Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill

Stuart Andrew Excerpts

2nd reading
Wednesday 8th June 2022 Commons Chamber

[The Minister for Housing (Stuart Andrew)]

It is my pleasure to deliver the closing speech on Second Reading of the Government’s Levelling Up and Regeneration Bill. I begin by thanking hon. and right hon. Members from all parts of the House for their thoughtful contributions to this afternoon’s debate. Before I address some of the points that have been raised, I should say that accompanying each of the 12 missions in our levelling up White Paper, enshrined in law by this Bill, is a clear commitment from this Government to work with all political parties, across all four nations and all tiers of government, to build a stronger, fairer and more united country after covid.

Despite the negativity we have heard from the Opposition Front Benchers, I am pleased to report that when I go around the country, I find that Mayors and leaders of all political persuasions are keen to work with us to deliver this mission. I believe that the Bill will help us to make this shared vision a reality by supporting local leaders to take back control of regeneration, end the blight of empty shops and deliver the quality homes that communities need. It is about giving them the tools that they need to deliver, along with the other major pieces of work that Government are doing in this area. I am grateful to hon. Members who continue to engage constructively with us on the provisions of this Bill so that it delivers the transformative change that we all want.

[Liam Byrne]

Could the Minister say a word about how he will use the missions to drive the reduction of inequalities in our country? One approach that the Labour Government tried was the use of floor targets in neighbourhood renewal funds. He may have a different approach, but that detail is terribly important.

[Stuart Andrew]

The right hon. Gentleman will have seen that, as the Under-Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, my hon. Friend the Member for Harborough (Neil O’Brien) just reminded me, we have a whole annexe with the measures on that and we will be held to account by Parliament. That is the right thing to do. I cannot recall there ever being missions like this before Parliament so that every single Member of the House can challenge the Government on whether they have reached those objectives; it is a real opportunity for Parliament to hold the Government to account on those missions.

I echo the sentiment of my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State when he said in his opening remarks that we will continue to work closely with right hon. and hon. Members to further hone and refine the legislation before it is put on the statute book. We want to build on our £4.8 billion levelling-up fund which, as hon. Members know well, is supercharging connectivity by building the next generation of roads, bridges, cycle networks and digital infrastructure. Through the UK shared prosperity fund, more than £2.6 billion is being spent to help people in the most deprived parts of the country to access more opportunities and pursue better careers. With more than £2 billion pledged by my Department over the next three years, we are helping local authorities to redouble their efforts to tackle homelessness and rough sleeping, building on the incredible achievements in the pandemic.

I will turn to some of the issues that were raised today. One issue that hon. Members on both sides of the House spoke about, including my hon. Friends the Members for Stoke-on-Trent Central (Jo Gideon) and for Stoke-on-Trent South (Jack Brereton)—I understand that they are calling themselves “levelling-up central”—and the hon. Members for Denton and Reddish (Andrew Gwynne) and for York Central (Rachael Maskell), and my hon. Friends the Members for Gosport (Dame Caroline Dinenage) and for Don Valley (Nick Fletcher), is the importance of breathing new life into our high streets, towns and city centres, all of which were especially hard hit by the covid pandemic and now require investment and support to adapt and thrive.

Many hon. Members spoke about the importance of entrusting councils, which know their areas best, to get on with the job and to green light regeneration schemes in their areas. We agree, which is why the Bill liberates councils to more easily redesign and regenerate their communities. The Bill allows local authorities to hold high street rental auctions so that landlords are encouraged to put empty buildings to good use. It makes the temporary freedoms around al fresco dining permanent, so that we can create more buzzing vibrant high streets. I have listened carefully to my hon. Friend the Member for Cities of London and Westminster (Nickie Aiken) and I will take her thoughts further—well, I would not be allowed not to do so.

Most importantly, the Bill makes it much easier for councils to issue compulsory purchase orders so that they can repurpose boarded-up shops and derelict sites. All those changes are accompanied by a series of common-sense reforms that will mean that no council has to pay over the odds in hope value to landowners when it issues compulsory purchase orders—a small change that will deliver big savings for the public purse. We will publish further details on how we intend to use those powers in the Bill. It should hopefully go without saying that we are more than willing to engage with hon. Members in the process.

One issue that is guaranteed to provoke lively debate in this place is planning reform, as we have seen today. I was going to list all the hon. Members who have raised planning concerns with me, but I suspect that I would run out of time. I am extremely grateful to all hon. Members who have engaged with the Government and with me on that issue over many months. We have listened intently to their feedback, and that is reflected in the fresh reforms that we have set out in the Bill.

Some may defend the status quo and question whether there is still a case for planning reform amid everything else that is going on, but let us look again at the facts. It currently takes on average seven years for councils to prepare a local plan, and, in some cases, five years before a spade even hits the ground. Response rates to a typical pre-planning consultation are around 3%, and that drops to less than 1% in local plan consultations. I say to hon. Members that we cannot deliver the homes that this country needs without planning reform, and we cannot level up communities without the improvements set out in the Bill. As my hon. Friend the Member for South Norfolk (Mr Bacon) rightly pointed out, we need these homes. I commend him for his excellent report and the proposals he has made to help people to build their own homes.

This Bill will simplify the content of local plans and standardise the process in a much shorter time, with improved local engagement. With more local plans in place, there will be far less speculative development, giving communities transparency and a real voice to influence what is built in their area. Our digital reforms will also move us beyond the days of laminated notices on lamp posts to fully accessible planning applications that people can view on their iPads and smartphones at home.

I am, of course, still continuing to listen to hon. Members. On the issue of local housing need and the targets, I should make it clear that they are not targets. They are there to inform the development of a plan, but in reality we know from listening to colleagues that they have been treated rather stringently. As my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State said in his opening comments, we need a more sensible approach and we are looking at that at pace.

[Ben Bradley]

My right hon. Friend rightly points out that planning often leads to a heated debate in this Chamber and can be quite a complicated issue. He also knows that the other elements of the Bill such as devolution, locally-led development corporations and all the other factors can have a huge beneficial impact on our areas. Can he assure me that the complicated planning debates and discussions among colleagues will not be allowed to delay the outcome on those other much more straightforward and well-supported parts of the Bill?

[Stuart Andrew]

My hon. Friend is challenging me to expose my parliamentary expertise, but this is really in the hands of the Committee, so I would ask him to kindly lobby members of the Committee to help me get the Bill through, and I can help him with his aim.

Let me mention a key element that people have been raising, which is the issue of the five-year land supply. If an area has an up-to-date local plan, it will no longer need to demonstrate such a land supply, and that is so that we can stop speculative development.

[Chris Grayling]

Part of the problem we face—for example, in an area where there are small local district councils in charge of planning—is that, however much Ministers may say that targets are not targets, the local officers see them as such and see their task as being to implement a number that has landed on their desk. It is really important during this process that we break free of that. One of the reasons that councils are taking so long to form their plans is, frankly, that it takes so long for them to work out what on earth to do with the targets. Can my right hon. Friend please bear in mind, as he takes the Bill through, how we send clear messages to councils about what they are and what they are not expected to do?

[Stuart Andrew]

I thank my right hon. Friend for that intervention. He knows—we have had a number of conversations on this very issue—that these are the things we are looking at. I look forward to bringing them forward as part of the Bill.

I want to touch on the issue of build out. I have heard loud and clear from colleagues, and so has my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State, about the issue of developers seeming to take a long time from approval to build houses. These commencement orders and an agreed rate of delivery will, we hope, help us to get such permissions built out much more quickly.

A number of Members—my right hon. Friend the Member for Chipping Barnet (Theresa Villiers), my hon. Friend the Member for Buckingham (Greg Smith) and others—have raised their concerns about the national development management policies. One of the key aims of the Bill is to reduce the administrative burden on local councils so that they can concentrate on delivering high-quality, locally-led plans. That is why, through this Bill, we hope to shift the onus of delivering on national priorities to central Government through introducing a set of national development management policies. These policies will cover the most important national planning issues facing the sector, including net zero, tackling climate change and making sure that we are also dealing with heritage issues and protections of green belt.

