Planning and Infrastructure Bill

Committee (5th Day) (Continued)

21:08:00

Amendment 125

Moved by

125: After Clause 51, insert the following new Clause— “Access to data on overheating risk(1) For the purposes of supporting the making of local plans, spatial development strategies and planning decisions, the Secretary of State must make provision for local planning authorities to have access to relevant data relating to overheating risk.(2) The Secretary of State must ensure that data on overheating risk made available to local planning authorities is updated at intervals not exceeding five years.”Member's explanatory statement This new clause would require the Secretary of State to ensure that local planning authorities have access to up-to-date data on overheating risk, to support the making of local plans, spatial development strategies, and planning decisions.

Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP)My Lords, I rise to speak to several amendments in this group, Amendments 125, 126 and 181, all of which address the issues of overheating.

I shall constrain myself to commenting on the amendments in my name, but this is the direction of the overall travel of the group. I do not have any particular attachment to the different means by which this issue is addressed here. What is very clear from the level of engagement is that there is a serious issue of overheating, as reflected by this group of amendments.

I shall start with a statistic that is quite shocking. Since 2016, about 570,000 new homes have been built without adequate adaptations to respond to increased temperatures. We have heard from Members of your Lordships’ House who are members of the Committee on Climate Change, and many of us in this debate will have heard from the reports about the inadequacy of climate adaptation. We were speaking in an earlier group about the inadequacy of dealing with flooding. This is overheating, which brings huge financial costs. We have had heatwaves this year but, if we go back to 2022, we saw temperatures over 40 degrees centigrade for the first time, which resulted in more than 3,000 heat-related deaths, the highest level of mortality since the first heatwave plan was written in 2023. We know that, with the climate emergency, this is going to happen more and more often at greater and greater levels. It is particularly the young and old who are most vulnerable to this, but we are increasingly in a situation where everybody is vulnerable.

To go back to a point that I raised on an earlier group about ventilation and so on, we are also going to see, sadly, an increasing number of fires, in natural environments and probably, as we saw in London in 2022, in urban environments as well. That is where we also have to think about wildfire smoke and its impact on human health.

I want to go to the issue that we keep raising again and again in amendments—that this is very much a social justice and inequality issue. It is broadly the more economically disadvantaged households that are at greatest risks from these overheating issues, although it is not just those households. Almost 5.5 million children, over half of those in England, are living in homes at risk of overheating; according to the English Housing Survey 2022 analysis by the Resolution Foundation, more than 1 million of those children are living in London, mostly in social housing.

These amendments look at allowing local authorities, where the local climatic data indicates elevated risk—which, in essence, now means everywhere in the UK—to take specific action under the Town and Country Planning Act. Also—and this is important, and it is crucial that we discuss it under my Amendment 181 about cooling hierarchy guidance—we heard during the recent heatwaves that we have experienced in the UK a great deal of discussion about air conditioning: “Why do we not have air conditioning? Why don’t we install air conditioning?” Of course, the problem with air conditioning is that it is innately counterproductive: you are cooling the home and heating the outside, whether that is through the electricity used or even very directly, with urban heat islands, and so on. Air conditioning is not the answer—and then there are the inequality issues that arise from that as well.

Amendment 181 talks about the Secretary of State providing guidance to local planning authorities to outline a cooling hierarchy and provide guidance on how it is applied. This is where again—it is the problem with green politics of everything being related to everything else—I have to cross-reference back to our discussion about nature. One of the best ways to provide cooling in environments is to have trees and greenery; it is much better than concrete, as it reflects back the heat heating up the area around it. It is about having a structured approach and looking at greenery and at passive and sustainable design elements.

Let us think, for example, of the people of Yemen, who have a traditional architecture, in the hottest temperatures that humans can just about stand, that is cool and comfortable, based on centuries of knowledge of how to build in ways that encourage breezes and bring the air coming over. We come back to the noble Baroness, Lady Willis of Summertown, not currently in her place, and the value of water as a key cooling element—a breeze coming across water, circulating through a house and cooling it down; shades in the right directions and in the right places; and, obviously, the thermal mass of a house so that it does not heat up too quickly but also ensures that it can cool itself down.

21:15:00

All these things need to be addressed, and this Bill is a crucial point where we can make sure that people have houses that they can healthily live in. We were talking about health before, and all the amendments in this group bring this together, so I really hope we are going to hear positive directions from the Minister. As I said, I am not attached to a particular way of doing this, but I think we need to hear a lot more. It is not just me saying that; the Committee on Climate Change too is asking the Government how they plan to deal with the overheating issue, particularly of residential buildings, though I remind noble Lords that it is not just residential buildings. Just across the road in Portcullis House in recent times, they have found that it is too hot for people to work in some of the offices over there, in a rather recently rebuilt building. I beg to move.

Lord Ravensdale (CB)My Lords, I declare my interests as a chief engineer working for AtkinsRéalis and as a director of Peers for the Planet. I thank my supporters on Amendment 127, the noble Lords, Lord Krebs and Lord Hunt of Kings Heath. I am very pleased to bring back this amendment, which I originally raised as part of the Levelling-up and Regeneration Act a couple of years back. The reason I am pleased to bring it back is that it is a reminder that we have made a lot of progress in this area over the last couple of years. Noble Lords may remember the great progress we made following ping-pong on the then Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill, when we started that process of embedding net zero and climate into our planning system.

Since then, we have had the updates of the National Planning Policy Framework, again embedding climate further into the system, which is already good progress, but as Ministers and noble Lords like to say, there is always more to do. Despite this progress, it is vital that the Government go further, because Peers from all parties across the House have worked extremely hard in recent years to embed our climate and nature goals across a range of sectors and regulatory regimes. That includes the health service, in the Health and Care Act 2022; our skills framework, in the IfATE Bill; Ofwat; the Crown Estate; and Ofgem, in the Energy Act 2022. It is vital that we take those same steps for our planning system, embedding this in statute, not only to help the Government deliver on their overarching climate and environmental goals but to support the 2030 electricity system targets and the target to build 1.5 million homes.

It is particularly important in planning, and the reason is that there are so many different issues to contend with when decision-makers are considering a planning application. Part of the problem is that lack of strategic guidance and direction on which factors are important; that is partly what is leading to paralysis in our planning system. In recent years, we have had legal challenges which have actually delayed sustainable homes being built for years—for example, the Salt Cross development in Oxfordshire—and we have had pushback on solar farms and other aspects of our electricity grid because of a lack of clarity in the planning system.

I am sure that when the Minister responds, she will come back to the NPPF, as I mentioned earlier, but many noble Lords have set out today in previous groups the limitations of relying on the NPPF. For example, the noble Baroness, Lady Willis, said that the guidance that has been there on green spaces for many years has just not delivered.

We really need the strength of a statutory duty in this area, because guidance in the NPPF is not future-proofed. It is only guidance and does not refer to our targets. It is also worth saying that, in the way we have structured the amendments, it is a statutory duty but it is worded around “special regard”, which is a well-tested legislative approach. It is not saying the environment must be considered, because there may be other material considerations that, on balance, override that, but it is saying that it should carry weight within the planning system. This perspective is fully supported by the recent Corry review undertaken for Defra, which says that Defra

“needs to find a way of ensuring clarity, from a spatial perspective, for how the multitude of nature and planning strategies come together in a way which local authorities and combined authorities can understand and deliver, in partnership with regulators”. The duty would provide exactly that: a golden thread running through the whole town and country planning system to ensure that it delivers for our national goals. We heard earlier in the debate about the future homes standard, which is coming up in the autumn. This duty would complement and work with that future homes standard to make sure that our targets are delivered.

It is this simplification and clarity that is going to help the Government in their target to build those 1.5 million new homes. The House of Lords Built Environment Committee in 2022 stated:

“Local plans are currently too complex and detailed, which results in delays. Alongside introducing time limits on plan-making processes, the Government should produce standardised definitions and simplified guidance for local planning authorities. Simplification will also aid community engagement with local plans”.

Ultimately, that is helping local authorities and local areas deliver. It is all about the devolution of power because in many areas local authorities want to play their part, but they are being blocked—fundamentally because there is little integration and join up at a local level, whether that is local area energy planning, rollout or clarity in our planning system. This leads to an inconsistent approach—a patchwork quilt of responses across the many local authorities in terms of their approach to the environment and net zero. Again, a thread throughout the system would help fix that.

To summarise, this amendment would have important practical effect through ensuring that the town and country planning system delivers against the UK’s strategic objectives: 1.5 million homes that are fit for the future, unblocking and simplifying the system and, critically, giving local authorities the power to play their part, working in concert with the future home standard. Rather than the current piecemeal mentions of climate change and planning policy scattered through the legislation and the NPPF, there is a fantastic opportunity here for the Government to update the Bill to fully embed these targets within statutes and ensure that there is a coherent thread running through the whole planning system.

I have added my name to Amendment 180 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett. For me, this is just another case in which there is work being done within industry, but we need a central function to co-ordinate these efforts and bring that consistency to reporting. However, I will not say any more at this stage.

Earl Russell (LD)My Lords, my Amendments 145B and 216 on overheating and climate change are in this group. This is an important group, and we generally support all the amendments that have been put forward.

We have just had the warmest summer on record—the warmest since 1884. Summer temperatures were 1.51 degrees above the long-term meteorological average and all five of the hottest summers have been since 2000. A summer as warm as the one we have just had is now 70 times more likely due to climate change. Obviously, continuous exposure to heat is a slow-motion killer and it is bad for our population. Our homes are not built—or fit—for the future, which is here now.

Buildings are responsible for over 40% of the energy demand in the UK. Some 80% of the buildings that will be occupied in 2050 have already undergone construction. Therefore, we must do more—all of us—to ensure that the homes we build and plan today are fit for the future. My Amendment 145B asks that, where a spatial development strategy includes provisions relating to housing, it also includes provisions for housing to meet recognised high efficiency and climate resilient standards, including but not limited to Passivhaus standards. This is with a view to reducing energy consumption, improving temperature controls and ventilations, particularly in response to extreme heat and contributing to our regional climate change mitigation and adaption objectives.

We have to do more. The Climate Change Committee has also been clear on these points. The UK will not meet its emission targets

“without near-complete decarbonisation of the housing stock”.

The houses we build are places of shelter. They need to provide long-term security, affordability, to be resilient and to cope in the warming climate. This is about asking simple questions about the houses we are building. Are they fit for the future?

Each new home that we build without proper standards leads to higher emissions, higher heating costs and greater vulnerability for those that live within them. Conversely, if we build to high efficiency standards, we can curb our emissions, reduce future retrofitting costs, protect families from the risk of heatwaves and reduce their energy bills.

The amendment refers to standards, particularly Passivhaus, but it allows flexibility; it is not restrictive, and it is not telling local authorities what they have to do, but it is for them to have regard to these things. Therefore, it is not prescriptive. We believe that is a good way of doing these things. It can save people money and give them a better quality of life. We think that this is a good amendment.

Amendment 216 proposes that every new home built in the country should meet a net-zero carbon building standard and be equipped with solar-powered generation as standard. I thank the noble Baronesses, Lady Young of Old Scone and Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb, and the noble Lord, Lord Grantchester, for adding their names. This not a radical measure; this is a reasoned, practical response, designed to support government policies which are either in development or are being developed but have not fully been put forward. Obviously, it covers exactly the same points. As we know, retrofitting is five times more expensive, which is just too expensive. We do not have the time, and we cannot afford to wait.

I acknowledge and thank the Labour Party for the work it is doing in this space. We look forward to the future homes standard and welcome the moves the Government are making on installing rooftop solar. There are various different strands and elements of policy that all need to come together. There is a warm homes plan, the overheating requirement that the Minister has referred to as well, and general building regulatory reforms around zero-carbon buildings. But a lot of these measures are either not here or not strictly laid down in planning law with the certainty that my amendment has. While I welcome the measure the Government are taking, and I know there will be policies published in the autumn, I want to push the Government as to whether, when those policies come forward, they will have the level of certainty to meet the actions we need. My amendment hopes to solidify and support the work that the Government themselves are actively doing, and to strengthen some of those measures. My question to the Government is: if you are not supporting my measures, what certainty can you give us around the weight the measures you will put forward will have in law?

I give my support to Amendment 127, so ably spoken to by the noble Lord, Lord Ravensdale, and supported by the noble Lords, Lord Hunt of Kings Heath, Lord Krebs and Lord Grantchester. I will not speak to it for too long, but this is an essential amendment. As the noble Lord said, it puts a golden thread through this stuff. “Have regard to” is good wording. This stuff needs to happen. All too often, these issues are ignored or set aside and do not have the clear weight within planning law that they need to. Therefore, we welcome this amendment. This needs to change and it is a sensible and well-reasoned amendment.

I am in favour of Amendment 180, tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett of Manor Castle, which would introduce a carbon assessment, as required for larger developments. We are no longer blind to one of the most significant drivers of climate emissions. The construction sector is responsible for a quarter of the UK’s carbon footprint and that is set to rise. These emissions remain largely invisible within the planning system, and we need a proper system to take better account of them and to regulate them, so we also support this as a sensible amendment.

21:30:00

Lord Krebs (CB)My Lords, I will speak to Amendment 127, which I have put my name to, ably introduced by the noble Lord, Lord Ravensdale, and to support the other amendments in this group.

I was glad to hear both the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett of Manor Castle, and the noble Earl, Lord Russell, referring to the work of the Climate Change Committee. It is so important that we understand what the expert advice is from our statutory body, and so I will quote a few sentences from the April report on climate adaptation:

“The UK’s preparations for climate change are inadequate… In terms of adaptation delivery, we do not find evidence to score a single outcome as ‘good’”.

About buildings, it says that

“6.3 million properties in England are in areas at risk of flooding from rivers, the sea, and surface water. This is predicted to rise to around 8 million (25% of all properties) by 2050 … Towns and cities will become increasingly hot, with a large fraction of current buildings at risk of reaching uncomfortable and potentially dangerous temperatures in summer heatwaves”—

a point made so ably by the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett of Manor Castle.

In table 1 of the summary of the adaptation committee’s report, there is a score card for delivery and implementation on the one hand and policies and plans on the other. Under “Planning system prioritises climate resilience”, for delivery and implementation it says, “Unable to evaluate”—there is no evidence—and for policies and plans it says, “Insufficient”. For “Buildings do not overheat”, on delivery it says, “Unable to evaluate”, and under policies it says, “Limited”. For “Buildings are prepared for flooding”, it says “Partial”—that is a good score—for both delivery and for policies and plans. For “Buildings are resilient to other climate risks”, it says “Unable to evaluate” for both delivery and for policies and plans. Here we have it, from the statutory expert advisers to the Government, that we are not doing enough to prepare our houses, public buildings and commercial buildings for the impact of climate change.

For me, the remarkable thing is that none of this is new. I chaired the adaptation committee between 2009 and 2017, and we were saying exactly the same things 15 years ago. Nobody is listening. It would be nice to hear from the Minister that this Government are listening and understand that this is not just some pie-in-the-sky thing for the future but urgent and needs to be addressed now.

Another important point was made in the introduction from the noble Lord, Lord Ravensdale, when he said that things may be written in the NPPF but what we need is to strengthen the commitments by putting them firmly into the statute book. I listened to some of the debate earlier about green spaces, sport and recreation, and all these wonderful facilities in new developments, and we heard reassuring words from the Government. However, when I look at the new housing estates around Oxford, where I live, they are nothing like that. They are simply identikit houses, jammed in as close together as possible, with no green space, no recreation facilities, no climate resilience and no plans to deal with overheating—as the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, said.

There are very simple things that could be done. If you go, as I sometimes do, to the south of France and rent a house, the house will have shutters. In the middle of the day, when it is hot, you close the shutters and they keep the heat out. Why are we not building new houses with shutters as a mandatory requirement? It would not cost much money and it would be a simple, effective tool to reduce the chance of overheating.

I hope the Minister will confirm that the Government have listened to the report of the adaptation committee of the Climate Change Committee and will do something about where it scored “Inadequate” or nul points under the various assessments, and that the Government are minded to firm up what is guidance and make it statutorily an obligation.

Baroness Young of Old Scone (Lab)My Lords, I will speak to Amendments 127 and 216.

Amendment 216, to which I have put my name, was led by the noble Earl, Lord Russell, and concerns the zero-carbon standard for new homes. If the noble Lord, Lord Krebs, feels that the adaptation committee reports are cyclical and the same and getting nowhere then the zero-carbon standard discussion feels like Groundhog Day, to be frank. We got so close to having a zero-carbon home commitment in 2015. We were within two weeks of the commitment coming into effect, at a time when the housebuilders, in spite of some initial grumping, had tooled up to deliver it, when all of a sudden the Chancellor, George Osborne, stepped in at the last minute and summarily cancelled it. It was the biggest letdown for everybody. That meant that, for 10 years, we built houses which could have been zero carbon, significantly contributed to reducing our carbon footprint, helped people have warmer homes and helped the communities have lower bills—but we did not. We have lost 10 years of delivery. We have to now grip that and make sure that we do not lose any more years.

The current policy under the future homes standard requires new homes only to be zero-carbon ready by 2025. That does not go far enough. It also does not require anything on solar panels, which this amendment addresses. I know that there has been a bit of a shift in thinking within government over the last few months on the question of distributed solar. I press the Minister to tell us what improvements we are expecting to see on the future homes standard to reverse the harm that was done by Mr Osborne.

Before I sit down, I commend Amendment 127, in the name of the noble Lord, Ravensdale, which would give clear mitigation and adaptation climate change duties to planning authorities. I very much endorse everything that the noble Lord, Lord Krebs, said. I was honoured to serve, at least for a brief period, on the adaptation committee. I helped get the legislation through this House to create it and then promptly did a runner after I had been appointed to it—as they say, it was a good idea at the time.

The whole role of planning authorities in climate change is absolutely crucial, not just for mitigation but for adaptation to the impacts of climate change. I draw the attention of the Minister and the Committee to a recent Local Government Association report which went out extensively to wide consultation. As a result of that consultation with a whole range of consultees, not only local government authorities, it came back with the proposition that there should be statutory powers and duties for local authorities on action for climate change mitigation and adaptation.

There was a bit of schadenfreude for me in that. When we originally got the climate Act through, it prescribed roles for local authorities. In fact, it had a reporting arrangement for local authorities that meant that they had a statutory requirement to report. That was cancelled very rapidly when the Conservative Government came in in 2010. We are now in a position where, although many local authorities are very committed to the idea of their place in mitigation of and adaptation to climate change, they are under no duress to report on that. The only thing they have to do is that, if they are asked by government to report, they are required to do so—but only if asked. That strikes me as a very strange way of keeping track of delivery on this.

As the noble Lord, Lord Krebs, said, the most recent report by the adaptation committee assessing the nation’s level of preparedness to adapt to the impacts of climate change was very gloomy about the lack of progress, and quite rightly so. Adaptation is the Cinderella, the poor relation of the whole climate change effort. It is not going to get any better; it is going to get worse, with heatwaves, droughts, wildfires and floods—it is being so cheerful at this time of night that keeps me going. Amendment 127, to clarify the climate change mitigation and adaptation duties of planning authorities, or something like it, is very important. I hope that the Minister will consider it seriously.

Lord Hunt of Kings Heath (Lab)My Lords, very briefly, I support the amendment of the noble Lord, Lord Ravensdale; I think it is very important. I want to pick up what my noble friend said: many local authorities are very keen to develop policies in relation to climate change, particularly on this very important issue of adaptation. My noble friend will have seen recently that some local authorities have put into reverse any commitment towards net zero and climate change policies. My question to the House is: what do we do about this? It is not fashionable at the moment to mention climate change, for some remarkable reason, but I think it is the most important and biggest issue we face. What are we to do if local authorities are saying, “No, we’ll turn our backs on this. We’ll commit ourselves to fossil fuels. We will develop policies that are very distinct—in opposition almost—to issues around climate change”? My advice to the Government is that this is not acceptable. If we are really serious about net zero and if we are serious about climate change adaptation as well as mitigation, we have to have a much greater concerted effort, in which local government clearly has to play an important part. That is why I think the amendment of the noble Lord, Lord Ravensdale, is so important.

Lord Jamieson (Con)My Lords, I will speak on this important group of amendments, which touch on the crucial matters of climate change and, more specifically, overheating, energy efficiency and net-zero carbon developments. I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett of Manor Castle, the noble Lord, Lord Ravensdale, and the noble Earl, Lord Russell, who have tabled these amendments. Their recognition of the pressing challenge that climate change presents and the role that planning and development must play in addressing it is both welcome and timely. In doing so, I wish to express our appreciation for the sentiment behind the amendments in their name and the desire to ensure that our built environment is resilient and sustainable in the face of changing climate.

We on these Benches recognise the need to address climate change and overheating risks in our built environment. However, it is also essential that we balance these aims with the need to avoid introducing overly burdensome mandates and excessive regulation that could hinder much-needed housing delivery, achieving the 1.5 million homes and economic growth. I look forward to hearing from the Minister how the Government intend to address these important and pressing issues, ensuring that we both protect our environment and support sustainable development and homes that are much needed.

Lord in Waiting/Government Whip (Lord Wilson of Sedgefield) (Lab)I thank the noble Lords who have tabled amendments relating to climate change and overheating. It is obviously the biggest issue facing not just the Government and the country but the world. I turn first to Amendments 125, 126, 181 and 216, which concern efforts to adapt new homes and buildings to account for the risk of overheating and the need to drive energy efficiency in new homes. The Government agree that action is needed to address these risks, but we must be mindful of the existing regulatory and legislative regimes that underpin action in these areas.

The building regulations already set specific performance targets for new homes and non-domestic buildings. Compliance with these regulations is mandatory. Aspects of building construction concerned with heating, energy efficiency and cooling are best addressed through these regulations, which the Government are using to make progress on these vital issues. For example, in 2022, a new part of the building regulations was introduced, part O, which is specifically designed to ensure that new homes are built to mitigate the risk of overheating. We are already considering whether part O and its associated guidance can be improved, having run a call for evidence as part of the consultation on the future homes and building standards to seek views on this.

21:45:00

It is those future homes and building standards that will deliver the net zero-ready buildings that the country needs, and which are the focus of the amendment tabled by the noble Earl, Lord Russell. These updates to the building regulations will be published in autumn this year and will ensure that new homes and buildings are future-proofed, with low-carbon heating such as heat pumps and, in the majority of cases, solar panels. As the grid decarbonises, these homes and buildings will be zero-carbon in operation, without the need for expensive retrofitting.

Amendment 127 seeks to require the Secretary of State and relevant planning authorities to have special regard to climate change mitigation and adoption in national planning policy, local plans and planning decisions. We agree with the notion that both central and local governments should be held to high account in considering climate change throughout the entire planning system. However, much of the content of this amendment already forms part of planning policy or is covered by existing statutory requirements.

To highlight just a few instances, it is already a requirement in the Planning and Compulsory Purchase Act 2004 that local planning authorities include policies in their local plans that contribute to climate change mitigation and adoption. The Environment Act 2021 also requires consideration of environmental factors in the planning system. This includes local planning authorities having regard for factors such as local nature recovery strategies in planning and decision-making, as well as the environmental principles duty that applies to Government Ministers making policies.

Additionally, risk management authorities such as district councils, lead local flood authorities or internal drainage boards are required to act in accordance with the flood and coastal erosion risk management strategy, which is produced by the Environment Agency in line with the Flood and Water Management Act 2010. As mentioned previously, the principles of sustainable development are already embedded in the National Planning Policy Framework. In case there were further matters in the EDP to be taken into account, Section 70(2) of the Town and Country Planning Act already requires planning decision-makers to have regard to all material considerations. I hope that, with this explanation, the noble Lord will not move his amendment.

Turning to Amendment 145B, it is vital—

Lord Ravensdale (CB)I appreciate the Minister’s response and that he has highlighted a number of areas of planning policy where this is mentioned. But the point I was trying to make was that there is no central duty that is tying all those areas of policy together into a framework and having that thread running throughout the planning system. Does he agree that this is needed?

Lord Wilson of Sedgefield (Lab)It is something that we should look at. The warm homes plan, for example, which will be published in October—in just a few weeks’ time—will look at our approach to heating in homes and the mitigation that we need to implement for climate change. We are looking at this and everything will continue to be under review.

Lord Lansley (Con)Can the Minister explain? I do not understand why he has not referred to the intended provisions of new Clause 12D(10) describing the content of a spatial development strategy. The Government are proposing that:

“A spatial development strategy must be designed to secure that the use and development of land in the strategy area contribute to the mitigation of, and adaptation to, climate change”.

Can the Minister not say with some certainty that the effect of that would be to ensure that mitigation and adaptation to climate change do form a central part of plan-making?

Lord Wilson of Sedgefield (Lab)Climate change mitigation does play a big part in all the planning arrangements that we are going to introduce. It is one of the central points of the Planning and Infrastructure Bill that we actually take those aspects into consideration.

I turn to Amendment 145B. It is vital that new homes are energy efficient and designed to mitigate the risk associated with overheating and spatial development strategies, particularly as climate change increases the frequency and severity of extreme heat events. The Planning and Compulsory Purchase Act already allows strategic planning authorities to include policies requiring housing to meet standards on energy efficiency and climate resilience in their spatial development strategies, provided they are of strategic importance to the strategy area. As I mentioned previously, the spatial development strategies are intended to be high-level documents. Energy-efficiency and climate resilience standards are more detailed matters that are better suited to a local plan.

