planning inspectors examining plans or appeals. Similarly, the national planning policy framework does not ensure that national policy contributes fully to climate change mitigation and adaptation. Although the Government promised to review it with a view to strengthening guidance on net zero, there is still no sign of the NPPF prospectus that one of the previous Housing Ministers who served on the Committee—forgive me; I forget which one—promised us would materialise this summer. As we argued many sitting ago during the debate on amendment 101 on plan making, the Government should overhaul the Bill to ensure that both national policy and local planning align fully with the commitments in the Climate Change Act 2008, and with statutory frameworks that provide for resilience to climate impacts, such as flooding and heatwaves.

Although there are commendable examples of local authorities seeking to bring forward local plans that include quantified, strategic-level carbon reduction targets, they are few and far between. That is likely to remain the case until the Government produce clear and unambiguous national policy guidance and a purposeful statutory framework to align every aspect of the planning system with net zero. The former requires the production of a revised NPPF that fully supports the drive toward net zero, but the latter can be accomplished by the Government accepting new clause 73, which would place an overarching duty on the Secretary of State, local planning authorities and those involved in neighbourhood plan making to achieve the mitigation and adaptation of climate change when preparing plans and policies, or exercising their functions in planning decision making.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lee Rowley]

In the spirit of the brevity that you have requested, Mr Hollobone, let me say that I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for the new clause, and I share his optimism about our ability to deal with climate change, but I also recognise that that it will take time, as we outlined in debate on previous clauses. Consequently, I will resist the new clause.

As the hon. Gentleman outlined in a number of ways that I will not repeat, there are already significant legal requirements on local authorities to consider climate change, as well as a national policy requiring local planning authorities to take a proactive approach to climate change. I cannot give any guarantees, but I will certainly consider his points, because that is an important part of the housing brief. On this occasion, however, the new clause is unnecessary, and I ask him to withdraw it.

[Matthew Pennycook]

The Minister will appreciate that I find that response disappointing; there is a clear difference of opinion. We think that the existing duties, requirements and guidance are not having the intended effect that he outlined, and we feel strongly that there is a case for amending primary legislation to ensure that the planning system aligns fully with the Climate Change Act and other statutory frameworks.

I know that we are on the clock, Mr Hollobone, so I will not labour those points, which have been made before, but to drive home how important we feel the issue is, I will press the new clause to a Division.

Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill (Twenty Fourth sitting)

Matthew Pennycook Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 18th October 2022 Public Bill Committees

[Lee Rowley]

The clause enables the Secretary of State to commission, from time to time, reviews of the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors. RICS, as many hon. Members will know, is the leading professional body for surveyors. Its members work across the UK, and RICS plays a vital role in these sectors. The guidance RICS publishes is valued by surveyors, industry and members of the public. The clause will enable reviews into RICS’s governance and its effectiveness in meeting its objectives. The clause does not prescribe the frequency of reviews, but gives the Secretary of State the necessary power and flexibility to further specify the scope and timing of any review that is required.

The Government do not envisage enacting a review of RICS on a regular or specified basis, so long as RICS demonstrates its effectiveness and is reviewing its own performance to the satisfaction of Government and Parliament, but should a review be required the clause sets out that the person the Secretary of State appoints to carry out the review must be independent of both the Secretary of State and RICS. The reviewer must submit a written report setting out the results and any recommendations of the review to the Secretary of State, who will publish a copy of the report. The clause does not include powers for the Secretary of State to act on any such findings or recommendations; they would need the explicit approval of Parliament. That will ensure that the Government have the ability in law to review whether RICS is performing in the public interest, and I commend the clause to the Committee.

[Matthew Pennycook (Greenwich and Woolwich) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve with you in the Chair, Mr Hollobone. I thank the Minister for that explanation of the purpose of the clause, but he will be aware that the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors has expressed deep concerns about its precise wording, not least in terms of the precedent that it would set in relation to Government interference in other royal chartered bodies.

The issue is not the need for RICS to undergo periodic reviews of its governance and performance. Following the September 2021 publication of the Levitt report into the events that took place within the institution in 2018 and 2019, and the subsequent independent review undertaken by Lord Bichard, which examined its purpose, governance and strategy, RICS’s governing council accepted that regular independent reviews should take place, with their findings laid before Parliament and the devolved nations. The case for periodic independent reviews is therefore uncontested.

From what the Minister said, I think what remains the point of contention is whether the Secretary of State should be given the power to commission reviews of RICS, the scope and frequency of which are not clearly defined in the Bill, or whether the clause should be revised to reflect the commitments made by the institution in the light of Lord Bichard’s independent review. Given the serious concerns expressed by RICS, I will probe the Minister further on the Government’s rationale for the clause’s wording. Can he set out more clearly why, given that RICS’s governing council has made it clear that it accepts recommendation 14 of Lord Bichard’s review in full and will implement it subject to Privy Council approval, the Government believe that they still need to legislate to ensure that the Secretary of State can initiate reviews of RICS whenever they choose, as well as determine their scope?

Can the Minister also outline how such periodic reviews initiated by the Secretary of State using the powers in the clause would differ, if at all, from the parameters of independent reviews as outlined in paragraph 3.22 of Lord Bichard’s review, and accepted in principle by RICS? Can he reassure the Committee that the Government have given serious consideration to the potential impact of approving this clause unamended on not only RICS’s independence and ability to act in the public interest but the status of royal chartered bodies more widely?

As I say, we have no issue with the clause in principle, and we do not suggest that it should be removed from the Bill entirely; there is clearly a need to act to ensure that RICS is subject to regular independent review. However, we want the Government to properly justify the inclusion of the clause as worded in the Bill, rather than amending it to reflect developments following the publication of Lord Bichard’s review. I look forward to hearing the Minister’s response.

[Lee Rowley]

I am grateful to the hon. Member for his questions, which are entirely reasonable and on which I hope to provide some assurance. First, he asked why the Government are asking for this power, given that the Bichard review has outlined a process to resolve the current situation. The view of the Government and of previous Ministers who instigated this was that a process was likely to be under way, but equally there is value in the Secretary of State having this power, should it ever be necessary in the future, which obviously we hope it would not, and we have indicated that it would be used extremely sparingly. The principle of having the ability to instigate a review is one that the Government believe is reasonable and proportionate.

Secondly, the hon. Gentleman asked how the terms of reference would differ from an independent review. That question would have to be asked in individual circumstances, so I hope he will accept that it is a difficult one to answer. However, I understand the sentiments behind the point he makes.

Finally, the hon. Gentleman asked whether the Government have given serious consideration to the impact of this approach on the ability of RICS and other bodies to operate. I am happy to confirm that the Government and I will engage in discussion with RICS about this in the coming weeks before further stages of the Bill, and I will be keen to discuss with RICS all elements of the Bill, to understand its concerns and to see what reassurances I can provide.

Question put and agreed to.

Clause 186 accordingly ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 187

Vagrancy and begging

Question proposed, That the clause stand part of the Bill.

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[Matthew Pennycook]

We are extremely concerned about the implications of this clause, and the explanation just given by the Minister does not reassure me one bit. Clause 187 is a placeholder clause that allows for a substantive clause to be introduced via Government amendment at a later stage in the Bill’s passage. Its effect is to disregard the full repeal of the Vagrancy Act 1824 that the House approved via amendments to the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act 2022.

There are two fundamental problems with the clause. First, in approving section 81 of the 2022 Act, the House made it clear that it wished the Vagrancy Act to be repealed in full, so that homelessness would no longer be criminalised. It did not seek to qualify the effect of that measure by stipulating that the repeal of the 1824 Act should be delayed until replacement legislation was brought forward, which appears to be the Government’s intention in inserting this placeholder clause in the Bill. The House voted purely and simply for repeal in full.

Secondly, precisely because clause 187 is a placeholder clause, we have absolutely no idea as we debate it today what the “suitable replacement legislation” will look like. It could include positive measures that featured in the consultation that the Minister mentioned, which was launched in April, such as multi-agency outreach, but there is a clear risk that any replacement regime introduced via the powers provided for by this clause could once again criminalise people who are begging or sleeping rough. We take the view that replacement legislation is not required at all. Existing legislation—including the Anti-social Behaviour Act 2003, the Modern Slavery Act 2015 and the Fraud Act 2006—already provides the police with sufficient powers to tackle harmful types of begging, harassment, antisocial behaviour and exploitative activity. By expressly allowing for the reintroduction of criminal offences or civil penalties for conduct that is the same or similar to that under sections 3 and 4 of the Vagrancy Act, clause 187 enables the effective re-criminalisation of homelessness and rough sleeping, with all the damaging and counterproductive implications that that entails.

As the Minister has recognised, the Vagrancy Act is an embarrassing remnant of Georgian England’s approach to the poor and destitute. It deserves to be consigned to the dustbin of history in its entirety, rather than being surreptitiously restored in a modern form to enable the criminalisation of rough sleeping or passive begging. As I said, the House made its views on this matter clear during the passage of the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Act, but if the Minister is in any doubt about the strength of feeling on this issue, she need only look at the long list of names of Members from her own Benches who have signed amendment 1, in the name of the hon. Member for Cities of London and Westminster (Nickie Aiken).

We do not intend to oppose clause 187 today, but if the Government do not voluntarily withdraw it from the Bill, we will work with Members from across the House to ensure that it is removed on Report. I hope that the Minister can give some indication today that that will not be necessary, and that the Government will reconsider their position.

[Tim Farron]

Likewise, I am appalled and deeply troubled by this provision. Clause 187 feels gratuitous—unnecessary. As we have heard, plenty of provisions already exist to allow the police to deal with antisocial behaviour that could be associated with rough sleeping and people who are begging. This clause feels unnecessary and counterproductive. Above all, it feels like an act of bad faith, given what the Government have committed to doing—both from the Treasury Bench in the Commons and from the Dispatch Box in the other place.

Tomorrow, we will either celebrate or mourn the 100th anniversary of the last Liberal leaving No. 10 —notwithstanding the current sleeper agent, obviously. The legislation that is brought back to life by this clause was nearly 100 years old, and out of date, back then, but even saying that is not going far enough, because if something is morally wrong, it is morally wrong no matter how old it is—whether it is 200, 100 or new, and whether it is from Georgian England, Lloyd George, or the current era. It is morally wrong to criminalise people for being homeless. It is pointless as well.