To those who are concerned that these provisions will somehow override local plans, I would say that that is not the intention. The intention is to produce swifter, slimmer plans to remove the need for generic issues that apply universally, which will help us to reduce time-consuming duplication, and to ensure that local plans are more locally focused and relevant to the local communities. I hope that, during the passage of this Bill, we will be able to give more assurance on that.

[Andrew Gwynne]

The Minister will know that Stockport, which is one of the two councils that covers my constituency, pulled out of the Greater Manchester spatial framework, largely because even though Manchester and Salford were taking a large chunk of its housing allocation, its councillors were against green belt development.

Stockport is a very tightly constrained borough surrounded by green belt. It is now in the process of developing a local plan, but it will have to meet even higher housing targets. Will the Minister guarantee that if Stockport develops a local plan that meets the needs of Stockport but saves and protects the green belt around Stockport, he will support it?

[Stuart Andrew]

The hon. Member knows that I cannot comment on individual plans. [Interruption.] The hon. Member for Wigan (Lisa Nandy) would be the first to apply for an urgent question asking me to explain why I prejudged a local plan. What I would say, in general terms, is that it is clear that local authorities can argue the constraints that they may have, and his local authority may be planning to do that; I do not know.

Let me move on, because I am conscious of time. I turn to second homes, because, if I did not, my hon. Friend the Member for North Devon (Selaine Saxby), as well as my hon. Friends the Members for St Ives (Derek Thomas) and for Penrith and The Border (Dr Hudson) and others, would be rather angry with me. We have put provisions in the Bill to try to help on that, and I know that she wants us to go further. I have made a commitment to come down to the south-west to hold a series of roundtables and see the issues for myself. We will see what else can be done as we go through the Bill’s passage.

[Rachael Maskell]

In addition to second homes, we have the challenge of Airbnbs, which of course the Bill does not mention, and yet they are blighting our communities as they take out existing stock and dominate new stock that is being built. Will the Minister look again—it is urgent—to put an amendment into the Bill to address that serious issue?

[Stuart Andrew]

In fact, I had a meeting just this morning to talk about that very issue. I will report back in due course, if that is okay.

[Tim Farron]

The Minister is being very generous in giving way. I concur with the hon. Member for York Central (Rachael Maskell), but will he also carefully consider introducing an amendment in Committee that would make second home ownership a separate category of plan and use? That is obviously the clearest way in which we could control second home ownership in communities such as mine and in other parts of the country. Will he at least consider that in the coming weeks?

[Stuart Andrew]

I am keen to ensure that we get it right. Of course I will consider it, because I want to ensure that we consider all aspects. There could, however, be unintended consequences in other parts of the country. We will want to ensure that we get it right, but I will look at all options. I have made that commitment to numerous colleagues who have raised the issue with me.

I turn to infrastructure. I want to mention in particular my hon. Friend the Member for South West Bedfordshire (Andrew Selous) , who seems to secure a Westminster Hall debate on this issue every other week. I congratulate him on that. Many have asked what the Bill means for our infrastructure: our roads, bridges, schools, GP surgeries and so on. This is where I believe communities stand to really benefit from our reforms. All of us know that, without new infrastructure, when people see new homes going up in their community, too often they fear the worst. They fear that it will result in more congested roads, busier trains and fewer services to go around.

I hope that the proposals that we have set out in the Bill will go a long way towards allaying those fears for good. I am determined to continue working with hon. Members on both sides of the House to do so. That starts with sweeping away the old, opaque section 106 agreements and replacing them with one simple infrastructure levy that is set and raised by local authorities. The new levy will be fairer, simpler and more transparent, and it will be imposed on the final value of a development. It is important to stress that, with the housing market as buoyant as it is, the levy will easily be able to respond to market conditions. Put simply, when prices go up, so will the levy.

Crucially, our Bill also requires councils to prepare an infrastructure delivery strategy, setting out how and when the levy receipts will be used. That means new development will always bring with it the new schools, nurseries and GP surgeries that communities want and need. I have listened, in particular to the debates secured by my hon. Friend the Member for South West Bedfordshire. He knows that I will be meeting my colleagues in the Department of Health and Social Care next week to see what more we can do to ensure that local health services are more involved with the planning process.

We will run a test and learn approach. We are holding a series of roundtables with stakeholders because we want to get it right. It is important to remember that councils can borrow against the levy, so they can bring the infrastructure in as soon as the development is happening.

[Sir Geoffrey Clifton-Brown]

I am grateful to the Minister for giving way. He will have heard what I said in my speech about the gross added value method of charging for the infrastructure levy, which will act as a disincentive to developers to put added value on environmental and design matters. Will he please discuss that matter with me to see whether we can use a better method by capturing the increase in land value?

[Stuart Andrew]

I certainly make that commitment. My hon. Friend raised that point with me earlier this afternoon. There are some points there that I want to further explore, so I will ensure I meet him in the next week or so.

[Richard Graham]

Will the Minister say something in his summing up on the points that I and my hon. Friend the Member for Sevenoaks (Laura Trott) raised, and which we discussed earlier with his colleague the Secretary of State, to reassure us that there is no intention to devolve upwards and that the powers of district councils will remain as they are without being poached by some CCA?

[Stuart Andrew]

I hope my hon. Friend saw the enthusiastic nodding on the Front Bench, which will give him the reassurance he seeks.

The Levelling-Up and Regeneration Bill represents a major milestone in our journey towards building a stronger, fairer and more united country. As my hon. Friend the Member for Aylesbury (Rob Butler) said, it is for all parts of the country. It confers on local leaders a suite of powers to regenerate our high streets, towns and cities, and gives them unprecedented freedoms to build the homes and infrastructure that communities want and need, following all the BIDEN principles—that is, the Secretary of State’s, not the President of the United States. I also take on board the points raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Wantage (David Johnston) about the environmental standards of homes. I hope to do some more work on that in the coming weeks.

[Marsha De Cordova]

I thank the Minister for giving way. He has not responded to the point raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Nottingham North (Alex Norris) about publishing an impact assessment. Will he confirm that one will be published, and will he let us know when?

[Stuart Andrew]

Yes, there will be, and it will come at the second stage of Committee.

[Munira Wilson]

The Minister talked about building the homes that communities want and need, and he made a commitment to the hon. Member for Gloucester (Richard Graham) about not devolving powers upwards. Last year, central Government pushed through permitted development rights, which enable developers to put whole storeys on top of existing buildings, causing misery for leaseholders even when residents and local planning authorities have opposed them. Will he look at rescinding those powers in the Bill?

[Stuart Andrew]

No, I will not.

As I said, these new freedoms will help communities to repurpose and redesign old unused sites, and turn them into new vibrant communities. The Bill allows us to become a regeneration nation. It will support the housing and construction sector to play its part in growing our economy, creating well-paid jobs and levelling up. At the same time, the Bill brings our ageing analogue planning system into the digital age, with residents able to share their views at the touch of a smartphone. It places local people at the heart of a smoother, simpler more streamlined planning system using street votes, new design codes and community-led plans.

Most importantly, by enshrining the 12 missions of our levelling-up White Paper into law and offering every part of England a devolution deal by 2030, the Bill fulfils our promise to the British people—a fundamental promise upon which the Government were elected—to take power away from Whitehall and place it directly in the hands of communities, so that they can determine their future and realise their full potential. That is the pledge we made and that is what the Bill delivers. I commend it to the House.

Question put and agreed to.

Bill accordingly read a Second time.

Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill (First sitting)

Stuart Andrew Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 21st June 2022 Public Bill Committees

[The Chair]

I call Stuart Andrew.

[The Minister for Housing (Stuart Andrew)]

Q Good morning Tracy; it is good to see you.

I want to return to planning. We share an ambition, in that we obviously want the right houses in the right places for our population. Much of the Bill is about community-led planning—that is, ensuring that communities have a say in where houses should be built, so that we can improve support for development within communities. How would that marry up with a strategic approach that was perhaps done by Mayors? I often describe planning as something that people feel happens to them, rather than them being engaged in it. If Mayors around the country had lots of strategic planning rights and powers, is there a danger that we might negate the chance of improving community involvement in the planning system in order to build the houses we need?

