Infrastructure (Financial Assistance) Bill

Debate between Nick Raynsford and Crispin Blunt

Monday 15th October 2012 Commons Chamber

[Mr Blunt]

That is fine, but the borough councillors of Reigate of Banstead, as the planning authority, have a mandate from their local electors and they are perfectly capable of making decisions about the requirements for housing in the area and to weigh up the competing factors. That is the mandate they enjoy from local people and, as far as I am concerned, there is no need for the view that the gentleman in Whitehall knows best. If there is going to be a wider economic case for building, it needs to be made with great clarity. If that needs to be done with infrastructure of major national significance, there are bound to be occasions when local interests will have to be overridden in the wider national interest. As far as housing is concerned, the arguments are certainly significantly weaker in that regard than they are for actual national infrastructure, the benefits of which we will enjoy for decades to come. If we have too much jerry-built housing, we will then have to live with the environmental consequences for generations.

[Mr Raynsford]

I draw attention to the interests declared in my entry in the register.

I disagree with the hon. Member for Reigate (Mr Blunt), but I do not intend to engage in a debate with him. I will simply say that I think he is in for a big disappointment and that he clearly did not listen to the statement that the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government made about changes to the planning system that will allow him to refer a whole series of matters to the Planning Inspectorate when he does not agree with a local council’s decision. I am afraid that that is where the Government have got to in relation to localism. However, I do not intend to enter into that debate.

I entirely understand why the hon. Member for Reigate misinterpreted the effect of amendment 2, because the amendment paper gives the impression that it was designed to refer only to housing of “national significance”. It was not. It is simply that housing is the last item prior to the next clause. My reference to “national significance” applies to all the items, including roads, sewers and all the rest, as well as housing. The purpose of the amendment, which is what I will focus on, is to limit the impact of the definition of the Bill to schemes of national significance.

[Mr Blunt]

I am extremely grateful to the right hon. Gentleman for that clarification following my inability to read his amendment properly. On the planning point, and with respect to his long-established expertise and experience in this area, if he thinks that green-belt constituencies such as mine are liable to be affected under the changes he has identified, I am in the market for his advice.

[Mr Raynsford]

I said that I did not intend to engage in a debate on that subject. I believe that we need a great deal more housing in this country, but I will not engage with the hon. Gentleman in a debate about his constituency, which he knows much better than I do, and I certainly would not advocate extensive building on the green belt, which would be entirely inappropriate. I was simply drawing attention to the fact that the Secretary of State’s recent decision on planning, which came a mere three or four months after the national planning policy framework was put in place, withdrew many of the original localist hopes about allowing decisions to rest with the local authority and made it clear that he would refer items over the local authority’s head to the Planning Inspectorate. To me, that is not localism, but let us leave it there.

I tabled the amendments simply to try to get clarity and focus on the uses and application of the Bill. As drafted, it is incredibly broad. I do not object to the definition set out in clause 1(2), but the definition in clause 1(3) states:

‘“Provision” includes acquisition, design, construction, conversion, improvement, operation and repair.’

As the right hon. Member for Wokingham (Mr Redwood) pointed out, subsection (4) defines financial assistance as covering a whole range of activities, including

“loans, guarantees or indemnities, or any other kind of financial assistance”.

In theory at least, that definition would allow the Government to offer a guarantee literally on the repair of a door in a school or prison. Although that work might be entirely necessary and desirable, it is clearly nonsense for the provisions in this Bill, which are designed to allow major infrastructure schemes that are stalled for financial reasons to proceed. That is the purpose of the Bill.