We intend to go further this autumn. We will set more ambitious energy-efficiency and carbon-emission requirements for new homes through the future homes and building standards. These standards will set new homes on a path that moves away from reliance on volatile fossil fuels. Homes built to these standards will use sustainable energy sources for their heating and hot water. This means they will be zero-carbon ready and will need no future work to achieve zero-carbon emissions when the electricity grid is fully decarbonised. I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, for proposing Amendment 180, which would require the submission of embodied carbon assessments for developments of a specified size as part of planning applications. However, to reiterate a point I have made throughout the debate, the National Planning Policy Framework already makes it clear that the planning system must support the transition to a low-carbon future. It calls for a proactive approach to both mitigating and adapting to climate change, in line with the long-term goals set out in the Climate Change Act 2008.

In our consultation on changes to the framework last summer, we sought views on whether carbon could be reliably measured and accounted for in plan-making and decision-making. We wanted to understand the sector’s readiness and to identify any practical barriers to the wider use of carbon assessments in planning. The feedback we received was wide-ranging and constructive. Having carefully considered those views, we concluded that it would not be appropriate at this stage to introduce a mandatory requirement for carbon assessments, given the current state of evolution of assessment techniques and the need to consider very carefully the impact on applicants where additional information such as this is mandated.

However, we recognise the need for greater clarity and guidance. That is why we have committed to updating the planning practice guidance to help both decision-makers and developers make better use of available tools to reduce embodied and operational carbon in the built environment. We also acknowledge that embodied carbon is not just a challenge for buildings; it is a systemic issue across the construction and supply sector. As wider decarbonisation efforts take hold and industries evolve, we expect to see a natural reduction in the embodied carbon of buildings over time. For these reasons, I kindly ask the noble Baroness to withdraw her amendment.

Lord Krebs (CB)My Lords, may I ask a small question? With regard to overheating, which was so eloquently introduced by the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett of Manor Castle, do the Government have any measurement of what proportion of houses that are being built now, as we speak, have within them measures to prevent overheating? Further, when all this new guidance that we have heard about comes into place, what proportion of homes will, in the future, from now onwards, incorporate measures to protect against overheating?

Lord Wilson of Sedgefield (Lab)To the first part of the noble Lord’s question, there has been an energy follow-up survey, which said that energy-efficiency measures that have been taken over recent years have not significantly increased the risk of overheating. On his second point, I will write to the noble Lord and give him the specific answer to his question.

Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP)My Lords, this has been another rich and full debate, and I thank the Minister for his answers and everyone who has taken part in this debate. It will, I am sure, please the Whips to know that I am not going to run through the whole lot, but I want to pick out a couple of highlights. The cri de coeur from the noble Lord, Lord Krebs, was “nobody listened”. I cannot help feeling that—we are here rather late in the evening, talking about what are truly matters of life and death, and this is perhaps not the ideal way to do it, but we are doing the best that we possibly can. I apologise to the noble Lord, Lord Ravensdale, for failing to acknowledge his signing—I think I lost a page somewhere in the general pile of a very long evening. I thank the noble Earl, Lord Russell, particularly for picking up the embodied carbon point, which is so crucial, as we have just been discussing. I particularly want to highlight, too, what the noble Baroness, Lady Young of Old Scone, said in reminding us how close we got to net zero-carbon homes—

Lord Wilson of Sedgefield (Lab)May I revert to being the Whip and ask the noble Baroness to move the decision? It is not about rehearsing the whole of the debate, which is what is happening, but about getting to the point of what she needs to be saying.

Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP)I am going to point to what the noble Baroness, Lady Young of Old Scone, said—how close we got, and a really bad decision was made. How do we make good decisions really quickly?

Okay, I will come to what the Minister said. It relied on building regulations and compliance with those, but we know what is being built now is not complying even with the inadequate regulations we have now, and that issue needs to be discussed. The final point I want to make is this: the noble Lord, Lord Jamieson, said that we cannot do anything to interfere with much-needed housing delivery. We have to build houses that people can safely live in. That has to be an absolute prerequisite. But, in the meantime, I—

Lord Jamieson (Con)I do not think I said that we cannot do anything. It is all about having a balance.

Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP)I accept the point made by the noble Lord, and I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment 125 withdrawn.

Amendments 126 and 127 not moved.

Amendment 128

Moved by

128: After Clause 51, insert the following new Clause— “Planning Acts legal challenges: reduction in time limit(1) The Town and Country Planning Act 1990 is amended in accordance with subsections (2) to (6).(2) In section 61N (legal challenges in relation to neighbourhood development orders)—(a) in subsection (1)(b) for “6 weeks” substitute “21 days”;(b) in subsection (2)(b) for “6 weeks” substitute “21 days”;(c) in subsection (3)(b) for “6 weeks” substitute “21 days”.(3) In section 106C (legal challenges relating to development consent obligations)—(a) in subsection (1)(b) for “6 weeks” substitute “21 days”;(b) in subsection (1A) for “6 weeks” substitute “21 days”; (c) in subsection (2)(b) for “6 weeks” substitute “21 days”;(d) in subsection (3)(b) for “6 weeks” substitute “21 days”.(4) In section 287 (proceedings for questioning validity of development plans and certain schemes and orders), in subsection (2B), for “6 weeks” substitute “21 days”.(5) In section 288 (proceedings for questioning the validity of other orders, decisions and directions), in subsection (4B), for “6 weeks” substitute “21 days”.(6) In section 289 (appeals to High Court relating to certain notices), after subsection (4B), insert—“(4C) An appeal under this section may not be made without the leave of the High Court.(4D) An application for leave for the purposes of subsection (4C) must be made before the end of the period of 21 days beginning with the day after the decision of the Secretary of State is made.”.(7) In section 63 of the Planning (Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas) Act 1990 (proceedings for questioning the validity of other orders, decisions and directions), in subsection (3A), for “6 weeks” substitute “21 days”.(8) In section 22 of the Planning (Hazardous Substances) Act 1990 (validity of decisions as to applications), in subsection (2B), for “6 weeks” substitute “21 days”.(9) In section 118 of the Planning Act 2008 (legal challenges relating to applications for orders granting development consent)—(a) in subsection (1)(b) for “6 weeks” substitute “21 days”;(b) in subsection (2)(b) for “6 weeks” substitute “21 days”;(c) in subsection (3)(b) for “6 weeks” substitute “21 days”;(d) in subsection (4)(b) for “6 weeks” substitute “21 days”;(e) in subsection (5)(b) for “6 weeks” substitute “21 days”;(f) in subsection (6)(b) for “6 weeks” substitute “21 days”;(g) in subsection (7)(b) for “6 weeks” substitute “21 days”.(10) The amendments made by this section do not apply in relation to a decision made before this section comes into force.”Member’s explanatory statement This new Clause would reduce the time-limit for legal challenges to certain orders from 6 weeks to 21 days, in line with the deadline for an application for permission to appeal. Transitional provision is further made to ensure that the amendments made by the new Clause apply prospectively only. This amendment extends Amendment 128 to proceedings brought under section 22 of the Planning (Hazardous Substances) Act 1990.

Lord Hunt of Kings Heath (Lab)My Lords, first, I pay tribute to the noble Lord, Lord Banner, for his outstanding work in relation to judicial review reform. It has clearly had a big impact on the Bill. At the risk of quoting the noble Lord to himself, he said in our earlier debate on this, which seems a long time ago, in relation to judicial review, that his review concludedusb that

“evidence demonstrated that the overwhelming majority of judicial reviews of NSIPs failed. It follows from this that the problem is not with the law, nor is it about ‘activist judges’ … It is about the time it takes for bad JRs to meet their doom ”.—[ Official Report , 17/7/25; col. 2102.] Obviously, the proposals in the Bill go quite some way towards meeting the noble Lord’s recommendations in the review. All I am trying to do here, with some probing amendments, is to test whether we could go a little further, and I am grateful to the noble Lord for putting his name to my Amendments 129 and 130. These, and Amendment 135D, attempt to replicate restriction appeals to the Court of Appeal where the High Court has certified the application as being totally without merit in relation to decisions under the Town and Country Planning Act 1990, the listed buildings Act and the hazardous substances Act. Again, the noble Lord asked the Government at Second Reading for clarification as to whether the changes here would be made

“only to infrastructure judicial reviews or to judicial and statutory reviews in planning generally ”.—[ Official Report , 25/6/25; col. 318.] It seems to me that there is a compelling case for doing that, and I hope my noble friend may be positive about this.

My Amendment 127 concerns the period within which legal challenges to planning decisions may be brought. It proposes the current six-week time limit be reduced to 21 days. I have used 21 days as a starting point as it reflects the standard time limit for civil appeals. The purpose is really to probe whether the six-week period continues to serve its intended purpose. I am aware that the noble Lord, on balance, in his independent review, did not support the shortening of time limits, but I would be interested in the Minister’s response on this.

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To turn to amendments to Clause 110, Amendments 357 and 358 would remove Clause 12 from commencement by regulations and instead provide that it should come into force two months after Royal Assent. This is from long experience of the endless delays there can be in activating legislation where it has to wait for the Government to bring regulations or the Secretary of State having to make decisions to commence a provision. We need to avoid uncertainty. After all, this Bill is all about trying to speed up planning decisions in relation to infrastructure. We know that regulations take an awfully long time to produce. You have to go through statutory consultation. As it is less of a priority within departments, the drafting is often delayed. I think that two months is a fair balance. It gives time to do it; it avoids a cliff-edge implementation, but it prevents unnecessary delay. Again, I will be interested in the Minister’s response to that.

My Amendment 360 would mirror the approach taken by Amendments 357 and 358 by providing for the other new clauses tabled in my name after Clause 51 in terms of extending the restriction of TWM judicial reviews to the Town and Country Planning Act 1990, the listed buildings Act and the hazardous substances Act.

These are, in my view, very sensible probing amendments, just trying to see whether the Government are prepared to go a little further and perhaps to consider this between now and Report. Having said that, I beg to move.

Lord Banner (Con)My Lords, I start by speaking in support of Amendments 129 and 130 from the noble Lord, Lord Hunt—and, indeed, of his Amendment 135D, which would extrapolate those amendments to the hazardous substances Act.

The background, in brief, is that Clause 12 of the Bill, following the recommendations of my independent review on legal challenges to NSIPs, removes the right of appeal to the Court of Appeal in relation to judicial review permission applications which are totally without merit. My independent review did not opine on whether that should be rolled out to other kinds of planning proceedings, as that was outside the remit of my review, but it is, of course, within the remit of this House and this Bill. I agree with everything that the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, has said in relation to rolling it out to other kinds of planning proceedings. To my mind, there is no meaningful distinction of context between a nationally significant infrastructure project and, for example, the granting of planning permission for 2,000 homes. Both are of fundamental importance to the objectives of the planning system.

So I firmly support those amendments. I also support the other amendments associated with those two. The one exception, as the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, has foreshadowed, is Amendment 128. I thought long and hard in the independent review about whether the time limits for judicial review should be shortened. My starting point was that they should be, but, on reflection, having taken soundings from a wide range of stakeholders, I concluded that that may end up being counterproductive. If there is too little time, claimants and their advisers might feel that it is better as a precaution to bring a judicial review claim and then review it and repent at leisure. In this context, I felt that the old adage, “I would have said less, but I did not have the time”, was applicable. It was a finely balanced conclusion, however. As the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, has said, it would indeed be interesting to hear the Government’s view.

I next speak to Amendment 168 in my name. That amendment would stop the clock on the deadline for implementing a planning permission while a judicial review was under way. Sections 91 and 92 of the Town and Country Planning Act have the effect that, for a full planning permission, one ordinarily has three years to commence development from the date of permission; for outline, it is the same period—three years—to bring forward an application for reserved matters.

Currently, however, it can take the best part of three years for a judicial review to run its course in cases that go to the Supreme Court, certainly, and even to the Court of Appeal. The delays in the planning court are such that even to get a permission decision in judicial review can take the best part of half a year. During that time, no rational developer, funder or land promoter would spend money, when a planning permission was at risk. That has real consequences for the status of planning permissions. I am aware of a number of planning permissions which have been put at risk because they have, in essence, been timed out. There was one well-known Supreme Court planning case a few years ago where the land promoter had to do a dummy reserved matters application just to keep the permission alive. Such applications can cost hundreds of thousands of pounds and sometimes more—wasted money which could be better used; for example, in providing a high amount of affordable housing contributions.

It is also an incentive to claimants to bring a judicial review, because claimants and their well-honed lawyers know that you can cause stress and distress to commercial parties by bringing a judicial review, threatening to tire them out and then seeking to extract undue concessions. I urge the Government seriously to consider this amendment. I do not understand what political capital, or any kind of capital, could be lost by accepting it. There are not really any downsides and there are an awful lot of upsides.

Viscount Hanworth (Lab)My Lords, I want to speak in support of Amendment 128. I am uncertain of the provenance of this amendment, but it is certainly well aligned with the Government’s agenda. It seeks to extend the provisions of Clause 12 of the Bill, which apply to nationally important infrastructure projects and other projects, notably those sponsored by local authorities. It seeks to limit the time available to make pleas against planning orders, reducing it from six weeks or 42 days to 21 days. I support this part of the amendment, which is entirely reasonable. More significantly, it proposes that an appeal to the High Court under Section 289 of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990 may not be made without leave of the court.

At an earlier stage of Committee, I spoke in favour of Amendment 52, which sought to limit the scope of judicial reviews that are liable to frustrate nationally important infrastructure projects. The proposal of that amendment is to bring the development orders for nationally significant infrastructure projects into Parliament. After a proposal has passed parliamentary scrutiny, then, by dint of an Act of Parliament, it should become legally incontestable and therefore it should not be subject to the hazards of a judicial review. Parliament must not be overburdened by such legislation; nevertheless, local development orders require greater protection against frivolous legal challenges.

I described the chicanery that obstructed the plans to eliminate a bottleneck on a major trunk road, the A303, where it passes close to Stonehenge on Salisbury Plain. The legal wrangling seemed almost interminable. The first grant of development consent for the bypass in 2020 was quashed by the High Court in July 2021. Then it was given a green light again by the DfT, which reissued the development consent two years later, in July 2023. The project was put on hold again because of another series of judicial reviews which were dismissed by the High Court in February 2024 and by the Court of Appeal in October 2024.

Undeterred by these two defeats, the claimants asked the Supreme Court whether they could appeal again, but on 29 January this year the Supreme Court refused permission to appeal on the grounds that the challenge did not raise any arguable points of law. However, this decision was immaterial, since within weeks of taking office last July, the Labour Government scrapped the plans for a two-mile tunnel which would bypass the monument on the grounds that the cost of the project had become unaffordable. The decision to cancel the project was made three and a half years after the development consent had been given and after a very full and detailed examination of all the issues. In this case, it might be said that the campaigners had won not by virtue of the strength of their cause but by dint of legal chicanery and delay. Moreover, the same recourse is available to many other parties who, for various reasons, wish to stand in the way of important development projects.

It is worth noting the circumstances that made the project unaffordable. They were attributable largely to the delays that had been caused by the appeals. Major work was being undertaken to improve the A303 but, by the time the legal issues had been settled, that work had been completed and the contractors had moved on. To call them back in order to complete the project would have entailed inordinate costs in re-establishing the project. Amendment 128 is wholly reasonable and, I think, long overdue, and I strongly commend it to your Lordships.

Baroness Coffey (Con)My Lords, I am really concerned about Amendment 128. The reason why I say that is that in this Bill, at the hands of the Government, we have already had an attack on democracy in terms of substantial decisions being removed from democratically elected councillors, and now it feels as if we are having an attack on communities. The reason why I say that is that six weeks from a determination to bringing about putting in a challenge when you believe that something may have been done unlawfully is already pretty short.

There are a number of factors. A judicial review probably costs between £100,000 and £150,000 just to get the process going, and it can be quite substantial in itself for a community to get that funding together. Normally you would do a pre-action protocol letter that the courts expect the Government—indeed, both sides—to comply with. Quite a lot of that will involve significant extractions of information from the Government. As a consequence, three weeks would end up timing out the opportunity for communities, which are concerned that something is being rammed through, to have a genuine opportunity to challenge it. This and previous Administrations will know that quite often—I will not say all the time, but there have been significant times—the courts have found the Government’s proceedings to be unlawful. That might be frustrating for the Government, but nevertheless there is still an opportunity for communities to do that.

So I am very concerned about halving the time for communities to consider how they might challenge a particular decision. We have seen that in a variety of ways, whether it is about housing, aspects of energy infrastructure or transport. I will not pretend that the Government will not often get frustrated, but nevertheless I think Amendment 128 in particular would still be an unnecessary adjustment. Frankly, although my noble friend Lord Banner is sympathetic to Amendment 128, as he said in his speech, I am delighted that he did not actually put his name to it.

Building on that, we then get into other considerations about going to the Court of Appeal. I have a lot more sympathy with the other amendments that have been put in this group in order not to have never-ending regulatory challenges through the courts. I used to represent Suffolk Coastal, and I know that Sizewell C in particular has had a lot of challenges that seem never ending and somewhat ridiculous, so I have some sympathy for that. However, I also have experience as a Secretary of State, not necessarily on infrastructure but on other judicial matters, where a judge in the High Court has ruled against the Government—despite, by the way, it having been through both Houses of Parliament in determining a particular aspect of legislation—and then initially said, “And you can’t appeal to the Court of Appeal”. There is a process that allows the Government, or indeed anyone, currently to go around that and just say, “That’s a bit ridiculous. You found against us and now, funnily enough, you’re actually accepting that you do not want your decision to be challenged”. That is where I have a bit of concern on where that particular aspect may go.

The noble Viscount, Lord Hanworth, happened to refer to the A303. I used to live quite near the A303 and while I am not trying to do a Second Reading speech—I am conscious of the advice of the noble Lord, Lord Wilson of Sedgefield—I just want to remind noble Lords of some of the amendments that have already been put to this Bill trying to limit the number of different reasons why a judicial review can be brought on infrastructure project.

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For example, on Stonehenge, under the new rules we are debating, if somebody had already challenged the environmental aspects, that would restrict the opportunity for other people to bring a judicial review on something completely different that has nothing to do with the environment—whether it was about roads, archaeology or so on. I can assure the noble Viscount that I have spent plenty of time sat on the A303 just after the roundabout after Amesbury, waiting while lots of rubbernecking is going on about how marvellous it is, and it is marvellous. I am nervous about certain aspects—not necessarily using the A303 as a great example—of what we are doing in our understandable desire to build, whether it is homes or other infrastructure. We are almost creating this fortress which will, in effect, allow the Government to build anywhere and everywhere they want regardless of the consequences.

Going back to this particular group, I am very concerned about the three weeks versus six weeks. The noble Lord, Lord Hunt, will know that—let me put it this way—not all of government is quite so efficient in responding to these pre-action protocol letters and the like. I think it would be unfair, if not unsafe, to try and insist on this change.

Viscount Hanworth (Lab)The supposition of the noble Baroness, Lady Coffey, seems to be that the consideration of a project by those that might oppose it is subsequent to the admission of a development order. In fact, usually the opposition long predates that, and so the limitation that we are proposing is not a denial of the opportunity to consider and to oppose a project.

Baroness Coffey (Con)What is being proposed is drastically reducing the amount of time if anyone wants to bring a judicial review. I have already mentioned the barriers of raising money, assuming you can raise that. Perhaps this will be a change, but the High Court will not like this. It will absolutely kick off. Right now, Governments really struggle to not do the whole amount of—forgive me, I have forgotten quite the phrase, it is disclosure but there is a particular phrase that goes with candour. But if that is the way and we are going to go with three weeks, then honestly the delays will get worse. Be careful what one wishes for in regard to three weeks versus six weeks. I think this is an unnecessary amendment, whereas I am somewhat supportive of the other amendments that the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, has tabled.

Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)I thank the noble Lord, Lord Hunt of Kings Heath, and my noble friend Lord Banner for their careful thought and experience in tabling these amendments. On Amendment 135D, I recognise the concerns expressed by the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, in seeking to restrict appeals to the Court of Appeal where the High Court has deemed an application to be totally without merit. This is, of course, a delicate balance between ensuring access to justice and preventing the courts from being encumbered by hopeless claims. I am grateful to him for placing this important matter before your Lordships’ Committee.

Similarly, the noble Lord’s Amendments 357, 358 and 360 raise pertinent questions about the commencement provisions of various clauses, particularly in relation to the new measures on planning and legal challenges. It is often the case that commencement by regulation can leave uncertainty. The proposal to provide for an automatic commencement two months after Royal Assent is, at the very least, a reminder of the need for clarity and timeliness in the law. These points merit careful reflection, and I look forward to the Minister’s response.

I now turn to Amendment 168, tabled by my noble friend Lord Banner. This amendment addresses a very practical difficulty—namely, the risk that development consents are lost due to time running out during the course of judicial or statutory reviews. By stopping the clock, the amendment would ensure that the permission does not simply expire while litigation is pending. This is important not only for developers and investors who require certainty but for local communities who deserve clarity about the projects affecting them. Without such a measure, there is a danger that meritless legal challenges might be deployed as a tactic to run down the clock, thereby frustrating legitimate development. I believe my noble friend is right to highlight this problem, and I warmly welcome his amendment.

I conclude by once again thanking the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, and my noble friend Lord Banner for their thoughtful contributions. We on these Benches will listen very closely to the Minister’s response on these matters.

Lord Wilson of Sedgefield (Lab)I thank noble Lords for their thoughtful contributions on this group. I turn first to Amendment 128, tabled by my noble friend Lord Hunt of Kings Heath and spoken to by the noble Lord, Lord Banner, which seeks to reduce the time limit for bringing a legal challenge against planning decisions from six weeks to 21 days.

Judicial and statutory review of planning decisions are already subject to a compressed six-week window within which a claim may be brought, compared with the three-month time limit in most judicial reviews. It is the Government’s view that the current time limit strikes the right balance between providing certainty for developers in local communities and preserving access to justice. Further shortened, the time limit for bringing a claim would risk restricting the public’s ability to hold the Government and planning authorities to account on planning decisions.

A shorter time limit would also leave less time for meaningful engagement between the parties to potentially resolve matters out of court or to narrow the scope of any claim. Claimants who fear being timed out may also feel compelled to lodge protective claims just in case. This could inadvertently lead to greater delays due to a potential increase in the number of challenges.

The Government are taking forward a wider package of reforms to improve the efficiency of the planning system, including measures to speed up decisions and encourage early engagement. These changes will have a far greater impact than trimming a few weeks off the judicial review timetable. While I recognise my noble friend’s intention to reduce uncertainty in the planning system, I believe the three-week time saving from the shortened time limit is outweighed by the risk of restricting access to justice and the practical implications of such a change. Therefore, I respectfully invite my noble friend to withdraw his amendment.

I turn next to Amendments 129, 130 and 135D, also tabled by my noble friend, which seek to remove the right of appeal for certain planning judicial reviews if they are deemed totally without merit at the oral permission hearing in the High Court. The effect of these amendments largely reflects that of Clause 12, which makes provisions specifically for legal challenges concerning nationally significant infrastructure projects under the Planning Act 2008.

The measures in Clause 12 follow a robust independent review by the noble Lord, Lord Banner, and a subsequent government call for evidence that made clear the case for change regarding these major infrastructure projects. We currently do not have any evidence of an issue with legal challenges concerning other types of planning decision. We will therefore need to consider this matter further to determine whether the extension of the changes made to Clause 12 will be necessary or desirable in other planning regimes.

With regards to the amendment, which seeks to clarify that legal challenges are to be made to the High Court, this is not necessary, as the process is set out clearly in the relevant rules, practice directions and guidance documents. I thank my noble friend Lord Hunt of Kings Heath for his Amendments 357, 358 and 360 concerning the commencement of Clause 12 and the new judicial review provisions which he is proposing. The amendments seek to ensure that these provisions all come into force two months after Royal Assent. With regard to Clause 12, this requires changes to the relevant civil procedures, rules and practice directions. The current power, which allows this measure to be commenced by regulation, is designed to ensure that the necessary provisions are in place before the changes come into force. I reassure my noble friend that the Government intend to commence the measure by regulation as soon as practicable following Royal Assent. With regards to my noble friend’s amendment linked to his proposed new provisions, I think he would agree that this amendment is no longer required as the related provisions are now being withdrawn. For these reasons, I kindly ask that my noble friend withdraws his amendments.

I thank the noble Lord, Lord Banner, for Amendment 168, which would extend the time period to commence a planning permission if the permission was subject to judicial proceedings. The Government agree with the policy intention behind this amendment. The statutory commencement provisions under Sections 91 and 92 of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990 are an important and long-standing part of the legal framework for planning permissions to ensure that permissions are implemented in a timely manner, and lapsed if they have not begun within the prescribed time period.

However, we recognise that it would be unfair on the applicant if judicial proceedings—where the court has confirmed the lawfulness of the permission—led to delays that mean that the commencement period of the lawful permission is effectively curtailed. Legal challenges on the validity of the permission should not seek to time out the practical implementation of the permission. That is why Section 91(3A) to (3B) was introduced to automatically extend the commencement period for a formal planning permission by a further year if there were judicial proceedings questioning the validity of a planning permission. This extension of a year is sufficient to cover the typical period for a planning case at the High Court, so applicants, where their planning permission has been lawfully upheld, should not lose out from the delay caused by the legal challenge. In light of these points, I kindly ask that my noble friend does not press his amendments.

