Growth and Infrastructure Bill

Debate between Phillip Lee and Nick Boles

Monday 17th December 2012 Commons Chamber

[Nick Boles]

I have very little time and I need to get on to clause 1. I hope the hon. Gentleman will forgive me if I do not give way right now.

The autumn statement a few weeks ago included another round of £350 million for the regional growth fund and a new local infrastructure fund worth up to £470 million. I hope my right hon. Friend and my other right hon. and hon. Friends will understand that it is not primary legislation that will ensure that local authorities plan properly, as they should, for infrastructure; it is money. Part of the way to get that money is to plan positively for development, because that development will bring the community infrastructure levy and the new homes bonus.

[Dr Phillip Lee (Bracknell) (Con)]

I had the good fortune to be born in the Thames valley and I represent a constituency in the Thames valley. In my lifetime I have watched tens of thousands of homes being built and many industrial estates and business parks. The M4 motorway has never been widened and the hospital has never been built to serve the community that has grown so much. Can my hon. Friend confirm that the levy to which he refers goes towards a new motorway and a new hospital? My region desperately needs them.

[Nick Boles]

It will be for my hon. Friend’s local authority to specify the infrastructure. Those are good examples. The money could go towards a hospital, a school, drains or whatever is required. He is right that that has not been available previously.

Finally, on new clause 11, I make this promise to my right hon. Friend the Member for Arundel and South Downs. We are currently looking at all the planning guidance that is provided to local authorities about how they should go about interpreting the national planning policy framework and putting that into their local plans. Although I do not want to up-end the careful balance of local plans by putting this in primary legislation, I will look at making sure that the guidance that is provided in a much reduced set of planning guidance is very clear about the need to plan positively and specifically for infrastructure that is required to support the development and to ensure that it is brought on stream in good time for that development.

I turn to the general arguments about clause 1. The hon. Member for City of Durham (Roberta Blackman-Woods) and I have debated this at some length over the past few months. It has been my sole objective since the autumn to provide satisfaction to her, so it is a matter of great regret that I seem to have failed in this mission. I will try one last time on clause 1 to persuade her that her fears can be allayed and she, too, can embrace this extremely restrained proposal.

We hope that vanishingly few local authorities will be caught by the measure, but just as we accept that some schools fail and require intervention, and that Ofsted is the right judge of whether they are failing, and some hospitals fail and the Care Quality Commission is the right judge of whether they are failing, we believe it is our responsibility as Government to identify where some—very few—local planning authorities are failing to discharge their responsibilities to local people. That is why we are introducing the clause.