I have spent a number of nights over the years raising money for our local homelessness charity, Manna House in Kendal. We do a night sleeping rough in January up at Kendal castle. Some of the people who work with Manna House have slept rough in reality—in many cases for years. As we went through the difficulties of one night out in the open, the casual way they would speak about their experience on the street I found more chilling than the night air. It was not just the poverty, the hardship, the hunger and the cold; it was the sense of shame, the sense of not being fully human. A Crisis poll of people who are street homeless found that 56% felt that laws that criminalise them added to that sense of shame.

People who are in desperate housing need, and are on the street, need more than just a roof over their head—though they need that. They need sustained help in rebuildibng their life. Often there are addiction and other mental health issues that partner their homelessness, and may even have fuelled it. The last thing that they need is to be criminalised. There is no value to society in doing so. All that happens is that they are displaced to somewhere else. Instead, our society should be compelled to do something to meet their needs.

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[Dehenna Davison]

That is why I made the point about the consultation we are running. We want to make sure that we get this right, which is why we sought views on this issue in a public consultation that closed in May. Analysis of those responses is ongoing and will form the backbone of our response to any new legislation. The measure is a placeholder until we can bring something forward. I recognise that it is not an ideal situation, but that is where we are.

[Matthew Pennycook]

I want to challenge the Minister on that point. If I heard her correctly, I think she said that the intention behind the clause is not to recriminalise homelessness.

[Dehenna Davison]

Absolutely.

[Matthew Pennycook]

Can she explain why subsection (2) allows regulations to include provision to create criminal offences, in similar ways to sections 3 and 4 of the Vagrancy Act 1824, which the House voted to repeal? It effectively will allow for the recriminalisation of homelessness. I think she is wrong on that point, but if she could provide further clarification, I would appreciate it.

[Dehenna Davison]

As I outlined, this is a placeholder, and we are analysing the consultation responses. The commitment I have given is that no criminalisation will result from the fact that someone is homeless. I want to put that point on the record incredibly strongly.

I cannot pre-empt the outcome of the consultation, but I have spoken to the Minister with responsibility for rough sleeping, who has committed to writing to Committee members to outline the next steps. As I say, this issue does not usually sit within my brief, but we are limited by the number of Ministers we can have in Committee today. Hopefully, that Minister will be able to provide additional reassurance.

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[Lee Rowley]

The Government and the country need to ensure that world-class sustainable infrastructure can be consented to, vitally, in a manner that can support our ambitions for economic growth. To achieve that, we must have a robust planning system that is able to accelerate infrastructure delivery and to meet the forecast demands and complexity of projects coming forward in order to attract strong investment in infrastructure. Through these changes, the planning system can continue to lead in its approach to supporting the delivery of nationally significant infrastructure, which incentivises investment and makes it quicker to deliver that infrastructure.

The Government have an ambition in the national infrastructure strategy for some development consent applications entering the system from September next year to go through the process up to 50% faster from the start of pre-application to decision, but to achieve that a national infrastructure planning reform programme was established to refresh how the nationally significant infrastructure project works and to make it more effective and deliver better and faster outcomes. New clause 60, as a consequence, will amend the part of the existing NSIP process that concerns the examination of a development consent order application. Under existing legislation, the relevant Secretary of State can set an extended deadline for the examination of an application for development consent, but there is no corresponding legislative power to enable the same Secretary of State to set a shorter deadline for such an examination.

Our measure will rectify that, providing the means for the Secretary of State to set a shorter examination period for projects that meet quality standards as part of wider NSIP reform and the fast-track consenting route that we plan to put in place, as set out in the energy security strategy. The mechanisms and criteria that could trigger the exercise of that power by the Secretary of State will be set out in supporting guidance and we will commit to consulting on that in due course. I commend these measures to the Committee.

[Matthew Pennycook]

We have serious concerns about the potential implications of Government new clause 60, which, as the Minister has made clear, will provide the Secretary of State with the power to impose a shorter statutory timeframe for the examination stage of some NSIP applications.

In the policy note entitled “Improving performance of the NSIP planning process and supporting local authorities”, which was published in August to accompany the tabling of the Government new clause, the rationale cited for its introduction is specifically the need significantly to reduce the time it takes to gain consent for offshore wind projects in order to realise the commitment set out in the British energy security strategy. That objective is entirely laudable, but while we support efforts to improve the overall performance of the DCO system—a reform, after all, introduced by the last Labour Government to expedite decisions on large-scale infrastructure projects—the Government have not provided any convincing evidence that the length of the DCO examination stage is the reason why project consents can take too long to secure.

As the Minister will know, the DCO system already specifies a fixed timeframe of nine months for the planning inspectorate to make a final decision, with only six of those months being allocated to the examination stage. The Minister might have some convincing evidence that he can share with the Committee to explain why the six-month examination process is the reason why the Government believe that offshore wind projects are taking up to four years to gain consent, but we are not aware of any such evidence that has been published.

Allowing an appropriate time for a DCO examination is important not only because that enables inspectors to gather and analyse all the available evidence and the social and environmental impacts of projects properly to be interrogated, but because it is the part of the statutory process in which communities have a say over developments that are often likely to have a significant impact on their lives. If the Government want to hand themselves the power to curtail the timeframe in which that important part of the DCO process takes place, we feel strongly that they need to bring forward the evidence to justify such a measure, and they have not done so yet.

However, beyond that in-principle concern over reducing the time available for the public to engage with a detailed process, there is a further reason why we are concerned about the possible implications of the Government new clause, which is that its scope is not limited simply to offshore wind projects. Instead, the powers provided to the Secretary of State by the measure will seemingly apply to all DCO applications and any large-scale infrastructure project that meets as-yet-to-be-specified qualifying criteria.

To take a topical example, the powers could be applied to schemes for hydraulically fractured shale gas production, which I know is of deep concern to the new housing Minister and other Government Members. With the Government having abandoned their manifesto commitment by signalling the end of the fracking moratorium and with UK onshore oil and gas already gearing up to convince Ministers to designate fracking projects as nationally significant, the obvious concern about Government new clause 60 is that the Government will use it to facilitate fracking applications with only the most limited opportunity for local communities to have their say on them. That concern is made more acute by the fact that Ministers have so far failed to provide any detail on precisely how it will be determined that local consent for fracking schemes exists.

Given the serious nature of those concerns, I would be grateful if the Minister answered the following questions. First, what evidence do the Government have that the examination phase of the DCO process is unduly holding up consent for offshore wind and other large-scale renewable energy projects? Secondly, given that the new clause allows the Secretary of State to set an unspecified date for a deadline below the current six-month timeframe for DCO examinations, can the Minister give us a sense of how much shorter the Government believe the examination stage should be under the proposed fast-tracked DCO application process? Thirdly, when will the Government tell us what the qualifying criteria will be for large-scale infrastructure projects subject to shorter examination stage timeframes via this route? Lastly, do the Government intend to designate schemes for hydraulically fractured shale gas production as “nationally significant” and bring them within the purview of this new fast-tracked DCO process—yes or no? I look forward to hearing from the Minister and to returning no doubt to this matter as we consider the Bill further.

[Lee Rowley]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for his questions. Again, they are entirely reasonable and I will answer as many of them as I can. We recognise that this is a change to the approach, but it is a change that comes directly from a recognition, which I hope we all share, that where there is a desire to move quicker on important infrastructure for this country that we are able to do that. We have an in-principle ability to extend this process, which has been in place for a number of years, and—although I do not know the history—presumably ever since the Labour party started this process a number of years ago, as the hon. Gentleman indicated. Given that, it is not necessarily conceptually problematic that we have the ability to vary that in the other direction, while accepting the understandable challenge of ensuring that there are appropriate reassurances within the process that mean that it will be used in a reasonable and proportionate manner.

While I understand the hon. Gentleman’s point about the evidence base and working through all the detail and ensuring that it is reasonable and proportionate, we are trying to establish the principle that while there is already an ability to vary this timeline in one direction, we can also vary it in another direction. In that narrow sense of what we are trying to achieve, that is a reasonable thing to do. I will try to answer the hon. Gentleman’s questions as directly as I can. On evidence, I am happy to have a further discussion with him—either verbally or in writing, whatever his preference—going through why the Government think this is reasonable and proportionate. This is all part of a broader attempt to improve this in aggregate, and I hope that the Opposition will accept that pulling multiple levers to try to secure incremental improvements in all parts of the process is a laudable aim to pursue.

On the hon. Gentleman’s specific questions on the length of time the stage should take and the qualifying criteria, that can be dealt with in guidance. I will ensure that the officials have heard his concerns and I hope we can deal with them at the guidance stage. In addition, because we have given a commitment to consult, there will be an opportunity for that. We have an interest in providing that information in the detail that is sought, so that the Government can consider it in appropriate detail as well.

Finally, on fracking, I have strong views on hydraulic shale gas and hydraulic fracturing, which I have put on the record many times in this place, and I will continue to share those views. At the same time, and I hope the hon. Gentleman accepts that there are times and places to debate policies like this one, I am no longer a Minister in the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy. I am sure that there will be regular opportunities to develop this matter, but my own position is known and understood. On his specific question, hydraulic fracturing is not within the NSIP process. There was a consultation in 2018-19 in which the Government decided not to put it in the NSIP process at the time. Should that change, I would be happy to debate with him at the appropriate moment.

Amendment 197 agreed to.

Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill (Twenty Fifth sitting)

Matthew Pennycook Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 18th October 2022 Public Bill Committees

[Greg Smith]

New clause 16 is relatively straightforward. It addresses an issue that arose from talking to Conservative and other councillors up and down the country in areas where rogue development—build now and seek to apologise or get retrospective planning permission later—has caused significant issues. The new clause would give the planning authorities the ability to take into account an applicant’s character, such as whether they have previous form on rogue or illegal development, when considering any fresh applications. It is relatively straightforward and aims to give our planning authorities more ability to protect their communities from rogue development.

[Matthew Pennycook (Greenwich and Woolwich) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve with you in the Chair, Sir Mark. New clause 37 in my name and that of my hon. Friends, is, like new clause 16, a simple amendment. I will not devote too much time to making the case for it.

We all agree that it is essential that the integrity of the planning system is upheld, not only to ensure that unauthorised development cannot blight local communities, but to maintain public trust and confidence in the planning decision-making process. When considering chapter 5 of the Bill, we had a number of debates about how planning enforcement might be improved as well as better resourced. A number of members of the Committee, including my hon. Friend the Member for South Shields, have spoken at length about the impact that rogue developers can have on communities across the country.