Lord Banner (Con)I thank the Minister for those comments. Does he accept that if it is only one year to cover the typical period of High Court proceedings, that gives unsuccessful claimants in the High Court an incentive to perpetuate the proceedings by taking it to the Court of Appeal and potentially thereafter to the Supreme Court to drag out the threat to the implementation of the permission in the way that I described?

Lord Wilson of Sedgefield (Lab)I am not a legal expert on these issues, but I am more than prepared to sit down with the noble Lord to discuss this specific point. We are extending it by a full year, but I think he was wanting to stop it; is that right?

Lord Banner (Con)Yes.

Lord Wilson of Sedgefield (Lab)That means it could go on and on anyway, but it is a point that perhaps we could discuss if the noble Lord wants to do so.

Lord Hunt of Kings Heath (Lab)I was very grateful to my noble friend for his very responsive wind-up. My noble friend said that the Government would need to consider Amendments 129, 130 and 135D further, and I am very grateful for that. On Amendment 128, I am very grateful to my noble friend for his support, but I did not get much other support around the Committee. I say to the noble Baroness, Lady Coffey: this is not an attack on democracy. As someone with mainly an NHS background, I am only too well aware of the importance of judicial review in the case of local people concerned that NHS bodies have not followed proper procedures. I am afraid that there are too many cases, and I have too many very rich lawyer friends who have made a lot of money out of the NHS’s cavalier approach sometimes. I do understand what the noble Baroness is saying, but I was trying to press whether we could speed up some of the processes. However, I will obviously reflect on what has been said.

Finally, on Amendments 357, 358 and 360, my noble friend said that commencement depended on changes to civil procedure rules, which will be done as soon as practicable. I am trying to think back to what it meant when I said at the Dispatch Box, “as soon as practicable”. I think it is better than “as soon as possible”, and I will take that as a win. I beg leave to withdraw my amendment.

Amendment 128 withdrawn.

Amendments 129 and 130 not moved.

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Amendment 131

Moved by

131: After Clause 51, insert the following new Clause— “Enforcement of planning decisions(1) A local planning authority when exercising a relevant function under the Planning Acts shall have a duty to—(a) enforce planning conditions, and(b) enforce the removal of any structure that has not received planning permission.(2) At the discretion of the local planning authority, minor infringements may be excepted from the duty to enforce.(3) Minor infringements under subsection (2) may not include any environmental, climate or nature-related conditions.(4) The costs of enforcement by a local planning authority shall be recovered by the application of a penalty payment regime.(5) The Secretary of State must, after consultation with local planning authorities, lay down a schedule of penalty charges.(6) The schedule under subsection (5) must—(a) reflect the full costs of enforcement by a local planning authority, and(b) be reviewed annually to reflect changes in costs.(7) The Secretary of State must lay down a schedule giving examples of what might be deemed as a minor infringement under subsection (2).”

Lord Teverson (LD)I remind the Committee that I am chair of the Cornwall & Isles of Scilly Local Nature Partnership, but I am also a director of Wessex Development and Investments Limited, a development company, so I am on both sides of planning and nature issues.

This is a probing amendment but quite a specific one. It comes on to the area of planning enforcement. Generally, the planning system is meant to be a permissive one; unless there is good reason to stop development, it should happen. Paragraph 60 of the National Planning Policy Framework states that the planning system is discretionary and proportionate, but it also makes the point that enforcement of the planning system is there to maintain public confidence. It is that area that I want to concentrate on this evening.

We will all know of residents who are concerned that people move ahead with developments that are wrong, without planning permission. They feel that those individuals are cheating the system and moving ahead of other people who are trying to go through a system legally and properly. That can cause a great deal of discontent. At the moment, planning enforcement is not a duty of local authorities. When I have talked about this area with local authorities, they have made it very clear that they are not funded to enforce, so it is not an area always given a great deal of emphasis because there is no return.

One area that I came across with one of my own principal local authorities is that, with regard to environmental conditions on planning, the track record was that 40% of those environmental conditions were never actually implemented over quite a long period of time. That is why, in this amendment, I have stressed environmental, climate and nature conditions on planning that are widely ignored in development and, because they are relatively minor on individual cases, are not enforced. However, on a broader scale, because that is the case, they are a major threat to biodiversity and net gain in nature and all the things that we need to do to more forward the environment and climate agenda. As we all know, with the built environment, if we do not get it right to begin with then that is a problem for the length and total age of the building.

I am trying to find out from the Government how we get out of this issue. On the whole, local authorities do not want to enforce. I am clear that, on other things, such as minor infringements that are not to do with nature, we do not want a system that looks like a police state, but we have the balance wrong at the moment, particularly around planning conditions that seem minor but are important on a macro scale. That is my question for the Minister: how do we get out of this? I believe that there is a way forward on this if we can reflect the costs on people who do not comply with planning, if those particular issues then have to be enforced. I beg to move.

The Deputy Chairman of Committees (Lord Russell of Liverpool) (CB)Before we proceed, the Government Whip will make a brief statement about the progress of business.

Lord in Waiting/Government Whip (Lord Katz) (Lab)My Lords, I thank the Deputy Chairman of Committees. Just to confirm, we will be going to target this evening, so I urge brevity from everybody in making speeches, so that we can make progress and get through the business.

Lord Lucas (Con)I am tempted to make a 10-minute speech in response to that. If the Government decide they want to go to such a ridiculous length, it really is for the Government to—

Lord Katz (Lab)I apologise. I should have added that it was agreed through the usual channels, with the Front Benches, that that would be an appropriate way to arrange business.

Lord Lucas (Con)My Lords, I accept that it has been agreed by the usual channels, but this is a revising Chamber and we are supposed to be looking at a serious Bill and taking its provisions seriously. If the Government want to get through 20 groups today then it will take the time it takes. None the less, when it comes to Amendment 135G, I shall be brief.

The main reason I hear for planning processes taking longer than they should is that planning authorities take longer than they should. The Government should have the power to do something about that, and that is what my amendment seeks to achieve.

Lord Jamieson (Con)My Lords, I begin by thanking the noble Lord, Lord Teverson, and my noble friend Lord Lucas for bringing their amendments to the attention of the Committee. They have raised a number of important points, and I look forward to hearing the Minister addressing both noble Lords’ concerns.

I turn to the amendments in my name. The purpose of Amendment 135HZG is to reduce costs and delays in the planning system by putting beyond doubt in legislation the principles that currently rely on case law. Where planning permission has already been granted and remains extant, decisions on subsequent planning applications relating to detailed matters, whether determined by an officer or a committee, should not reopen issues that were settled in the original planning permission. This matters because uncertainty in the system not only increases costs for applicants but creates unnecessary duplication of effort for planning authorities and applicants. Greater clarity will enable both sides to proceed with confidence, efficiency and speed.

Amendment 135HZH, in my name and that of noble friend Lady Scott of Bybrook, is a probing amendment intended to test whether the planning system provides sufficient certainty once a permission has been granted and to explore how necessary changes prompted by new national legislation might be handled without reopening matters that have already been settled. The principle of finality is essential, particularly where significant work has already been undertaken and applications are well advanced. This amendment invites the Government to consider whether clearer statutory guidance on finality could help improve efficiency and reduce delay.

Finally, Amendment 185SE, tabled in my name, aims to provide clarity to the planning system, so that project delays are minimised where legislative changes necessitate modifications to an already approved permission—for instance, as we discussed earlier today, legislation that might require solar cells on all new homes.

In such circumstances, such modifications should be deemed to have planning permission in principle. It is vital, because projects can be significantly delayed and costs increased, and developers are required to seek fresh planning permissions simply to comply with new legislation that has come about after they receive their original planning permission. By ensuring that those modifications are covered in principle, we can safeguard progress while maintaining the integrity of the planning system.

If we are to achieve the Government’s objective of 1.5 million new homes, the planning system needs to deliver. These three amendments are guided by the same underlying principle. Clarity and certainty in planning law reduce unnecessary delay, avoid wasteful duplication and allow both applicants and authorities to focus their energies on what should be their priority, which is delivering high-quality developments of high-quality homes that support our residents and our communities.

Lord Fuller (Con)I had not realised what the noble Lord was going to say from the Dispatch Box, but I wish to support his Amendments 135HZG and 135HZH What he could have said—but did not—was that there is almost an interaction with the previous group, in that sometimes there is a perverse incentive to add delay to a process to run down the clock. However, in this case, the noble Lord could have said that, as a result of those delays, a whole series of new studies would need to be remade. For instance, ecology studies may last for only two or three years so may be triggered once more, and they in turn can only be created at certain times of the year—in the spring, for example. The combination effect, in respect not just of the previous group but of this group, means that the delays could be even longer, so I strongly support the noble Lord. Finality and certainty are important, and I support him not only for the reasons he gives but for the avoidance of interference with the previous set of amendments.

Baroness Pinnock (LD)My Lords, my noble friend Lord Teverson has raised an important aspect of the planning process in his amendment on planning enforcement. Planning enforcement can be a neglected part of the planning system, partly because it is not a statutory function but a discretionary one, and as such is not necessarily funded to the extent that it ought to be. Effective enforcement is vital in the planning process so that everyone—the developer, the council and local people—can have trust that what has been agreed will be fulfilled.

I will give noble Lords one example from my role as a councillor, when I was contacted about a housing development which is adjacent to a motorway. A resident raised the concern that the developers were not adhering to the agreed siting of units. Planning enforcement went on site to investigate and discovered that the construction was undermining the motorway banking, which would have had catastrophic consequences if it had continued. A stop notice was issued and the matter resolved; I should say that this was a major housing developer.

Enforcement is key for the integrity of the planning system, for the conditions that are applied to a planning application when it is given consent and for residents who have asked questions about its impact. It is therefore key to retaining the trust of residents, as my noble friend has said, and so that democratic decision-making can be relied on to check that planning conditions are properly fulfilled. That requires adequate funding. I would like to hear from the Minister whether the Government are of a mind to make a move from a discretionary function to a statutory one, which would then be adequately funded for the very important role that planning enforcement plays.

Lord Wilson of Sedgefield (Lab)I thank the noble Lords, Lord Teverson, Lord Lucas and Lord Jamieson, and the noble Baroness, Lady Scott, for their amendments. I turn first to Amendment 131, which would place a duty on local planning authorities to take enforcement action in relation to certain breaches of planning control and introduce a system of penalty payments.

The Government recognise the frustration that many people feel when they see development carried out without planning permission. We understand therefore that effective enforcement is vital in maintaining public trust and confidence in the planning system.

While I can appreciate the sentiment behind this amendment, it represents a fundamental change to the enforcement system and it is not something which could be introduced without very careful and detailed consideration, including consultation with interested parties. Furthermore, I believe that the current approach to enforcement represents the right balance. It gives local planning authorities discretion about when and how they use their enforcement powers. This flexibility is important, as local planning authorities are best placed to consider the circumstances of each case and reach a balanced and informed decision. While, as I have said, I think the current approach is the right one, I assure the Committee that we will keep the operation of the enforcement system under review.

22:45:00

Amendment 135G would enable the Secretary of State to prescribe the timeframes for determining planning applications, and where these are not met, the Secretary of State may set the process used by which applications may be granted deemed consent. I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Lucas, on the need to speed up planning decisions. Provision for deemed discharge of planning conditions already exists within the Town and Country Planning Act 1990. This was introduced in 2015 to incentivise local planning authorities to speed up dealing with such applications, but it is little used.

When faced with a request for deemed discharge, local planning authorities have often simply refused the application. Based on this experience, a deemed consent applied to applications for planning permission is likely to result in local planning authorities issuing more refusals, which would lead to more planning appeals and result in further delays.

In particular, on applications for large-scale developments, amendments to proposals are needed to make sure they are compliant with planning policy. Section 106 negotiations are also needed to ensure that affordable housing and other infrastructure are provided, and deemed consent would adversely affect this. Creating a deemed consent regime would require a set of standard conditions to be applied which would further complicate the planning process.

Instead, we believe it is better to focus the underlying reasons for delays to decision-making, of which capacity and capability pressures within local planning authorities has been a key one. That is why we are scaling back the role of statutory consultees, have increased planning fees for householder and certain other applications and are empowering local planning authorities to set their own planning fees to cover costs.

Amendments 135HZG and—

Lord Fuller (Con)I may have misunderstood what he said, but I thought the Minister was saying they were reducing the power of certain statutory consultees. I know we are probably advancing the consideration of the Bill, because we are going to deal with this next week, but the entirety of Part 3 creates entirely new burdens for an entirely new set of quangos. It is actually going to slow things down. I just wondered whether, in the light of this consideration of Part 3, he might like to review what he has said. If we truly are going to reduce the veto that these statutory undertakings have, then that is absolutely to be welcomed. It is just that the thrust of this Bill is going in the completely the other direction.

Lord Wilson of Sedgefield (Lab)I would not accept that. It has to be a balance between what we can do to make things more flexible and ensuring that we have the right kind of infrastructure to lead to the growth we want in the local economy. We need a flexible system and what we are trying to devise here is that.

Amendments 135HZG and 135HZH cover the important but technical issue of decision-makers revisiting matters which have been established through the grant of planning permission when determining applications for supplementary consents, such as reserved matter approvals. I recognise that these are probing amendments, and I understand the concern about matters being revisited when they should not be. We want to see supplementary consents determined as swiftly as possible. Case law has long established that supplementary consents must focus on the specific matters directly related to the consent and not revisit wider matters which have been addressed by the original grant of planning permission.

However, we are sceptical about the merits of putting this case law on a statutory footing as suggested by Amendment 135HZG. The principle is well established among planning officers and putting it on a statutory footing will not speed up their decision-making. Indeed, it could create new grounds for legal challenges to planning decisions, which we want to avoid.

Similarly, I am not convinced that we need a review on this matter.

Lord Jamieson (Con)I gratefully appreciate the answer the Minister has given, but I want some clarity. He made two comments there. The reason for this, and I accept it is a probing amendment, is to bring into the planning process absolute clarity that a decision has been made and cannot be revisited. That certainly seems to be the case with case law. But the reason we have case law is because people are making decisions in the planning system which then have to go to court. By making things much clearer, it will enhance the role of those who are saying, “Hold on, we have already decided that there is planning approval for x”. Just because you are now changing the colour of the door, that does not mean you can revisit the original planning permission again. I am slightly puzzled why he is saying that, by making that clarification, it may even result in more legal processes. I am not necessarily expecting an answer tonight, because I appreciate he has valiantly stepped in at the last minute, but if he could think a little more about that and maybe we can have a conversation afterwards.

Lord Wilson of Sedgefield (Lab)I could write to the noble Lord on that specific point. But it seems to me that the principle is well established among planning officers and putting it on a statutory footing will not speed up the decision-making. Similarly, we are not convinced that we need a review on this matter. We, of course, are always looking at opportunities to improve the planning system and if there is evidence that supplementary consents like reserved matter approvals were unnecessarily revisiting matters, we would want to take action, but we do not think a review would be proportionate.

Finally, Amendment 185SE seeks to ensure that changes required to extant planning permissions to comply with changes in legislation would benefit from automatic planning permission. I can say we share a common goal, which is to ensure that developments are not delayed by new legislative requirements. When the Government introduce changes to planning legislation, they are usually not applied retrospectively to avoid the uncertainty this would cause, but we recognise that changes to other regulatory regimes, such as building regulations, can impact on approved development and this may require subsequent amendments to the planning permission which can be frustrating for developers. However, we do not think this amendment provides a solution. It is too broad, and some regulatory changes can have a material impact on approved development which warrant further consideration from a planning perspective.

Instead, we are keen to ensure that, when new legislation is developed which could impact on development, the consequences for planning are recognised and minimised. There are already a number of mechanisms available within the planning system which allow changes to planning permissions in a proportionate way, such as light-touch applications for non-material amendments under Section 96A of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990, and we are keen to see these mechanisms being used to address the consequences of any wider regulatory changes on approved development. For these reasons, I hope that the noble Lord will beg leave to withdraw his amendment.

Lord Teverson (LD)My Lords, I will be very brief. To be honest, the enforcement regime is not the right balance at the moment that the Minister suggested. I think there is a real concern about the confidence that those that receive planning permissions apply them properly, and that those who do not feel that they are under pressure from enforcement when those issues come up.

The other issue is that, clearly, even it is not a duty, the principle that the offender should pay for the cost for enforcement, is one that the Treasury and department should find a way forward on and maybe solve it on that basis. In the meantime, I beg leave to withdraw my amendment.

Amendment 131 withdrawn.

Amendment 132 not moved.

Amendment 133

Moved by

133: After Clause 51, insert the following new Clause— “Promotion and use of mediation etc.(1) The Town and Country Planning Act 1990 is amended as follows.(2) After section 323A insert—“323B Promotion and use of mediation etc.(1) The Secretary of State or the Welsh Ministers may issue guidance in relation to the promotion and use of mediation and other forms of alternative dispute resolution (ADR) technique in relation to the following—(a) the preparation of local development plans and related evidence reports under Part 2,(b) a prospective applicant’s compliance with any requirements in respect of pre-application consultation imposed under or by virtue of sections 61W or 61Z,(c) assisting in the determination of an application for planning permission, including related planning obligations or their variation under sections 106 and 106A, and(d) any other matter related to planning including the acquisition or appropriation of land for planning purposes that they consider appropriate.(2) Guidance under subsection (1) may include provision about—(a) the form of mediation or other ADR technique that is to be used in a particular circumstance, and(b) the procedure to be followed in any such mediation.(3) Local authorities must have regard to any guidance issued under subsection (1).(4) Before issuing any guidance under subsection (1), the Secretary of State and the Welsh Ministers must consult—(a) planning authorities, and(b) such other persons that they consider appropriate.(5) The Secretary of State and the Welsh Ministers must make any guidance issued under subsection (1) publicly available.(6) The power under subsection (1) to issue guidance includes power to—(a) issue guidance that varies guidance issued under that subsection, and(b) revoke guidance issued under that subsection.(7) For the purposes of this section, “mediation” and “ADR technique” includes any means of exploring, resolving or reducing disagreement between persons involving an impartial person that the Secretary of State or the Welsh Ministers consider appropriate.(8) The Secretary of State and the Welsh Ministers must issue guidance under subsection (1) within the period of two years beginning with the date on which the Planning and Infrastructure Act 2025 is passed.””Member’s explanatory statement This amendment requires that guidance must be issued on the promotion and use of mediation and other forms of ADR in the planning process. It is intended to engender a culture of informal resolution of disputes, in order to reduce the risk of the delay and expense caused by litigation.

Lord Murray of Blidworth (Con)My Lords, I once again declare my interest as a practising barrister and mediator in a set of chambers which specialises in public and planning law.

The Government’s objective, and the overriding objective of the Bill as I understand it, is to speed up the planning process and build more homes. One way—I suggest the best way—of achieving this would be to reduce conflict and to avoid lengthy litigation about planning matters, with all the delay and expenditure which results. I venture to suggest that Amendment 133 in my name could do more than any other single measure in the Bill to achieve that objective. It is a big claim, but I make no apologies to the Committee for making it. I have been most enheartened by the positive reception that this suggestion has already had from the Government Front Bench.

This amendment can, I believe, achieve what numerous amendments to planning legislation have never focused on: namely, giving a clear legislative steer from government that all stakeholders must now seek to engage in a more constructive conversation rather than defaulting to confrontation and, ultimately, to litigation. The alternative to this amendment is that the status quo of delays, confrontation and forced outcomes will be perpetuated—an alternative which is certainly not in the public interest.

The present system, in which mediation is permitted but not encouraged, frequently allows polarised positions to be perpetuated, and, too often, their related toxic conversations simply lead to the greater likelihood of confrontation and litigation in the planning sphere, with all the attendant division, costs and delay.

As I say, mediation within the English planning system is presently known and has been successfully deployed. However, it continues to be a significantly underused and underappreciated resource. In contrast, in other spheres of litigation, mediation has now become central to the civil justice system, greatly encouraged by repeated appellate court judgments—and it is increasingly becoming mandatory. This is all the case despite the planning system recognising that the potential of mediation is long acknowledged.

In the recent case of Churchill v Merthyr Tydfil County Borough Council in 2023, in the decision of the Court of Appeal, comprising the Lady Chief Justice, the Master of the Rolls and the Deputy Master of the Rolls, it was decided that a court can order the parties to engage in non-court-based dispute resolution and can order a stay in proceedings to allow that to take place. Of course, that applies in ordinary litigation, but this amendment would mean that it would apply with full force within the planning sphere.

Planning law lags behind almost all other areas of the law. There have been earlier efforts to try to incorporate mediation in the planning sector. As I explained to the House when first raising the possibility of this amendment at Second Reading, there have been four major examples. The first was the 2006 Barker Review of Land Use Planning. The second was the Government’s 2009 response to the Killian Pretty report, which urged investigation of the use of ADR at all stages of the planning process. Thirdly, there was the 2010 report commissioned by the National Planning Forum and the Planning Inspectorate, called Mediation in Planning , and fourthly, the National Planning Forum’s 2011 Mediation in Planning: A Short Guide , which was endorsed by the then Minister for Planning, Sir Bob Neill.

Then, in 2012, the noble Lord, Lord Pickles, introduced something called Section 106 brokers, an initiative introduced when he was Communities Secretary. This system was designed to facilitate the agreement of Section 106 agreements, whereby a mediator sat with an independent surveyor and would discuss with landowners, developers and the local authority what agreements could be reached on Section 106. This was to have—and had—the effect of accelerating development projects. The initiative was then taken into legislation through the short-lived Sections 106(BA) to 106(BC) of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990, and it allowed for renegotiation of Section 106 obligations in respect of affordable housing. The sunset provision for those measures expired in April 2016. The real problem with that model was that the Treasury was paying for the mediator and the independent surveyor. We then had another legislative provision brought in under Sir Brandon Lewis, when he was Planning Minister, and that led to new Sections 106(ZA) and 106(ZB) to allow for a form of adjudication of disputes. However, those measures were never implemented.

23:00:00

In 2021, the Government initiated a pathfinder scheme to deploy mediation to reduce the enforcement backlog. One of the reasons that that failed was that many local planning officers were less than enthusiastic about engaging in meaningful discussion about mediation because they did not understand the process. That lesson has also been experienced in Scotland, and it is only with necessary efforts to overcome that lack of familiarity that the mediation process can work through governmental officers.

There will need to be, consequent to this amendment, education in this regard, and this is something that we can consider further in negotiations with the Front Bench. However, it is abundantly clear that where formal mediation has been deployed in planning scenarios, it has often been successful. Even where its techniques have been deployed informally, through the presence of a neutral facilitator or chair, negotiations have been accelerated and produced better outcomes. Consequently, both public and private public and private resources have been saved and stakeholder relations have been improved. Crucially, earlier delivery of new developments in houses and infrastructure has resulted. Accordingly, the capabilities of mediation in planning are, I think, now well established and align clearly with the Government’s objectives and those of the Bill.

Turning briefly to the text of the amendment, it inserts a new clause in the Town and Country Planning Act. To an extent, it is modelled on Section 40 of the Planning (Scotland) Act, although this version is broader. It promotes mediation and other ADR techniques, and requires the Secretary of State and the Welsh Ministers to issue formal guidance on the promotion and use of mediation and other methods of resolving planning disputes. The important part, looping back to my earlier remarks, is proposed new subsection (3), which would introduce as an essential requirement that local planning authorities must have regard to the guidance issued under proposed new subsection (1). Before the guidance is issued, there must be wide consultation with the local authorities—planning authorities—and more widely. That would mean meaningful engagement with key players: the Royal Institute of Chartered Surveyors, the Royal Town Planning Institute, the Local Government Association, the Planning Advisory Service, the Planning Officers Society, the Civil Mediation Council, the Chartered Institute of Arbitrators and the specialist associations within the Bar Council and the Law Society. All of these will have meaningful impacts and are better and suitably informed as to the outworkings of the new provision in the Town and Country Planning Act. In that way, hopefully, the historic experience of low engagement with ADR schemes can be successfully overcome. The technique of alternative dispute resolution—allowing neutral chairing and neutral evaluation—will help parties to limit the issues in a dispute and bring on faster construction projects with less confrontation and less waste in terms of cost and delay.

As I say, I am heartened by the interest across the Committee in this measure, and I look forward to hearing the contributions on this group. I will listen particularly hard to the contributions from the Minister. This is a change of approach that could make a real difference, and it cannot come about soon enough. I beg to move.

Earl Russell (LD)My Lords, I will briefly speak broadly in support of this amendment tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Murray of Blidworth. The amendment would embed the promotion and use of mediation and alternative dispute resolution in our planning system. I inform the Committee that I have been an elected local councillor sitting on a planning committee and worked for a number of years as a community mediator, helping to run a community mediation service specialising in neighbour disputes.

For too long, our approach to resolving planning disputes has been overly adversarial, leading to court battles, mounting costs, lengthy delays and frustrated developers, communities and local authorities. Too much of our planning process revolves around zero-sum games—talking to people, doing things to them and resorting to formal legal processes when things go wrong, as they inevitably do. The amendment is an invitation to do things better, for the benefit of all people and the interests of better governance and speeding up the planning process.