Tracy Brabin: It feels to me that there are already those checks and balances for local communities. When there is an option for a warehouse or the building of homes and so on, the public and communities have an opportunity to reject that planning. Obviously, local plans are a responsibility for local councils, but for me what would be interesting with the strategic planning is to support local councils when they have a vision. For example, in Stockport in Manchester, the council has a vision to bring together greater investment and a bolder planning opportunity, working with communities. Maybe it would be cross-border and difficult to navigate, so the Mayors could be helpful there.

Of course, it is important for the public to have a voice in what their communities look like, but we would hate to get into a situation where communities that are happy with their village could block much-needed housing from their community. It is important that we keep the conversation going, though. I know our local councils do everything they can to work with communities to get the right outcomes, but we do need more social and affordable housing in our region. There is a role for the Mayor to play in that, and the strategic plan would help.

Ben Still: To add to what the Mayor has said, the strategic planning covers a variety of topics of which housing is one. There is probably a role for Mayors from mayoralties and combined authorities to join up when looking at things like strategic infrastructure such as transport, broadband and so on, where it makes sense to plan across individual local authority or unitary authority areas. As the Mayor said, the local authority is the planning body and it has that process with communities. The Bill has a number of aspects that might strengthen that.

[Stuart Andrew]

Thank you.

[The Chair]

Any other questions? No. That brings us to the end of the session. Tracy—Madam Mayor—thank you for your enthusiastic evidence. Ben, thank you for coming along for your evidence, too. It is most appreciated.

Tracy Brabin: Thank you, and good luck everybody.

Examination of Witness

Mairi Spowage gave evidence.

Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill (Second sitting)

Stuart Andrew Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 21st June 2022 Public Bill Committees

[The Chair]

Okay, Minister?

[Stuart Andrew]

Q I just want to return to the issue you raised on neighbourhood planning. There is an interesting concept there about the neighbourhood share, particularly in areas where there is not a parish council or town council. What potential issues might you see in terms of any conflict between the interests of that group and what they are wanting to deliver for that community and the wider community? What governance arrangements might be needed to ensure that there is transparency around the needs of that community and how they develop?

We have a significant number of neighbourhood planning groups and neighbourhood plans around the country. However, there are areas—particularly more deprived areas—that have not developed those. The Bill provides for the neighbourhood priority statements to introduce a simpler way for communities to think about how they want to improve their place. Do you see any issues around that area in the Bill that need to be looked at again? Is this a real opportunity for such groups to formulate how the needs of their communities are delivered on the ground for those towns and areas?

Rich Bell: The creation of neighbourhood priority statements, which allow people at the local level to very clearly set out their priorities, and having those accounted for in local plans, is definitely a positive step forward, and we really welcome that. The point we would make is that community anchor organisations work in a way so as to unlock the capacity that is already present in communities. We would suggest that drafting them into this work could actually be key to addressing the geographic disparity in current levels of neighbourhood planning, particularly as research by the Communities in Charge campaign has demonstrated that the sorts of organisations we are talking about—community anchor organisations that seek to address local challenges in holistic ways that are truly reaching the community—are actually more likely to be found in areas that we would describe as deprived.

Clearly, there are challenges around how you ensure those organisations are acting with legitimacy. We think that the Government’s pledge to bring forward community covenants in their White Paper is potentially a game changer in that respect. We see that as a means of working through the challenges of a public body investing a degree of authority in a community organisation that is not on a statutory status. We would suggest that as long as you are working through the intermediary organisation in the form of the local authority, and as long as the Government provide guidance and regulations to ensure that that local authority is ensuring the community organisation has the trust of the whole community before it invests that power, it is a neat and relatively easy quick fix to what might otherwise be a problem by which the Bill would wind up deepening inequalities in control and power rather than resolving them.

[The Chair]

I call Matthew Pennycook.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Chair]

I call the Minister, Stuart Andrew.

[Stuart Andrew]

Q Thank you very much, Sir Mark. I am half-tempted to say, “G’day, Sam.” Thank you for your time today.

Just touching on the local plans, obviously at the moment we have about 39% of England covered by local plans, which means that there is a significant area not covered by them. Clearly, the Bill is trying to simplify the process of developing local plans. What has been the reaction your members of to the measures in the Bill to try to achieve that, and are there any other suggestions they have made that they think would be helpful, so that we can get more local plans in place within a much shorter timescale than we are currently experiencing?

[The Chair]

Just before you answer that question, Sam, can I just bring it to the Committee’s attention that we have now been joined by Councillor James Jamieson, chair of the Local Government Association, and Councillor Tim Oliver, chair of the County Councils Network. Welcome to the sitting. I am sorry that you have had those technical problems, but we are glad to see you here. We are just partway through a question from the Minister, Stuart Andrew, at the moment. I will bring you both in and we will obviously tailor some of the questions towards you both as the sitting progresses.

Cllr Chapman-Allen: Thank you, Chair. Stuart, the answer is twofold. Local planning is an immensely complicated process—that to-ing and fro-ing with the planning inspector makes it immensely challenging. I think it comes back to the previous questions: “Is this a top-down exercise? Do we need a very clear framework for what planning is?” But planning derives from that local position.

If we are being really clear and setting clear parameters for what local communities need to deliver through that formula of housing growth, challenge if it cannot be delivered, and allow those local communities to move forward and deliver upon that in a set timeframe, then we will expediate that. In my local authority in Breckland, we delivered a local plan, confirmed in December 2019. We are already out for review again, at vast cost, vast expense and vast frustration for our communities, when actually we should probably only be tweaking some of those local policies.

The sad fact is that some of those locations that you mentioned, which do not have a developed local plan, are now in the challenge around nutrient neutrality and an inability to deliver those plans, and of course the duty to co-operate places a further burden on those councils to provide that local plan.

In answer to your question, really briefly—sorry to waffle—make the timeframe shorter; allow that local drive to come from the bottom up; ensure that the national planning inspector supports those local policies, not a top-down approach; and I think you would see expediated local plans and adopted local plans across the country.

[Stuart Andrew]

Q Thank you. I will try to give you a bit of a breather now, and involve our other two witnesses.

I want to turn to the infrastructure levy. The intention behind this is that it is non-negotiable, to try and reduce all the time that planning officers seem to spend on negotiation. Are the measures welcome? On the development of the infrastructure statements that local planning authorities have, do you see the opportunity for greater working between county and district councils in agreeing, as part of a local plan, the sort of infrastructure that is needed within those communities ahead of development being granted?

Cllr Jamieson: Thank you and apologies for my technical problems. On the infrastructure levy, I do think that is a helpful move. All too often, developers use viability as an excuse to increase their profits, or landowners to increase the value of their land. Really, where there is a significant uplift in the value of land as a result of receiving planning permission, it is only right and fair that that bonus of increase in value should go towards providing the essential infrastructure that is needed to support that development, whether that is roads, schools or soft infrastructure, such as health and community support. We welcome the community infrastructure levy as a simpler mechanism and one that will be applied to more developments, both commercial and housing.

One of the issues we have raised many times is the fact that developments of fewer than 10 houses do not pay anything. Quite clearly, that is all very positive. Of course, there are parts of the country where the land value uplift is not sufficient to provide the infrastructure, and that needs to be addressed and will have to be addressed by funding from Government. However, in areas where it is—yes, we welcome the fact that it is simplified. Of course, Sam just mentioned some of the other issues, such as nutrient neutrality, which is yet another imposition on development, so we need to be cognisant when we look at the infrastructure levy of the other levies and costs that are put on the land.

[Stuart Andrew]

Q Tim, do you have anything to add from a county council’s perspective?