New clause 37 seeks to probe the Government on a specific issue of concern. As the hon. Member for Buckingham has just made clear, at present it appears that it is entirely permissible for an individual developer to consistently breach planning control, with the only risk being that they face enforcement action in respect of that specific breach. We believe that it is right that enforcement of planning law and regulation is based on the principle of proportionality and that when it comes to cases of alleged unauthorised development, local authorities have discretion to determine how the breach can be remedied. However, we also believe there is a strong case for changing the law so that certain categories of proscribed persons, in particular those who breach planning control and make no efforts to rectify those breaches, can be prohibited from carrying out development of any kind.

New clause 37 would allow that sanction to be applied to those who persistently offend when it comes to contraventions of planning law and regulation. Its objective is the same as new clause 16, on a character test and the prior record of an applicant. Adopting new clause 37, or a version of it, would reduce the burden on local authorities that are attempting to deal with the minority of rogue developers of this kind, and would also strengthen the integrity of the system overall. I hope the Government will give it serious consideration.

[Lee Rowley]

I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Buckingham and the hon. Member for Greenwich and Woolwich for their new clauses. I am extremely sympathetic to some of the concerns. I agree with the hon. Member that ensuring the integrity of the planning system is paramount. We will all have examples from across the country of where development does not occur in the way that is sanctioned, or before it is sanctioned, and then an attempt is made to gain planning permission retrospectively by those who are not necessarily following either the letter or the spirit of the rules as set down. It is extremely frustrating.

By the same token, we have to tread extraordinarily carefully here. There are a set of principles, which my hon. Friend and the hon. Member acknowledged in their speeches—that the planning system is based on a specific application, which should be judged accordingly on its merits. It is challenging to bring forward a form of character test within those principles, although I recognise that there is an issue here that many communities up and down the land are seeing.

As those who have debated it for longer than I have will know, the Bill already includes a significant package of measures that will help tackle persistent abuses of the system. Those will speed up the enforcement process, restrict the circumstances in which an appeal can be lodged, increase fines for non-compliance and discourage intentional unauthorised developments that rely on a slow enforcement timescale. The Government acknowledge some of the concerns and are trying to find appropriate levers with which to approach them.

While offering a commitment to continue to talk about this issue, although wanting to be being clear that it is extremely difficult in terms of legislation, as my hon. Friend and the hon. Member acknowledged, the Government are not minded to accept the new clauses. I therefore ask both Members not to press them.

[Greg Smith]

I welcome the commitment my hon. Friend has just made to carrying on the conversation. I accept the complexity, in a system that looks at individual cases, of bringing in a more universal test. However, there are other areas of life where people—for example, those with particular criminal records—are barred from doing certain activities—particularly where children are involved. If we could extend the principle and precedent whereby somebody who has form with rogue development—that is, turn up, build now and apologise later—which blights communities up and down the land, is barred through legislation that is practical and that does not undermine the planning system, I am up for carrying on that conversation. If not through the exact wording of this new clause, then perhaps by another means, we could find a happy solution that protects our communities from those who, I am sorry to say, continue to blight them by building out schemes that they do not have planning permission for.

[Matthew Pennycook]

I thank the Minister for that response. I agree that we have to tread very carefully in this area; the principles that we have all spoken about, in terms of planning system proportionality and judgment on individual applications, are important. The Minister was not on the Committee at the time, but the Opposition broadly supported the measures outlined in chapter 5 of part 3, which strengthened enforcement. I welcome his commitment to continue the discussion outside the Committee, but I hope he gives the issue some serious thought.

I accept what the Minister said about the difficulties, particularly in terms of a character test, but at the same time it does not seem beyond the talents in this Committee Room—I will put it that way—to come up with a system that proscribes certain categories of person. Even if it was a threshold of a certain number of planning breaches in the past, beyond which someone cannot bring forward applications, there must be some way of doing it. A minority of rogue developers are causing havoc for communities and lots of work for planning departments in local authorities. We think the Government should give further thought to making progress on the issue.

[Greg Smith]

I beg to ask leave to withdraw the motion.

Clause, by leave, withdrawn.

New Clause 17

Community right of appeal

“(1) The Town and Country Planning Act 1990 is amended as follows.

(2) After section 78 (right to appeal against planning decisions and failure to take such decisions) insert—

‘78ZA Community right of appeal

(1) The Secretary of State must by regulations make provision—

(a) enabling communities to appeal against a decision to grant planning permission or permission in principle for a development, and

(b) about such appeals.

(2) The regulations may require a certain number or proportion of residents of a local area to record objection against a decision for such an appeal to proceed.

(3) The regulations may, in particular, make provision the upholding of such appeals and the revocation of permission if—

(a) the development is inconsistent with a relevant neighbourhood plan, or

(b) due process has not been followed in relation to the planning application.

(4) The first regulations under this section must be laid before Parliament before the end of the period of six months beginning on the day on which this section comes into force.’” —(Greg Smith.)

This new clause would introduce a community right of appeal against the granting of planning permission.

Brought up, and read the First time.

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As we go for localism, community control and a system that genuinely puts communities in charge of planning, we need a mechanism to ensure that we do not shut people out of the planning process by demanding that they travel great distances to attend meetings. That applies as much to the councillors who sit on the planning committee as to the residents or interested parties who have a right to be heard in the process. As much as I hate the virtual environment, I think that it is necessary to allow councils to meet in that way to ensure that everyone can have their voice heard.

[Matthew Pennycook]

It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Buckingham. I think that hate might be too strong a word, but I certainly share his preference for in-person over virtual meetings, where possible. However, there are circumstances where virtual meetings have become necessary or useful, and that is what these new clauses both seek to address for the planning system.

While there are significant points of disagreement between the Opposition and Government Benches on the question of whether the Bill, in the round, will enhance or discourage community engagement in the planning process, there none the less exists a broad consensus that that objective is a worthy one. Whatever one believes the causes to be, there is general agreement that it is a problem that, as things stand, less than 1% of people engage with the local plan-making process, only around 3% engage with individual planning applications, and—of particular concern to the Opposition—particular segments of society typically have no voice whatsoever on planning decisions that will have a huge impact on their communities and their lives.

We therefore think that reducing barriers to engagement with the planning process would be beneficial for a variety of reasons. Chief among them—this is a point that I return to again and again—is that, in some ways, we think it would address the extremely low levels of trust and confidence that the public has in the planning system as a whole.

New clause 69, which, in many ways, is similar to new clause 28 in the name of the right hon. Member for Chipping Barnet, seeks to increase public engagement in the planning process by allowing local authorities to hold planning committee meetings virtually or in a hybrid form. That proposal is obviously not novel. We know from the experience of local authorities during the pandemic that allowing for remote participation both worked effectively and had a number of benefits, including—as the hon. Member for Buckingham said—reduced travel times for councillors and the public, and greater transparency and openness.

What attracts us to this proposal is the fact that virtual meetings facilitated an increase—in many cases a dramatic one—of resident engagement in decisions, in part because remote participation made it far easier for a broader range of people, including those with disabilities, caring responsibilities and work commitments, to take part in meetings for the first time. New clause 69 simply seeks to ensure that those benefits, particularly increased public participation in planning decisions, can be enjoyed on a permanent basis.

However, it is important to say that it does not seek to do so prescriptively. While the language used is drawn from section 78 of the Coronavirus Act 2020, we would expect any regulations to follow to provide for local authorities to determine for themselves whether any given meeting is virtual or hybrid. That is on the basis that councils and councillors are best placed to decide how and when to use different meeting formats in particular circumstances. We feel strongly that it is important that they are given the freedom to do so.

There is widespread support for putting remote meeting arrangements on a permanent footing, including from the Local Government Association, Lawyers in Local Government, and the Association of Democratic Services Officers. As the Minister may know, the planning inspectorate already enjoys the freedom to offer virtual or hybrid meetings, at the discretion of a lead inspector, relating to hearings and inquiries.

To conclude, as every hon. Member knows, online meetings are now commonplace not just for work but for many other forms of social interaction. The public rightly expect that kind of accessibility for council meetings as well, and we are convinced that the freedom for local authorities to hold virtual or hybrid meetings will be welcomed by all our constituents.

We hope that allowing planning committees the option of meeting virtually, or permitting virtual participation in physical meetings, is an uncontroversial and common-sense measure. I hope that the Government are minded either to accept the new clause or, if they feel that it is defective in some way, to table one of their own that achieves the same aim.

[Ben Bradley]

I support the principles of the new clauses, although I will suggest a way in which they might need to be amended so as to apply not just to planning meetings, but to all council meetings. Throughout the pandemic, councils were allowed—and therefore invested in the technology—to permit members of the public to engage in council meetings through those mechanisms, and the public did. As the hon. Member for Greenwich and Woolwich said, engagement in many of those conversations was much higher during the pandemic. People were able to engage with them more easily from their own homes, and they probably had “Coronation Street” on in the background. The more something allows people to take part in a much easier way, the better.

As officers and councillors increasingly work in a more hybrid way, we are encouraging our staff in Nottinghamshire to work from home more, not least because of the practicalities—staff expect that these days. Financially, we do not want, and cannot afford, to run as many buildings as we currently have. Fewer people are in the office. Every time we have a face-to-face meeting that does not need to be face to face, that requires people to trek across the county. It requires councillors to do a three-hour round trip, sometimes for a 20-minute meeting. It is a waste of resources.

Through the pandemic, we also found that we saved thousands of tonnes of carbon—never mind the travel expenses—by not trekking around the county for meetings. I struggle to get opposition councillors, never mind members of the public, to attend some of our governance and ethics meetings. Accessibility is not an issue in that sense.

If there is to be a change to the new clauses, I ask Ministers to make them broader, to include all council meetings. Our full council meeting will always be an in-person public meeting; it is the exciting, set-piece event at the heart of our council calendar. However, many other meetings need not be. Giving local government that flexibility would be very welcome.

There has been a process to review this issue. There was a consultation a year or so ago, I think, and local government was asked to submit views. I can confidently imagine that the broad consensus was, “Give us flexibility, please, to make those decisions locally.” We have done it before, and we can very easily do it again. When Ministers consider the new clauses behind the scenes, I ask that they make them broader still and give us the scope to make those decisions locally.