Mediation is no longer an untrusted novelty. It is widely used in all sectors of society. Its benefits are well established in many sectors and many areas of everyday life. It is used fairly infrequently, but it is used in the planning process. Properly structured and supported mediation interventions and processes can resolve specific contentious issues at an early stage, reducing hostility and helping to build trust, to foster positive relationships in a way that litigation is not capable of doing. When used, it produces high satisfaction, more creative solutions and results that last beyond the immediate dispute. As opposed to legal processes which are imposed from on high, mediation resolutions are designed and tailored by the parties themselves to fix exactly their individual needs. These outcomes can be transformative and, because the parties design them themselves, they tend to work more for their specific needs, meaning that they are more committed to the outcomes that they have helped to create.

Mediation will obviously not work in all cases, but it can work in some. What is certain is that, if mediation is not widely available, not promoted and not explored, it will not work in the planning processes. In some areas I do disagree with the noble Lord. My view is that mediation should be wholly a voluntary process for both parties. Every dispute that is kept out of lengthy appeals or court hearings is a saving to the public purse, a saving to local councils and a help with the Government’s stated aim of speeding up the planning processes. Studies have found that as many as 73% of mediated cases avoided further appeals, cut expenses and helped to reduce times.

It is not just about saving money. This is about making the system more accessible, making it work better for the people involved and making it more inclusive. Mediation enables genuine dialogue and empowers communities to participate meaningfully in the decision-making process. It is especially effective in complex cases—major developments, local plans, Section 106 negotiation and compulsory purchase disputes—where misunderstandings and mistrust can easily escalate into enshrined conflict. Mediation offers confidentiality, tailored solutions and better governance. Some worry about the cost, but this could be overcome and lead to savings. I call for the Government to look at this and to take it seriously. However, for this system to work it would need some dedicated funding and support from government.

I conclude with a couple of questions. We know that we have some mediation processes within planning, but they are rarely used and not very well embedded. Have the Government done any assessment on the use of mediation to date? Has it helped to speed up processes? Has it resulted in better outcomes? Have those outcomes lasted longer than legal ones? If the Government are not going to support this amendment today, can they consider doing a larger-scale trial of the use of mediation within the planning process? Then the outcomes can be properly monitored and the Government can make a fair assessment of the use of mediation more wholly within the planning process.

Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)My Lords, I wish to speak briefly on Amendment 133, tabled by my noble friend Lord Murray of Blidworth. We welcome the opportunity the amendment provides to hear more from the Government on how they intend to reduce the risk of lengthy and expensive litigation within the planning process. As many in the Committee will know, such disputes can cause considerable delays, uncertainty for local communities, and significant costs for both the applicants and local authorities. It is therefore important to understand what practical steps the Government are considering to streamline proceedings while ensuring that proper scrutiny and accountability remain in place. I look forward to the Minister’s reply.

Lord Wilson of Sedgefield (Lab)I thank the noble Lord, Lord Murray, for his amendment on statutory guidance on mediation in planning. This would require the Secretary of State to publish guidance promoting the use of mediation in a range of different planning activities, including plan-making, decision-taking and the use of compulsory purchase. The thrust of the amendment is to ensure that issues are dealt with upfront, as opposed to relying on issues to be dealt with through the courts.

As the noble Lord set out in his speech at Second Reading of the Bill, this is not a new issue. Previous Governments have explored this approach multiple times, but it has borne little fruit. Although we completely agree with the underlying objective of the amendment, we regretfully cannot accept it.

We feel that a statutory duty to have regard to such guidance would not be appropriate or necessary for all planning activities. In particular, when determining planning applications, planning law requires the decision-maker to consider all relevant planning matters set out in the local development plan and weigh this with other material planning considerations.

Given this legal framework, it would not always be possible to reach consensus on all matters—this is not the exercise when determining whether development should be granted permission. Where a planning application is refused by a local planning authority, there is a well-established procedure whereby the applicant can appeal the decision. In an appeal, an independent inspector from the Planning Inspectorate, acting on behalf of the Secretary of State, will consider planning matters afresh. The procedures used give relevant parties the opportunity to state their case further. As these processes are carried out in public, it ensures that the process is transparent and fair. This process provides a considerable benefit compared with mediation, in that mediation is carried out behind closed doors.

It is common practice, and encouraged through the NPPF, that when determining applications local planning authorities work positively and proactively with applicants. It is often the case that large-scale and complex development applicants and local planning authorities enter into planning performance agreements, which will help manage the process and provide a forum for dispute resolution.

There are some areas where we actively encourage mediation already. In relation to compulsory purchase, the Government have already published guidance on the use of alternative dispute resolution techniques, including mediation, to help parties resolve concerns on the principle of compulsorily purchasing land by CPO. The Government are also committed to strengthening the system of developer contributions, including Section 106 planning obligations, to ensure new developments provide necessary affordable homes and infrastructure, and we are considering a range of options to deliver on that commitment.

For the reasons I have set out, I hope that the noble Lord can withdraw his amendment.

Lord Murray of Blidworth (Con)My Lords, I am very grateful to the noble Earl, Lord Russell, for his support of the amendment. I rather agree with the questions that he asked. I look forward to seeing a copy of the letter which I am sure the Minister will write in response to the questions posed by the noble Earl. I am also grateful for the support from my noble friend on the Front Bench.

Turning then to the response from the Minister, I must confess that I am rather disappointed with the tone of the reply. Clearly, it is out of kilter with the approach taken by the senior courts of this country in encouraging the use of alternative dispute resolution. I have to say I find the reasoning as to why this particular route should not be explored unpersuasive; saying that it has not worked in earlier iterations is not a reason not to try a better formulation. That does not stack up. The second reason given was that planning processes occur in public and mediation occurs in private. That is true in all civil litigation, where mediation is positively encouraged by the courts. The point is that, if we enable the parties to negotiate in advance, we can avoid litigation, save public money and avoid delay.

I hope the Government will revisit their resistance, because I would consider returning to this issue on Report. I look forward to my meeting with the Minister’s colleague, which may or may not result in a different position. With that, I beg leave to withdraw.

Amendment 133 withdrawn.

23:15:00

Amendment 134

Moved by

134: After Clause 51, insert the following new Clause— “Removal of Permitted Development Rights for Conversion to Dwellinghouses(1) The Town and Country Planning (General Permitted Development) (England) Order 2015 (2015/596) is amended as follows—(a) in Schedule 2, Part 3 (changes of use), the following Classes are repealed—(i) Class G (commercial, business and service or betting office or pay day loan shop to mixed use);(ii) Class L (small HMOs to dwellinghouses and vice versa)(iii) Class M (certain uses to dwellinghouses)(iv) Class MA (commercial, business and service uses to dwellinghouses);(v) Class N (specified sui generis uses to dwellinghouses);(vi) Class Q (buildings on agricultural units and former agricultural buildings to dwellinghouses);(b) Schedule 2, Part 20 (construction of new dwellinghouses) is repealed.(2) Any development under the revoked Classes in Part 3 and Part 20 of Schedule 2 that has—(a) commenced before the date on which this Act comes into force, and(b) received valid prior approval or notification from the local planning authority before that date,shall be allowed to proceed under the conditions applicable prior to the repeal.(3) No new applications for prior approval under the revoked Classes may be submitted after the date on which this Act comes into force.”Member’s explanatory statement This amendment removes a range of permitted development rights that previously allowed certain non-residential buildings to be converted into homes without full planning permission. It repeals specific change-of-use and new dwellinghouse construction rights in the General Permitted Development Order 2015. Developments already approved or commenced before the repeal may continue under existing rules, but no new applications can be made once the changes take effect.

Baroness Thornhill (LD)My Lords, I will speak to my Amendment 134 with a butchered, watered down and much shorter version of my speech than the one I was going to give, so forgive me if it is not quite up to my usual standards.

This amendment seeks to reverse the decision of previous Governments to give permitted development rights to allow the conversion of non-residential properties into dwelling houses—in other words, to get back to where we were, when they would have had to apply for planning permission. The incremental changes were brought about over 10 years ago. Now, there is loads of evidence, including the Government’s own, that this is failing, and on three main grounds. Given that, in future, with more working from home, there are likely to be—and there already are—a lot more empty office blocks, we feel that this needs to be looked at fully and seriously before our town centres and business centres are hollowed out.

First, on quality, there is no doubt that many of these conversions are substandard. Indeed, in my own borough, Watford, there is a case study of a small factory that had been made into several flats with no windows. This happened with PDRs. The case was brought to government—with a body of other things, obviously—and made the previous Government include that such dwellings should have windows.

Secondly, and close to our hearts—I am looking at the noble Lord, Lord Best, here—we have lost loads of affordable housing. Had planning permission been collected, we would certainly have had more. Indeed, the LGA reckons that we have had a loss of 28,000 affordable homes. Think how many could have been housed off the temporary accommodation list had we had those homes.

Thirdly, it rides roughshod through local plans and policies, and the design, sustainability and accessibility that have been worked up with local councils and communities to build the places that they want to see.

Amendment 134 is not anti-housing; it is pro quality housing. The amendment was drawn up by the LGA, and many councils and development partners have contributed. Some 39 organisations and many individuals have signed an open letter to the Government—I heard only today that Mayor Burnham has added his name to the letter—to ask them to seriously consider rescinding PDRs. This shows the strength of opposition. In opposition, several government Members, including the Minister, had strong feelings and concerns about PDRs. My question is very simple: what has happened? I will listen carefully to the Minister’s response. I beg to move.

Lord Lucas (Con)My Lords, I am delighted to find that I take exactly the opposite point of view to that of the noble Baroness, Lady Thornhill. I see permitted development rights—as in my Private Member’s Bill, and as in my amendments to this Bill—as having a large potential to contribute substantially to housing expansion. Like the noble Baroness, Lady Thornhill, I shall curtail my remarks in the hope that what the Minister says will be so enlightening that I shall not need to ask her further questions.

My amendments propose a targeted set of expansions to permitted development rights to boost uptake and delivery by methods such as: removing unjustifiably onerous restrictions, including those concerning the ability to convert commercial buildings in areas of outstanding natural beauty, or the inability to extend upwards on pre-1948 buildings of no defined heritage value, or buildings postdating an arbitrary date; clarifying the wording of prior approval conditions to remove vagueness, which leads to a lack of consistency in decision-making between LPAs and more uncertainty in their application to, for example, natural light, flood risk or transport impacts; and removing the subjectivity currently allowed for within external appearance conditions for upward extensions, which are regularly used to refuse or frustrate upward extension in classes A and AA to AD and which act as a strong disincentive for the use of these permitted development rights by SME developers and housebuilders.

Instead, the local design code-based conditions in my amendments would provide certainty and consistency to decision-making, permitting the combined use and application of class MA and classes A and AA to AD, to maximise the development potential for existing buildings to deliver new homes.

Design codes are hugely important in this. Mandatory local design codes, already supported by the NPPF, are essential to make permitted development rights work at scale. They would replace subjective judgments on external appearance with rule-based certainty, define acceptable height, density, daylight and amenity standards to reduce the risk for developers, and be capable of delivery via a public/private model with some costs recovered through planning fee reforms, which could target PDR applications.

Reforms would bring consistency, reduce risk and make PDR a viable route to delivery. Local design codes would improve outcomes and boost developer confidence and certainty in the uptake and use of PDR. PDR allows for greater numbers of conversions and extensions of existing buildings to provide new housing and sustainable urban environments. This would help to reduce the demand and strain of granting housing developments in less sustainable greenfield locations.

Together, the amendments that I suggest would unlock new housing capacity in the most sustainable and accessible locations and benefit smaller building firms, while still maintaining quality and control over the urban environment.

Baroness Warwick of Undercliffe (Lab)My Lords, I will speak briefly in support of the noble Baroness, Lady Thornhill. With the Government’s ambition to increase the supply of social and affordable housing and the reforms to improve the capacity of the planning system, now seems the right time to reform PDR. The Government have rightly made the quality and safety of housing a priority, but conversions to PDR are not subject to the same standards compared to developments going through the full planning system. The Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors, in its report on the impact of extending permitted development rights on public authorities and communities, found that the quality of office-to-residential conversions was significantly worse than those which had been brought through the planning process. Other than the nationally described space standards and requirements around natural light, there are no minimum standards for these converted homes relating to safety, facilities, communal space, or connection to amenities.

It is essential that the housing that is developed is the right housing to meet local needs and make a positive impact on the lives of residents. It is necessary to make it a viable solution for addressing the housing crisis. At a minimum, conversions should meet the healthy homes principle brought forward by the Town and Country Planning Association’s Healthy Homes campaign. I hope that the Minister will be able to respond positively to these points.

Lord Jamieson (Con)My Lords, I thank my noble friend Lord Lucas and the noble Baroness, Lady Thornhill, for bringing these matters to the attention of the Committee. Permitted development rights are a significant area of policy as they play a crucial role in both the supply and the quality of new homes. It is important not only for the delivery of more housing but also for ensuring that those homes meet the needs of the communities in which they are built. The rules which govern permitted development therefore deserve careful consideration and the contributions made in today’s debate have highlighted the balance that must be struck between delivering more homes and protections for local communities and ensuring quality homes.

My noble friend Lord Lucas has raised a point of particular frustration for many homeowners in his Amendment 185A, and this reads across to other areas of government policy. I know owners of heritage properties and homes in conservation areas face particular challenges with increasing the energy efficiency of their home, and my noble friend is right to put this challenge to Ministers. I also note that the Government have announced that as of 2030 all private landlords will be required to meet a higher standard in their properties, with energy performance certificates of C or equivalent, up from the current level of E. Given the fact that many heritage and listed properties, including those in conservation areas, are often not permitted to instal double glazing—I refer to my comments in the previous group—can the Minister confirm that the new EPC requirement will not apply to listed and heritage properties? We look forward to hearing the Government’s view on these amendments and to understanding how they propose to address the concerns that have been raised.

Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)All the amendments in this group tabled by noble Baroness, Lady Thornhill, and the noble Lord, Lord Lucas, seek to amend permitted development rights. Changes to permitted development rights are brought forward through secondary legislation as amendments to the general permitted development order, generally following public consultation. This ensures that the views of the public are taken into account, including those that would benefit from or otherwise be impacted by the rights created or removed. We will continue to keep permitted development rights under review and I am grateful for the views that have been put forward by noble Lords in this regard.

Amendment 134 seeks to revoke the nationally set permitted development rights that deliver new homes through a change of use or by extending upwards and that allow dwelling houses to change use to a small house in multiple occupation and vice versa. The sustainable solution to the housing crisis is to accelerate the delivery of affordable, safe and decent purpose-built housing. I understand the intent of these amendments, with which I have a deal of sympathy. However, as the noble Baroness, Lady Thornhill will know, we are in a housing crisis and these permitted development rights have provided over 113,000 new homes in the last nine years. Permitted development rights are subject to prior approval by the local planning authority to allow for local consideration of specific planning matters. We acknowledge the concerns that exist about the quality of some of the residential units created through permitted development rights, particularly those created from commercial-to-residential conversions. We have all seen booklets with pictures of horrendous examples of those conversions and I would not want to advocate that type of practice.

All new homes delivered under permitted development rights are now required to meet nationally described space standards and provide adequate natural light in all habitable rooms. All new homes, whether delivered through permitted development rights or following a planning application, are required to meet building regulations.

We all know that small houses in multiple occupation can play an important part in providing low-cost accommodation. The permitted development right for a change of use from a dwelling house to a small house in multiple occupation helps to provide flexibility. The permitted development aspect of that can be removed by making an Article 4 direction where the local planning authority considers it necessary and in line with national planning policy. The amendment would make it harder to create new homes from existing buildings at a time of acute housing need. I have not seen the letter that the noble Baroness, Lady Thornhill, referred to and I look forward to receiving that. But, for all the reasons that I have explained, I hope she will withdraw the amendment.

23:30:00

Amendment 185A would allow for the installation of double glazing in conservation areas under nationally set permitted development rights. The householder permitted development rights already permit replacing windows with double-glazed windows in conservation areas, subject to a condition that the materials used must be of a similar appearance to those used in the existing dwelling house. However, where necessary, local planning authorities are able to remove specific nationally set permitted development rights within their area, as I said before, by making an Article 4 direction following consultation with the local community. Some areas have chosen to do so in respect of conservation areas. In such cases, a planning application would be required.

I had a meeting today with colleagues from the Department for Culture, Media and Sport and various heritage property organisations, and we have agreed to have further round tables with them to debate the issues around conservation properties. I will continue to update the House on where we are getting to with those discussions.

Amendments 185Q and 185T would make changes to the permitted development rights that deliver new homes through the change of use of commercial buildings, or by extending certain buildings upwards. They would require all local planning authorities in England to introduce local design codes in respect of the development permitted by those and other related rights.

I reassure noble Lords of the importance that I attach to ensuring a planning system that creates well-designed development, and to the role of local design codes in achieving that. A clear framework already exists through the National Planning Policy Framework and the National Model Design Code for local planning authorities to prepare design codes at the most appropriate level, to provide maximum clarity about design expectations for development.

As I have already explained, we acknowledge the concerns around the quality of residential units that have been created through permitted development rights. We would therefore not want to make changes to the rights that could remove or weaken some of the protections currently set out in the rights. Overall, changes to permitted development rights come forward in secondary legislation, as I have explained, as amendments to the permitted development order, generally following on from public consultation. That ensures that the views of the public, including those who would benefit from the rights, are taken into account. Of course, we will continue to keep permitted development rights under review, and we are grateful for the views that have been put forward in this regard and the discussions that have taken place this evening.

Lord Lucas (Con)I am grateful for the answers that the Minister has given, and I will think hard on what she said. I certainly understand what she said about the way of dealing with these things not being through the Bill. However, I urge the Government to remember that lots of small improvements—as the Minister has pointed out in terms of the last 10 years of permitted development rights—make a difference. They nourish the small end of the builders’ market and give some balance to the domination of housebuilding by the big housebuilders. It is really important that that end of the market works well.

Baroness Thornhill (LD)My Lords, I will make a quick comment. Article 4 directions are actually a very challenging process; the Secretary of State really gives you a hard time about it and you usually have to justify covering a larger area. The problem with PDRs is they are all over the place and that makes an Article 4 direction a little bit more difficult.

I would like to challenge a fundamental misconception. The Minister talked about the 113,000 homes that have already been created. The misconception is that they would not have happened anyway. I am sure some of them would not, but the majority, if they had gone through the planning process, would have had things suggested, altered and improved to pull up the standard. But, of course, it would not have happened quite as quickly.

I am going to end on a slightly tangential anecdote that shows that we really need to look at this. The people in the house next door to me have informed me that they will be erecting a 12 metre by 20 metre single-storey building in their garden directly adjacent to mine. They do not need planning permission. It is half the size of the garden and they are allowed to do that. If I want to erect a fence to cover the hideous wall of brick that I am going to be looking on instead of a beautiful garden with mature trees, I will have to apply for planning permission. Therefore, I think it is time to review the whole set-up, but particularly office to residential. I wish to withdraw my amendment.

Amendment 134 withdrawn.

Amendment 135

Moved by

135: After Clause 51, insert the following new Clause— “Planning permission for self-build and custom housebuilding(1) The Secretary of State must amend the Self-build and Custom Housebuilding Regulations 2016 (2016/950) as follows.(2) After Regulation 3 (definition of a serviced plot of land), insert—3A. “(1) For the purposes of section 2A(2) and (5) of the Act (Duty to grant planning permission etc), only the following development permissions may be considered to meet the demand for the carrying out of self-build and custom housebuilding in the planning authority’s area arising in each base period—(a) planning permission (as defined by section 58(1)(b) (granting of planning permission: general) and section 70 (determination of applications: general considerations) of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990 (“the 1990 Act”)) which is—(i) subject to a planning conditions restricting either the whole of or a specified number of units within the proposed development to self-build and custom housebuilding;(ii) subject to an obligation under section 106 of the 1990 Act (planning obligations), restricting either the whole of or a specified number of units within the proposed development to self-build and custom housebuilding;(b) permission in principle (as defined by section 58A of 1990 Act (permission in principle: general), where the description of the proposed development is for self-build and custom housebuilding.(2) For the purposes of this Regulation, self-build and custom housebuilding has the same meaning as in section 1(A1) and (A2) of the Act (Registers of persons seeking to acquire land to build a home).”.”

Baroness Coffey (Con)My Lords, 10 groups done; 10 to go. I turn to Amendment 135. I am doing this in the name of a friend of mine, Richard Bacon, who used to be the Member of Parliament for South Norfolk. He retired at the last election and is watching proceedings now—I am delighted he is—and he has spent a lot of time on self-build, which is what this amendment is about.

To pay credit to my friend Richard, he had managed to get issues about self-build into primary legislation. It had been commenced, but there are still elements that seem to be holding back this potential of self-build. Recognising, as the Minister said earlier, the words of her latest Secretary of State, to “Build, baby, build”, we should unleash the self-builders, where it is appropriate, right across the country. As my friend has pointed out, this is tenure neutral. There are great examples. Anyone can read his report that was commissioned by the previous Administration. He has written extensively on this, so I do not need to repeat everything he has put in the public domain.

To give a sense, there are good examples of this in the Netherlands, where groups of people have come together. They have actually built high-density and multiple-storey by some housing being particularly desirable—the penthouse may have got more of a price. You see multi-generational homes being built. To some extent—recognising what has been already pointed out in several parts of the debate, not only today, but in earlier consideration of the Bill—self-build is certainly a sector which needs to have the opportunity to at least be given a go. I recognise what the noble Baroness, Lady Thornhill, has just said about permitted development rights, with her neighbour building something which sounds rather extraordinary. That said, as someone with a large garden, perhaps that persuaded them that this was a way to reduce the amount of gardening; but that is a different story.

The Bacon review recommended that a range of regulatory reforms be brought forward to support the scaling up of self-build and to help boost much-needed housebuilding across England. I have already referred to the fact that the amendment to the 2015 Act through LURA, which came into force last year, made it clear that only planning permissions that are specifically for self-build can count towards meeting an authority’s statutory duty.

Despite that amendment, there remains considerable uncertainty over what types of permissions should be counted towards the duty imposed on local authorities to permit enough plots of land to meet the demand on their self-build registers. The LURA therefore provided for this new power to allow the Secretary of State to specify in regulations the types of development permissions that can be counted by a relevant authority to comply with its duty to meet demand as defined under Section 2A(2) of the 2015 Act. This has not been taken forward yet by the Government.

Amendment 135 proposes to insert a new provision into the Bill to require the Government to amend the Self-build and Custom Housebuilding Regulations 2016 to clarify the types of development permissions that must be counted towards the duty of local authorities to meet their local demand for service plots of land for people to build their own homes. The amendment would have the effect of implementing the provision in Section 123(1)(a) of the Levelling-up and Regeneration Act 2023 that enables the Government to specify regulations on the types of development permissions that can be counted by local authorities to comply with their duty to meet demand under Section 2A(2) of the Self-build and Custom Housebuilding Act 2015.

The Government’s plan for change set an ambitious target to build 1.5 million new homes over this Parliament. They say they are committed to reforming the planning system, that they are pro-growth and that they back SME builders to get Britain building. In May of this year, the former Deputy Prime Minister said that smaller housebuilders

“must be the bedrock of our Plan for Change”

and to get

“working people on the housing ladder”.

She also said that she was committed to making the planning system

“simpler, fairer and more cost effective, so smaller housebuilders can play a crucial role”

in building the homes we need, improving choice and boosting tenure mix on larger sites to improve buildout. To deliver against these objectives, the Government must surely look to operate all possible levers at their disposal, yet so far they have chosen not to bring forward much-needed further regulation to support more people to build their own homes.

The Competition and Markets Authority’s 2024 housebuilding market study report concluded that self-build and custom housebuilding is one of the main models in the UK housing market, with some 15,900 homes completed in 2021-22—admittedly, that was just as we were coming out of the variety of lockdowns. It concluded that, by enabling more alternative, private and non-speculative models, such as self-build and custom housebuilding development, dependence on the speculative housebuilding model can be reduced and market diversity improved, which in turn helps to speed up housing delivery. This could allow for more homes to be absorbed within local markets without housebuilders needing to reduce house prices, thereby speeding up housing delivery.

The Self-build and Custom Housebuilding Act 2015 places a statutory duty on local authorities in England to hold a register of people who want to acquire land to self or custom build in their area, and to grant planning permission for enough plots of land to satisfy that demand. The Self-build and Custom Housebuilding Regulations 2016 set out that authorities must meet this demand—that is, grant sufficient planning permission within three years. Despite these provisions, the Government’s own data shows that the gap between the supply of SBCH plots and consumer demand continues to fall.

Self-build and custom housebuilding data released by the Minister’s department in February showed that the number of individuals on local registers had risen by 4% to over 64,000 and that group registrations are near to 1,000. Despite this increase, planning permissions have continued to fall, reaching just over 5,000 a couple of years ago—the lowest level since legislation was first introduced in 2016. A key cause of the decline in supply plots is that many local authorities—including, I am led to believe, Winchester, Uttlesford, Dacorum, Rutland and South Kesteven—refuse planning applications on grounds that they are meeting local demand. Yet, when they are tested, it is often clear that they are counting planning permissions towards their annual targets, when they are plainly not for self-build or custom housing, to avoid releasing more land to meet growing demand. Such practices are frustrating delivery and costing taxpayers and developers many thousands of pounds in fighting planning appeals to prove councils wrong. It is not unusual for planning barristers, consultants and local authority officers to debate at length at appeal whether a council has correctly counted the number of such permissions it has given to meet local demand and for inspectors then to have to interpret the evidence submitted and decide what weight they should give to the arguments.