Cllr Oliver: Many thanks, and my apologies too for the technical issues. We absolutely welcome a simplified community infrastructure levy and section 106 arrangement. At the moment, CIL is administered by the district and borough council, and the county council, in normal circumstances, would make an application for a part of that funding. It would be helpful for the Bill to provide clarification on how that infrastructure levy should be used. It is a levy to enable infrastructure support to facilitate housing and development. I know that part of the suggestion in the Bill is that 25% of that infrastructure levy would be set aside for parish councils, but, to your point, I would hope that there would be early conversations between all three tiers of local government, where they exist, as to how that levy should be spent for the benefit of the community.

[The Chair]

Thanks Stuart. Just before I bring in Tim Farron, I will give both Neil and Matthew the opportunity to ask a question to the other two panellists, who unfortunately were not present earlier. Neil, have you got any brief questions? I will then bring in Matthew.

Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill (Third sitting)

Stuart Andrew Excerpts

Committee stage & Committee Debate - 3rd sitting
Thursday 23rd June 2022 Public Bill Committees

[The Chair]

We are now 20 minutes into this evidence session. In the interests of time, I will call the Minister. If there is any time left at the end, I will come back to you, Mr Pennycook.

[The Minister for Housing (Stuart Andrew)]

Q My first question is straightforward: what practical changes do you think the Bill will make to the people you represent?

Victoria Hills: I represent 27,000 members. Practically, and on a strategic level, we welcomed the Bill, because we welcome the recognition that, rather than having a planning Bill, planning is integral to levelling up and regeneration. That is why we warmly welcomed the Bill: it has elevated the status of planning from being some regulatory thing over there to being fundamentally essential to delivering levelling up. Indeed, we say it is the lead domino; if you get the planning system right, you have the framework and the foundations to deliver regeneration.

That is our starting point. Within that, we have to have a broader conversation—perhaps not today—about how we ensure that local authorities in particular are resourced for the changes. We look forward to the forthcoming consultation on the fees to help to fund some of the additional work. Practically, it will mean that our members are going to be extremely busy—first, with responding to all the consultations, and secondly, moving forward with implementing the new system. There is an urgent need to address the resourcing, as I have highlighted, because local authorities are somewhat struggling at the moment anyway to deliver business as usual.

Some of this will be a bit business as unusual. We have heard that the CIL is potentially a major change. Changing local plans and updating them will take time and resources. It will be a busy period for the members I represent. That said, although we welcome the recognition that planning is integral to levelling up, we do need to have an open and honest conversation with you about how we now move forward quickly to resource local authorities to enable the changes. I hope that answers the question.

David Jackson: Likewise, given the high profile that has been given to the levelling-up agenda, it is very welcome that planning is so closely associated with such an important part of the Government’s programme. We very much welcome that.

For the people I represent, it is difficult to define exactly what the changes will mean, because they are multifaceted. For people I work directly with, there is a lot to get through and understand about the changes, but we are planning professionals and that is what we direct ourselves towards. That is part of our responsibility. For our clients, there is an expectation of a transition period, and that is a process to be navigated through. We are there to help them through that process. I repeat what I said earlier about the importance of trying to get through that phase as quickly as possible so that we can move on to obtaining the key objectives of building prosperity and creating flourishing communities.

On flourishing communities, in the work that we do as planning professionals we become very much associated with and embedded in communities for the period of a project. It is really important that that process of local engagement and projects being opened to the public scrutiny that leads to improvement—[Inaudible.]

[The Chair]

David, you are looking away from the microphone again and we missed what you said.

David Jackson: Sorry. Public scrutiny is necessary to improve projects and win public trust.

Tony Mulhall: Chartered surveyors provide their services largely at the level of strategic land preparation and development delivery, so they are acutely aware of the increasing risk associated with development projects proceeding. Planning comes with certain risks—in other words, getting a project through the planning system—so it is very important that we have a system that works well in process terms.

From a development point of view, planning is one of the factors. We have huge pressure on costs at the moment. I have here a document that I have just received from the Building Cost Information Service that says that the materials cost index has continued to grow, with annual growth in excess of 20%, and figures say that the cost of complying with the building regulations is around 6%. Those are cumulative risks, and the planning system is just one of those. It is a very important one, and getting it right is very important, but in a development context the danger is that investors will defer making decisions on taking projects forward until they have greater certainty about the regulatory environment they are heading into and that that regulatory environment can be priced, in a sense—what is it going to cost to get through the regulatory environment?

We need to take account of that, and not just in relation to large house builders. They are capitalised very well, but a lot of small and medium-sized enterprises find it extremely difficult to engage with the planning system at a level they can afford. That impacts on borrowing: you cannot engage a lender if you have what I would describe as planning risk associated with your side. These are the realities that our members face in advising their clients.

[Stuart Andrew]

Q Thank you. One of the complaints that I hear quite a lot, not just from my own constituents but from people throughout the country, is that people feel planning is something that happens to them, and we know that public engagement with the planning system is incredibly low. Do you think the measures in the Bill—the neighbourhood planning, the priority statements and the digitisation of the whole system—will help to improve community engagement? Do you think that, in turn, it will help to enlist more support for development within communities?

Victoria Hills: We welcome all those aspects, and particularly the investment in digital transformation and a bit more structure around what that looks like for local authorities so that they can make the investments in digital that are required. We also absolutely welcome neighbourhood planning, and also, potentially, street votes and all that comes with that.

Something equally important that we are strongly advocating for is that virtual planning committees can continue in the way they did during the pandemic. We are seeking an amendment to the Bill for that purpose, because we think it provided an additional aspect to the ways in which communities could be genuinely engaged, particularly for those people who cannot get to committee meetings in the evenings because of their own commitments.

We welcome all the aspects that have been included in the Bill to broaden engagement. Our top two omissions are the one that I started with—involving the community in the national policies—and enabling them to join in via a virtual committee.

Tony Mulhall: This is a really important point. Our experience, and what we get reported back, is that the community does not tend to engage with the plan-making process—people need to get a development on the corner of their street before they become exercised—so it is very important for us to understand what is a meaningful way to get feedback from the community about what it is that they do not like and what is top of their list of what they want.

I am not sure that the plans that we put through have the legitimacy we might expect from real engagement with people, because I think they do not fully understand what the plan is saying. We have seen the kind of developments in neighbourhood planning that were really good but probably did not get to the people who need to participate to improve their local communities. There is an interesting measure in the Bill to facilitate that. I would say that we really need to rethink what meaningful participation in plan making is about, because people are coming away from the production of a plan without much knowledge of what is going to turn up in their neighbourhood.

David Jackson: I agree with that point. What we need is engagement at all levels of the plan-making process, from the SDS—spatial development strategy, the new strategic level of plan making—all the way through. It is down to the profession to go out and do that. That is where the parallel development of the levelling-up agenda, putting planning alongside that as the key delivery mechanism, has some advantages, because it demonstrates exactly the role that planning has in facilitating the benefits that we want to see for those communities. My slight concern is in what I might call the hyper-local, because that allows people to focus just on their immediate areas, but as I say, what we want is a focus across the plan-making portfolio, so that people have that aspiration.

One example of the risk of the hyper-local is footnote 54 in the NPPF, which requires onshore wind turbines to be supported by the local community that is most affected. While onshore wind has overall high levels of public support, a massive drop-off in the delivery of onshore wind has been the result of that particular control. It does not take us away from the need to engage with communities at the local level to win their support, but it does create difficulties—challenges—in that hyper-local environment.

[Stuart Andrew]

Q My final question returns to the community infrastructure levy. We have said that we want to take a test-and-learn approach, trialling it with a number of authorities, so I welcome the fact that you want to engage in that process. Do you agree that planning authorities often spend a considerable amount of time in negotiation on CIL or section 106, and often find the negotiations going downwards in terms of investment for the local community? That further erodes trust in the process in respect of what will be delivered on the ground for communities. Will this legislation help to free up the time of some of the planners to do some of the more important strategic stuff? I will go to David first.

David Jackson: On replacing CIL with the infrastructure levy, the simplification of the infrastructure levy based on value is certainly advantageous. In our experience, we were very engaged in the preparation of CIL on behalf of the Home Builders Federation. We engaged with many local authorities on that basis, and it was indeed a very complex process, looking at viability and trying to project that over a period of time and for a range of development scenarios. That simplification is welcome.