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[Rachael Maskell]

I rise to move new clause 43 and to support new clause 68. They mirror one another and therefore emphasise the need for a review of permitted development rights, which are a major issue in planning.

New clause 43 calls for a change in the Town and Country Planning (General Permitted Development) (England) Order 2015. It would require a review to be published, within a year of the Bill becoming law, on the effectiveness of permitted development rights in achieving housing targets. Much planning permission is granted on the basis of balancing the economic viability of a site in favour of developers. Planning authorities may stipulate the framework around that, but it is not uncommon for developers to come back to authorities pleading that the site does not hold viability and seeking to change the tenure of units planned for it.

Furthermore, we have a housing crisis. The Government are right to want to fix it by setting targets for the number of units to be built, but if those units are unaffordable to a local population, or if they are sold as investment properties—as assets—and remain empty or are converted into short-term holiday lets, the housing demand is not addressed. Worse, property prices can heat up the market, resulting in a greater pool of people who are unable to access housing, which is making things far worse.

By allowing such a liberalisation of planning, not least for developers, the Government are creating a worsening situation. Rather than resolving the housing situation, they are pushing people out of their localities, as people cannot afford to either buy or rent. Now, with the economic crisis, they cannot get a mortgage either, but cash buyers can scoop up properties and then drive revenue through holiday lets. In York, we are seeing that in spades. York Central promises to be such a site of investment properties rather than homes, with the wrong housing in the wrong place heating up the market and exposing our city to even greater numbers of short-term holiday lets. This has to stop.

My new clause would enable a review, which would include an examination of the quality of housing delivered. I cannot tell hon. Members the scale of shoddy workmanship that we are witnessing. Developers hand their properties over to property management companies and then deny responsibility. Water ingress is common. Sinks are fitted just with silicone, and not properly plumbed in. Wiring is half done. Bin stores are turned into inaccessible bike shelters. The list of unresolved complaints is endless.

York is naturally concerned about its heritage and conservation sites, and we want to ensure that its archaeology is preserved, too. On the environment, we know that new developments help to solve the carbon crisis rather than add to it. If measures are not reviewed and taken seriously, we know that transport planning can be poor, as we are seeing on the York Central site. That will have an impact on the rest of the city. I have already mentioned the thorny issue of the cost to local authorities of the mess that is being created.

Reviewing permitted development rights, as the new clause seeks to do, is about addressing all the consequences, foreseen and unforeseen, of rushing planning through, not least at a time when planning departments across our communities are significantly under-resourced and under-powered. The new clause seeks a review, which is needed, and we want to see action following on from that. If the Government committed the resources and time needed to carry out a review of a such a significant issue, they could make such a difference to communities up and down the country. The review would ultimately be of real value to the Government, by ensuring that the planning system is working effectively for the purpose for which it is designed.

[Matthew Pennycook]

I rise to speak to new clause 68, in my name and those of my colleagues, and to speak in support of new clause 43. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for York Central on tabling new clause 43 and on her powerful remarks, not least about the contribution of the extension of permitted development rights to the affordability pressures in urban parts of the country such as hers.

It is a matter of public record that the Opposition have long-standing concerns about the detrimental impact of the liberalisation of permitted development rights on local communities. The Government have always justified the progressive liberalisation of those rights on the grounds that it removes unnecessary administrative impediments to development in the planning system. There is no doubt that the extension of PD rights since 2013 has boosted housing supply; estimates suggest that it has led to a net increase of around 100,000 dwellings. However, the increased supply secured as a result of deregulatory measures over recent years, and the significantly reduced control of rural and urban land that they entail, has come at the cost of a loss of affordable housing and infrastructure contributions, and an increase in poor-quality housing, with obvious implications for public health and wellbeing.

Evidence of the negative impact of the extension of permitted development for the conversion of office, commercial and industrial units to housing is now ubiquitous. A report published by the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government in July 2020—at the same time, incidentally, that Ministers were setting out plans for a further extension of PD rights—found that, in comparison with schemes created through planning permission, permitted development schemes were far less likely to meet national space standards and far more likely to have reduced access to natural daylight and sunlight.

Members may well have come across some of the more well-publicised examples of poor-quality PD schemes. Those include the Wellstones site in Watford, which involved the conversion of a light industrial building into 15 flats, seven of which had no windows at all; 106 Shirley Road in Southampton, a former electric and gas fire shop, which was converted into six studio flats, each roughly the size of a single car parking space; and Terminus House in Harlow, a former office block converted into hundreds of homes, many with just one openable window, which has rightly been described as a “human warehouse”.

--- Later in debate ---

[Rachael Maskell]

I listened carefully to the debate, and I am grateful for all the contributions to it. The Minister will know that we are not putting forward a plan to tear up the whole PDR framework; we are simply calling for a review, as we believe is appropriate. After a scoping review, we would determine which points to drill down on, to ensure that we are looking at the parts of the system that are simply not working. That is the intention behind the new clause. Although it has a broader scope, it homes in on some of the challenges in the system. I therefore do not think that the proposal to put a scoping exercise in the legislation is unreasonable. I welcome the Minister’s offer of dialogue on these matters, which clearly are significantly impacting our communities. Dialogue will be really important. I will not press my new clause to a vote, but I will certainly take up that offer.

[Matthew Pennycook]

As I think the Minister will expect, I am naturally disappointed by his response. There are times when hiding behind the fact that there are trade-offs in balancing problems is appropriate; there are times when it is just a fig leaf, and not doing anything about a glaring problem. His own Department has produced evidence that it is not just a problem at the margins. I encourage him to go and see some of the sites being allowed on appeal because of national planning policy. It is not a problem at the margins; it is endemic, and intrinsic to the liberalisation of PD rights that has been allowed over the past nine years.

It is a straw man for the Minister to say, “We can’t do this, because it’s reviewing all PD rights.” Uncontroversial elements of PD can be dealt with very quickly; we are talking about the problematic aspects and the expansion of PD rights over the past nine years. It is causing a huge amount of human suffering, if nothing else. For that reason, not least to signal the Opposition’s intent to deal with this matter if and when we form the next Government, I will press new clause 68 to a Division when the time comes.

[Rachael Maskell]

I beg to ask leave to withdraw the motion.

Clause, by leave, withdrawn.

Ordered, That further consideration be now adjourned. —(Nigel Huddleston.)

Oral Answers to Questions

Matthew Pennycook Excerpts

Monday 17th October 2022 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

I call the Opposition spokesperson, Matthew Pennycook.

[Matthew Pennycook (Greenwich and Woolwich) (Lab)]

Last week Government sources told The Times that Ministers were planning to renege on their commitment to abolish section 21 no-fault evictions, only for the Prime Minister to stand up days later and deny that that was the case. Private renters need long-term security and better rights and conditions now, not chaotic mixed messaging from a Government in disarray. Can the Secretary of State give the House a cast-iron guarantee from the Dispatch Box today that if the Government are still standing come the time, a renters’ reform Bill will be introduced in the next parliamentary Session?

[Mr Clarke]

I can confirm that we will introduce the rental reform Bill in the course of this Parliament. That is a commitment that we have made and are determined to honour. I could not be clearer in saying that I echo the Prime Minister’s words last Wednesday that this is going to happen.

Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill (Twenty Second sitting)

Matthew Pennycook Excerpts

Committee stage
Thursday 13th October 2022 Public Bill Committees

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (Dehenna Davison)]

Thank you, Mrs Murray. It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, particularly for my first outing as a Minister. I would appreciate your going slightly easy on me on procedural matters—I will do my best.

As we know, the Government are committed to empowering local areas to drive forward growth and renewal without the need to establish a body accountable to central Government. Development corporations are powerful tools that can deliver large-scale development, and they have been successfully used to deliver more than 20 post-war new towns across England, such as Telford and Milton Keynes. They have also been instrumental in regenerating brownfield sites, such as Canary Wharf and the London Olympic site. However, the enabling legislation was designed for a different time and in response to very different circumstances, so there are now multiple types of development corporation, which have varying powers and remits that inhibit their use. Given the scale of the challenge to level up the country, provide the necessary infrastructure and deliver the growth and housing that current and future generations need, we want to ensure that development corporations are accessible right across England.

In October 2019, we consulted on the legislative framework for development corporations to ensure that they have the powers they need to deliver. The results of that consultation showed that there is a gap in the existing models. Outside of mayoral areas, there is no model available for local authorities to regenerate their areas, which is what the clause is intended to address. The clause introduces a new locally led urban development corporation model, which will be overseen by a local authority covering the area, rather than by central Government. It will also allow local authorities, rather than central Government, to put forward proposals to the Secretary of State to designate and create a locally led urban development corporation.

Subsection (4) sets out what authorities will need to do before submitting a proposal to the Secretary of State for designation. That includes what a proposal must contain, who is able to put forward a proposal and who can become an oversight authority. Local authorities will not be able to unilaterally decide to ask the Secretary of State to designate a locally led urban development corporation. Instead, the clause includes a statutory requirement for the proposing authorities to consult local residents, businesses, MPs and other local authorities before making a proposal to the Secretary of State. When the proposal is received by the Secretary of State, they will look carefully at the robustness of the plans, including community involvement and the views expressed, before making a decision. That is why new clause 53 is an unnecessary addition to the consultation requirements and would slow down the designation of development corporation areas.

The purpose of designating an area is to determine the area in which the locally led development corporation will operate and deliver a programme of urban regeneration, and there will be other opportunities for the local community to have their say on the planning proposals for the area through the planning system. Respondents to the consultation noted the considerable amount of up-front resource required to make the case for a locally led development corporation, expressing apprehension about the level of evidence that may be required.

The clause introduces a different test for locally led urban development corporations. Before they are established, the Secretary of State must assess whether it is expedient in the local interest, rather than in the national interest, to designate the development area, which means that local authorities will no longer need to prove that their proposal is in the national interest. A similar provision is introduced for locally led new town development corporations under clause 132. We will provide further guidance to ensure that the evidence required to meet the test is proportionate and provides the certainty that local authorities desire.

We also want to ensure that the proposals are implemented as planned. Subsection (7) requires the Secretary of State to give effect to the proposal, subject to its meeting the statutory test that it is expedient in the local interest. That will include the order providing for the name of the development corporation, the number of board members, who the oversight authority will be, and arrangements for the performance of functions by oversight authorities consisting of more than one local authority. The order must also provide for any other functions that the proposal sets out as planning powers.