23:45:00

This amendment would remove the scope for such debates and bring much-needed additional clarity to the legislation, helping streamline delivery of the legislation in line with the Government’s ambitions. It is possible that the Government will say that development is not needed and that a broader set of planning reforms will help self-build and custom housing, but, candidly, that is not supported by the experience on the ground or, indeed, the Government’s own data. As a consequence, I hope that the Government will at least consider carefully these amendments.

Modular is very sensible, and it is cheaper to do this by having an approved scheme as in the amendment that my noble friend Lord Lucas has tabled. Regrettably, the whole NHS building regime got dragged into the mire, again, of customised building as opposed to modular. If we want to make sure that we have good-quality homes for communities right around the country, I suggest that we back my noble friend’s amendment as well. I beg to move.

Lord Fuller (Con)My Lords, I rise to speak in support of Amendment 135 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Coffey, and declare an interest in that the sponsor of her amendment, Richard Bacon, was the Member of Parliament for South Norfolk, where I represented the council for many years; it is worth putting it on record that he devoted the greater part of his parliamentary career to pursuing the importance of self-building in our nation. Self-building is not just the right thing to do because it is going to deliver more homes; it enables striving families to build a house of their dreams. Of course, they do not actually build it themselves. Self-building is not about getting all the tools; it is about procuring and possibly designing a home for you to live in for the long term—the basis of community and empowerment in that sense.

I welcome the amendment, not least because we have sleepwalked into a situation where a small number of national housebuilders have created for themselves a substantial monopoly, not just in the building of homes but in their design. Local distinctiveness and vernacular have been lost. A bungalow that has gone a bomb in Barnsley is built in Bunwell, 200 miles away, yet it is the same design language. We need distinctiveness. The logical conclusion, the spirit of what this amendment seeks to achieve, is that not only do we give those wanting to build their own home or procure their own residence the chance but local authorities can be very distinctive about making sure that we are capturing the correct need for those people who have the wherewithal to do it—not just the casual want, as was the original case and has now been tightened up.

Lord Lucas (Con)My Lords, I have Amendment 135H in this group. This is another of my attempts to help the Government make the way that housing is delivered slightly more efficient. I live in Eastbourne, and Eastbourne Borough Council has a long-standing partnership with a modular house builder called Boutique Modern, which has produced some very effective houses in the town, looking quite different from one another because it is easier to customise the outside of those modular homes; but the structure, what is happening inside, is the same. It is produced in a factory. It is daft, when you are producing identical goods, to have to go through type approval for them as if they were being built on the ground.

You have a design, which has passed all the tests and been approved by the Buildoffsite Property Assurance Scheme, I suggest—though it could equally be some other body—then you avoid all the processes and costs associated with whether it is an acceptable design for a place for someone to live in and can concentrate on how the site is laid out and what the building looks like. That makes a really effective way for people to build and procure their own houses, to go with my noble friend’s excellent amendment.

I urge this on the Government as a way in which they can make another small improvement that will, over time, decrease the cost and increase the rate of housebuilding.

Lord Lansley (Con)My Lords, I want to say a word or two about self-build and custom housebuilding, in support of my noble friend Lady Coffey—although I also want to ask a question about the precise terms in which her amendment is phrased.

I declare an interest, in that my nephew is seeking to build his own family home and has been on the register in Tandridge for a number of years now. He has received nothing from Tandridge by way of an offer of any plot anywhere, although he is entirely eligible, including being a locally connected person and so on.

I remember that we discussed this during the Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill—I remember talking to Richard Bacon about the provisions. My noble friend is absolutely right: we put a regulation-making power in with the objective of trying to ensure that the development permissions that were granted for self-build and custom housebuilding were genuinely for that and not for something else. The question to Ministers is whether, at this stage, they will use this power and how they will they use it.

The phraseology in my noble friend’s amendment, in so far as it says that only the specific development permissions that are referred to are to be treated as meeting a demand, may have the benefit of excluding some things that should not be treated as such but may have the disbenefit of excluding some things that should be treated as such, including people who bring forward their own plots for this purpose that do not form part of a wider development. It is rather important that we bring in what should be part of development permissions that meet demand for self-build and custom housebuilding and exclude those that do not and get the structure of it right.

Where we need to think more, if I recall correctly, is about what we do in relation to local planning authorities that have persistent unmet demand on that basis for self-build and custom housebuilding. There is an enormous potential benefit here. Look at other similar countries that have very large numbers of self-build and custom housebuilding. If the Government are looking for an opportunity to add to the extent of building, and indeed to support small housebuilders, this is absolutely the right territory to be working on.

To return to a familiar subject for me, the use of national development management policies in relation to decisions on planning applications for people who wish to build for themselves may well be one of the routes that the Government might like to consider for taking this issue forward.

Lord Best (CB)My Lords, I support Amendment 135, proposed by the noble Baroness, Lady Coffey. I piloted the Self-build and Custom Housebuilding Bill through your Lordships’ House in 2015, so I have an ongoing vested interest in the progress that this has made. I am grateful to the noble Baroness, not just for a full account of where this has come from and where it might be going to but for the technical detail that she explained very fully, which saves me struggling to do the same.

I can add two things. One is this: why should the Government be interested in this? The self-build and custom housebuilding sector has so much merit and is so undeveloped. It does the following things. It adds additional homes toward the 1.5 million target. It introduces diversity and competition to the speculative housing model that has let us down on so many occasions. It brings back the small and medium housebuilder. It makes use of small sites that are of no interest to the large-scale developers. It supports the fledgling modern methods of construction—or MMC—sector. It enables people to create the homes they really want, not what is served up to them by the volume housebuilders. It does so many good things all at once and it is certainly worthy of support, especially as it does not cost the Government anything to provide that support, which is a rarity.

The Government initiated an equity loan scheme, through Homes England, which enabled people to borrow on preferential terms. That finished in April of 2025, leaving the sector without any real extra support or governmental backing. This amendment would be one helpful step forward for a sector that is providing between 5% and 10% of all the homes we are creating, so it is not insignificant in its scale.

If this particular amendment is not the way by which the Government could be more helpful in the future, is there any intention in government to do anything at this stage that would support the self-build and custom housebuilding sector? It is deserving of a bit more backing. I support the amendment.

Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)My Lords, I will speak briefly to Amendments 135 and 135H. I should perhaps declare an interest, in that I think I am in the middle of building one of these self-build houses—I know I am, but I do not think of myself as a self-builder because I am not out there with bricks and mortar. More seriously, the complexity involved and time it takes for an individual who wants to convert their own little two-bedroom cottage to get through the planning system is unbelievable—it probably took me two and a half years. That is not acceptable and it does put people off, I am sure.

On Amendment 135, tabled by my noble friend Lady Coffey, modern housing delivery, particularly self-build and custom housebuilding, is important because it can add to supply. It can provide homes that better meet local or individual needs, and it can encourage innovation. Too often, as I have said, individuals face barriers in accessing land or securing timely permission. Will the Minister set out how the Government intend to make the existing right to self-build more effective and ensure that local authorities bring forward and encourage more sites to be built out in this way?

Amendment 135H, tabled by my noble friend Lord Lucas, addresses modular and off-site construction, where homes are manufactured to a set design and then assembled on site. When I was a Minister, I spoke many times on this, and I know that these methods can improve speed, quality and sustainability, yet planning delays can hold them back. Will the Minister please set out how the Government will support modern methods of construction in the planning system and whether they will streamline processes to encourage their wider use? Critical to making modular and off-site construction companies successful, and helping them survive, is that they need a pipeline of contractors putting in contracts. How do the Government propose to support the sector on this issue? It is a critical sector for building out these 1.5 million houses as quickly as possible and for them to be sustainable into the future. I look forward to the Minister’s reply.

Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)My Lords, I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Coffey, and the noble Lord, Lord Lucas, for these amendments. By the way, I hope it is not the nephew of the noble Lord, Lord Lansley, who is building the structure next door to the garden of the noble Baroness, Lady Thornhill. Amendment 135 seeks to restrict the types of development permission that may be counted by relevant authorities in meeting their duty to grant development permission for self-build and custom housebuilding under the Self-build and Custom Housebuilding Act 2015 to those set out in the new clause. The Government recognise that self and custom-build housing can play an important role as part of measures to diversify the market and support SMEs to ensure we can deliver the homes we need and support home ownership.

00:00:00

We are aware of concerns that the implementation of the self-build and custom housebuilding legislation is not supporting self and custom-build homes sufficiently. We are also aware of concerns that development permissions that are not intended to be built out as self and custom-build housing have been counted towards the relevant authority’s statutory duty to grant permissions in line with demand in their area, as evidenced by their self and custom-build registers. Although I understand the concerns of the noble Baroness, the definition of the development permission that can be counted by relevant authorities to meet their duties under the Self-build and Custom Housebuilding Act 2015 was amended through the Levelling-up and Regeneration Act 2023. The changes strengthen the definition to ensure that only development permissions explicitly for the carrying out of self-build and custom housebuilding qualify towards the statutory duty to grant planning permission. These changes came into force in January 2024 and there has been limited time for the impact to be felt so far. The Secretary of State already has the power, under the Self-build and Custom Housebuilding Act 2015, to make regulations to specify the types of planning permission and permission in principle that can be counted by the relevant authority in meeting their duty, should he choose to exercise his discretion to do so.

We are not currently persuaded of the need to use planning conditions or obligations to further tie permissions granted by relevant authorities at this stage. We believe that this approach may be more burdensome for local planning authorities, requiring conditions or obligations where they may not be necessary and creating the potential for delays to be introduced into the planning process for limited benefit. We believe that, currently, the right approach is to set out how planning conditions and obligations may be used to secure permissions for self and custom-build in planning practice guidance. We therefore intend to bring forward, later this year, updated guidance for self-build and custom housebuilding that reflects this. For these reasons, we do not believe this amendment is necessary and I hope the noble Baroness will withdraw her amendment.

Amendment 135H, tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Lucas, proposes that the Secretary of State may appoint an organisation to give type approval to designs for the modular construction of buildings. I thank the noble Lord for raising this issue. Modular construction offers an important opportunity to improve productivity in the construction sector. I have spoken about it before in the Chamber and I am a great supporter of modular construction. It will help to deliver high-quality, energy-efficient homes, while creating new jobs in the sector. However, a design specification for modular construction is insufficient for both planning control and building control purposes. Both control systems take into account the local environment and conditions of the building. Design for planning purposes is about much more than just physical characteristics; it is also about how a building relates to its surroundings and its interactions with the wider landscaping, layout and access.

Building regulations are intended to protect people’s safety and welfare. They set minimum acceptable standards for new building work, including when a building is being designed and constructed, and are enforced through the building control process. All new building work, including modular construction, needs to meet the functional requirements of building regulations. It may be assessed as having done so by a registered building control approver. That is the distinction: the planning process takes account of the situation of the property and its impact on the local environment, and building control takes account of the physical functional requirements of the regulations.

We recognise the opportunities offered by modular construction. That is why we and the British Standards Institution published a publicly available specification for residential properties in April this year. It offers greater clarity to the insurance and warranties market and supports delivery of quality homes. We may have some more work to do on insurance and warranties here, but I think we can get there. The industry is very keen to move this on and we are happy to work with it to do that. For all these reasons, I kindly ask the noble Baroness to withdraw her amendment.

Lord Lucas (Con)I am grateful to the Minister for her answer. I welcome her to 10 September.

Baroness Coffey (Con)My Lords, I thank noble Lords who have spoken—my noble friends Lord Fuller and Lord Lansley, and also the noble Lord, Lord Best. In response to my noble friend Lord Lansley, I am very conscious that perhaps there is a proper definition that can deal with this, so I will reflect on that and see what I can work through. He is absolutely right in saying that national development management policies are the way forward.

I inferred from what the Minister said that it is early days, and we will see where it goes. There is a group of willing people who want to get on. This is designed to make it as straightforward as possible for people to have homes. I know she supports that outcome, and I hope I can potentially work a little more with her and the noble Lord, Lord Best, in order to make that a reality. On that, I beg leave to withdraw my amendment.

Amendment 135 withdrawn.

Amendment 135A

Moved by

135A: After Clause 51, insert the following new Clause— “Planning decisions: consideration of an EDPIn section 70(2)(aa) of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990 (determination of applications: general considerations) at end insert—“(ab) any Environmental Delivery Plan made under the Planning and Infrastructure Act 2025, so far as material to the application,””Member’s explanatory statement This amendment seeks to ensure that when making a planning decision, the local planning authority must take into account any EDP applying to the land question.

Baroness Coffey (Con)My Lords, Amendment 135A may perhaps look a little innocuous, but it is actually critical in considering how Part 3 of the Bill will work. By the way, I did not determine where this appeared in the Bill; that was done by the clerks.

It has arisen due to evidence given by the chief executive of Natural England, who was asked by the Environmental Audit Committee in the House of Commons to address Part 3 of the Bill. I appreciate this is before the Government backtracked and made a number of changes to try and address the significant number of concerns, which have not been fully alleviated, in regard to the potential for environmental damage.

I am very pleased to set out this suggested amendment to the planning Bill, which would, in effect, put into place what was said by the chief executive of Natural England—the body being allocated all this power not only to create but to deliver the increase in biodiversity in compensation for the development the Government want to see.

Marian Spain, when asked about these powers being given to Natural England—it will be tasked with writing, delivering, monitoring and reporting on EDPs—responded by saying that developers will be able to choose not to pay the levy if they do not have the confidence in the relevant EDP, and also that planning authorities can refuse to grant planning permission to developers if they are not convinced that the EDP would work. That is not what is in the Bill today, but the chief executive—the accounting officer—of Natural England has said to Parliament that this is what the Bill is doing. This amendment, in effect, puts that into place.

She specifically said that, in terms of not choosing to pay the levy, there is a risk that developers could not have confidence in the EDPs. This is worrying. It means that, if developers promote a new scheme through the planning system, they will not know whether or where an EDP will land or what environmental features it will cover. They do not actually know if levies will be mandatory or voluntary or how much the levies will be. They will not know whether the local authority considers an existing EDP to be ineffective. Developers would need to navigate the added very real risk that planning permission is refused because a planning authority does not trust that an EDP is being or will be delivered properly.

As a consequence of what the chief executive has said, it seems that the planning authority would need to police the progress and effectiveness of EDPs in their local authority areas. That was not in the Government’s impact assessment and may not be the intention of the Government at all. I say to the Minister that the very person who will deliver exactly what is left out in Part 3 of this Bill is saying that is the case. Frankly, if it is the case, and that is what the chief executive has told Parliament, then this will be exceptionally worse than the status quo for developers.

Developers can already access strategic solutions for nature that are competitively brought forward by a range of actors, including landowners, charities, Natural England itself and private companies. These alternative solutions will be crowded out by EDPs, and we will get to that more substantial debate next week in Part 3. At the same time, there is a risk that planning permissions will be held up because local authorities will not trust that an underfunded, unscientific, non-locally led EDP will actually be delivered.

I have greater concerns about the whole concept of Part 3. However, what I think is good is that, by my amendment, we can put back in exactly what the chief executive of Natural England says this legislation is supposed to do. That is why I am moving this amendment. Speaking to my noble friend’s amendment on planning information, it is a very straightforward amendment, and I support my noble friend. It is basically saying, “We are looking at biodiversity, we need to know what it is, why don’t we get it all ready and we can share it with the developers, so we can know what the basic part is”. I am sure my noble friend will explain it far more eloquently than I have tried to do in those 15 seconds. With that, I beg to move.

Lord Lucas (Con)My Lords, I have two amendments in this group. Amendment 135F is basically saying, “Look, we are generating a lot of quality biodiversity information within the planning system, but we are not capturing it”.

As a previous Government—this Government are too, I believe—we were committed to restoring biodiversity in this country from a very unfortunate, low level. To do that well, we need really good data. There are a number of potential sources of that data, but the great majority of the quality biodiversity data—that which can absolutely be believed because it has been collected by people who are qualified and has been properly checked and done carefully—is generated by the planning system.

But the majority of the data collected by the planning system never finds itself going anywhere else. We have a system in the country of local environment record centres, where this data should be deposited; it is not. This is what I want the Government to do. I know there are those within the Government who are working in this direction, but they are in Defra not in MHCLG, so what I would like MHCLG to do is to say, “Yes, it is important that we collect this data; we will mandate that”. When it is created as part of the planning system, it should find its way into the national data record. This is not something that would impose huge costs, because the data will almost always be in an easily accessible format. If you are applying for planning permission, and you have done a biological survey, you have to say where you found what. That is basically all that is needed for the environmental record centres. What we need to do, though, is get the data flowing.

The other side of this is—within the limitations of the Bill—my second Amendment 253A is saying that we ought to be using this data much better than we do. We create things and make decisions without accessing the best possible data that we already hold, and we ought not to do that. We ought to be making the best possible informed decisions when it comes to biodiversity; otherwise, we will do stupid things that damage the environment even further. The best possible data—the best possible decisions. That requires that, when we are taking a decision which affects the environment, we go and get the best available data. Again, the planning system is central to that. There ought not to be an application within the planning system which does not use the best data. My amendment asks that we put that right.

00:15:00

Lord Fuller (Con)My Lords, I am gravely concerned. Normally, of course, I agree wholeheartedly with my noble friend Lady Coffey, and perhaps I have misread her amendment, in which case I apologise, and she will correct me in the winding. In the evidence that the chief executive of Natural England gave to your Lordships’ Built Environment Committee 18 months ago, she said that it had no regard whatever for economic growth in determining its position on development proposals; it was purely, solely and entirely for environmental purposes. Of course, if growth is the principal and number one objective of this Government, these things need to be balanced. So the amendment puts a touching faith in the professionalism of Natural England, which, as I think we will discover next week, may be misplaced.

Natural England, in its provision of EDPs, as I read in the Bill, will be given monopoly powers to be a monopoly regulator, a monopoly provider and a monopoly price-maker of environmental schemes in this country. These EDPs, as I see it, could conceptually be 100 different EDPs on a national basis for 100 different species, each of which may be in a less favourable condition, or so forth.

If the experience of nutrient neutrality is anything to go by, it will take Natural England years to come up with mitigating programmes. That is what it has done, and in some parts of the country we are still waiting. So I have no faith that Natural England, vested as it will be in Part 3 of the Bill, will be prompt and complete in its provision of EDPs.

As I read this amendment, I see that it will be an excuse for local authorities not to grant an otherwise appropriate permission, which would in normal cases sail through because every other obligation and stipulation has been met. So I think we can contemplate that this could not only gum up and slow down the development, but there is a second problem. The risk is that the developer may have made his own inquiries and found his own local solution to a particular local requirement for an especially local problem, whether for species, environmental ecology, or whatever. I can see that the consequence of this amendment would be that he might have to pay three times: once for the delay, once for his own mitigation, which in so far as he or any reasonable person is concerned meets all the regulations, and another time to wait for the EDP, which may or may not be coming from Natural England in a prompt situation.

I am really concerned about this amendment. I do not believe that Natural England is the appropriate body to do this. If the Government take a different view, that is their prerogative. But we should not vest in Natural England monopoly powers that cut out private provision, private delivery, and especially local delivery, and sacrifice them on the altar of some national scheme at hugely inflated values.

Baroness Grender (LD)My Lords, I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Coffey, for ensuring that one person is watching tonight—it is much appreciated—and the noble Lord, Lord Lucas, for raising interesting debates regarding Amendments 135A, 135F and 253A in the context of biodiversity protections through environmental delivery plans, or EDPs, and the capture and use of that data.

EDPs must do more than simply mitigate harm. They must require the active protection and enhancement of biodiversity, with clear enforceable timetables and measurable outcomes. Our concern is that EDPs risk becoming instruments of offsetting impact rather than delivering real local environmental recovery. We need a strong legal framework that prevents development-related damage to irreplaceable habitats, such as ancient woodlands and chalk streams, and makes sure these habitats receive the highest protection in planning decisions.

We welcome these amendments and look forward to some level of timetabling and monitoring in EDPs and the introduction of an overall improvement test seeking to ensure that conservation gains significantly outweigh harm. However, for us, questions remain about whether the provisions are sufficient in practice to guarantee meaningful biodiversity outcomes. The reliance on compensation rather than upfront prevention remains a concern, as does the limited timeframe for public scrutiny of EDPs. We all in this Committee note that Part 3 includes new measures on EDPs, including, as discussed, powers for Natural England to oversee and design conservation strategies, but it is still unclear how these changes will translate into on the ground improvements or prevent the loss of vulnerable habitats.

The hour is late, but it would be useful if the Minister could tell us to what extent these recent changes to Part 3 address the deep concerns about EDPs being used as a compromise rather than a solution. Will we see stronger enforcement, longer public consultations and better integration of biodiversity data into our planning decisions?

EDPs that guarantee biodiversity need to ensure that our natural heritage is a foundation, not a casualty, of sustainable development. I welcome this debate, therefore, and look forward to clarification—if not tonight then certainly when we debate Part 3 next week—to ensure that the Bill delivers the nature protections that we all believe this country urgently needs.

Lord Lansley (Con)My Lords, it seems to me that we are getting ahead of ourselves. We are yet to reach Part 3, but these seem to be mostly considerations relating to the content of Part 3 and how the environmental delivery plans and the nature restoration levy are intended to work.

I understood my noble friend Lady Coffey’s amendment to be grouped where it is and say what it does because nowhere in Part 3 is there something that otherwise tells us how the making of an environmental delivery plan affects a local planning authority in making its decisions. It seemed to me that she had tabled a rather useful amendment that did precisely that.

I do not think it is relevant whether a developer has to pay the levy or not. It can request to pay the levy, or, as we can see in Clause 66 and Schedule 4, Natural England can make it mandatory that it pays the levy. Either way, it does not really matter. The point is that, if the environmental delivery plan is made, a local authority should clearly take it into account in determining any planning permission, in the same way as it would be required to have regard to all the legislation relating to protected sites and protected species. Schedule 4 simply tells us that when the local authority makes planning decisions it may disregard them because there is an environmental delivery plan in place. What my noble friend Lady Coffey is saying would be at least a useful addition, in a technical sense, to the Bill.

Lord Jamieson (Con)My Lords, I thank my noble friend Lord Lucas for his thoughtful ongoing contribution to our debate on this Bill. His amendment raises some significant questions about how biodiversity information is gathered, shared and used within the planning system.

This sparked a few questions that we wish to ask the Minister. First, can she clarify how the Government see the balance between requiring robust biodiversity data and avoiding unnecessary burdens on applicants—particularly smaller developers or individuals making household applications? Secondly, what consideration has been given to the readiness and capacity of local environmental record centres or other organisations to provide such information, should regulations of this kind be introduced? Thirdly, has consideration been given that this be addressed as part of the spatial development strategy or local plan? Lastly, how do the Government propose to ensure consistency and standardisation in biodiversity data collected so that it meaningfully informs local and national policy in the future?

Amendment 135, tabled by my noble friend Lady Coffey, seeks to ensure that environmental delivery plans relevant to the land in question are considered when making planning decisions. This seems to be an eminently sensible and pragmatic measure that joins up the EDP process with planning decision-making. However, this amendment also raises the important point that I raised at Second Reading: the chicken and egg question. How can you develop an EDP without knowing what the spatial development strategy is that it is seeking to mitigate? Conversely, do you need an EDP to make a spatial development strategy deliverable? It would seem sensible that they are done in parallel. If so, why would an EDP not be part of the spatial development strategy? Can the Minister please provide a clearer answer than at Second Reading?

Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Coffey, and the noble Lord, Lord Lucas, for their amendments in this group. There will be a very full debate on the wider issues around EDPs, the role of Natural England and so on next week. I will answer the specific points today and, in view of the hour, we will leave the wider discussions until next week.

Amendment 135A seeks to ensure that any applicable environmental delivery plan is taken into account by a planning decision-maker when making a planning decision under the Town and Country Planning Act. Although it is crucial that EDPs are fully integrated into the wider planning system, I assure the noble Baroness that how EDPs work in practice means that the amendment is not necessary. Where a developer makes a payment into an EDP, the making of that payment discharges the relevant environmental obligation. This means that the planning decision-maker will not need to consider the specific environmental obligation covered by the EDP when deciding on an application. To respond to the points about the differences that came forward after we had met with the environmental NGOs, and the response of the OEP, the government amendments make changes explicit in the Bill which were only implicit. We met with noble Lords to discuss this.

Amendment 135F seeks to enable the Secretary of State to make regulations about the biodiversity information required for applications for planning permission and enable specific bodies providing this information to applicants to charge for it. The Government agree it is critical that developers reduce and mitigate their impacts on biodiversity. We also agree that to achieve this, robust biodiversity information should be provided with planning applications where habitats and wildlife are affected by development proposals. However, I am not convinced that we need further powers to achieve this or that we should specify precisely where and how such information needs to be sourced.

Since 2024, subject to certain exceptions, biodiversity net gain has been mandatory for new planning permissions to achieve at least 10% net gain in biodiversity value. As part of this framework, developers are now required to provide a baseline assessment of pre-development biodiversity value of the site using the statutory biodiversity metric published by the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs. Natural England provides considerable guidance and support to developers and local planning authorities on the use of this metric. The biggest infrastructure developers will also be required to do so from May 2026 when BNG is extended to nationally significant infrastructure projects.