I take a slightly different view on section 106. It goes without saying that where section 106 is engaged, we are dealing in large part with complex, difficult, challenging projects. We have to ensure that local communities have trust in the process and that it will deliver the outcomes they expect to see. Inevitably, there is an element of commercial negotiation, because viability can often be engaged where we have multiple demands on investment in a local community, so it is right that we go through that complex process. I think CIL helps in terms of taking—[Inaudible.] The complexity of section 106 is merely a reflection of the complexity of the projects we are dealing with and the wish on both sides—both the community and the developer—to ensure that the infrastructure that is required to make the project work is actually delivered.

Victoria Hills: We have been very clear that anything that comes in needs to not overcomplicate an already quite complicated system. As proposed, the infrastructure levies will all go through PINS—the Planning Inspectorate —which we think will add more delay and cost to the system. We are advocating for the new infrastructure levies to get directly agreed by local authorities with the Secretary of State or the Department, to take out some of what I think you are alluding to—the horse trading, the negotiation and all the rest of it. Then, there is one discussion between the directly elected authority and the Department, and that gets agreed. You can take months and significant cost out of the whole system by not running it through PINS.

Another important point, which I could not make earlier, is that it is really important to understand how, in simplifying the system, the new infrastructure levy will sit alongside other statutory requirements—not least biodiversity net gain and affordable housing—and how, in simplifying it, it will balance out those quite complex aspects. The requirement for affordable housing has always been the case, but biodiversity net gain was not a thing before.

At the moment, until we see the detail, we are not convinced that it will all be simplified. There are some important complexities to take on board.

[Rachael Maskell (York Central) (Lab/Co-op)]

Q In the light of the Government’s proposals and commitment to building 300,000 homes by 2025 and real revision of the planning process, do the witnesses believe that is deliverable? Do they believe we will see homes that are predominantly assets, investments, second homes and Airbnbs?

Victoria Hills: We have always been very clear that the way to deliver great places and great communities is through a robust local plan and framework where the local authority has the opportunity to set out their priorities, which could include some of the aspects you referred to. The elevation of the importance of the local plan in all this is welcome. The detail, which we do not yet have, is on to what extent local authorities will be able to carry on delivering priorities through policy, and to what extent they will get pulled out into the national framework.

We support the principle of the local plan being elevated. We recognise that it is the only way you can move ahead with delivering on agendas including net zero, affordable housing and well-designed, healthy homes. If you are going to have policies against second homes, that may well be something to prioritise in your local plan, or in national guidance—the detail is yet to be seen on that.

Whether or not it meets the housing numbers is still an area for debate. The Government are on the record saying that is very much the plan in action. We will be advocating for local authorities to be well resourced, without delay to the national framework, to enable them to get on with the business of producing local plans as quickly as possible, in order to provide certainty for local communities and the development sector, so that it can get on and start planning and then building. It really just relates to the earlier theme of resourcing.

However, there also needs to be no further delay. There is an urgent need to deliver more homes, as we know. The housing waiting list continues to rise, and more and more people are still desperate to have a place of their own. The need continues to grow, so it is important that we move forward quickly on any regulatory reform and that we move forward with a resourcing package—which surely must include bringing up the planning fees as well, to help to move those things forward as quickly as possible.

Tony Mulhall: I totally agree with Victoria’s point about the importance of having up-to-date local plans, and the important aspect in the Bill of being able to combine local authorities so that they better match their functional urban region or their socioeconomic hinterland. That is important because we are spending a lot of time and money squeezing the carbon out of our buildings, but there will not be much point in doing that if we have to drive miles to get to our jobs and schools. It is critical that we have a proper planning system linked with the standards of quality construction that will achieve climate change.

On the point as to whether the measures in the Bill will deliver the target of 300,000 houses per annum, the feedback that I get from our members is “No.”

--- Later in debate ---

[The Chair]

We have until 1 o’clock and this time I turn to the Minister first.

[Stuart Andrew]

Q Thank you, Mrs Murray, and I thank the witnesses for their attendance this morning.

In the previous evidence session, we heard that people often describe planning as something that happens to them. Do you think that the measures in the Bill will increase community engagement in all aspects of the planning process, particularly the development of local plans and other individual planning applications? Do you think that some of the measures, such as the introduction of the neighbourhood priority statements, will help to increase the number of neighbourhood planning groups that might be spread in areas that have been difficult to reach so far?

Tony Burton: Generally, we think the Bill is helpful for communities who want to have more of a say on planning issues. There are one or two headlines. The most pre-emptive one is that the Bill confirms the statutory role for neighbourhood planning, given the uncertainty since the publication of a White Paper that said relatively little about it and that brought forward some proposals that would have shut out community input, such as those at the planning application stage.

The specific measures around neighbourhood planning, and I appreciate that your question goes wider than that, are relatively limited. The adjustments to the basic conditions and the broad definition that has been provided, which is helpful, will not have a significant impact on take-up. They will help to clarify some elements of process. And neighbourhood planning will be caught up in the same changes as local plans, when it comes to the primacy of the development plan and the centralisation of the development of management policies. Again, they need to play out, but much of that is welcome, because it attaches additional weight to the document, and to the time and effort that volunteers invest.

The neighbourhood priority statements are triggering some interest among the groups we work with, but they are also raising a significant number of questions. In our view, if the aim is to support greater take-up, particularly in urban areas, which I know the Minister is keen to see, then more needs to be done. They need to be seen as something that is additional to and complementary to neighbourhood planning, not a replacement for it.

The legislation is quite weak in the weight that needs to be attached to it by local authorities; the “have regard” requirement is weak. We have a decade of experience in London of boroughs not really taking that much notice even of neighbourhood plans, which are statutory documents, so we would like to see a stronger weight attached.

It needs to be confirmed in the legislation, not just elsewhere, that it is about more than informing local plans. We understand that that is the Government’s intention, but the current drafting of the Bill is quite restrictive. We think that it would be really sensible if the Government supported communities to pilot and to try to make all priority statements before the legislation is finalised, so that we get a real sense of what they could achieve.

The disappointment is that the local planning provisions are not more extensive, to encourage wider community involvement. We are about to publish our “The State of Neighbourhood Planning in London” report this evening, and it shows that progress in engaging communities is still being hampered by obstructive local authorities in many cases. Therefore, we believe that if the Bill is to effectively engage communities in leading development, as opposed to responding to it—doing planning, as opposed to having it done to them—it really needs to strengthen the legal duty on local authorities to support neighbourhood planning. It needs to give neighbourhood forums the same powers as parish and town councils in receiving and spending the neighbourhood element of the community infrastructure levy. At a stroke, that is the single most important thing that the Government could do to encourage local planning in cities. The Bill also needs to set time limits on local authorities making decisions on key stages.

The final point we would make is that the Bill itself will not be enough, and that there will need to be support for communities to engage and involve themselves. We would put particular attention on the role of the neighbourhood planning support programme, which is probably the single most important measure available to accelerate community involvement in planning decisions. It could be significantly improved and increased.

Jonathan Owen: I am sure it will not surprise any of you to hear that probably the No. 1 issue affecting 10,000 parish and town councils and 100,000 councillors is planning. That is top of their agenda, and I think it would be fair to say that we need to look at every way we can to make sure that the public are more effectively engaged with the system. We are pleased with the emphasis on a plan-based system—that is right—and public engagement in that planning is absolutely vital.

The main area of interest for us is neighbourhood planning, and parish and town councils have really been in the driving seat of producing those plans. I think there have been about 3,000 so far, with about 90% done by parish and town councils. They have had amazing referenda, with something like a million people voting in them over the last few years. I think they cover an area of about 10 million people. That is a really good way in which the public can engage with the planning system, but there are thousands and thousands of other communities that are being left behind and that do not have neighbourhood plans by parish and town councils or neighbourhood forums.