Orders designating locally led development corporations will, as for mayoral development corporations, be subject to the negative procedure. That reflects the fact that local democratic scrutiny will have occurred prior to the proposal being permitted to be made. The clause will equalise mayoral and non-mayoral areas with locally led development corporations by standardising the parliamentary process, with democratic oversight at the local level.

We intend to use the powers in the clause as we did the locally led New Towns Act 1981 (Local Authority Oversight) Regulations 2018, which will be subject to the affirmative procedure. That includes setting out which functions will be transferred to the oversight authority. We will consult on regulations in due course to ensure that they are informed by both communities and stakeholders. In the light of that explanation, I ask the hon. Member for Greenwich and Woolwich not to press new clause 53.

[Matthew Pennycook (Greenwich and Woolwich) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to reconvene under your chairmanship, Mrs Murray. I welcome the two new Ministers to their places. I want to speak to new clause 53, not least because I am not entirely convinced by the reassurances just given by the Minister. As she said, and as the policy paper accompanying the Bill sets out, this part of the Bill makes provision for a new type of locally led urban development corporation accountable to local authorities rather than the Secretary of State. It amends the process for establishing locally led new town development corporations and updates the planning powers available to both centrally and locally led development corporations, bringing them into line with the mayoral development corporation model in terms of enabling them to become local planning authorities for the purposes of local plan making, neighbourhood planning and development management.

In the view of the Opposition, part 6 of the Bill is largely uncontroversial, and we are broadly supportive of the measures contained within it. The development corporation model established by the New Towns Act 1946 was a key part of the post-war planning settlement and, as the Minister referenced, it proved remarkably effective in addressing the housing emergency faced in those years. The 32 new towns built under the post-war UK new towns programme today house over 2.5 million people. Funded by 40-year Government loans, they ultimately not only paid the Treasury back, but returned a surplus. The legacy of urban development corporations is more mixed, but their potential for large-scale regeneration is undeniable and their capacity to successfully deliver major projects, such as the London Olympics, is testament to their utility.

In a real sense, development corporations remain an answer to one of the core weaknesses of the planning system, which is that local planning authorities have the power to develop and set a strategy in a local area, but few powers and little capacity to ensure the necessary development to realise it is delivered. On the other hand, development corporations combine strategic planning capability with powerful delivery mechanisms that help ensure that the development objectives they set are realised. They can, for example, commission private sector companies, or establish their own, to deliver homes and infrastructure, and they can compulsory purchase the land they need to deliver a plan and then control consent to bring forward development. For all those reasons and more, we therefore welcome the fact that the Bill includes provision to amend and enhance the development corporation model. However, we need to ensure that the new types of development corporation provided for by part 6 of the Bill realise their potential and have legitimacy in the eyes of the public—the latter being directly related to the former.

When it comes to their likely efficacy as a means of regenerating areas, the decision to provide for locally led development corporations risks proving a double-edged sword. The advantage is, of course, that a local authority, or authorities, seeking to designate an urban development area and create an urban development corporation, as provided for by clause 131, or to oversee the creation of a new town in an area within their administrative boundaries, as provided for by clause 132, can determine their own priorities rather than having them determined for them by the Department. In that sense, the measures provided for in this part are in keeping with the spirit of the original New Towns Act 1946. The disadvantage is that, in practice, there is likely to be little incentive for a local authority, or authorities, to take the financial and political risk of designating a given area and establishing the necessary development corporation to regenerate it. The recent experience of four north Essex authorities, which attempted unsuccessfully to designate and oversee the development of three garden communities, is a stark illustration of the need for central Government to be far more active in supporting locally led initiatives if they are to succeed.

The success of the post-war UK new towns programme lay, in part, in the fact that each development corporation operated within the context of strong national policy and enjoyed the active and direct support of the Government of the day and their Ministers. It is telling that this part of the Bill places no duty on the Secretary of State to support—financially or otherwise—the locally led development corporations it enables to be established. As things stand, we have no sense of what the Government ultimately wish to achieve by means of the provisions in this part, not least how they believe such locally led development corporations will assist in levelling up, given the likelihood that most will come forward in the south and, I would wager, the south-east of the country. Our new clause 53 is not designed to address the potential challenges involved in ensuring that locally led corporations realise their full potential in that sense, as vehicles for regeneration and levelling up, but I hope the Government will carefully consider the points I have made in that respect.

When it comes to community consultation, I am afraid that I am not satisfied that the proposed measures are sufficient. In terms of the perceived legitimacy of these development corporations, it is essential that they provide for an element of public participation in any proposal to designate and establish such a corporation. At present, the process provided for by clause 131 entails no public inquiry before designation and no right for members of the public to be heard prior to a decision being made.

The same is the case for locally led new town development corporations, as provided for by clause 132. That means the Bill will allow land to be designated as an urban development area, and powerful new bodies to be established to oversee development on such land, without any rights for the local communities affected to have their say and at least test the evidence as part of that process. We believe that is an error, and new clause 53 simply seeks to ensure that proposals to designate land as an urban development area and to establish a locally led urban development corporation would be subject to independent examination, at which the public would have a right to be heard. As you will know, Mrs Murray, that is part of our ongoing efforts throughout the passage of the Bill to overhaul it to ensure that there is an ongoing role for the public in the planning process at these stages, with the obvious benefits that that entails for trust and confidence in the planning system. I look forward to any further thoughts the Minister might have having heard my argument.

[Dehenna Davison]

I thank the shadow Minister for not only expressing his concerns but indicating his broad support for part 6 of the Bill and the enhancements it will make overall to the development corporation model.

The point about trust and confidence in planning and the development corporation system is vital. On the point about consultation, I refer the hon. Member back to the comments I just made: there would be no unilateral ability for local authorities to go straight to the Secretary of State to request that a locally led urban development corporation be set up. There is a statutory requirement for authorities to consult local residents, businesses, MPs and other local authorities before making those representations to the Secretary of State.

On the resources for establishing a development corporation, we recognise that this can be a significant undertaking, but the Government have a range of programmes available to help support local authorities in their growth aspirations. We would encourage local authorities that are interested to approach the Department and see how we can work with them to provide that resource and confidence. On that basis, I once again ask the hon. Member not to press new clause 53, and I commend the clause to the Committee.

Question put and agreed to.

Clause 131 accordingly ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 132

Development corporations for locally-led new towns

Question proposed, That the clause stand part of the Bill.

--- Later in debate ---

As with a locally led urban development corporation, the clause also updates the procedure that the Secretary of State must follow in designating a locally led new town development corporation. This will ensure that all locally led development corporations align with the negative procedure already used for mayoral development corporations, reflecting the local democratic scrutiny that is a precondition for any such order. I therefore commend the clause to the Committee and, with the clarifications I have provided on the clause’s overall intent and operation, I kindly urge the hon. Member not to press his new clause.

[Matthew Pennycook]

I will speak to new clause 54, but I shall be extremely brief. As the Minister will know, the new clause seeks to achieve precisely the same outcome as new clause 53, in relation to locally led urban development corporations, but in relation to the locally led new town development corporations, as provided for by clause 132.

For the record, I reiterate that we are not reassured by the Minister’s comments about public consultation being intrinsic to the proposed measures. If I have understood her correctly in terms of that public consultation, we are talking about the ability for communities to comment after the areas of land in question have been designated and established. I suggest that the process of designating land to be developed in this manner and of establishing a corporation is a matter that local communities will want to have a say on, as is rightly the case, before they get a say on other elements of the process to follow.

We believe it is a mistake to establish a process for creating these corporations in which the public have no input into the designation and no right to be heard at the point that the land in question is delineated and the corporation established. I appreciate that the Minister will give me exactly the same answer she did in response to new clause 53, but I hope that the Government will at least reflect on what it will mean for trust and confidence in the planning system, which we know is extremely low, if local communities are cut out of this stage of the process entirely.

[Dehenna Davison]

Once again, I completely share the hon. Gentleman’s sentiments around trust in the planning system. It is absolutely paramount to the planning system operating and getting that local buy-in—it is really crucial. That is why it is a statutory requirement for a public consultation to be undertaken before the proposal is submitted to the Secretary of State, on the grounds that I outlined in the previous clause. I hope that that provides at least some reassurance that local residents will absolutely be consulted before these processes move forward.

Question put and agreed to.

Clause 132 accordingly ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 133 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Schedule 12 agreed to.

Clauses 134 to 137 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Schedule 13 agreed to.

Clause 138

Removal of restrictions on membership of urban development corporations and new town development corporations

[Matthew Pennycook]

I beg to move amendment 183, in clause 138, page 157, line 26, at end insert—

“(4) In the case of a locally-led urban development corporation, the board must include no less than three community members who represent a local qualifying body.

(5) In this section, ‘local qualifying body’ means a parish or town council, or an organisation or body designated as a neighbourhood forum, authorised for the purposes of a neighbourhood development plan or such other bodies that reflect the cultural, social or environmental priorities of the locality to be designated as a locally-led urban development area.”

This amendment would ensure that local communities within the locality to be designated as a locally-led urban development area are represented on the board of a locally-led urban development corporation.

[The Chair]

With this it will be convenient to discuss amendment 184, in clause 138, page 157, line 39, at end insert—

“(2ZC) In the case of a locally-led development corporation, the board must include no less than three community members who represent a local qualifying body.

(2ZD) In this section, ‘local qualifying body’ means a parish or town council, or an organisation or body designated as a neighbourhood forum, authorised for the purposes of a neighbourhood development plan or such other bodies that reflect the cultural, social or environmental priorities of the locality to be designed as the site of a proposed new town.”

This amendment would ensure that local communities within the locality to be designated as the site of a proposed new town are represented on the board of a locally-led development corporation.

[Matthew Pennycook]

In our exchanges on clauses 131 and 132, we debated the public legitimacy of the new locally led development corporations. We believe the same issue arises in relation to clause 138, which concerns the membership of urban development corporations and new town development corporations. The clause amends schedule 26 of the Local Government, Planning and Land Act 1980 and section 3 of the New Towns Act 1981 to remove the previous board member cap and the need to set out board membership numbers in an order in relation to both types of corporations, bringing them in line with mayoral development corporations and locally led new town development corporations, to which no cap applies. We believe that is a sensible measure, and do not object to it.

