Planning and Infrastructure Bill

Munira Wilson Excerpts

Report stage
Tuesday 10th June 2025 Commons Chamber

[Munira Wilson (Twickenham) (LD)]

It is an honour to speak in this important debate. I will address three amendments that stand in my name: amendments 88 and 89, which go together and relate to hope value, and new clause 107, which relates to the disposal of public land.

Amendments 88 and 89 are linked and represent a simple yet important change to the Bill. They would extend the circumstances in which hope value may be disregarded in the event of a compulsory purchase order to include playing fields and recreational facilities. I and my Liberal Democrat colleagues warmly welcome the important changes in the Bill. Ministers have brought forward measures to reform the CPO process for the purpose of building more affordable homes, so that hope value no longer over-inflates land prices for acquiring authorities. However, I believe that a prime opportunity has been missed. As such, my amendments seek to include recreational facilities such as playing fields in these provisions when an acquiring authority—for instance, a local authority—is using a compulsory purchase order to acquire land for use as a sports or recreational facility. They would ensure that hope value would not be applied, thus making the cost more affordable and helping to boost grassroots sports provision in communities up and down the country.

We in Twickenham, Teddington, the Hamptons, St Margarets and Whitton are incredibly fortunate to have a thriving grassroots sports scene, from football to cricket, rugby, hockey, tennis and much more. Girls’ and women’s football is just one example of the continued growth in grassroots sports in my constituency; my own daughter plays with the growing number of girls’ teams at Whitton Wanderers, and Twickenham Cygnets now boasts over 300 girls and has 40 women—Twickenham Swans—on its books. However, they are at the point of turning more away because they simply cannot get the pitch space to train and play matches. This problem affects many clubs across the country, and certainly right across the London borough of Richmond upon Thames. At the same time, we have the absolute scandal of Udney Park playing fields in Teddington lying derelict for more than a decade, with successive developers paying over the odds for the site, only to be rightly prevented from developing it; that precious site has numerous protections attached to it.

The brilliant Udney Park Community Fields Foundation —a community group in my constituency led by Jonathan Dunn, who has been a tireless campaigner for grassroots sports—has repeatedly bid for the site to bring the playing fields back into community use. The current owner has given notice that he wants to sell the playing fields, but has not engaged with the foundation at a realistic playing fields valuation. Trying to recoup a high purchase price for this precious and well-protected site does not look feasible. Extending the Bill’s provisions to playing fields to allow hope value to be disregarded for a compulsory purchase order could allow such sites to be acquired by the local authority or another public body.

Richmond council, like many other local authorities, is hardly awash with cash, but simply having that provision in law would provide leverage for community groups when they have to negotiate with developers, as we have seen in the case of Udney Park. I am certain that Udney Park is not the only example where this is happening. I was therefore extremely disappointed by the Minister’s response to these amendments in Committee, which, with all due respect, was contradictory. He rejected them on the following basis:

“Affordable housing, education and health are types of public sector-led development where the public benefits facilitated through the non-payment of hope value can be directly demonstrable to local communities. The Government have concerns that the provisions would be less compelling for sporting and recreational facilities.”––[Official Report, Planning and Infrastructure Public Bill Committee, 20 May 2025; c. 489.]

I say that sport and physical activity are critical to physical and mental health, and he said that health is an important public benefit for the purposes of disregarding hope value.

Just yesterday, Ministers in the Department for Culture, Media and Sport stated that the Government

“are committed to supporting the growth of grassroots sports across the UK.”

The Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport made a brilliant speech last night at an event attended by many Members in this place to launch the inspirational Lionesses’ campaign to defend their European crown. She was passionate about the importance of grassroots sports and extending opportunity to every community. She has announced £100 million of investment in grassroots sports facilities, which is extremely welcome.

The change proposed through my amendments would help Ministers to achieve the important objective of expanding sports and recreation grounds without costing them a penny. It would not encroach on the principle that the use of CPO powers must be proportionate and justified in the public interest, given that Ministers have so strongly and correctly championed the growth of grassroots sport across the UK as being in the public interest. The amendments would apply solely to land that is already sports field or recreational land, where there is local need for that sports and recreational facility and it is at risk of loss to speculative development.