Some of the feedback that we had from our 10,000 parish councils was that they were concerned that it will be costly and time consuming, and that the neighbourhood plans will be overlooked and not taken seriously by principal authorities. A lot of the measures in the Bill will help address those issues, which should help with promoting neighbourhood planning.

This must not stop with the Bill. If you are going to reach the other 7,000 or 8,000 communities, we need to make sure that we are promoting neighbourhood planning and its benefits, and that we are investing in helping those communities to do that work. I would encourage you to continue with the grants that are available, and perhaps to make them easier to access. We have had a good start to neighbourhood planning, and I am really pleased that you are committed to continuing with it and making it more effective. We will work with you to try to make that happen.

There are a couple of bits of other feedback around the infrastructure levy. Again, that is to be supported, but there is a risk that because the percentage is the same regardless of whether you have a neighbourhood plan or not, there might be a slight disincentive to produce a neighbourhood plan. As you know, there is a boost to the share of the community infrastructure levy if you have a neighbourhood plan. It would be good if you could consider how best to address that point, so that people are incentivised to have neighbourhood plans and to engage effectively with the public.

On the specific matter of the mini neighbourhood plan, I think that is fine but, again, we need to make sure that doesn’t limit communities’ ambitions to go further and to have neighbourhood plans. We probably need to balance that territory.

I have been amazed by the innovation of many neighbourhood plans and the things they are now trying to address, including climate change, health and wellbeing, such as dementia-friendly aspects, and a vast range of other things. Clearly, we must not lose that innovation. We must use this Bill to drive forward neighbourhood planning and get more people involved with it, and I think that would be a good thing.

[Stuart Andrew]

Q Thank you. In the spirit of wanting to encourage more people to get involved in the development of local plans, we have certainly heard from communities that it is a very complex process. If you are a parish or town council, there may be some resource you can lean on, but in areas that are not covered by town or parish councils such work is reliant on volunteers. Do you think the digitalisation of the process will life a lot easier? Will that encourage more people to take up the mantle of developing a neighbourhood plan for their community?

Jonathan Owen: I think one thing we have learned over the last couple years is that people are getting more and more used to digital engagement and using such systems, so that probably will be the case. Obviously, you will need to review and monitor it, but I think it is certainly something that is worth developing further.

Many of our parish and town councils are already using digital processes when considering planning applications for principal authorities, so I think that could well make a difference. There might be some capital investment required to ensure that even remote communities in the middle of rural Suffolk, where I live, can access the material online without being excluded.

Tony Burton: Our experience is that digital is part of the answer. In relation to local and neighbourhood plans, we would point to the opportunities it presents around new, complementary forms of community engagement—there are now a variety of tools available to support that—and more effective ways of pooling and analysing the evidence that is required, which is often a minefield of PDFs that do not link to each other or help people to navigate the system or get to the nub of the issues.

There is a potential—this is something we have been pressing for—for the neighbourhood planning support programme to provide bespoke support around this and to offer provision for particular elements, such as centralised tools or databases. Also, we would emphasise more digital mapping. Almost by definition, planning is about maps and places—it is spatial—and yet the ways in which we bring everything together on a map are still rather clunky and not all that effective. The best of what is out there shows what can be done, and the best should be the norm.

I would emphasise that digital is only part of a solution. It is no panacea and nothing is more important than the peer-to-peer, face-to-face support that communities need to support them to be their best when it comes to engaging with these processes.

[The Chair]

I am afraid that this will have to be the last question from the Ministers before I move to the Opposition spokesman. Minister O’Brien, I believe you have a question.

Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill (Fourth sitting)

Stuart Andrew Excerpts

Committee stage
Thursday 23rd June 2022 Public Bill Committees

[The Chair]

For the Government side, I call the Minister.

[The Minister for Housing (Stuart Andrew)]

Q With permission, Mr Bone, I shall ask the first question, and then Minister O’Brien has some further questions to ask.

Good afternoon, Andy. It is good to see you and thank you for giving up your time.

Andy Street: You, too.

[Stuart Andrew]

Q You have been quite a champion of brownfield sites and regeneration, particularly with a focus of trying to preserve many of the greenfield areas in the West Midlands. There are a number of planning reforms in the Bill. Do you see those as potentially helping you in your aim to deliver the housing that the West Midlands needs and, in particular, to level up the parts of the region on which you are really keen to focus?

Andy Street: I will give you a straight answer to the question in one moment if I may, Mr Andrew, but let me give a bit of general context. This, I think, is a very good example of where the combined authority has been able to demonstrate the fundamental principle that each can achieve things that individual local authorities working on their own probably would not have done. Of course, the critical point is that we achieve it by working with our local authorities, but we can clearly demonstrate that we have brought additional firepower.

The stats are very clear: we have hit our housing target in this region over the last four or five years, and we had, pre pandemic, doubled the number of homes being built every year in this region. One way that we were able to do that is, of course, working with central Government by deploying the brownfield land funding that the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities had allocated to us in various tranches. We have made the existing system work, and very clearly we probably would not have had a negotiation—for example, Walsall or Wolverhampton separately—with DLUHC had we not existed.

Coming to your question, we are doing this against a good backdrop. We hope we will win further funding in due course to advance this even further, but on the reforms in the paper—it is a general question—essentially I would be supportive of them because they do bring simplicity to the operation. I do think that one of the challenges we constantly face is the time difficulty in drawing these items to a conclusion.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (Neil O’Brien)]

Q Thank you, Andy, for joining us. The Bill makes various provisions to speed up and to simplify the creation of new combined authorities and to make it easier, as we have just discussed, for Mayors to take on PCC powers. It also makes it easier to create combined authorities in two-tier areas through the combined county authorities clauses. Do you think the extension of mayoral combined authorities to more areas of the country is a good idea, and what would your advice be to places that are setting up new combined authorities?

Andy Street: The answer to the first question, in one word, is yes. Let me explain why, and this is something that Minister O’Brien and I have talked about for probably a decade, since we were both in previous roles. If you look at the economic history of this country and compare it with other, similar countries, we definitely have a weakness in the out of London areas. There is nothing original there; we know that. Of course, part of the answer is to try to address that in what you might call areas of sufficient scale. I think the thing that the combined authorities have done, as you could argue that the more successful and bigger LEPs did as the precursor to it, is begin to think about economic policy at an appropriate spatial level, or what the books would probably call a natural economic area—a travel-to-work area or whatever. That, I honestly think, has been one of our great successes. Transport policies do not stop at the end of Birmingham when it moves into Solihull, as Gill’s market does not stop at the end of Wolverhampton when it moves into Dudley. We have been able to think about these determinants of economic success across the appropriate geographical area. In our case, that is not yet fully complete, and if you look around the country, you see that other combined authorities are more clearly incomplete in that sense. I would argue that they should be encouraged to expand to fill their natural economic areas.

In terms of the advice, I think there is one simple word: you have to make sure that everybody is up for it. I do not believe this should be imposed. I do not think this should be about unwillingness. I do believe there needs to be a sort of buy-in to the core principle that the very first question is that everybody has got to be prepared to compromise and make this work for it to be a success.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Chair]

We have unfortunately almost run out of time. I was tempted to see whether the Housing Minister wanted to come back and chat to our witness, but he seems to be pointing to the fact that time is up. Or does he want to use the remaining minute?

[Stuart Andrew]

The time is up.

[The Chair]

The time is up, I am told. Thank you so much for coming, Mr Street. Your evidence was extremely clear and very helpful to the Committee.

Andy Street: Thank you very much.

Examination of Witnesses

Nicholas Boys Smith, Lizzie Glithero-West and Adrian Dobson gave evidence.

--- Later in debate ---

[Stuart Andrew]

Q Thank you, Mr Bone. There has been quite a bit of criticism that much of the development that we see around the country is the same wherever you are, and that there is a lack of imaginative design. Some would describe those developments as uninspiring places to live. How important is it to improve the design of new developments for the people who live there and to encourage more support for development in communities?