However, we believe there is a more fundamental issue with development corporation board membership. As part of a locally led proposal, a local authority or authorities must be identified for designation as the oversight authority for the development corporation in question, but when it comes to a corporation’s appointed board and its deliberations, there are no safeguards in the Bill to ensure that the voices of residents are heard. If new locally led development corporations are to be a success, we believe it is important that they have robust governance arrangements, and that those arrangements enjoy public trust and confidence. In our view, the obvious means of ensuring that is to enable an element of public participation in them.

Amendments 183 and 184 seek to probe the Government on this important issue by providing for the inclusion of at least three community members representing a local qualifying body, as defined in proposed new paragraph 1A(5) to schedule 26 to the Local Government, Planning and Land Act and proposed new subsection (2ZD) of section 3 of the New Towns Act, which appear in the amendments. We believe the inclusion of representative members of a local community on the board of a locally led development corporation would strengthen those corporations’ legitimacy in the eyes of the public and help ensure that the significant planning powers those corporations will exercise enjoy a degree—albeit a limited degree—of local community oversight. I look forward to the Minister’s response.

[Tim Farron (Westmorland and Lonsdale) (LD)]

Mrs Murray, it is a genuine pleasure to serve under your guidance today. I offer a huge welcome to the two new Ministers. I am very pleased to see them in their places, and they have made a good start so far.

Just a quick word from me on this: there is a real danger when the Government seek to do good things. With development corporations, the ability to regenerate communities and create economic benefit and equality is certainly an aim and a likely outcome of doing it properly. The danger is that we establish a bunch of quangos that people feel detached from, with the sense that this is something being done to their community rather than them being part of it. That is why I think that the amendments are wise and worth taking on board, from the Government’s perspective.

I can give a little example. Our new Ministers will get used to me talking about national parks a lot, but they are quite a good example of outfits that do a very good job that are run by very good people who are not directly elected. I have the Yorkshire dales and the Lake district in my patch. When we talk about legitimacy and public consent for decisions that are made—sometimes they will not be the most popular decisions; they will be difficult decisions—then, rightly or wrongly, if we do not have people who are directly accountable to, elected from and, indeed, from the communities that are served by those bodies, there will be pushbacks, and it will cause a lack of consent and of unity in the community. However, the lakes and dales are run by brilliant people. None of them is directly elected by the people they serve, yet they make the kind of decisions that, outside national parks, are made by directly elected councillors.

That is a side plea for the Government to consider those issues, but when it comes to development corporations, I think the Government need to go out of their way to ensure that local communities’ voices are not just heard but seen to be heard. Therefore, people in the community should be directly part of those boards.

--- Later in debate ---

[Dehenna Davison]

I thank the shadow Minister and the hon. Member for Westmorland and Lonsdale for their contributions, and hope that I can provide a little bit of reassurance.

We feel that, while incredibly well intentioned, the amendments are unnecessary. The appointment of board membership for locally led new town development corporations is already addressed in the New Towns Act 1981 (Local Authority Oversight) Regulations 2018. Those regulations provide that

“the oversight authority must have regard to the desirability of appointing one or more persons resident in or having special knowledge of the locality in which the new town will be situated.”

That could include members from parish councils or local community groups, or organisations that reflect the cultural, social or environmental priorities of the locality.

We intend to replicate that approach for locally led urban development corporations. We intend to set out further details on the composition of board membership in regulations, which will be subject to parliamentary debate. As we did with the New Towns Act 1981 (Local Authority Oversight) Regulations 2018, the Department will consult on draft regulations to ensure that they are appropriate and permit local communities and businesses to have a say.

In appointing independent members, we expect oversight authorities to ensure that the board has the relevant skills and experience needed. That includes those with an understanding of the local area. In accordance with the principles of local authority appointments, the appointments of the chair, deputy chair and independent board members should be through an open, transparent and publicly advertised procedure, which I hope will provide some reassurance to the hon. Member for Westmorland and Lonsdale. I appreciated the examples from his own constituency.

Regarding the suggested minimum of three appointments, it is the Government’s view that it should be up to the oversight authority to determine the appropriate board composition and numbers, based on local circumstances. I hope, therefore, that the hon. Member for Greenwich and Woolwich will agree not to press his amendments.

[Matthew Pennycook]

I thank the Minister for that response and am partly reassured by it. As I hope I made clear, we are trying to drive at what I think is a very limited form of public participation on the boards. I accept what the Minister says, both on what is expected by the Government from oversight authorities in putting the boards together, and the further details, although what “a say” means is yet to be defined. We look forward to seeing in the regulations what those further details entail.

I hope the Minister has taken away our very firm view that there must be an appropriate level of community participation on the membership of the boards so that local communities have trust and confidence in what they are doing. However, I do not intend to press the amendment to a Division at this time. I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.

Clause 138 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 139 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clause 140

Acquisition by local authorities for purposes of regeneration

Question proposed, That the clause stand part of the Bill.

--- Later in debate ---

[Dehenna Davison]

I will now explain clauses 140 to 144 and schedule 14. The Government want to see local authorities empowered to use compulsory purchase to regenerate their areas, so that places and regions can drive improvements in economic growth and pride in place. The levelling-up White Paper made it clear that we want local communities to be empowered to take the lead, and we want to ensure they have the tools they need to succeed. Key to that is ensuring that local authorities have the right compulsory purchase enabling powers and processes, and the confidence to use them. This is the intent behind the clauses, which focus on modernising and streamlining the compulsory purchase process to make it faster and more effective.

With clause 140, we are making it crystal clear in the Bill that local authorities in England have the power to use compulsory purchase for regeneration purposes and to bridge the gap the urban centre recovery taskforce identified last year, which we are keen to address. Currently, local authorities in England are able to use their compulsory purchase powers for development, redevelopment and improvement purposes.

Clause 140 will ensure that local authorities have the certainty to acquire land compulsorily for regeneration schemes too. That will align them with other public authorities such as Homes England and the Greater London Authority. That could, among other things, improve the social wellbeing of a local authority’s area, while not actually involving the construction or reconstruction of a building. For instance, this regeneration compulsory purchase order power could be used to transform a vacant commercial building into a community hub. Alongside this change, we will bring forward updated guidance to provide more clarity on the use of compulsory purchase for long-term strategic land assembly by local authorities.

On clause 141, we need to ensure that the CPO process is efficient yet accessible and fair for all involved in it. The clause retains the current requirements for the physical deposit of documents and service of notice. It remains the case that sufficient proof of delivery through electronic communications is difficult. Given the nature of compulsory purchase, it is crucial that affected parties receive—and can prove that they have received—the necessary communications. The clause also requires acquiring authorities to make CPO documents and notices available online, and it creates the flexibility for Ministers to direct, in extreme circumstances where the physical deposit of documents is impractical, that online provision is sufficient. Further provisions in clause 148 provide for the application of common standards to compulsory purchase data. As I have described, these amendments begin the modernisation of the CPO process, and I commend clause 141 to the Committee.

Clause 142 will create a faster, more effective confirmation process. At present, a single affected landowner can demand an expensive and lengthy public inquiry for any CPO. This can be used as a delaying tactic, slowing down the decision-making process and increasing the costs for the acquiring authority and others involved. As we know, cost for the authority means cost for the taxpayer. In turn, this can make acquiring authorities, such as local authorities, less inclined to use CPO powers. We believe that the confirmation procedure should reflect the complexity of the order. Many CPOs involve one or a very small number of properties, with little impact outside the boundaries of those properties. Confirmation proceedings for orders like these do not generally need a public inquiry.

We also believe that it is right to give the discretion to the confirming authority to determine the appropriate procedure based on the circumstances, while protecting the right for affected parties to have an oral hearing if they wish. In keeping with those ambitions, clause 142 enables confirming authorities to decide to hold a public local inquiry, or to follow the new representations procedure, which will include an oral hearing if objectors request one. We will engage with stakeholders in shaping the representations procedure to ensure it works practically and produces a faster and more efficient process.

On clause 143, we want to ensure that authorities have the confidence to achieve positive outcomes in making CPOs. Too often when there is a decision to confirm a CPO, the CPO is rejected because of a specific impediment at the point of decision, and that often results in significant delay or even the complete collapse of the scheme. We want authorities to know that where a specific impediment, such as funding uncertainty, remains outstanding at the point of decision, a condition can be imposed for that to be dealt with and discharged at a later point.

Clause 143 achieves that end by introducing the concept of conditional confirmation, which will allow decision makers to confirm CPOs subject to the conditions being met before the compulsory purchase powers may be used. That may assist progress-stalled developments, as conditions could be imposed to force a landowner to follow through on commitments to undertake developments, and if they fail to do that, that will allow a CPO to become operative.

We also want authorities to make their CPOs earlier in the delivery process of a scheme. That will encourage authorities to make their CPOs concurrently with seeking other consents, rather than sequentially after obtaining other consents. Introducing conditional confirmation will support that aim.

To reassure hon. Members, that does not mean that insufficiently prepared CPOs or CPOs without sufficient justification will be conditionally confirmed. The test of there being a compelling case in the public interest to confirm the CPO will absolutely remain. We expect only very specific conditions to be imposed in most cases—one or possibly two to a CPO that otherwise shows a compelling case in the public interest. Guidance will be updated to provide clarity on the imposition of conditions. Initial confirmations will be a significant lever to provide authorities with more confidence in using CPOs and to deliver schemes more quickly.

Clause 144 gives effect to schedule 14, which makes provision in relation to compulsory purchases by Ministers, corresponding to clauses 141 to 143. Given that Ministers may use compulsory purchase in a number of circumstances —for example, to deliver major highway or rail schemes—it is only right that those provisions benefit from improvements to the process. I hope I can get the support of all hon. Members for the clauses.

[Matthew Pennycook]

The Minister referred to at least two further sets of guidance that are to follow. Can she give the Committee any sense of the timeline for that?

[Dehenna Davison]

I cannot today, but I will endeavour to write to the hon. Gentleman within the next 48 hours to provide that clarity.

Question put and agreed to.

Clause 140 accordingly ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Clauses 141 to 144 ordered to stand part of the Bill.

Schedule 14 agreed to.

Clause 145

Consequential amendments relating to date of operation

Question proposed, That the clause stand part of the Bill.

[Dehenna Davison]

I sincerely hope that we can get agreement for these clauses. New clause 62 goes further to deliver the Government’s priority to ensure that the compulsory purchase system is fit for purpose. It will build on other measures to ensure a fair balance between landowners and acquiring authorities in the public interest when it comes to the payment of compensation.