It is entirely proportionate and justified in the public interest that CPO powers and the removal of hope value should apply in such circumstances, so it defies all logic that Ministers have not embraced this change and that they continue to oppose it. I look forward to hearing an explanation from the Minister. I hope he will at least commit to engaging further on this issue as the Bill moves to the other place. Perhaps he will meet me to discuss it, rather than dismissing it completely.

Let me turn to new clause 107, which is also in my name. There is cross-party consensus on the dire need for more housing across our country. The Liberal Democrats have a strong commitment to delivering desperately needed social housing, so it was disappointing to see Labour Members vote against our amendment 15 last night to write a social housing target into law. One important way to secure sites for social and affordable housing is when public bodies dispose of land and buildings. In constituencies such as mine, with its royal park, a river and other important protected parks and spaces, sites are few and far between, yet week in, week out I see cases in my inbox and at my constituency surgeries of families on the social housing waiting list for years, with little hope of getting out of desperately overcrowded and unsuitable accommodation.

I am incredibly proud that Liberal Democrat-run Richmond council has consistently sought to repurpose, and sell below market value, sites that it owns but no longer needs to provide for more social homes from which families in my constituency can benefit. The council has done this despite the immense pressures on local government funding, but sadly other public bodies do not feel able to do the same, whether they are national Government Departments such as the Ministry of Defence, key public services such as the Metropolitan police, or arm’s length bodies such as NHS England. They all want to achieve as high a price as they can when selling assets that they no longer need in order to be able to invest in frontline public services. That is a laudable and important aim, but it prices social housing providers, and other public service providers, out of the market, while losing assets from the public sector balance sheet at the same time.

New clause 107 would fill the gaps in the existing patchwork of legislation and regulation that is somewhat piecemeal in the public bodies included and is not properly used to allow all public sector bodies to sell assets below market value for public benefit, whether that is for social housing or for much-needed community infrastructure like health facilities or a community centre. Not only would it extend that provision to all public bodies; it would go further still by imposing a duty on all public bodies to at least consider disposing of assets for public good.

This wide-ranging new clause builds on my successful campaign in the last Parliament, when I worked with a succession of Conservative Housing Ministers to secure a change in the then Bill, which became the Levelling-up and Regeneration Act 2023, that included police authorities under existing provisions to sell public assets below market value for public good. My campaign was born of frustration about the fact that the disused Teddington police station lies derelict in my constituency. A local housing association and the Park Road GP surgery are desperate to obtain the site to expand and provide state-of-the-art GP facilities on the ground floor, as well as much-needed social housing on the floors above. This Government think that all members of the public are blockers, but I can tell the Minister that the Teddington community are right behind my campaign, and we will fight tooth and nail to ensure that when the Met puts the site on the market we can obtain the GP surgery and housing that our community desperately need at a reasonable price, which will almost certainly not be as high as private developers can offer.

I secured the legislative basis to achieve that ambition in the Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill, but in many other cases the provision is not there or is not used. Furthermore, the amount below market value for which some public sector bodies can dispose of their assets has not been updated since 2003. New clause 107 seeks to address that anomaly, although I note that the Conservative Government made a commitment to consulting on and reviewing the amount—something that did not happen before they left office, and something that the present Government have not implemented since they took power last year.

The Chancellor herself has previously said that surplus Government land is a

“huge untapped resource that could create opportunities for the next generation of homeowners.”

I warmly welcomed the news in March that Network Rail would set up a property company to use surplus land for house building. There is so much more than just Network Rail land, but we need both the legislative basis for public sector disposals below market value and the incentives to achieve those sales. I do not blame the Metropolitan Police Commissioner for wanting to get top dollar for Teddington police station, especially when I read about the cuts that he is having to make to frontline policing and the intransigence of the Treasury when it comes to proper funding for the community policing that the Government have promised.