Nicholas Boys Smith: I assume that question is for me. Thank you, Minister. That is a very profound question, and I do not mean that in a sycophantic way. The current percentage of British people who trust planners to make their local neighbourhood better is in medium single figures, and for those who trust developers, it is in low single figures—between 4% and 7%. Despite the widely accepted desperate need for new housing, the instinctive assumption of most neighbourhoods, most of the time—sorry, this is a bit of a coda, but we have the lowest houses to households ratio in the western world—is that new development will make places worse. That informs the politics of all large developments and most small ones.

That is new, and it used not to be the case 50, 70, 100 or 200 years ago. It is something that is particularly prevalent in this country. Until we fundamentally fix the instinctive assumption that people have—before they learn more—that new development will worsen your bit of the world, the caught-between-the-horns nature of the politics of housing will never go away. As elected Members of Parliament, you do not need me to tell you that. This is not a criticism of the Bill, but it will not fix that—no one bit of legislation or set of actions can—although some elements of it are relevant.

I will say one final thing before I shush so other people can come in. This is not just about support for new housing, important though that is. Provably, where we live has very measurable and, in some large degree, quantifiable and predictable consequences for the lives we lead, our personal health, our mental health, how many of our neighbours we know and how much we walk in our daily existence, rather than just jumping in a car to go to the shops. It has very profound consequences, not just for spatial development patterns, but for the depth with which we tread upon the planet.

[The Chair]

Q Lizzie, do you want to come in on that?

Lizzie Glithero-West: Very briefly, because I am sure that Adrian will have some points on this. From the perspective of heritage and the environment, the Bill and the things around it—I support the point that this is not just about the Bill, but about the policies around it—should support sustainable reuse of buildings. Some of the best new homes are not necessarily new built; they can be renovated. Something that would be on our list for the Government to think about alongside the Bill would be the incentives to encourage reuse rather than demolition and new build.

We welcome the possible introduction of design codes, which would allow for developments that could recognise the local vernacular. Design codes should offer sustainability, safety and quality. There is a big point about the protection of designated heritage assets, as well as non-designated heritage assets, which are not necessarily included in the Bill. Some provisions could be made, either within the Bill or around it, to incentivise repair and saving buildings, and using them as a way to keep the character of a place rather than just resorting to new homes and new buildings.

There are two things that we could look at in particular. The first is removing the permitted development right for demolition, which is a problematic loophole at the moment; it incentivises flattening beautiful buildings that may not be listed. Secondly—I can presumably talk about this in more depth later—we could look at the VAT on the maintenance of current buildings. That is normally 20%, which is completely contrary to the 0% rate for new build and incentivises the wrong solutions for the environment as well as for local communities.

Adrian Dobson: The Building Better, Building Beautiful Commission highlighted the value of good design, presumably in part because communities are more likely to accept well designed buildings. It also highlighted a lack of resource within the planning system, particularly in design expertise. The Bill itself places a lot of emphasis on local design codes. I am sure the Committee will want to talk about that; it is something that excites quite strong opinions both ways. Some people see local design codes as a way of establishing good basic principles, greater certainty around development and the ability to reflect local needs, but some people see them as potentially stifling innovation. That would be one way of addressing the issue.

I think it is important for us to think about design as not just being skin deep, although it is about appearance. Good quality design needs to address issues around sustainability, quality of build and the health and welfare of the people who use the buildings. When we talk about the Bill, there are perhaps some contradictions at the moment. There is possibly a contradiction between emphasis on local design codes, but growth in permitted developments. They seem to contradict each other slightly, and that might be one thing to think about. Also, there is a tension in the Bill between national development management policy and its relative weight against local development plans. Again, that might be part of the area of debate on the issue.

To follow up on something Lizzie said about the sustainability and embodied carbon aspects, we probably ought to be making more presumptions on reuse, retrofitting and alteration of existing building stock, and not just looking to new build as the solution to those issues.

[Stuart Andrew]

Q Looking more broadly at heritage, there have been a number of calls for the strengthening of measures. Do you think the Bill goes far enough in answering the calls that the sector have been making for some time?

Lizzie Glithero-West: We believe that heritage is at the heart of the levelling-up and place agenda. We are really pleased that heritage is in the Bill and has its own chapter—chapter 3. There is a lot to welcome in the Bill. Given that heritage has not recently had any distinct legislation of its own, as we had hoped to have with the draft Heritage Protection Bill of 2008, nor is it likely to, it is important for us to take any opportunity to address some of the legislative aims of the sector and policy makers. Many of those aims had cross-party support. This Bill is one of those significant opportunities. There is always more to be done around heritage protection, but several elements of the Bill, and some further measures we have sent in a briefing to the Committee—I can unpack that, if it would be helpful—address some of those long-awaited calls from the sector.

We strongly support clause 185, which would make historic environment records statutory. That has been a long-term ask from the sector, and it features in our heritage manifestos. The sector is delighted that this has made it into the Bill, and I congratulate those working on that behind the scenes. We strongly support clause 92, which extends the protection of heritage assets. We suggested a limited number of key additions to the heritage assets list that would ensure that protection was clearer and more comprehensive, and those are outlined in our briefing.

Given the presidency of COP26 last year and the recognition of the climate emergency, we hope to see more action from Government in parallel with the Bill, or possibly within it—for example, the mention of permitted development that I made earlier for demolition —to encourage the use of current building stock over a presumption to new build. We hope that will be picked up in tandem.

Clauses 93 and 94 are also welcomed by the sector. Clause 93 makes stop notices, which have long been available within the wider planning system, applicable to heritage consent regimes. There is strong support from some in the sector for clause 94, which says that urgent works can be required in certain cases where listed buildings are occupied.

I think clause 95 is the one that you are probably referring to. There is general agreement from the sector that there needs to be a better system for the protection of buildings that are being considered for listing. The whole sector recognises that interim protection of heritage during the listing process is important. There are different views in the heritage sector on the proposals in the Bill to address that. Many in the sector welcome the removal of compensation in clause 95 and would go further by asking for a duty on local planning authorities to serve a building preservation notice where they believe criteria for listing can be met.

A significant minority, however, have concerns about the removal of compensation from those wrongly served a BPN, which could result in delays and losses. There is a concern that that would set a precedent for other compensation clauses. The organisations that I mentioned would rather have a system of interim protection akin to that in Wales. It is important for the whole sector that there is clarity on the approach taken in any transition period until the Act is fully effective. There are other bits I would like to mention, but they are not necessarily directly on the heritage angle and are particularly in relation to the replacement of environmental impact assessments and strategic environmental assessments. We can come on to those if the Committee would like to touch on them later.

[The Chair]

Q Nicholas, did you have anything that you wanted to add?

Nicholas Boys Smith: I will make a quick point linking to the wider discussion on levelling up. The danger in the years to come is that as public sector money rightly supports the regeneration and investment in left-behind towns and places, in areas with low land value, that could actually lead to the reduction in quality of the urban realm and thus the reduced liveability of lots of historic but low-value places—the Grimsbys, the Hulls and the Stoke-on-Trents of this world. It is very important that the Bill focuses on the protection of heritage.

I think it will be very important in the years to come to think hard about how we protect, as we do not do quite so well at the moment, late Victorian and early 20th century heritage. At the moment, the ability to list gets much tougher for the late 19th century. This is not something that needs to be done through the Bill; it could be done through secondary legislation or guidance. We should make sure that as lots of money and focus goes on to levelling up places, we do not, as we have too often in the past, erringly do great harm to areas with unlisted and perhaps not very fashionable early 20th century-style places.

The quality of the urban infrastructure and realm of many of our left-behind towns is fantastic. They are often post-industrial towns with much lower levels of listing than the Salisburys and the Winchesters of this world; that is no disrespect to Salisbury or Winchester. There is a quite urgent need to face into that. Doing so would have the added advantage that more of our housing requirement could hopefully come in a more sustainable pattern from these rather under-utilised, under-invested-in and under-lived-in towns in the midlands and the north.