The Land Compensation Act 1961 contains the principal rules for assessing compensation relating to compulsory purchase. Under the current rules, when assessing the open market value of the land to be acquired, there are statutory assumptions that must be taken into account. They include the discounting effects of the compulsory purchase scheme, known as the no scheme principle, and considering the planning prospects of the land being acquired. The latter gives rise to landowners being able to claim hope value as part of their compensation—an issue that has attracted significant attention in recent years, including from the Levelling Up, Housing and Communities Committee.

One method of assessing the prospect of planning consent is to establish appropriate alternative development, namely development that would have received planning permission if the scheme underpinning the compulsory purchase were cancelled. Where appropriate alternative development is established, it may be assumed for valuation purposes that planning permission is in force on the relevant valuation date. That is known as planning certainty. Assuming the value of the appropriate alternative development is greater than the existing use value creates an uplift in the value of the land.

The 1961 Act allows parties concerned with a compulsory purchase to apply to a local planning authority for a certificate to determine whether there is development that, in its opinion, would constitute appropriate alternative development. Certificates of appropriate alternative development, CAADs, are used as a tool to establish whether there is appropriate alternative development on a site, and thus planning certainty for valuation purposes.

Under the current rules, there is no requirement for a CAAD to be applied to establish planning certainty and secure any resulting uplift in the value of land. In addition, when issuing a certificate, local planning authorities are required to identify all developments that they think are appropriate developments, not just developments that match the description of the development being applied for. That can increase the administrative burden on a local planning authority’s resources and the risk of a legal challenge, which results in further costs to the authority and the taxpayer. Expenses incurred by applicants submitting their CAAD applications must be paid for by acquiring authorities.

My Department has been working closely with stakeholders to develop a package of measures to reform the CAAD process and ensure that the assessment of the prospect of planning permission is aligned with normal market conditions. It is important that a balance is struck between landowners and acquiring authorities. We are therefore seeking to introduce Government new clause 62 to ensure that the compulsory purchase compensation regime does not deliver elevated levels of compensation for prospective planning permissions, which would result in more than fair value being paid. That will be achieved by ensuring that compensation attributed to alternative development is claimable only via the issuing of a CAAD and, further, that value attributable to potential alternative development in the future cannot be claimed. Although the prospect of planning permission will still be claimable, our new clause will bring the assessment of value attributable to prospective planning permission in line with the position in a normal market transaction. It will also ensure that valuations of hope value are not disproportionate.

We are very clear that those affected by compulsory purchase are entitled to a fair value for their land, but we want to ensure that the compulsory purchase compensation regime does not lead to elevated compensation, including costs being paid for prospective planning permission, which would result in more than fair value being paid by local authorities, and thus by the taxpayer. I hope that the whole Committee will support Government new clause 62.

[Matthew Pennycook]

I thank the Minister for that very detailed exposition of the purpose of the new clause. She will be pleased to learn that, in general terms, we are supportive of the provisions in part 7 of the Bill, which concerns compulsory purchase. They are sensible and proportionate measures that will give local authorities clearer, more efficient and more effective powers; greater confidence that they can acquire land by compulsion to support regeneration schemes; and greater certainty that land can be assembled and schemes delivered quickly through compulsory purchase.

We also support the Government new clause, which concerns compensation in relation to hope value. The cost of land is a major barrier—only one of many—to development across the country, and to increasing investment in infrastructure and affordable housing. As the Minister made clear, land values are frequently inflated well above agricultural or industrial values because of hope value—that is, the value attributed to the expectation that land could be awarded planning permission for new housing.

Hope value often makes social housebuilding and the provision of infrastructure unviable for local authorities and developers, and the fact that it is based on the assumption that each plot of land will maximise short-term profitability disincentivises long-term value generation. A landowner with a plot of land that might be ideal for specialist or affordable housing, or other essential uses that the market has no incentive whatsoever to deliver, can under the current regime always choose to refrain from developing it, in the expectation that they will receive a far better price in the future for a standard scheme dominated by market-sale homes at current prices.

The 2020 White Paper, “Planning for the Future”, rightly recognised that less than half of the uplift in land values created by the granting of planning permission is being captured by communities to help to pay for infrastructure and affordable housing. Given the demands on captured value when it comes to infrastructure and affordable housing, we agree with the Government that it is right to seek to reform the system, in order to ensure that assessment of value attributable to the likelihood of alternative development is more akin to what it would be in normal market conditions, and to rebalance the position with regard to costs and compensation between landowner and acquiring authority to make it fairer. To that end, we believe that the Government new clause, which proposes implementing a range of changes to section 14 and other sections of the Land Compensation Act 1961, as set out in the first part of the Government’s compulsory purchase compensation reforms consultation, published in June, is good. We are pleased that the Government felt able to bring it forward.

Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill (Twenty Third sitting)

Matthew Pennycook Excerpts

Committee stage
Thursday 13th October 2022 Public Bill Committees

[Dehenna Davison]

Part 9 of the Bill will greatly enhance our understanding of who owns or controls land and property. To assist the economy to grow, the Government need to break down any barriers and find key tools that ensure our property market is fair, open, competitive and resilient. One big barrier at the moment is information asymmetries. The land market in England and Wales currently lacks full transparency, particularly when land control arrangements are used—opaque arrangements short of ownerships such as options and conditional contracts.

The Government are determined, for the benefit of us all, to shine a light on complex arrangements used to control land and property. Clause 178 allows the Secretary of State to expand the collection of information about legal and beneficial ownership of land and property in England and Wales. We intend to use the power to dig deep into opaque ownership, and to control structures into narrow use cases.

First, the power will ensure that landlords responsible for the cost of remediating unsafe buildings under the Building Safety Act 2022 do not avoid their liabilities. Some are seeking to avoid their remediation responsibilities and frustrate the Act through the use of obscure structures. A targeted power will help to cut through that, and will allow us to ensure that works are carried out swiftly, so that we avoid continued costs for leaseholders and calls on the Government’s legal budget. Secondly, the power will allow the intelligence and security agencies to identify opportunities for hostile actors to misuse properties in the vicinity of sensitive sites and put national security at risk.

Clause 179 further expands the Secretary of State’s power to collect information on certain specified types of arrangements used to control land. The powers will allow us, for the first time, to collect information on arrangements used by developers and others to control land. I would like to share some facts and statistics about the extent of land control arrangements, and the impacts that the practice has on the housing market, but I cannot, because Ministers and the public are blindfolded on that point. We have no accurate data on the area of land that is subject to such controls, although we suspect that it is substantial. That means that it is hard for local authorities, communities and businesses to identify who controls developable sites. In many areas, that hampers good place-making and slows down development of new areas for people to live in and thrive in.

Collecting and publishing information about land control arrangements will give communities and local authorities a better understanding of who controls land in their area, and addresses those barriers. It will also provide Government with additional information that will allow them to understand who exercises control over land and property, even where that person is not the legal owner. It will provide the basis for assessing that hidden market and producing evidence-based policy.

To implement these powers effectively, we must retain the flexibility to respond swiftly to attempts to avoid or evade this legislation, and ensure that we have all the information we need to unpick the complex and opaque structures used by some to hide their ownership or control. Clause 180 specifies the key information that must be set out in statutory instruments before the powers under the previous two clauses can be used. Parliament will have the opportunity to debate and approve all regulations made under this part of the Bill before they come into force, and all draft instruments will be laid before the House under the affirmative procedure.

Clause 181 allows for the retention, sharing within Government and publication of information collected under clauses 178 and 179. In her Second Reading speech, the shadow Secretary of State, the hon. Member for Wigan (Lisa Nandy), expressed concerns that we were seeking to withhold information on arrangements used by developers to control land. I am pleased to reassure her, and members of the Committee, that we will publish such data as machine-readable open data, in line with our commitments, set out in the 2017 housing White Paper, to improve the transparency of those arrangements and—our key motivations behind the measure—to make the land market more transparent and competitive.

Bearing in mind privacy and security considerations, it is the Government’s intention that other types of information collected—but not published—will be shared with and used by Government bodies to carry out their functions; for example, they could be used for the enhancement of national security and the implementation of the Building Safety Act 2022.

Clause 181 allows for the payment of fees to cover the costs of collecting that information. As our proposals are designed to work with the grain of existing processes, we expect that any fees, if charged at all, would be modest. To be clear, regulations creating any such fee must be made under the affirmative procedure, so Parliament would have to approve them first.

Clause 182 allows the creation of criminal offences by regulation, so that penalties could be imposed on those who failed to comply with requirements to provide information, or who provided false or misleading information. In the overwhelming majority of cases, we expect that people will comply, but the steps that we are taking through this legislation to increase transparency about the ownership and control of property will be disruptive to dishonest actors, or those seeking to conceal their ownership or control of land and property. The stringent transparency measures are, in part, designed to deter nefarious activity or the avoidance of other initiatives aimed at increasing transparency. It would be naive to assume that there are not those who will try very hard to avoid their obligations. That is why that power is so important. The final clause in this part, clause 183, is a technical clause that sets out key definitions. I hope that is non-contentious.

In summary, together, these clauses will provide crucial tools to ensure that our property market is fair, transparent, competitive and resilient. I commend them to the Committee.

[Matthew Pennycook (Greenwich and Woolwich) (Lab)]

Part 9 is one of the less remarked-on parts of the Bill, but it contains important measures. As the Minister outlined, it provides for enabling powers that require the disclosure of information relating to the ownership and control of land in England and Wales, including transactional information.

Labour fully supports the goal of increasing transparency and accountability in respect of the ownership and control of land that could be used for development, as well as transactional information relating to instruments, contracts and other arrangements. We agree with the Government that reform in this area has the potential to help expose anti-competitive behaviour by developers, tackle strategic land banking, aid smaller-sized enterprises to acquire land for development, facilitate more effective land assembly by local authorities and others, and help communities to better understand the likely path of development in their area. As the Minister rightly said, reform will also help to ensure that where buildings are defective in terms of building safety and require remediation, those works are undertaken as swiftly as possible.

New Developments on Green-belt Land

Matthew Pennycook Excerpts

Wednesday 12th October 2022 Westminster Hall

[Matthew Pennycook (Greenwich and Woolwich) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve with you in the Chair, Sir Gary. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Coventry North West (Taiwo Owatemi) not only on securing a debate that is clearly of great importance to the communities that she represents, but on her willingness to tackle at length a subject that is controversial and has arguably failed to receive the attention it deserves in this place. I also thank all right hon. and hon. Members who have taken part this morning in what has been a lively, interesting and thoughtful session.