I say to Ministers that this is robbing Peter to pay Paul. We need a duty on all public bodies, and financial incentives from the Treasury for them to repurpose or sell their assets for community good. We can achieve the homes and public services that our country desperately needs, not by ripping up our green belt and precious open spaces but by thinking creatively about how we repurpose existing sites, including those already owned by the taxpayer. I look forward to hearing the Minister’s response.

[Robbie Moore]

I rise to speak about new clause 127 and amendment 153, both of which are in my name.

Compulsory purchase is a highly emotive and highly controversial subject. Indeed, much of yesterday’s debate was taken up by discussion of precisely the new CPO powers that the Bill will grant to Natural England and local authorities. The fact that under the Bill a farmer in Keighley can be told how to use his land, on pain of a CPO, as a result of a development in Kent is complete and utter madness, but that is exactly the intention of the Bill. No matter where someone owns land, they may be put at detriment by a scheme that is taking place elsewhere. That is exactly what the Government intend to do through the additional CPO powers: to give Natural England—an organisation with which I have huge frustration and which, dare I say it, is not accountable robustly to a Minister—more power to use compulsory purchase orders.

--- Later in debate ---

[Matthew Pennycook]

The Liberal Democrat spokesman tempts me to stray beyond the specific measures in the Bill and how that power can be used. We are clear and have recently issued guidance about how that power can be used.

That leads me helpfully to amendments 68, 88 and 89, which would expand the LURA power in question. Sympathetic as I am to the more frequent removal of hope value from the assessment of compensation, the use of the relevant power must be proportionate and justified in the public interest so that it does not fall foul of article 1 of the first protocol to the European convention on human rights. Seeking to expand the use of the power beyond that test and apply it much more widely is problematic for that reason. I cannot accept the amendments on that basis.

However, I want to make it clear to the hon. Member for Twickenham (Munira Wilson) that use of the direction power can be sought on mixed use schemes that include sports or recreational uses, but within those schemes there must be education provision, health provision or affordable housing provision to justify the use of the power in the public interest. On that specific point, and to respond to the Liberal Democrat spokesman, I confirm that clause 104 does not extend the LURA power to other uses or social objectives; it merely enables parish and town councils to make use of the existing power.

[Munira Wilson]

Will the Minister give way?

[Matthew Pennycook]

I will not give away any more. I want to bring our remarks to a close because, as hon. Members are aware, there is a statement to follow our proceedings on the Bill.

I turn to new clause 85, which would change the lost payments regime under the Land Compensation Act 1973. To be clear, lost payments are an amount of compensation paid to eligible claimants to reflect and recognise the inconvenience and disruption caused by CPOs. They are an additional payment to compensation claimable under the Land Compensation Act 1961 for the market value of land or property taken by compulsory purchase. The new clause would allow claimants to claim compensation for the market value of their interests twice, and result in over-compensation being paid. That would be disproportionate. It would also run counter to the established, overriding principle of equivalence in compensation law where a person subject to compulsory purchase should be left no better or worse off in financial terms after an acquisition than they were before. On that basis, we cannot accept the new clause.

I will touch briefly on new clause 42 in the name of the other shadow Minister, the hon. Member for Ruislip, Northwood and Pinner (David Simmonds), regarding loss payments. It would introduce a change to the loss payment compensation regime under the Land Compensation Act 1973, increasing the amount that occupiers of buildings or land subject to a CPO would be entitled to and placing them on an equal footing with owners. As we discussed at some length in Committee, the Bill already achieves in part what the hon. Gentleman is seeking in the new clause as it increases the loss payment compensation due to occupiers of buildings and land.

The purpose of loss payments is to reflect the inconvenience caused by compulsory purchase. It is occupiers, rather than investor-owners, who bear the greater burden in that respect: they are the ones who will need to close or relocate their businesses. Loss payments are a separate head of claim from compensation paid for land taken under compulsory purchase. The Bill rebalances loss payment compensation to allow occupiers to claim a higher amount and landowners to claim a lower amount. We believe that the rebalancing of loss payment compensation in favour of occupiers is the right approach and will benefit, for example, groups such as tenant farmers, for which Opposition Members have made a case in this afternoon’s debate. On that basis, I am afraid that we cannot accept the amendment and I request that the hon. Member does not press it.