Unauthorised Encampments (Brighton)

Nigel Adams Excerpts

Wednesday 15th June 2011 Westminster Hall

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government (Robert Neill)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Streeter. I apologise to you and to my hon. Friend the Member for Brighton, Kemptown (Simon Kirby) for arriving a little late and missing the very beginning of his speech, but I quickly caught up with the gist of it. We will get the clocks department at the Department for Communities and Local Government checked.

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for raising this issue and to those Members who have participated. From my postbag as a Minister and from the postbags of my colleagues, I recognise the strength of feeling among Members of the House and constituents on this issue. I am also aware of it from my experience as a constituency Member of Parliament; indeed, my next-door neighbour, my hon. Friend the Member for Beckenham (Bob Stewart), inherited the site he talked about from me in the boundary revision. The issue therefore needs to be approached proportionately.

Without being invidious to others, perhaps I can single out one of the Members who intervened. My right hon. Friend the Member for Mid Sussex (Nicholas Soames)—I hope that I may call him that already, and I am delighted to be able to use that term, which is thoroughly well-deserved—got it absolutely right: the key test is fairness, a sense of balance and consistency, and that is where the difficulty arises.

The Government recognise that Gypsies and Travellers have a right to exercise their traditional lifestyle. It is equally true, however, that anyone exercising their lifestyle must have regard to the concerns of their neighbours and the communities in which they live. The Government are seeking to achieve balance and consistency on that. When there is a perception that one group can, for whatever reason, achieve objectives that other members of the community cannot, perceptions of unfairness arise. As my right hon. Friend rightly said, that presents a risk to community cohesion. The Government want to address the issue in a way that recognises that the majority of Travellers behave lawfully and properly. However, the minority who do not do so make life much harder for the law-abiding majority, as well as for their neighbours. We therefore seek to strike a balance.

We have sought to adopt a proportionate twin-tracked approach. We have abolished the regional strategies, because arbitrarily imposed, top-down targets on Traveller site provision did not work, alienated communities and did not always accurately reflect the need on the ground. On the other hand, we have sought to encourage the appropriate provision of more authorised sites in the right places. To that end, future authorised sites will attract the new homes bonus. We are also making available £60 million to support local authorities and other authorised providers in delivering further authorised sites.

We have set up a cross-departmental working group to look at some of the welfare issues that hon. Members mentioned. We have recognised that those who live on authorised sites are entitled to a measure of legal protection. Since 30 April, we have strengthened their position by applying the Mobile Homes Act 1983 to local authority authorised sites, giving people living on such sites greater security of tenure. All those are incentives to encourage Traveller families to seek authorised sites. That, therefore, is the positive side—the assistance to Travellers, which is an important part of the mix.

On the other hand, we recognise that it is necessary to strengthen enforcement provisions in relation to unauthorised sites, because those are where the damage to community relations and the environment is done. As well as abolishing the regional strategies, which were unfair and ineffective and which caused resentment, we have published proposals for a new planning policy for Traveller sites. They were published for consultation on 13 April, and the consultation will close on 6 July. We have already had a lot of responses.

The proposals seek to remove the two existing circulars—one on Gypsy Travellers and the other on travelling show people—that were introduced under the previous Administration. They have not worked effectively and have caused inconsistency and resentment. We intend to replace them with the light-touch guidance we have set out in the consultation document, which will provide a fairer balance. We have not yet removed the circulars, because there must, as you will know, Mr Streeter, be proper consultation on all such matters. However, it is worth bearing it in mind—local authorities should bear this in mind—that the Government’s intention to revoke the circulars is itself a material consideration, which local planning authorities can take into account when deciding to act on planning or enforcement matters, as is normally the case in planning law.

[Nigel Adams (Selby and Ainsty) (Con)]

When the Government consultation ends in July, will information be made available on the allocation of sites? Will local authorities be given advice about numbers and the methodology for calculating the allocation of pitches?