00:30:00

Amendment 253A, tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Lucas, would establish a new power for the Secretary of State to make regulations setting out the circumstances where an EDP may be required to be accompanied by certain information related to biodiversity. I agree it is vital that EDPs are underpinned by the best available scientific evidence—we have made that point a number of times. That is why, as I said, the Government introduced the amendments making clear what was already implicit, that when drafting, making and implementing EDPs, both Natural England and the Secretary of State must take account of the best available scientific evidence. It is for that reason that I hope I can assure the Committee that the Bill already ensures that appropriate environmental information is provided as part of the EDP insofar as that information is related to the environmental feature in question.

Clause 55 already requires EDPs to include all necessary information on the environmental feature and the impacts of development to which the EDP relates. The collection of this information is part of the process of drafting an EDP, which will then be recovered by the nature restoration levy as provided for in Clause 71, which states that regulations may provide for the levy to be used to fund administrative expenses in connection with an EDP. These information gathering provisions are supported by Clause 88, which includes a duty on public authorities to co-operate with Natural England. This includes the provision of information.

The proposed amendment would take this further and require Natural England to gather information that is not specifically relevant to the environmental feature that the EDP is intended to address. In practice this would add further cost to Natural England when drafting EDPs, which would then be passed on to developers through the levy. Broadening the scope of information required from EDPs risks drawing focus away from their targeted focus on specific environmental features. With that explanation, I would kindly ask the noble Lord to withdraw his amendment.

Lord Lucas (Con)My Lords, I am grateful for that answer by the noble Baroness, but she did not go as far as I hoped on my first amendment. I know that there is a lot of information being gathered as a result of the biodiversity net gain process. I am comforted that the noble Baroness appears to assume this will continue, because it has been a matter of doubt, given the recent consultation. But the problem is not that it is not generated; it is generated, but then nothing happens to it. It is locked up within that particular planning application; it never gets into the national records.

What I would really like to see coming through as planning policy is that where this information is generated, it must find its way into the national database because otherwise we lose it—it is inaccessible. We do not know what was found. We cannot draw on this information to take other decisions; we are depriving ourselves. Having generated this information and people having paid for this information, it then just disappears. That cannot be the right way of doing things. We must have a planning system which contributes to the national understanding of our biodiversity. The information that we gather as part of planning surely must become part of the national biodiversity database. That is something I would really like to pursue with the noble Baroness, if she will allow me to write to her further.

Baroness Coffey (Con)My Lords, I thank the Minister for her reply and, indeed, all noble Lords for speaking. I do not want to get into the whole Part 3 debate; we will be debating that next week. I say to my noble friend Lord Fuller that this is based on evidence given to the Environmental Audit Committee on 30 June of this year by the chief executive, Marian Spain, rather than the chairman, Tony Juniper, over a year ago. I thank my noble friend Lord Lansley for giving me confidence—it was in the right place, after all—and for providing the clarity. The key point right now is that what the Minister has said tonight contradicts what the chief executive—the accounting officer—of Natural England told Members of Parliament about the effect of the Bill. I am going to read more carefully tomorrow what the Minister has said: I am not suggesting in any way that she is misleading the House either, but I think there is a problem. Putting this amendment in has got the outcome that I would like to see but perhaps not that of the Government. With that, I withdraw the amendment.

Amendment 135A withdrawn.

Amendments 135B to 135D not moved.

Amendment 135E

Moved by

135E: After Clause 51, insert the following new Clause— “Meetings of local planning authorities to be available for participation online(1) This section applies to any meeting of a local authority held to discharge the authority’s planning functions, including a committee or a sub-committee of the authority held under section 101(1)(a) of the Local Government Act 1972 (a “planning meeting”).(2) A local authority must make arrangements for the proceedings of a planning meeting to be available over the internet both in real time and for five years after the meeting, and those arrangements must include the ability for members of the public observing a planning meeting over the internet in real time to address the meeting where permitted by the person chairing the meeting.(3) Subsection (2) applies despite any prohibition or other restriction contained in the standing orders or any other rules of the authority governing a planning meeting and any such prohibition or restriction has no effect.(4) A local authority may make standing orders and any other rules governing participation by a member of the public in a planning meeting over the internet, which may include provision for access to documents.”Member’s explanatory statement This new clause would require local planning authorities to make their meetings available for observation and participation online.

Baroness Thornhill (LD)My Lords, I rise to move my Amendment 135E—in another streamlined contribution—which is self-explanatory. I also speak to Amendment 135HZA in the name of noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh of Pickering, who is sadly not in her place due to the hour; we believe it definitely has some merit.

The emphasis for this amendment comes very strongly from our commitment on these Benches to community engagement and, more importantly, from the fact that the community has never before been so apparently disengaged from the need to build houses and engaged instead in full blown opposition.

The pandemic changed everything, including how we did meetings. The one positive thing that is said is that remote council meetings increased the opportunities for planning committees to hear views from a far more diverse group of participants, because they were more accessible to a wider audience.

Several paragraphs have been chopped here. My amendment simply states that the Government would require local planning authorities to make their meetings available for observation and participation online—that latter word is key. It does allow for a degree of local authority autonomy in the way that it decides to allow such participation in meetings. It is not the intention of the amendment to be prescriptive, nor to favour one particular means over another. The purpose of the amendment is that meetings have to be recorded and should be kept for posterity. They could be used in appeals or public inquiries and are genuinely an accurate record of what was actually said.

The public being able to contribute is the key thing, and I believe that, unless this is mandatory, those councils that are not doing this will not choose to do so without compulsion. There are still a number of councils, around 15%, that do not even record their meetings, but, for the 85% that do, they are not always webcast in a way that people can participate in. It should also be said that many councils recognise a range of benefits from providing online availability for questions at meetings, so we must ask ourselves why these other councils are dragging their heels. Surely, giving more means to the public to participate, in a much less formal way than giving a five-minute presentation at the beginning of what can be, for many, a daunting meeting—which is what is afforded at most planning meetings that I have experienced—has got to be a benefit and make communities feel that their voice is being heard. It should be something we want all councils to do.

We know that there is plenty of research, particularly that done by the RTPI, that shows that digital transformation can help various groups, the young in particular. Half the people in the RTPI’s most recent survey said that being able to respond digitally would make them more likely to get involved in the system—and maybe we might then get some yimbys joining in the housing debate.

The Greater London Authority and the Local Government Association have been pioneering this. There are lots of good examples and good practice that we can learn from. This would particularly help people living in rural areas, who may have a long journey to get to meetings or be disadvantaged by poor public transport. It would better accommodate the needs of those with work or caring responsibilities, and people with personal or protected characteristics who may find online attendance or viewing much more accessible than turning up to the fairly stiff formal council meeting. That is why we believe this clause should be mandatory across all authorities.

The situation with regard to the public and planning has never been worse. Anything we can do to improve that has got to be tried, but we fear some local authorities will need the final push of mandatory provision to make it happen. I look forward to the Minister’s response. I beg to move.

Lord Lansley (Con)My Lords, I want to intervene, not least on behalf of the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh. She is not here to speak to her amendment but, as a number of noble Lords will recall, she and I worked together during the Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill on amendments to the same effect. Indeed, the noble Baroness, Lady Pinnock, will recall that she led an amendment for this purpose, all to the effect of bringing us firmly into the post-pandemic, 21st-century manner of holding meetings, enabling local authorities to hold virtual meetings. There are many reasons for that, which I will not rehearse.

I remind noble Lords, and especially the limited number of us who were here for the Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill, that we went into ping-pong on this issue on the basis of the amendment at the time from the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh of Pickering. It was sent back to the other place on a second occasion with a narrow majority in this House, which included the Minister responding to this debate. The then Opposition committed themselves in principle to virtual meetings. I hope they will see that through now.

Lord Fuller (Con)My Lords, I want to make a brief comment. I very much sympathise with the thrust of this amendment, but I am anxious about the term “members of the public”. Those noble Lords who sit on a planning committee will know that there are decision-makers—the councillors who sit around the table—who will ultimately pass judgment one way or the other on the application. As I understand it, the amendment would contemplate that those decision-makers would be in the room and then members of the public outside, watching remotely, might contribute.

Is it the intention of the noble Baroness, Lady Thornhill, that special participants, who are not members of the public but also are not decision-makers, will be able to contribute from outside the room? The people I have in mind are local members, for example, local parish council members, or the local neighbourhood group, who have special status in the sense that they are consultees. While I can see that the decision-makers need to be in the room and members of the public might be outside, perhaps the noble Baroness could help us by saying what would be the status of these special people—the local member and so forth—who may be members of the council but not decision-makers.

Baroness Thornhill (LD)I do not think that it is for us to decide about these special stakeholders. I would have thought it would be up to the council to decide whether they are allowed in the room. In my council, they are certainly encouraged to attend. The key issue is the involvement of people who would not dream of turning up to a council meeting. Of course, the local member and all the other people the noble Lord mentioned would not fear going into a council meeting and could get there easily enough. It is those who are normally excluded who are the issue. I genuinely believe that, by expanding the voice of people who contribute, we may take some of the heat out of these really controversial planning decisions.

Lord Fuller (Con)At the moment, some of these special stakeholders are not permitted to participate unless they are in the room. I take the noble Baroness’s amendment to say that they might be able to participate if they are outside the room. That is what I was trying to probe.

Baroness Thornhill (LD)It would certainly put more pressure on the council to allow that, which I think they should.

Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP)The noble Baroness talked about people who would not dream of participating. It is also worth stressing that certain people would not be able to participate because of disabilities, caring responsibilities and other reasons. In fact, given the responsibilities the Government have in terms of protected characteristics, surely that would make the argument for this amendment.

00:45:00

Lord Jamieson (Con)My Lords, ensuring that planning meetings can be held when they are needed and that they are accessible is of real importance. Equally, the clarity of outcome is critical, and the transparency. Applicants, the public and those participating need to see that proposals have been properly considered with clarity of decision-making, otherwise confidence in the system will be undermined. I therefore ask the Minister what consideration has been given to how these provisions will operate in practice. Linked to this issue, what safeguards can the Government provide to ensure that the decisions reached in local planning meetings are both transparent and understood by all? I hope the Minister can reassure your Lordships’ House on these points.

Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)I thank the noble Baronesses, Lady Thornhill and Lady McIntosh, for the amendments relating to planning authority meetings. Amendment 135E would require councils to stream their planning meetings online, to publish records of those meetings and to allow members of the public to speak at them via online participation.

I have to say “well remembered” to the noble Lord, Lord Lansley, on the levelling-up Bill—I think all of us who worked on that Bill deserve a badge to say that we survived. I indeed supported this issue, and the Government are committed to legislating to allow councils to meet remotely in response to our consultation. We are working with sector representatives such as the Local Government Association and others to clarify how this would work in practice, including how to ensure that existing rules around meetings are applied appropriately to remote and hybrid meetings without undermining democratic accountability or procedural integrity. We want to get this right and that might mean taking a little longer to work through the detail of the proposal to make sure that the changes are legally robust, practically workable and aligned with the expectation of both local authorities and the public.

We are committed to ending this micromanagement of local councils from Whitehall. Decisions about how councils run their day-to-day affairs should be taken locally. We do not think it is appropriate at the moment to make streaming meetings compulsory, as this amendment proposes. Councils can already stream their meetings online and can, if they wish, make arrangements to hear representations from the public online. Indeed, many councils already do this. The Government encourage councils to consider how they can make local democracy accessible to their residents, and that includes for reasons of disability, as the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, pointed out. Streaming meetings may be a helpful step to make local decision-making more transparent. However, making that a locally operational decision and not because of a diktat is important.

Amendment 135HZA would allow planning committees and subcommittees to meet remotely or in hybrid form in circumstances to be specified in regulations. Outdated legislation has the implied effect of requiring all local authorities to hold their meetings in one physical location only. This was confirmed by a court case several years ago. As I mentioned earlier, all local authorities are independent bodies with their own democratic mandate, and as the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh, has raised several times in this House in recent years, they should be able to decide how they want to organise their own meetings and Parliament should not stand in their way. That is why the Government have committed to allowing councils to make decisions themselves about whether to hold their meetings in person, to do them fully online, or to have a hybrid form.

Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)Have the Government looked at any legal opinion as to whether a planning meeting is different from any other council meeting because it is quasi-judicial?

Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)That is exactly the detailed work that we are doing now with the Local Government Association and with other advisers to make sure that we get all the regulations right so that we do not breach any legal duty that councils have as we go through this process. We think this choice should apply to all council meetings and not just planning committees or planning authorities. We do not think there should be conditions attached to the decision. We trust that local authorities will make arrangements that work for them and for their residents, but we need to carry out the further work that I have referred to in order to bring this forward. However, I am very committed to moving it onwards, but we do not believe that the amendments are necessary and I kindly ask the noble Baroness to withdraw Amendment 135E.

Baroness Thornhill (LD)My Lords, I was quite positive about the Minister’s response because I feel that if the work that she outlined is happening, and I understand why she said it may take a little longer, I think that will give good councils—which are a little bit fearful of doing this, but need that extra guidance—confidence to go ahead and give it a try. However, we all know that there is a group of councils which, let us just say, give rise to concern within the department for not completing their local plans. We know there are issues in council meetings that are reported every week in the planning newsletter that comes out. I think they will be allowed to drag their heels and will continue to cause concern.

I also had a wry smile when the Minister said that the Government did not want to give diktats, because they are certainly not averse to giving them in other areas. I thank the Minister for her positivity on the subject and let us hope that more and more councils do start to do this. I beg leave to withdraw my amendment.

Amendment 135E withdrawn.

Amendments 135F to 135HZH not moved.

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[Continued from column 1414]

00:53:00

Amendment 135HZI

Moved by

135HZI: After Clause 51, insert the following new Clause— “Planning consents: reportingThe Secretary of State must publish quarterly, for each local planning authority, the number of planning consents granted where—(a) building has not started;(b) building has not been completed.”

Baroness Coffey (Con)My Lords, the Bill in its entirety is designed, to paraphrase the Government, to remove all the barriers that prevent homes being built. The reality is that about a million homes across our country have consent to be built but have not been built. I have explained to your Lordships’ House my concerns that more and more land is being allocated to be built on while we are not doing anything about the homes that have not been built. We are in this odd, almost Catch-22 situation where we are chasing our tails. Meanwhile, there are plenty of families, as we have heard from noble Lords, who do not have a home of their own and are living in temporary accommodation, or indeed worse.

By the way, I did group these amendments together; the Government had originally suggested they be separate. I appreciate that Amendment 135HZJ may seem a bit odd; it is basically giving power to allow direction to repeal planning permission, when we are trying to get homes built. However, the combination of Amendments 135HZI and 135HZJ is designed to be very transparent and, frankly, to allow Ministers in MHCLG, all the mayors and all these other bodies that are being developed to get to grips with the situation that we have around the country much better and deliver the outcome, which by and large people share.

By reporting where planning consent has been granted and either building just has not started at all or has not been completed, that would give some clarity. We know that the Government have established a variety of task forces to try and help local councils get on with what is proving a problem, so this would make things clearer not only for the Ministers—by the way, they can probably access that information anyway—but for the public and for Parliament.

Perhaps I have not identified the right piece of legislation, but legislation certainly exists already where councils can basically say to developers, “Use it or lose it”, but, where councils are not using that, Ministers do not have a way to overreach them. This is the way. I would say it is analogous to something that we put through earlier in the Bill when it comes to energy infrastructure, where the convention has been, “I want to connect. I can generate energy. Give me this, and I can think about how I will eventually do it in detail”. The Government have realised, as had the previous Administration, that stuff just was not getting done. Meanwhile, it was clogging up the system on all sorts of issues. Therefore, this is in effect giving Ministers the same power to say, “We need to get these homes built. We want to make sure in different ways that those developers who are going to build get the consent. Meanwhile, get out of the way, those people who have not actually bothered”. Some of that has traditionally been done to get hope value or whatever it is; nevertheless, we know that land is getting stuck.

My noble friend Lady Hodgson of Abinger has put in a—how can I put it? I will not say “aggressive”—demanding timeline for developers to get on with it. Ultimately, I hope that the Minister recognises the intent of the two amendments I have tabled: to make things far more straightforward. It does not entirely to take a Stalinist approach, but it is not far off. They would make the Secretary of State’s words “Build, baby, build” come to fruition. I beg to move.

Baroness Hodgson of Abinger (Con)My Lords, I will speak to Amendment 227B, which is in my name and is reasonably similar to those of my noble friend Lady Coffey. I hope it is not aggressive.

Baroness Coffey (Con)Ambitious?

Baroness Hodgson of Abinger (Con)Ambitious. As the explanatory statement sets out, this amendment proposes a new clause after Clause 106

“to prevent ‘land banking’—the practice of purchasing undeveloped land and holding it for future development or resale, rather than immediately building on it”.

Its proposed new subsection (1) would create an obligation on the developer or company to declare whether they held planning permission for similar developments within a 10-mile radius of the new site they were seeking permission to buy or lease. Proposed new subsection (2) would give the power to refuse development if any similar sites identified by proposed new subsection (1) had not been activated for over a year.

The point succinctly made by others at Second Reading is that we must not conflate housing delivery with granting planning permissions. Planning permission will not meet targets if it is not acted on. Indeed, a Competition and Markets Authority working paper on the housebuilding market in 2023 highlighted that

“a number of stakeholders have voiced concerns … around the impact of housebuilders’ land banks on the way the housebuilding market functions”.

According to the CPRE, a staggering 1.2 million homes given planning permission since 2015 have not been built. Others report that there are between 500,000 to a million land-bank plots currently being held by the big house developers, with eight of the major companies holding land of a value in excess of £198 billion. In 2023, the Big Issue argued that the amount of land banking by the eight leading housebuilders had increased by 49% since 2018, with all eight companies having enough land to build for more than 11 years based on the rate they built homes in the last full trading year. Indeed, it has been argued before, in the other place, that the timescales involved in land banking in the UK seem long compared to other countries such as Germany, Japan, the USA, and even France.

01:00:00

The Government state that they want to build 1.5 million homes. Although this is not the only issue impacting the housing market, I argue that simply by refusing to give the big companies more planning permission until they develop what they already have, we can unlock sites already approved rather than risk urbanising our vital green belt— something this Labour Government are attempting to do with the Bill. Surely it is of the utmost importance that we ensure that we do not lose yet more of our countryside and agricultural land by allowing yet more planning permission when there is already planning permission not utilised in the area. This would arguably invigorate the market, compelling homes to be built without having to go through the timely requirements of getting planning permission or force forward the decision to sell surplus land if projects are no longer viable. The Minister failed to reply on this point at Second Reading. What assessment have the Government made of this potential building pipeline and ability to meet their housing targets if all land banks were brought into service? Also, have they attempted to map whether they match areas where there is most need and demand is strongest?

The housebuilding lobby has long been a strong one. I hope that the Minister will agree to meet me to discuss the practicality of this amendment ahead of the next stage of the Bill. I can only reiterate that we must not lose any more of our countryside and agricultural land than necessary.

Baroness Pinnock (LD)My Lords, it is 1 am, and here we are debating a very important group of amendments. Whether all our brains will work well enough to give them the justice that they deserve, we will see.

I have considerable sympathy with the amendments in the names of the noble Baronesses, Lady Coffey and Lady Hodgson. If the Government wish to achieve their targets of 300,000 new homes a year, one of the easier ways to do so is by ensuring that those sites that already have planning consent are built out—and built out rapidly. However, that is not in the interests of the developers. I will give one or two examples that I hope the Minister will be able to respond to.

We have already heard that the ONS report—last year, I think—assessed that, of the 2.7 million homes given planning consent since 2015, only 1.5 million have actually been constructed. That obviously leaves 1.2 million homes already with planning consent that have yet to be constructed—which, interestingly, is four years’ worth of the Government’s targets for this Parliament.

What are the reasons for this inactivity? Obviously, some are valid, including a lack of skills or materials that prevent developers getting going with their sites. However, in my experience, one cause is that major housebuilders deliberately phase the construction of a big site over many years to keep the selling price of their units as high as possible. In other words, they do not want too many new housing units on the market, which may depress the selling value that they would be able to get for those homes. I will give one simple example. Where I live, a developer has had consent, I think for three years, for a site of nearly 300 homes, which the developer claims will take 10 years to build out. If the Government are genuine about getting more homes, this amendment is an easy way of making progress by putting some oomph behind developers to get the sites built.

I just noticed the Government Chief Whip sighing—well, it is not my fault we are here at 1.05 am.

Another way in which housebuilders delay construction is by, having got planning consent, delaying the start by then putting in a series of amending planning applications, to keep their original planning consent alive. Although they are running out of time on the original consent—usually three years—they put in these amending applications to keep the site alive. Those sites will be within that £1.2 million. What will the Government do about that? The tactics create considerable delay in meeting the housing targets, which we are all concerned to see met.

The only beneficiaries of this are the housebuilders, who benefit further from how the planning system is designed. When councils develop their local plans, they must have a five-year housing supply. What housebuilders do is quickly gobble up the housing sites indicated on the local plan. They do not always build them out; they keep them hanging on. When the five-year supply has run out, they then say, “Ah, you haven’t got a five-year supply of housing. We will now build on any site we like in the green belt”, which is what the Government permit. There is a big problem here, which I hope the Minister will be able to address when she responds.

There are issues, which the amendments partially address, around trying to force developers to build out their sites once they have received planning consent. That is why I have a lot of sympathy for the noble Baroness, Lady Hodgson, in putting a bit of oomph behind all this to get things going. We want houses, but housebuilders should build them once they have received planning consent—it seems easy to me; that is what should happen. If they do not build, they should be deprived of the consent.

Lord Lansley (Con)Before the Minister’s response to the debate, I will take an opportunity to contribute. We heard earlier from the noble Lord, Lord Carlile of Berriew, about the Competition and Markets Authority inquiries into the housebuilding industry. I will inject into this short debate one of the findings of the CMA report related to land banks. It states that

“the CMA assessed over a million plots of land held by housebuilders and found the practice of banking land was more a symptom of the issues identified with the complex planning system and speculative private development, rather than it being a primary reason for the shortage of new homes”.

The reference to “speculative private development” related to the finding immediately prior, where it said a

“significant reason behind under delivery of homes are the limitations of private speculative development. The evidence shows that private developers produce houses at a rate at which they can be sold without needing to reduce their prices, rather than diversifying the types and numbers of homes they build to meet the needs of different communities”. This seems to directly complement and follow what was in the Letwin review, which said that we really must have work by housebuilders, and indeed in the planning process, to ensure that we have a diversity of tenures and supply to maximise the market absorption rates into the market. That will stimulate greater speculative private development and reduce land banking.

Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)My Lords, I would like to thank—

Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)My Lords—

Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)Sorry, I thought the noble Baroness was not getting up.

Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)My Lords, I will not be long. I support the spirit and principle of the amendments tabled by my noble friends Lady Coffey and Lady Hodgson of Abinger, which directly target the heart of our shared ambition to further unlock building in this country. These amendments do not seek to burden the system, but to shine a light on it by requiring the Secretary of State to publish on a quarterly basis the number of planning consents where buildings have not started or have not been completed. We bring much-needed transparency to the process, and we are not here to punish but to ensure that permissions translate into homes on the ground.

May I also suggest that land allocated through a local plan but that does not yet have planning permission also be looked at? Previous research by the LGA estimated that this could be in the region of 1 million units, and it is this land that often has the greatest delays.

Too often, the perception is that land is banked rather than built upon. Whatever the reasons, the effect is the same: consented sites stand idle while the need for housing grows ever more acute. By monitoring and publishing this information, we will equip local planning authorities, communities and indeed developers themselves with the clarity to drive progress. In truth, this is about getting on with the job. It is about ensuring that when Parliament grants a framework for development, the outcome is not paper promises but bricks and mortar. Transparency will build not only trust but confidence in the planning system and what it delivers. May I ask the Minister whether the Government plan to enact the part of the LURA which places penalties on developers who conveniently land bank sites with planning permission?

These are modest, proportional measures, but they carry a powerful signal that permission should lead to homes, not bottlenecks; that we are committed to building, not land banking; and that the public deserves nothing less than openness and delivery. Above all, we owe it to the next generation—to those striving for a secure roof over their heads—to turn words into walls and plans into places that they can call their homes.

Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)My Lords, I thank the noble Baronesses, Lady Coffey and Lady Hodgson, for these amendments related to the build-out of development. Of course, it is important that we make sure that sites that are permissioned are built out quickly. We are desperate for homes and to have over 1 million permissions sitting there that are not built out is just shameful, so we need to get on with this.

Amendment 135HZI seeks to improve the transparency of build-out data by requiring the Secretary of State to publish information on a quarterly basis about the number of planning consents granted where building has not started or completed in each local planning authority. Amendment 227B seeks to stop land banking by developers by requiring planning permissions by them to be refused if they have not commenced another development nearby within a year.

I reassure the noble Baronesses that I fully agree with the objective of improving that build-out rate of residential development and increasing the transparency around build-out. But I do not think these amendments are necessary to achieve this, and I will explain why. We are already taking action on this. In May, we published an important working paper on speeding up build-out, which sets out a more comprehensive and effective approach to this issue.