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[The Chair]

For your benefit, Sir, the purpose of this Committee is to gather evidence to help us when we consider the Bill as we go through it line by line next week. One advantage of this Committee is that the Minister gets to ask questions. That is the only fun that he will have in this Committee, so I think we will start with him.

[Stuart Andrew]

Q Thank you very much, Mr Bone.

Dr Ellis, thank you very much for your time this afternoon. Could you perhaps tell us what your organisation and its members think about many of the reforming aspects of the planning system that are contained in the Bill?

Dr Ellis: I think they regard it, and we regard it, as a mixed picture. We welcome the issues on hope value and on development corporations, and strengthening the development plan is certainly welcome. But then there are a series of issues on which we need some serious reassurance. There are just three. First, how can we drive delivery and does the Bill do enough on that. Secondly, democracy and public trust are absolutely critical to everyone because, as we have already heard, there is a lack of public trust in the system. Finally, there are the really positive measures that could be taken on climate change.

Briefly, I will throw one more in. When we write legislation on planning and when planners think about the future, we often have a tendency to think about it through our lens. I think it would have been great to see more creative, local community solutions in the Bill, particularly on the cost of living. The planning system has enormous potential to be a solution for things such as local food growing and local flood defence. It would have been great to see some concrete measures enabling that kind of activity from the bottom up.

[Stuart Andrew]

Q Given that about 39% of England is covered by up-to-date local plans at the moment, do you think that the measures in the Bill will make it easier, or is there anything else that should have been included to try to progress these plans; to give confidence to communities about what will be developed in their areas?

Dr Ellis: The primacy of the local plan is really important. We are very worried about the relationship with national development policies and whether that masks a centralising tendency. Local and neighbourhood plans are so important in giving certainty to communities. As is often the case, we are making some changes to the process of planning reform—that is nothing new—but the fundamental issue is about resources. Most people who talk to us about planning and the delivery of local plans would say, “Well, if we had more resources we could deliver them more quickly, and if we had more certainty we could also do that.” So we should not get too hung up about changing the law.

We have divided the local plan into several pieces now through this Bill: we have said there is a local plan, then a supplementary plan, and then a strategic plan, and two of those are voluntary and one is not. In that sense, we have created that framework. The answer is that it all depends: it depends on resources and on how much power the Secretary of State wants to take to the centre on the content of local plans. We have an honest concern that if you want to rebuild public trust, you need to handle those powers with extreme caution.

[Stuart Andrew]

Q Do you welcome the strengthening of neighbourhood planning and the neighbourhood statements included in the Bill to try to engage more of that community involvement?

Dr Ellis: I think we do. We are obviously desperate to preserve the rights to be heard. That is an important point. We are losing some rights to be heard and communities really need them. The TCPA fought for them from the 1960s onwards so that people had a right to be in the inquiry of a plan. Our planning system is very asymmetrical; the development sector is very dominant in that process.

A lot of people are sceptical about the idea of neighbourhood planning. I admit my own scepticism about it, because plans are often happening in places with more social and economic capital than others and we absolutely have to address that, but they are proving powerful—I speak as an ex-parish councillor, so I have served my time on this. Whether the statements get us over the line in creating something simple and meaningful is the challenge we want to see explored through this Bill’s progress. Will those statements actually have weight? Yes, you have to have regard to them, but what exactly will that mean in detail? Local and parish councils are denigrated, but they do have a powerful and meaningful role in the planning process.

[Stuart Andrew]

Q Finally, we have heard time and again about complexity and bureaucracy in the development of local and neighbourhood plans. What has been the reaction of your association’s members to the digitisation of the planning process in the Bill?

Dr Ellis: There are two sides to that reaction. First, what is not to like about digitisation? There are some very archaic practices in the planning process and it would be great if we could catch up and have the resources to digitise. That will make information more accessible. It is also really important that we are able to integrate environmental data, because there are competing datasets out there. One of the most important recommendations is that we sort of need a national laboratory for that spatial data, as that would simplify the process no end.

But digital data goes so far. There is an issue about digital exclusion that worries us for communities. We can have as much digital information as we like, but we also need access to the arenas where decisions are made, so there is a twin relationship between understanding what is going on and being able to do something about it. That is where rights to be heard, which we are so exercised about in the planning process, are so important.

[The Chair]

I call the shadow Minister, Matthew Pennycook.

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[The Chair]

We are having slight problems with the sound. We will just give it a second. Do you want to carry on?

Kate Henderson: I was just saying that we are very, very keen that, as test and learn is rolled out, housing associations, working with councils and developers, are part of that programme, so we ensure we set the levies at a level that enables the delivery of great places with high-quality affordable housing on site in mixed communities. Doing that in a phased way to make sure it is working, while retaining parts of the old system as this is transitioned out, sounds like a sensible, pragmatic way forward.

[Stuart Andrew]

Q I thank you both for your time this afternoon. We know that protracted section 106 negotiations can sometimes result in a reduction in the amount of affordable housing from what was originally intended to be delivered. We are introducing the right to require, so we can get as much, if not almost all, of our ambition to achieve that. Are there any specific points you would like us to look at as we develop that side of the policy? More broadly, how do you see the proposals on access to information on land helping housing associations to look at opportunities to deliver more affordable housing?

Kate Henderson: Taking the second part first, transparency on land ownership is hugely welcome, as are the clauses in part 7 on compulsory purchase. I know this is not the same thing, but they are interlinked. Being able to access land at the right price to capture that land value is a really important mechanism for ensuring that we are able to deliver affordable housing. The best section 106 agreements do that because they understand the infrastructure need in a local area and those policies are in the local plan, so that when you go in for your planning application it is all costed in. I think the main principle of the infrastructure levy is that the cost of the levy is costed in so it can be factored into the price, which factors into what you are willing to pay for the land.

Land transparency is welcome, as is part 7 on compulsory purchase, regeneration and the enhanced role of Homes England, not just as a housing agency but as an agency involved in regeneration and place making.

Gavin Smart: I support much of what Kate says. I do not want to repeat her, but I have a couple of observations. Some of this is about the creation of a new planning system and some of it is about the resourcing of local authorities. Some of what characterises good section 106 negotiations is the ability to negotiate effectively. It is quite hard to design either a section 106 or a levy system in which developers may not come back, either legitimately or less legitimately, to argue that the situation has changed and needs to be looked at again. We have to accept that as a fact of life in these negotiations. It is not done until it is done.

I agree with Kate that land transparency is very helpful. Considering whether compensation needs to be paid in quite the same way as it has until now, and addressing hope value, is a very sensible proposition that we would support.

[Rachael Maskell]

Q In areas of high land value, how do we bring forward sites that are not built just for investment—Airbnb, asset homes and second homes—but are built to meet local need? What measures would you add to the Bill?

Gavin Smart: I do not know about adding measures to the Bill, but it is about the quality of local plans and the quality of local decision making. Going back to Kate’s point, it is about making sure we are operating on an objective assessment of need. We need to be sure that in our plans we are delivering the housing that is required for the whole community, rather than simply housing that can make the best return. In that sense, the planning system is something of an intervention to prevent what one might describe as a kind of market failure, which is that the housing market will not deliver the housing we need without being provided with a degree of direction. It is as much about what happens in implementation as what is actually in the Bill and the quality and strength of local plan-making behaviour.

Kate Henderson: There are already tools in the planning toolbox that enable local authorities to deliver different types of development that are right for their area. One example is rural exemption sites. I know your constituency is in York, so you are not necessarily rural, but our rural areas often have high land values and pressing affordability issues. The rural exemption policy enables affordable housing to be developed in perpetuity. A local landowner might be more likely to put forward a piece of land for affordable housing if they know it is going to stay in the community, for the community, so there are policies such as those that can be used. I agree with Gavin: it is really important that the local authority has a good evidence base of what is actually needed, so that when it is making decisions on schemes coming forward, there is an opportunity to argue for the social mix that it wants to see, including affordable housing.

I also think there is a role for different actors in the housing market: who is actually coming forward with proposals? What is the role of Homes England in terms of its land assembly role and its partnership role with local authorities, and how do we get HE more in the mix in its place-making role, as well?