In opening the debate, my hon. Friend outlined with her customary forcefulness her concern about the large-scale green belt release that has been authorised on the fringes of her Coventry constituency. The individual cases she mentioned are complex and I do not intend to comment on them in detail, other than to say that, more than anything, they illustrate the difficult position in which individual local authorities are placed in the absence of effective sub-regional frameworks for managing housing growth.

My hon. Friend was also at pains to situate the general issues arising from green-belt development in her city within the context of Britain’s housing crisis, and she was right to do so. After all, the point at issue here is not whether green belts have value and can provide for public recreation, contact with nature and habitat maintenance, which they do. Rather, it is whether green-belt land should be released to meet the significant housing need that now exists across England and, if so, how much and under what circumstances.

When it comes to the green belt, what should be in many ways a relatively dispassionate debate consistently provokes intense emotion and polarisation. That is partly because housing development, by its very nature, will always be a contentious issue, but that fact alone cannot account for the strength of feeling generated by this issue.

I would suggest that at least two other factors underlie the passions provoked by the green belt. The first is that any consideration of the green belt as policy labours under a series of misconceptions. Chief among them is the falsehood, which was mentioned by the right hon. Member for East Hampshire (Damian Hinds), that green belt is always and everywhere green fields, as opposed to the reality, which is that, at least on the edges of most major cities, green belts include abandoned industrial buildings, petrol stations, scrubland, motorways, farmland, golf courses and nature-rich green fields. 

The second misconception is that, more often than not, any debate about the future of the green belt is framed as an irreconcilable choice between two flawed options— namely, the complete abolition of green belts or rendering their present boundaries entirely sacrosanct. A more honest and nuanced approach is long overdue—one that recognises that the green belt has served England’s towns and cities very well over many decades, in terms of its original aim of preventing unlimited urban sprawl, and that it must be retained for that purpose. We also need to accept that the green belt’s existence has come at a cost, in terms of constrained housing supply, growing problems with affordability and problematic development displacement, and that there is a strong case for looking again at how the policy should operate in the years ahead.

The Labour party fully supports the prioritisation of brownfield development. We remain committed to preserving the green belt and would resist any attempts to abolish it, as per the long-held wishes of those for whom nothing short of total planning deregulation will suffice. Not only are green belts not to blame for all the country’s housing shortage ills, but their removal would without question trigger a tsunami of land speculation and an increase in low-quality, high-cost and infra- structure-deficient development of the kind that, as we have heard, is already far too commonplace.

However, we are equally opposed to any attempt, along the lines mooted by the right hon. Member for Richmond (Yorks) (Rishi Sunak) in the recent Conservative leadership contest, to prevent green-belt land from being released for development under any circumstances. The truth is that there are certain types of land within green-belt boundaries—for example, brownfield land within green belt or poor monocultural farmland next to key transport hubs—that are ideally suited for development. Politicians who argue that every inch of green-belt land should be forever off limits are doing the public a disservice.

[Sir Gavin Williamson]

I wish to respectfully correct the hon. Gentleman. He is referring to already developed land—he talked about petrol stations and industrial areas—but actually that sits outside the green-belt designation. Green-belt designation does not include previously developed industrial land.

[Matthew Pennycook]

I disagree with the right hon. Gentleman; I think he is wrong on that point. It includes brownfield land and land that has previously been developed. That is part of the problem: there is a misconception that green belt always equals greenfield, but it does not. I will talk about the distinction in a minute, because it is important for how we might go forward.

The debate we should be having is not a rehash of the stale exchanges between those who wish to abolish the green belt entirely and those who wish to render it inviolable. It should instead focus on what the Government need to do to ensure that more of the right bits of the green belt are released for development, that land-value capture is maximised on those sites so that the communities in question can benefit from first-class infrastructure and more affordable housing, and that green-belt land with the highest environmental and amenity value is properly protected, enhanced and made more accessible. The selective release of green belt should increase, rather than decrease, the opportunities for urban communities to benefit from green space and nature.

In our view, any approach to green-belt development must be premised on the involvement of local communities. More needs to be done to ensure that local authorities routinely review green-belt land as part of the local plan-making process, and that they have the freedom to take a balanced view of how green-belt land within their boundaries is managed. We also want to see a more meaningful role for the public in determining which areas of green-belt land are permanently protected, which are improved and made more accessible, and which, if any, might be appropriate for new homes.

Perhaps most importantly, any green-belt development must deliver tangible benefits for local communities. As my hon. Friend the Member for Coventry North West ably outlined, the problem is that in far too many cases today, green-belt land is being transformed into ill-planned neighbourhoods full of overpriced executive homes with the inevitable community backlash that that results in. That point was also made by my hon. Friends the Members for City of Chester (Christian Matheson) and for Reading East (Matt Rodda), and by the hon. Member for Lewes (Maria Caulfield).

Ensuring that green-belt development leads to beautiful and well-serviced neighbourhoods with good access to improved green open spaces and homes that are genuinely affordable for local people would require reform, not least to enable local authorities to acquire the land at a reasonable price, but that is entirely feasible if the political will exists. We can debate the precise delivery mechanisms, but Labour believes that the case for more effectively facilitated, very limited development on poor-quality land within green belts in areas where it is most needed, in a way that meets local housing need, while at the same time protecting and enhancing high-quality green-belt land for the benefit of the public, is unarguable.

The alternative—here I take issue with the right hon. Member for South Staffordshire (Sir Gavin Williamson)—is to accept what is already taking place: namely, the progressive loss of all kinds of green-belt land, including greenfield and high-quality green-belt land, via haphazard and speculative fringe development, often of poor quality and via appeal. Doing so also sets aside a potentially valuable means of boosting housing supply, simply because it is too politically sensitive.

In the face of a housing crisis that is our country’s most pernicious iniquity, blighting the lives of millions, the notion that every part of the green belt is sacrosanct cannot be justified. It is high time for a serious debate about the role that a reimagined green belt can play in tackling the crisis. I look forward to hearing from the new Minister, and I once again welcome him to his place. I hope he can clarify not just what the Government intend to do to prevent the ongoing release of high-quality, nature-rich green-belt land of the kind we have heard about, but what the Government’s thinking on the green belt now is more generally, given that in the space of just three years the present Prime Minister has called both for a million homes to be built on green-belt land and for no green-belt development whatsoever to take place.

--- Later in debate ---

[Matthew Pennycook]

Will the Minister give way?

[Lee Rowley]

I really must make progress.

The hon. Member for Coventry North West talked about a failure to address issues in planning. I accept that there are always challenges in planning, but I wish to put on the record the importance of the 2 million new houses that have been built over the last 12 years—2 million families have had the opportunity to realise their dream of home ownership. Some 600,000 of those are affordable homes, and 242,000 were built in 2019 alone. Billions of pounds, whatever our views on whether that is sufficient, will have come forward in infrastructure to support communities.

The hon. Member for Coventry North West also highlighted the challenges in how the system works. I absolutely accept that there are challenges in how the system works, but ultimately this is a process where local authorities—I will not mention specific councils—have the power to bring forward a plan at the time that they wish. They should understand the context in which local plans are brought forward. They have the ability to both include and exclude locations, and they can set the overall framework in which development happens in a local area.

There is then clarity that allows developers, communities, individuals and those who are affected to understand what will and will not happen. Some authorities do that well. Some of those that perhaps do it less well could learn. I am unable to comment on Coventry specifically, but I hope the hon. Lady and her colleagues from the city will reflect on that.

[Matthew Pennycook]

Will the Minister give way?

[Lee Rowley]

I need to make progress—I have only a few minutes. My right hon. Friend the Member for South Staffordshire (Sir Gavin Williamson) talked about the duty to co-operate, and I hope we will be able to make further announcements on that in due course. I am happy to discuss it with him separately if that helps, given his interest in it.

Colleagues from various constituencies, including the hon. Member for Reading East (Matt Rodda) and my hon. Friend the Member for Eastbourne (Caroline Ansell), talked about brownfield land. I absolutely accept the huge importance of developing on brownfield land. As I highlighted, the national planning policy framework indicates the importance of that. A substantial amount of taxpayer subsidy has already been brought forward for brownfield land. There was only one announcement, back in July. I hope that, if hon. Members’ local authorities had the opportunity to bid into that brownfield land fund between July and August this year, they did so. Should it be appropriate, it is important that local authorities take opportunities to bid to build on brownfield land, and that they think through what they can do locally to bring forward additional brownfield land.

The hon. Member for York Central (Rachael Maskell) talked about investment zones. I place on the record that the expression of interest guidance for investment zones is clear on the environment: mitigation would be required of any environmental impacts of proposed investment zones. If local authorities that apply do not concur with that, their application would be failed. That is publicly available in the guidance on expressions of interest.

My right hon. Friend the Member for East Hampshire (Damian Hinds) made strong points about the importance of a diversity of approaches to ensure that we support housing need in local areas. I am happy to talk to him more about the land constraint point that he highlighted.

The hon. Member for City of Chester talked about the importance of green belt, which I have already talked about. I wholeheartedly concur with him on that point. He also highlighted water and storage facilities. Paragraph 160 of the NPPF covers that, but if there is a specific point he thinks I should be made aware of, I would be happy to talk to him separately.

My hon. Friends the Members for Eastbourne and for Lewes (Maria Caulfield) talked about specific applications. I am afraid that I am unable to talk about those, but my hon. Friends have noted them. I completely agree with my hon. Friend the Member for Lewes about the importance of neighbourhood plans and the involvement of local areas in them. I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Rugby (Mark Pawsey) for raising the issue about his locality. Within the bounds of appropriateness, I am happy to receive further representations on that and to talk about it. I am also grateful to the hon. Member for Reading East for highlighting the brownfield element.

In the 30 seconds that remain, I again thank all colleagues for their comments. It has been a useful and helpful debate, and I look forward to further discussions. If there were simple answers on this issue, I am not sure that we would be here today. If there were easy ways to resolve the very difficult trade-offs, I am sure that my many predecessors would have done so years ago, as I have been told on a number of occasions. However, it is good to talk and to understand the concerns in local areas. I am grateful both to the hon. Member for Coventry North West for securing the debate and to everybody for their contributions to it.