01:15:00

Once housebuilders have been granted permission, we expect to see these permissions built out as quickly as possible. We recognise the frustration that stalled, delayed or slowly built sites can cause to communities. That is why we are changing incentives in the housing market and giving local authorities the tools they need to speed up delivery. First, the working paper proposed that we will require developers to commit to delivery timeframes before planning permission for residential development is granted, alongside annual reports on their progress, implementing provisions from the Levelling-up and Regeneration Act. The technical consultation was also published alongside the working paper, setting out our proposals for implementation in more detail. This reform will ensure greater transparency about the starts and completions of individual residential developments. Coupled with our wider digital reforms, this data will become available at local planning authority level, so Amendment 135HZI is not necessary.

Secondly, we propose to give local planning authorities the power to decline to determine applications from developers who consistently fail to build out quickly enough by implementing the power introduced by the Levelling-up and Regeneration Act. We will make it easier for them to issue completion notices—a form of “use it or lose it”; the noble Baroness, Lady Coffey, mentioned these—that require developers to complete their development within a reasonable period of time, or the planning permission will cease.

We believe that the power to decline applications where a developer has a track record of slow build-out in the area is a better approach than the one proposed by Amendment 227B, as it focuses not just on when a developer has commenced their development but on how fast they are building out.

Thirdly, the working paper stated that we want to support more mixed tenure developments. The noble Lord, Lord Lansley, referred to the CMA report. It is very important that we have a greater mixture of tenures, because they can build out faster and may deliver more affordable housing. We will seek to strengthen planning policies to achieve this.

Fourthly, the working paper also emphasised that we want to make it easier for local authorities to acquire land through compulsory purchase orders, unlocking stalled sites and making land assembly easier when this is in the public interest.

Finally, the working paper made it clear that we are exploring, as a last resort, a delayed homes penalty paid directly to local authorities when development falls materially behind pre-agreed build-out schedules. We are analysing the responses to the working paper, and we will set out our next steps in due course. I want to emphasise that the measures set out in the working paper will make a real difference to the build-out of the housing development we all want to see.

I turn now to Amendment 153HZJ, which would enable the Secretary of State to direct local planning authorities to make an order under Section 97 of the Town and Country Planning Act to revise or revoke a permission in principle. I hope I can assure the noble Baroness that this amendment is not needed. Permission in principle is an alternative way to seek an “in principle” planning decision for small-scale, housing-led development, compared to the traditional approach of preparing an application for outline planning permission, which could be costly, particularly for an SME builder. Importantly, permission in principle is not a planning permission that allows one to develop. Following the grant of permission in principle, an applicant still needs to obtain technical details consent from the local planning authority to secure planning permission. At this stage, important matters such as design and layout, access and so on are determined.

As part of the framework for permission in principle, the Secretary of State already has powers, through Section 100 of the Town and Country Planning Act, to make an order to revise or revoke a planning application or permission in principle. So, a further power to direct a local planning authority to revise or revoke a permission in principle is unnecessary. I therefore kindly ask the noble Baroness to withdraw her amendment.

Baroness Coffey (Con)I thank the Minister for her response. I have not got the legislation quite right, as she has eloquently pointed out in a gracious way. Recognising the arguments being put forward by my noble friends on the Front Bench and the noble Baroness, Lady Pinnock, we need to get these homes built. Whatever demise we can do, this House would support the Minister in making that happen. On that basis, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment,

Amendment 135HZI withdrawn.

Amendment 135HZJ not moved.

Clause 52Spatial development strategies

Amendment 135HA

Moved by

135HA: Clause 52, page 69, leave out lines 34 and 35 Member’s explanatory statement This amendment seeks to probe the move from an optional approach to a mandatory requirement for designated strategic authorities to prepare Spatial Development Strategies.

Lord Jamieson (Con)My Lords, I rise to speak to a series of amendments in my name and in the name of my noble friend Lady Scott of Bybrook. Amendment 135HA is a probing amendment, which seeks to explore the Government’s decision to move from an optional approach to a mandatory requirement for designated strategic authorities to prepare spatial development strategies. We have a number of concerns.

First, making SDSs mandatory removes the discretion that local councils currently hold. It risks overriding the principle of localism. Secondly, the Bill provides for the Secretary of State to intervene or produce an SDS directly. This shifts influence away from locally elected representatives and hands it to Whitehall. Thirdly, requiring every designated authority to prepare an SDS risks producing frameworks that are inflexible and detached from the distinct economic, environmental and social needs of different communities. Finally, there is a question of consistency and certainty. In opposition, Labour accused the Conservative Government of chopping and changing planning rules so often that sectors never knew whether they were coming or going, but is this not also chopping and changing? This amendment does not seek to strike down the principle of strategic planning; it asks the Government to justify why compulsion is necessary.

Amendment 135HB seeks to probe the definition of a strategy area in relation to a spatial development strategy. We need clarity on its geographic scope, the criteria for designation and, critically, how it interacts with existing local and regional planning boundaries.

Amendment 136A addresses the uncertainty facing local authorities over the geographical scope of SDSs, particularly during periods of local government reorganisation. Planning authorities face the dilemma of pressing ahead with local plans or pausing to prepare for SDSs, rather than risk duplication, wasted effort and delay.

Amendment 136B raises an equally pressing issueplanning capacity. Principal authorities will be tasked with preparing SDSs, yet many planning departments already operate with limited staff. Too often, the solution has been secondment from lower-tier councils, but that simply robs Peter to pay Paul. It drains district and borough councils of the very staff they need to deliver their own local plans, creating knock-on delays across the systems. If we are serious about spatial planning, we also need a workforce strategy.

Amendment 151A seeks to require the Secretary of State to provide a clear timetable for the preparation of SDSs. Timetables give participants realistic expectations of delivery and avoid drift. Linked to this is Amendment 152A, a probing amendment that seeks clarity on how competing objectives, regulations and aspirations will be prioritised when preparing these strategies. As we have heard tonight, there are many competing objectives for development. While these may all have merit, it is often not possible to achieve all of them. Having clear priorities and clarity on what these decisions are will enable and facilitate decision-making and help local councils and those producing spatial development strategies to deliver on time.

Finally, Amendment 153A asks about the phrase “from time to time”. I note that the Minister has frequently made comments such as, “This will be delivered soon”, “It is in the works” and other such phrases. It would be good if we could have greater clarity on what such phrases might mean. Does “from time to time” mean annually, every five years or only when it suits the Secretary of State?

In conclusion, these amendments all seek to achieve the same thingclarity, certainty and capacity in the planning system. Without them, we risk inconsistency, delay and inefficiency, which is exactly what our communities and developers cannot afford. I beg to move.

Lord Lansley (Con)My Lords, with this group we have arrived at Clause 52 and introduced the important issue of spatial development strategies. Wearing my Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill badge, I recall the debates on joint spatial development strategies—others will also recall them; indeed, my noble friend Lady Scott of Bybrook remembers them very well—which of course formed part of the Act. They allowed local planning authorities to seek to engage in joint spatial strategic planning.

I therefore come to the point that my noble friend Lord Jamieson was just making. The principal distinction here, I suppose, is that instead of that option for local planning authorities, the Government have instead determined that there must be a national structure of strategic planning. I speak again with my levelling-up Bill hat on, and the Minister and others will recall that I very much supported—and have for a long time—strategic planning. It is difficult to envisage how genuine strategic planning is to be accomplished if it is to end up as a patchwork quilt.

For the purposes of this debate, especially given the hour, I will not engage in whether there should be mandatory strategic planning across the whole country—let us assume that there should be and then see how well it can be put into place. Some of the drafting of the spatial development strategies in Clause 52 draws directly on Section 97 and Schedule 7 of the Levelling-up and Regeneration Act, so I assume that that will not be brought into force. If I am wrong about that, it would be very helpful to know otherwise, but I think that I am right.

As I understand it—again, it would be helpful if the Minister will say whether I am wrong about this—the Government’s intention is to achieve a national structure of strategic planning by 2030 and, in order to achieve that, they wish to commence the process of strategic planning next year. The significance of that is of course that, at the same time in the other place, the legislation to create strategic authorities will follow this Bill. Logic might have said that, at the same time as one creates strategic authorities that will have responsibility to produce strategic plans—the English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill says that—it would be incorporated into the same legislation. A theme we might return to a number of times before we conclude consideration of this Bill is the extent to which it might be better, in some cases, to leave it to that legislation or others to bring it forward. My point, however, is that the Government need to make progress and are not prepared to wait.

The passage of the English Devolution and Community Empowerment Act sometime next year will not be sufficient to create strategic authorities. We will have to go through a process to create the agreements for the necessary authorities to come together to determine what the scope and scale of strategic authorities will look like. To that extent, it is necessary to envisage that we create strategic planning. We can then retrofit it into—or, perhaps more accurately, prospectively fit it into—the structure of strategic authorities as they emerge.

01:30:00

Later groups will enable us to look at the content and procedures for strategic development strategies. I do not propose to dwell on them. I have drawn the Committee’s attention to my registered interest in development forums. Let me take the examples of Cambridgeshire and Oxfordshire. Cambridgeshire, of course, has a combined authority. I think there is no question but that a strategic development strategy would be for the combined authority, and the geography would be Cambridgeshire and Peterborough.

My noble friend’s question about the geography is much more illustrated by reference to Oxfordshire. Oxfordshire, on the face of it and under the Bill as we see it, would have a strategic development strategy for Oxfordshire, the county. However, in Oxfordshire, three options are being presented for the unitary authorities. One of those would entail South Oxfordshire District Council and the Vale of White Horse merging into a single unitary authority with West Berkshire. On that basis, it is very difficult to see how a strategic development strategy for Oxfordshire would make sense in relation to local planning for a unitary authority with a non-contiguous geographical area, so we have a rather interesting question about the sequencing of this. Maybe now is not the moment for it.

We probably can, in later groups, come back to how this is to be sequenced and whether the Secretary of State, who has the power to require strategic development strategies to be implemented, would simply hold back in Oxfordshire, for example, and say not to produce a strategic development strategy as a unitary authority or a single foundation authority in the way that the Bill offers because the Government are intending to have a larger strategic authority, which could be Oxfordshire, Oxfordshire and Berkshire, or Oxfordshire, Berkshire and Buckinghamshire. There are a number of unknowns about the overall scale of the strategic authority. Indeed, the implication of the Government’s intentions is that the strategic plan and the strategic development strategy should be aligned with strategic authorities. Anything else does not really make any sense.

To come back to the amendments in this group, I have talked about the issues relating to difficulties with geography. Previous debates have told us that it is important that we do not undermine the capacity and resourcing of local planning authorities to deliver local plans. That, I think, is the burden of the point that my noble friend was quite rightly making. I do not think the solution is to take district councils out of the process of being involved in this issue, but we need some assurances from Ministers. There is a commitment of the order of £46 million overall to the delivery of the planning reforms, but I do not think we yet know how much of that money is available to strategic authorities for the purpose of strategic development strategies. That commitment to resourcing the strategic development strategies is important.

There is a power in the Bill to set a timetable and to require timetables to be set, so I will not dwell on that. I hope that, in a later group, we will return to the fact that there is not yet—there should be—a power in this Bill to require the co-operation of neighbouring authorities and other public bodies in the process of making a strategic development strategy, as in Section 100 of the Levelling-up and Regeneration Act. I hope that, although that section has not yet been brought into force, Ministers will create a like provision in this Bill in order to ensure cross-border co-operation, as well as co-operation with utilities and other public bodies, so that transport planning, utility planning and local planning across borders and on a larger scale can be achieved through strategic planning. I am very much in favour of strategic planning, as the Minister knows. In the then levelling-up Bill, I and my noble friend Lord Young of Cookham were in favour of national targets and strategic planning; I hope that we can successfully deliver both.

Baroness Pinnock (LD)My Lords, we on these Benches welcome spatial development strategies. Strategic authorities should be encouraged to produce them because they provide coherence over a wider area in terms of some of the big issues that planners have to tackle, such as transport development across an area that is wider than a council area. That is to be encouraged.

One of the challenges that we have heard about is the devolution Bill; that will make it difficult for potential strategic authorities as they will have much to do, whenever these decisions are made, in getting organised to create a spatial development strategy. Another is the expertise to do this. It is not any old planner who can undertake strategic planning; it requires special expertise to create a coherent and effective spatial development strategy. It would be good to hear from the Minister how these challenges will be met.

Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)My Lords, I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Scott of Bybrook, and the noble Lord, Lord Jamieson, for these amendments relating to the preparation of spatial development strategies. As other Peers have said, this is a really important issue with a lot of potential to transform the planning process.

I turn first to Amendment 135HA, tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Scott, which seeks to probe why the Government are providing for a mandatory system of strategic planning instead of a voluntary system, as provided for in the Levelling-up and Regeneration Act. I was aware of the voluntary system because—as the noble Baroness, Lady Thornhill, will recall only too well, I am sure—in Hertfordshire, we worked for many years across all 11 local authorities to deliver two strategic plans, one for the south and one for the north, based on the economic clusters in Hertfordshire. I always felt that it was a successful process; it worked very well, although it needed a lot of data collection and so on. Like the noble Lord, Lord Lansley, I am a fan of strategic planning. Although there are lots of issues around the regional planning process, it was very successful in identifying both the housing and the economic development that was needed across the region.

This is an important step forward. The Government have been very clear: we cannot meet the housing need without planning for growth on a larger-than-local scale. We are not persuaded that a voluntary system would deliver this outcome, as strategic planning authorities could simply choose not to prepare a spatial development strategy. This would, in effect, continue the current position where strategic plans have only limited coverage and only London has a spatial development strategy in place. Through this Bill, we will introduce national coverage of spatial development strategies so that all parts of the country can benefit from more effective cross-boundary strategic planning, enabling us to meet our housing needs, to grow the economy and to improve the environment.

I turn to Amendment 135HB, which seeks to remove the part of the Bill that defines the area for a spatial development strategy. As I mentioned earlier, the Government have been clear that we need strategic planning coverage nationally, so the Bill provides for this. In Clause 52, proposed new Section 12A(4) sets out that a spatial development strategy must cover the entirety of any strategic planning authority; and that, in the case of a strategic planning board, the SDS must cover the entirety of all of the constituent authorities of that board. Without such a definition, the extent of the SDS coverage would be unclear. A strategic planning authority could choose to produce an SDS for only part of its area, or it could produce multiple SDSs covering its area. Our proposals are the most straightforward definition of SDS coverage. I am concerned that this amendment would cause confusion and potentially make the legislation inoperable; it also may not achieve the ambition of national coverage of strategic plans.

Amendment 136A sets out to probe the impact of local government reorganisation on plan-making and whether authorities should prioritise preparing a spatial development strategy or a local plan. First, it is important to emphasise that local government reorganisation is a once-in-a-generation opportunity to work together both to put local government on a more sustainable footing and to create simpler structures that will deliver the services that local people and businesses need and deserve.

Spatial development strategies will be prepared by strategic planning authorities. In the case of combined authorities, combined county authorities and upper-tier county councils, these are distinct from local planning authorities, which obviously have the duty to prepare the local plan. However, where unitary authorities are in place, they will have responsibility for producing both a local plan and an SDS, albeit that the SDS may be produced in partnership with other authorities as part of a strategic planning board. As we move forward to further devolution, this distinction will become clearer. However, I accept that some authorities will have to balance local plan production and producing an SDS, including as part of a strategic planning board.

The production of an SDS should not, however, be seen as being in competition with local plan production. SDSs are intended to deal with strategic and cross-boundary issues that many local plans have struggled to address successfully over the past 15 years. Therefore, the production of the SDS should make the local plan production more straightforward. In addition, we expect that local government reorganisation will simplify structures and lead to possible efficiency savings as we move to a single tier of unitary authorities in all parts of the country. This will reduce resource pressures on local authority planning teams; I do not want to overestimate that, but there are some savings to be made.

The Government also expect the usual functions of local government to continue while reforms to both the planning system and local government are being implemented. Continuing with these functions will put the successor authorities in the best position to be able to continue service delivery post reform. Removing the stated lines from proposed new Section 12C(4) would inhibit the Secretary of State’s ability to establish effective strategic planning boards for areas not covered by a strategic authority.

Amendments 136B and 152A seek to probe how principal authorities will secure sufficient planning staff to prepare Senior Deputy Speaker. It raises an important issue around how strategic planning authorities will balance competing objectives, policies and legislative requirements when preparing their SDS. I have previously set out what the Government are doing to support capacity and planning. We envisage that all strategic planning authorities will have a dedicated planning team, which will lead the preparation of a spatial development strategy regardless of whether there is a combined authority in place.

On certain topics, we also expect the core team to draw on the expertise of individuals in the constituent authorities—for example, for advice on environmental or economic issues. Where there are capacity constraints or capability gaps, strategic planning teams can use consultants.

It is important to emphasise once again that strategic planning will make the job of local planning authorities easier in terms of producing local plans. Furthermore, as we look to the next two to three years, we will see a process of local government reorganisation, which will see a move to a single tier of unitary authorities in all parts of the country. Through this process, we expect to see simpler structures and the potential for efficiency savings; this will mean that, overall, there will be fewer local plans, which, again, could reduce resource pressures on local authority planning teams.

01:45:00

Turning to Amendments 151A and 153A, which would require the publication of guidance about the timetable to which an SDS should be produced and how regularly they will be reviewed, it is important to acknowledge that strategic planning authorities that will produce the SDS are at varying stages of readiness. In some areas, established and prospective strategic authorities are keen to get on with their SDS—some have a form of that already, so it is not such a big leap for them—because they recognise the benefit strategic planning will have on creating more certainty about development and investment opportunities.

In other areas, new strategic authorities are being set up, or will be set up from next year, and will have a period when they gear up for delivery. In other parts of the country where new strategic authorities may be further off, SDSs will be produced by partnerships of county councils and/or unitary authorities operating under a strategic planning board. The Government will work with and support all areas to begin their SDS as soon as possible, but this will have to be a tailored approach, recognising the particular circumstances in different parts of the country.

An effective spatial development strategy will be pivotal to delivering the housing and infrastructure that local people and businesses need and deserve. They are intended to plan for the long term and provide certainty for communities, local planning authorities and investors on where development should come forward. It is therefore important that they are not changed regularly as this will introduce uncertainty and undermine the ability of local planning authorities to bring forward local plans that accord with SDSs. However, there will be occasions where a review of a spatial development strategy is necessary to ensure that it reflects significant changes at a national or local level, for example, substantial changes to national policy, to respond to new evidence of development needs or opportunities such as the announcement of investment in a major piece of infrastructure which could unlock development.

We do not think it appropriate to mandate a specific review period in legislation, given that the need for a review will depend very much on local circumstances. We will, however, consider setting out further guidance on the circumstances when a review may be appropriate, either in national policy or in planning practice guidance. I hope I have given a clear explanation of that. I thank the Opposition Front Bench for the probing amendments, which are useful in enabling us to set out how this will work but, for all the reasons I have set out, I hope the noble Baroness will withdraw her amendment.

Lord Fuller (Con)Before the Minister sits down, the clock says 10 minutes and for six of those minutes she was explaining how simple it was going to be. It took six minutes to explain that simplicity, with a cat’s cradle of district, county and combined authorities with different areas, strategic prioritisation with local plans and so forth. I wonder whether the Minister might like to reflect that, when she talks about simplification, all I heard was complexity. At the same time, the Government are disbanding the teams currently trying to get 300,000 houses a year built. I wonder whether the Government need to reflect on their own priorities. Do we throw planning up in the air and start again, or doing we carry on and just try to get these homes built? I do not think they can do both at the same time.

Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)I was responding to amendments submitted by the Opposition Front Bench in the way that I thought most helpful. Having had experience of this in Hertfordshire, I believe having a strategic plan that sits above the local plan simplifies the local plan process, and means that people are working together with knowledge and experience of their local area to make better decisions on those things that will drive economic investment across the county and things such as housing and infrastructure needs. It is as simple and straightforward as making the process better for local people to deliver the things they need, and to drive our economy forward. I am not taking any lessons on that from the party opposite.

Lord Jamieson (Con)I thank the Minister for her reply on this series of amendments. As I look around the Chamber, I am pleased to see the fraternity of ex-council leaders and some existing councillors who bear the scars of trying to get the local plan process to work. We all know how difficult it is to get a local plan through. Our concern about this is not conceptual; this is very much about telling local planning authorities, top down, what they need to do. These amendments are about making it easier for councils and these new strategic authorities to do the job being asked of them to deliver for their residents. This is very important. We cannot just, so to speak, flog a dead horse. Sometimes you have to revive the dead horse to make progress.

It is important to have clarity on what is expected of a spatial development strategy. We need to make it easier. My noble friend Lord Lansley made the point about co-operation with other parties, a duty to co-operate and how you build a spatial development strategy on the shifting sands of a changing local government framework and geography. These are important amendments and we reserve the right to come back to them. However, at this point, I beg leave to withdraw Amendment 135HA.

Amendment 135HA withdrawn.

Amendment 135HB not moved.

Amendment 135I

Moved by

135I: Clause 52, page 70, line 40, at end insert “, or where the area of a spatial development strategy contains any part of a national park authority.” Member’s explanatory statement This amendment seeks to ensure coherent planning through extending the Secretary of State’s powers to establish a joint committee of authorities where a national park is present in the spatial development strategy area.

Lord Lucas (Con)My Lords, national park authorities ought to be part of this. I will wait for the Minister’s reply before I enlarge on that.

Lord Lansley (Con)My Lords, I will speak to Amendment 136 in my name. We have just had a debate on the levelling-up Act approach of allowing local planning authorities to choose whether to join together to create a spatial development strategy. The Government are going down the route of a mandatory spatial development strategy, but in the latter route, as the Bill is written at the moment, it reserves to the Secretary of State the determination of whether to require a spatial development strategy to be created by the mechanism of appointing or requiring the establishment of a strategic planning board.

I was interested in the way the Minister described the policy, saying that there was a degree of transition and flexibility in this, particularly in the context of developing local government reorganisation. There is a potential role for principal authorities, in the terminology of my amendment and the Bill, to come together to ask the Secretary of State whether they might proceed with the formation of a spatial development strategy. I quite take the point that, in the long run, the question will not arise because all the strategic authorities will have a strategic development strategy, but we are talking about the transition and the interim. Giving local authorities the opportunity to come forward with a proposal to the Government seems an inherent part of the flexibility that the Minister is talking about.

Baroness Pinnock (LD)My Lords, this group of amendments on the composition of strategic planning boards is very important and, as the noble Lord, Lord Lansley, said, will vary across the different arrangements for local authorities that currently exist.

The noble Lord referred to areas where the devolution Bill would not yet help to create strategic authorities; however, from my perspective, a mayoral combined authority would act as the strategic planning board. The West Yorkshire Combined Authority, for example, covers 2.5 million people. As I understand it from reading the Bill—if I have it wrong, I hope that the Minister will put me right—the board would consist of the elected mayor and the leaders of the five constituent authorities. I have concerns about the small number of people who will take a very serious decision that will affect the whole area, without having any wider ramifications.

In a large strategic authority such as the one I mentioned, there should be reference back to the individual councils to confirm the decisions being made. What the Government are saying is that no single council can disrupt the creation of a spatial development strategy, and that the majority view will hold. I urge the Minister to consider a consensus-based approach to strategic planning boards. As we have heard, the spatial development strategy will influence the local plan. If that is pushed through without consent across the constituent authorities, it will lead to very difficult decisions being taken at the local plan stage, which could challenge the spatial development strategy. That has been the experience in the Greater Manchester Combined Authority area, and nobody wins in that situation.

If we want a spatial development strategy to work—and most of us do—it must be by consensus. If it is not, we would create the situation where there is more controversy further down the line for individual councils as they create their local plans. I urge the Minister to consider those points, because none of us wants that situation to arise.

Lord Jamieson (Con)My Lords, I will speak briefly to Amendment 135I, tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Lucas. I am not sure that I will be as brief as he was, but I will try to keep my words to a minimum.

I can see the logic for the proposal that national parks should be included; they are, by their very nature, areas of national significance and local sensitivity. However, the amendment raises some important questions for the Government. First, how do Ministers envisage striking a balance between national park authorities and their statutory duty to conserve and enhance natural beauty, and the often very different pressures felt by surrounding local authorities to accommodate growth and development? Secondly, where a joint committee is established, how will accountability operate?

Amendment 136ZA, in my name, seeks to ensure that the composition of a strategic planning board, and of any committees established under it, properly reflects the constituent authorities and the populations they serve, to guarantee fair representation. The noble Baroness, Lady Pinnock, raised that point.

The principle is important, because without it there is a real risk that the voices of smaller authorities or communities could be diluted in favour of those of larger ones. Strategic planning is about bringing areas together to shape the future collectively and to think about housing, infrastructure, transport and economic development at a scale that makes sense, but such co-operation will succeed only if all partners feel that the governance arrangements are balanced and legitimate. Ensuring fair representation is therefore not simply a matter of equity in its narrowest sense; it is about the very foundations of good governance.

Finally, I thank my noble friend Lord Lansley for bringing forward Amendment 136. It is only right that a spatial development strategy should also look at employment sites as well as housing because, without these, how can one truly consider the real demand for housing? I apologise: I have jumped a page and gone a bit too far. I will leave it there and just say that we need fair representation.

02:00:00

Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)That is completely understandable at two o’clock in the morning.

I thank noble Lords for their amendments relating to strategic planning boards. Amendment 135I seeks to ensure that strategic planning boards can be established by the Secretary of State where there is a national park in the strategy area—and I commend the noble Lord, Lord Lucas, for moving his amendment so briefly. An SDS strategy area is defined in new Section 12A that the Bill will insert into the Planning and Compulsory Purchase Act 2004 as the area of the strategic planning authority preparing the spatial development strategy. The strategy area includes all local authorities, including local planning authorities. Therefore, the Secretary of State could already use the power in new Section 12B to establish a strategic planning board covering an area with a national park or part of a national park. I hope that this gives him the assurance that he is seeking and that he will be able to withdraw his amendment.

I thank the noble Lord, Lord Lansley, for tabling Amendment 136, which would make formal provision for two or more principal authorities to propose that they should form a strategic planning board. I understand the intent behind the amendment, but I do not think that it is necessary, as there is nothing in existing provisions to prevent authorities doing this already. Ultimately, it is for the Secretary of State to decide which authorities should produce their spatial development strategy through a strategic planning board. However, I reassure noble Lords that the Secretary of State may make regulations establishing a strategic planning board only after consulting the proposed constituent authorities of the board, so any principal authority will have a say in the establishment of any board that they are a part of.

Amendment 136ZA, tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Jamieson, would require provision in strategic planning board regulations about the composition of the strategic planning board and any associated committees to be representative of the authorities that constitute the strategic planning board and their population. I broadly agree with the noble Lord’s aim in the amendment and, in principle, I want to see what he described as fair and legitimate representation on strategic planning boards.

However, there are a range of potential scenarios for strategic planning boards. For example, in some cases a strategic planning board could consist of an upper-tier county council, representing a large population, alongside one or two unitary authorities representing much smaller populations. It could be that a balanced representation would simply mean that the larger authority would always get its way. Alternatively, attempts to even out representation could mean that relatively smaller authorities can thwart the will of an authority representing a much larger population. I expect that there will be a wide range of situations, with possibly no two strategic planning boards being alike. In such a circumstance, I feel that it will be better to discuss and agree a resolution for each strategic planning board on an individual basis with the relevant constituent authorities.

The regulations needed to establish each strategic planning board will be subject to statutory consultation, as required by Clause 52 of the Bill, which will insert new Section 12B(4) into the Planning and Compulsory Purchase Act 2004. Given this explanation, I hope that noble Lords will feel able not to press their amendments.

Lord Lucas (Con)My Lords, I thank the Minister for her answer, but I do not understand it. I will take the example of the future Sussex unitary, which will be a principal authority, or at least can be a strategic planning authority. It actually is not the planning authority for a huge chunk of its territory, which is occupied by the South Downs National Park. If you are going to have a strategic plan, which is a planning document, covering the area of the principal authority, you surely have to involve the national park in that structure.

I cannot see how you can have a strategic planning authority that is not the planning authority for a third of its area; it just does not make sense. You have to find some way of bringing in the national park. As my noble friend said, it is not the simplest of structures to work out, but surely, if you are producing a strategic plan for the whole area, it has to involve the planning authorities for that area.

Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)I shall briefly respond to that. While national park authorities will not sit on boards, they will have a very important role to play in the preparation of the SDS. We will expect boards and other authorities with national parks in their areas to engage very closely with national park authorities to ensure that the valued areas remain protected. National park authorities will continue to prepare local plans for their areas, which will set out policies for them on the use and development of land.

Lord Lucas (Con)Those are not strategic plans at all; they are just bits. You are not actually producing a Sussex strategic plan at all; you are producing a north Sussex strategic plan. There is no provision for the south Sussex strategic plan here, because it is just the ordinary planning functions of the national park. When we are trying to produce a unified structure across the UK, it seems really odd to fracture it in this way.

The solution I propose, using the Section 12B strategic planning boards as having the main authority, with the national park on that board—there is no reason why they should have equality, but they should be part of that—produces a structure that is a strategic planning authority that covers the whole area. That surely is the sensible way of doing it. This is really something we must return to on Report. It is ridiculous the way it is, but I beg leave to withdraw the amendment for now.

Amendment 135I withdrawn.

Amendments 136 to 138B not moved.

Amendment 139

Moved by

139: Clause 52, page 73, line 13, at end insert— “(4A) A spatial development strategy must meet the needs of older and disabled people, through a requirement for new homes to meet the Building Regulations Part M4(2) accessible and adaptable standard or the Part M4(3) wheelchair user dwelling standard, as set out in Schedule 1 to the Building Regulations 2010 (S.I. 2010/2214).”Member’s explanatory statement The amendment introduces a requirement for all new homes to comply with the Part M4(2) accessible and adaptable standard, as defined in the Building Regulations 2010, or the higher M4(3) wheelchair user dwelling standard. The amendment aims to ensure that all new housing is inclusive, age-friendly, and suitable for people with varying mobility needs.

Baroness Pinnock (LD)My Lords, I am moving this amendment because I have my own amendment at the end of this short group of three. If other noble Lords wish to speak to the amendments in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Best, that is fine by me.

I have discussed the issues of accessibility and provision of older people’s housing with the noble Lord, Lord Best, on many occasions, because I feel as strongly as he does that it is a neglected area of housing policy. We have an ageing population and a need to enable people who are getting older and perhaps less mobile, who need a bit of support, to retain their independence. They can do that if the right provision for housing is made within their locality.

For example, currently, where I live, 80 units of housing with extra care are being built by a registered social landlord—Housing 21, I think it is—so that people who are older will have a home with social rent and on-site provision and support where they need it. It seems to me that the noble Lord, Lord Best, makes the point in his second amendment that it would be important for that provision to be included in the housing policy. That means spatial development strategies having a requirement to consider the needs of our ageing population and provision for them so that people can retain their independence. That is Amendment 152 in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Best.

His Amendment 139 simply says that, if 300,000 homes are being built a year, it is important that all of them are designed so that people with disabilities are able to use them and are not restricted to only a handful of homes that have been converted. That makes good sense and is in line with all the other proposals that we have been considering today. We should look ahead and make the right provisions for the population rather than trying to retrofit later.

My Amendment 153 is designed to try to get more public involvement in considering the spatial development strategies. What I have asked in this amendment is that the

“strategic planning authority must prepare and consult on a statement of community involvement which provides for persons affected by the strategy to have a right to be heard at an examination”.

If the Minister can agree to that, it will take away some of the anxieties and frustrations built up by people who see a plan being developed, see that it will affect local plans—and therefore, in a very practical way, their lives—and yet are not able to have their say at the strategic plan level.

Most of us in the practical world of politics know how hard it is to engage people in consideration of theoretical planning. Strategic planning and local plans are less theoretical but still are theoretical in the minds of many people because they are not actual practical planning applications. That is what my amendment asks for, and any way in which we can encourage involvement with people who are affected by a strategic plan only has to be good. With those few words, I move Amendment 139 in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Best, and look forward to the Minister’s response.

02:15:00

Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP)My Lords, the noble Baroness, Lady Pinnock, did a great job of channelling the noble Lord, Lord Best. I have two brief points to add to what the noble Baroness said. First, Amendment 139 aims to ensure that all new housing is suitable for people with varying mobility needs. It is a point I often make in relation to disability provision and provision for those in our society who are in some way vulnerable. Making provision that suits the most vulnerable in our society is good for all of us. None of us knows the point at which we might suddenly have to have an operation and need those extra facilities. That should be the standard; it should not be something specially adapted.

Secondly, Amendment 152 tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Best, has regard to the housing needs of ageing populations. When we talk about this, we are often thinking about people becoming frail and needing extra support, but “ageing population” means that household sizes become smaller. Perhaps a couple who were living in a four-bedroom house want to move to something smaller. They still have a reasonable amount of available funds, and reasonable mobility. They want a certain class of housing, and your classic so-called luxury flat rental property—with two bedrooms, two bathrooms and tiny rooms—does not meet their needs at all. We need much more flexible housing, and this means thinking about not only frailty but the actual distribution of household sizes across our society.

Lord Jamieson (Con)My Lords, first, I declare my interest, having previously sat on the Government’s Older Person’s Housing Taskforce, so ably chaired by Julienne Meyer.

We have an ageing population. This is great news, as we are all living longer—as I am sure a number of noble Lords will attest. However, it comes with some significant issues, such as the increasing cost of social care and how we ensure that everyone has the opportunity for an active and healthy later age and can be part of their communities. Housing is a key factor. Ensuring the availability of appropriate housing in the right places is crucial to enabling us all to retain independence and lead happy, active lives.

While it may not be right for everyone, there is a huge shortfall of this type of housing. An ageing society makes this question unavoidable. It is not simply a matter of numbers on pensions or the strains on the NHS, although these are real and pressing. It is about how people live their lives and whether they can remain independent, safe and connected to their communities as their circumstances change. Too many older people find themselves in homes that are ill-suited to reduced mobility, and the result is avoidable hospital admissions, preventable accidents and unnecessary moves away from familiar surroundings. Many Members of the House have been involved in delivering this kind of housing, and we have seen personally—I can attest to it myself—the transformational impact it can have on older people and those with disabilities. I was almost in tears following one small development we did for a person with very severe disabilities who was stuck in a wheelchair and could not use his hands. He was able to open his front door for the first time in his life—in his 50s—through an IR-activated door that he could operate. It was transformational, and we need to think about these things.

I am grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Pinnock, for moving Amendment 139, in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Best, and for the noble Lord’s personal advocacy on this issue time and again in the House.

Through Amendment 153, the noble Baroness, Lady Pinnock, has underlined that process matters as much as outcome. Notifying and involving disabled people in the development of spatial strategies ensures that the voices of those most affected by poor design are heard at the stage when change can actually make a difference. Taken together, these amendments call attention to an essential principle: housing is not just about shelter but about enabling people to live their lives fully, safely and with dignity. I look forward to hearing from Minister about how the Government will bring forward more housing for an ageing population and those with disabilities.

Lord Wilson of Sedgefield (Lab)I thank the noble Lord, Lord Best, and the noble Baroness, Lady Pinnock, for the amendments in this group. The Government are clear that the provision of appropriate housing for older and disabled people is crucial in helping them to live safe and independent lives.

Amendment 139, tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Best, seeks to ensure that new housing meets the needs of older and disabled people in spatial development strategies. Local planning authorities already have the means to support the delivery of accessible, adaptable homes. Planning policy is clear that authorities should assess the size, type and tenure of housing needed for different groups, including older and disabled people, and set clear policies to address these needs. They can apply enhanced technical standards from the building regulations through planning conditions. Where there is a demonstrated local need, authorities are expected to make use of the technical standards to help bring forward an adequate supply of accessible housing, which can include setting out the proportion of new housing that will be delivered to M4(2) and M4(3) standards. The Government are committed to ensuring that everyone has access to a home that meets their individual needs, and we will soon outline our approach to accessible new-build housing.

Amendment 152, in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Best, is on the same topic. Although I agree with the need to ensure that the housing needs of older people are considered when preparing spatial development strategies, the existing provision for strategic planning authorities to have regard to the need to ensure that their spatial development strategies are consistent with current national policy will ensure that this objective is met. As I have previously set out, national planning policy already contains clear expectations on assessing and reflecting the housing needs of older and disabled people.

Amendment 153, in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Pinnock, is on community engagement in the process. It seeks to ensure that disabled people are aware of the publication of the draft SDS and have the opportunity to make representations at examination hearings. The Government are committed to ensuring that local communities are actively involved in shaping spatial development strategies for their areas, which is why, under the Bill, everyone has a right to make representation on a draft strategy.

We do, however, think it is appropriate to let strategic planning authorities determine the most effective approach to managing their engagement with local communities on their spatial development strategies. Local planning authorities will no longer be required to produce a statement of community involvement, following the implementation of changes introduced by the Levelling-up and Regeneration Act 2023. In light of this, it would not be appropriate to impose a similar obligation on strategic planning authorities.

Likewise, I do not believe it is necessary to confer a formal right to be heard at the examination of a spatial development strategy. The spatial development strategies are intended to be high-level documents that provide a strategic framework for subsequent local plans, which must be in general conformity with them. Unlike local plans, SDSs do not allocate specific sites for development. It is therefore more appropriate for individuals to have the right to appear at local plan examinations, while keeping examinations of spatial development strategies proportionate to their strategic role.

I am grateful to the noble Lords for tabling their amendments and facilitating an interesting debate on the subject. However, for the reasons given, I hope they will not press their amendments.

Baroness Pinnock (LD)My Lords, I thank everybody who has engaged in this quite important but narrow subject matter about housing policy and ageing communities. The noble Lord, Lord Best, is not able to be in his place, but I suspect he will wish to bring the amendment back on Report. If he does, I will very happily support him. I beg leave to withdraw.

Amendment 139 withdrawn.

Amendment 139ZA

Moved by

139ZA: Clause 52, page 73, line 13, at end insert— “(4A) The spatial development strategy must indicate how the infrastructure specified or described in accordance with subsection (4) is to be funded, and any impact on the spatial development strategy of the infrastructure not being available, including which development areas would not be feasible without it.”Member’s explanatory statement This amendment would require a spatial development strategy to explain how essential infrastructure will be funded and to assess the consequences of such infrastructure not being available, in order to ensure that necessary infrastructure is delivered as part of the strategic plan.

Lord Jamieson (Con)My Lords, it is a pleasure to open this group. I shall speak to my Amendment 139ZA and set out my reasons for it. This amendment would require a spatial development strategy to set out clearly how essential infrastructure will be funded and to assess the consequences if such infrastructure is not available. The purpose is to ensure that necessary infrastructure is properly planned and delivered as part of a spatial development strategic plan.

This is important because we know from experience that, too often, development proceeds without the schools, GP surgeries, transport links, utilities and other vital services that people rely upon. The result is pressure on existing provision and frustration for local residents; in many cases, communities feel short-changed. Housing numbers are met on paper, but without the underpinning infrastructure. These are not sustainable places to live and homes do not meaningfully contribute to the economy. In many instances, this is why we have a lack of trust and why local communities so often object to new housing: they have no faith that they will get all those promises.

By its nature, a spatial development strategy is long term and strategic. It is precisely the level at which infrastructure planning should be embedded, rather than being left to chance or to fragmented negotiations on individual sites. By requiring a clear statement of how essential infrastructure will be funded, we would bring accountability and realism into the process. Planners cannot simply assume that money will somehow materialise; they must demonstrate where the resources are coming from and, if gaps remain, they must assess the consequences.

This is about delivery. A strategy that sets out aspirations, but is silent on how it can deliver, is not a strategy at all. It risks becoming an expensive exercise in box-ticking. But a strategy that ties development to infrastructure planning and acknowledges the risks of failure is far more likely to deliver the sustainable balanced growth that we all want to see. I hope the Minister will agree that this amendment would strengthen the purpose of spatial development strategies and ensure that they serve the communities they are meant to support. I move the amendment.

Baroness Warwick of Undercliffe (Lab)My Lords, I speak to Amendments 139A and 140A in this group and link them to 150A in my name in a group discussed earlier today, which dealt with affordable social housing. Together, these amendments seek to ensure that, when strategic planning authorities develop their spatial strategies, they do so on the basis of a full and accurate assessment of housing need, including the needs of all those experiencing homelessness in their area. I am grateful to Crisis and to the National Housing Federation for their detailed and careful briefing on these issues.

The context of my amendments is the huge scale of homelessness that people face across the country. Homelessness, including people rough sleeping and households living in temporary accommodation, is high and still rising. The Government’s £39 billion investment to build more social and affordable housing and their commitment to develop a cross-government homelessness strategy are very welcome steps towards addressing homelessness. However, it is important that, for planning purposes, strategic planning authorities consistently calculate the true scale of housing need, especially the need for social housing, homes for survivors of domestic abuse and housing with support, so that the Government’s ambition to build 1.5 million homes translates into homes for those experiencing homelessness.

At present, local housing needs assessments are a vital first step in determining how many homes should be planned for. However, the Planning and Infrastructure Bill does not require those preparing spatial development strategies to calculate the amount of housing needed by their population using a consistent assessment of housing need. It also does not require specific breakdowns of the amounts of different forms of affordable housing and housing with support. This risks a range of approaches being taken between different areas and an underestimate of the amount and types of new homes needed.

The current calculation, which begins with 0.8% of the existing house stock and adjusts for affordability, is too blunt an instrument; it ignores the reality on the ground in many localities. For example, work by Crisis, Brent Council and local partners revealed that the official rough sleeping count was, at one point, 34% lower than reality. Similar undercounting has been identified by the Women’s Rough Sleeping Census, which shows that women sleeping rough are routinely missed from statistics. The most recent census found over 10 times as many women sleeping rough than had been identified by the official government figures. If homelessness is underestimated, plans will not reflect the full range of housing needs of the population. That means too few homes and too few of the right kinds of homes being built to address homelessness locally. We risk undermining not only the Government’s welcome ambition to deliver the biggest boost to social and affordable housing in a generation but the goal of ending homelessness.

02:30:00

The current drafting of Clause 52 of the Bill is worded in a way that it will not result in consistent assessments of housing need and the need for other types of housing between strategic planning bodies. My amendments would make four changes. First, they would replace the discretionary “may” with a requirement that spatial development strategies must specify the amount of housing that is needed in a strategic area.

Secondly, they would explicitly require that this calculation includes those who are statutorily homeless, those sleeping rough, those in overcrowded housing, those on housing waiting lists and those who are homeless but not recorded in the statutory data. My noble friend Lady Whitaker would want me to include those who are homeless but not statutorily recorded in their area, including Gypsies and Travellers who, finding no authorised sites in which to live or having been evicted from unauthorised sites, are homeless. To ensure provision in their traditional homes would right an injustice.

Thirdly, they would ensure that strategic planning authorities must also calculate the need for social and supported housing, using the same comprehensive assessment. This would mean planning in line with the duties set out in the Supported Housing (Regulatory Oversight) Act, which requires local authorities to carry out a strategic needs assessment for supported housing in their area.

Fourthly, they would include the provision of social rent housing as defined in regulation specifically for the purposes of preparing spatial development strategies. As currently drafted, the Bill encourages local authorities to consider the need for affordable housing in preparing their spatial development strategies. This includes tenures such as low-cost ownership and affordable rents as high as 80% of market rents. Neither of these tenures are truly affordable or accessible. The creation of a new planning system that delivers more unaffordable tenures will only exacerbate the housing emergency and social housing waiting lists of 1 million households already.

This is not simply about numbers; it is about types of housing. Local plans must reflect the reality that many people need secure social rent housing or housing with tailored support, such as Housing First. Without this, we will not match supply to human need. To implement these amendments and make the same improvement to the assessment of local housing need in local plans, Crisis and others are calling for the Government to work with experts to reform the local housing needs methodology so that it captures the full picture of homelessness and housing need. In the interim, Ministers could make use of the independent assessment from Heriot-Watt University, commissioned by Crisis and the National Housing Federation. This model considers demography, affordability, homelessness and other needs relative to supply and has wide backing across the housing sector.

The Government’s investment in social and affordable housing is significant and welcome. However, unless our planning system counts all those most in need, the delivery of homes will remain disconnected from the lived reality of homelessness in our towns and cities.

Lord Lansley (Con)My Lords, I will speak to Amendments 140 and 144 in my name and say a quick word about Amendment 145A before the noble Baroness, Lady Thornhill, has a chance to introduce it. I will be brief, but not because I think that this is not terrifically important; I emphasise that there is a great deal I could say, but I am not going to say it. We may need to return to this on Report.

Amendment 140—I have the benefit of having anticipated that my noble friend Lord Jamieson will agree with me on this—would introduce a requirement to specify within the content of a spatial development strategy the amount of distribution of commercial, employment, logistic and industrial activity that is anticipated across the strategy area. The simple proposition is that the Government and all of us are focused on trying to deliver investment, employment and growth. The reason why we have to specify specific levels of housing is often because there are significant increases in employment.

The Government themselves suggested in their devolution White Paper that the strategic authorities would be best structured around economically functional areas. The economic component of the development strategy is absolutely integral to an understanding of what the requirements for housing and affordable housing are going to be, because this is about where people who travel to work can live and how they can travel.

I know that, in replying, the Minister will no doubt also be aware that, in local plan-making, the best approach to creating an understanding of what the housing need looks like is often to understand what the employment growth in an area looks like. This is no less the case when it comes to thinking about strategy areas and strategic development strategies—indeed, it is potentially even more important. I hope, therefore, that this is one of those amendments that the Minister might agree to consider rather than resist.

I likewise will not elaborate on Amendment 144, but I might do so when we come back on Report. As I understand it, trying to write a spatial development strategy for a substantial area while not taking into account the underlying land values in the respective parts of that strategy area—as well as the extent to which those land values can support viable development, developer contributions and infrastructure levies— is a pointless structure of consideration. If you go about this without understanding all those things and incorporating them into the process of strategic plan-making, you will end up simply drawing on a map lines that are filled with optimism, hope and the like but are without any reality that is rooted in deliverability. Deliverability is absolutely essential.

We do not need to invent this. The London Plan, which is a strategic development strategy, does it this way. It looks at viability and deliverability and relates them back to land values, developer contributions and receipts from the mayoral infrastructure levy. This, of course, relates to my noble friend’s amendment—Amendment 136A, I think—on funding infrastructure; it forms part of the exact same point, so I very much agree with him.

I have one last point on Amendment 145A. We had a debate on design. Exactly the same principles apply here; they are just at a level of vision rather than a level of detail. We should not discount the possibility of many strategy areas working together on big design guides. Essex, a large county with 1.5 million people, has a design guide that is very successful. The idea that there should be a design guide in a strategy area in the long run seems to me to be a very desirable thing.

Baroness Thornhill (LD)I should just say, “I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Lansley”, and sit down but I shall speak briefly to my Amendment 145A, which is supported by the noble Lords, Lord Carlile of Berriew and Lord Lucas, and my noble friend Lord Teverson—not to mention the Royal Institute of British Architects, which worked up this amendment. I thank them all and regret that, due to the hour, with the exception of the noble Lord, Lord Lucas, they are not here to give their contributions.

It is absolutely clear that strategic development strategies are a key positive plank in this Bill. I agree with much of what the noble Lord, Lord Lansley, has said, both earlier and now. There was also a lot of good commentary in our debates on the previous groups, which I refer to personally in hoping that the Government will take much of it on board.

At present, the Bill does not require the SDSs to set out a design vision that turns developments into real places. They might sound technical—the discussion that we have had so far has been very technical, in terms of having this here and that there—but, at their heart, they are about people and place. They allow us to step back, look to the future and plan with purpose. A design vision is a clear articulation of what an area should be in future. Too often, we have made decisions in isolation, with housing here, employment there and schools somewhere else—and transport between them as an afterthought—without working out how they all fit together. However, life does not work in silos. Families need homes near jobs, children need safe routes to schools and communities need high streets that thrive, as well as green spaces to enjoy—that is, places we can be proud of. Without that vision, what are we left with? A scattering of housing estates, with a road scheme here and a retail park there. It may be functional and meet targets but it is utterly soulless; it is about numbers being ticked off a list, not communities being built to last.

A proper design vision is not a frilly bit; it is the framework within which everything else sits. It is the difference between creating thriving neighbourhoods and repeating the mistakes of the past. We all know what happens without one: car-dominated estates with no green spaces, no heart and no chance of belonging. Sadly, there is a lot of evidence to back this up. If this Bill is to mean anything, it must be rooted in a clear design vision; otherwise, we will be remembered not for building communities but for building mistakes. It will set out direction and principles for quality development.

Including the requirement for a design vision would strengthen the Bill by putting design quality at the heart of strategic development. To put it simply, without design, it is like pouring concrete without foundations—it will not stand the test of time.

Baroness Hodgson of Abinger (Con)My Lords, I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Thornhill, and the noble Lords, Lord Carlile of Berriew, Lord Lucas and Lord Teverson, for tabling Amendment 145A, which I wholeheartedly support.

As I touched on earlier in my remarks on Amendment 123, design and what buildings look like is so important. It can enhance the community, being sensitive to existing architecture and local housing layout that uses local materials. To be sustainable, we must build homes that people will still want to look at and live in years from now. Too often, developers are building houses that do not differ between communities and places. Although provisions are in place for local authorities to insist on local styles, that is frequently sacrificed in favour of lower costs per home. I would argue that we should encourage new housing to be carried out more by small local builders, who should be more responsive to local need and invested in local communities. As noble Lords know, developers are allowed to appeal if they do not get their planning permission, yet locals are not allowed to appeal against poorly designed and badly-thought-through applications. We need to ensure that local people are listened to and brought alongside the process. There is no set standard for consultation; it could take months and be very well run and detailed, or it could be just a tick-box exercise on one weekend when everyone is on holiday. Are consultations always heeded? I am concerned that people are consulted then just ignored.

This amendment seeks to rectify these issues by including a design vision into the spatial development strategy. It is vital for high-quality design to be prioritised in the strategic planning process to ensure that new development meets the practical and visual needs of residents and enhances communities. I am pleased that this amendment is endorsed by so many key bodies who work in the sector.

02:45:00

Lord Wilson of Sedgefield (Lab)I thank noble Lords for their amendments relating to the contents of a spatial development strategy, or SDS. I turn first to Amendment 139A, tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Warwick, which seeks to make it mandatory for strategic planning authorities to specify an amount of distribution of housing, including affordable housing. I understand the concerns that authorities may interpret the current drafting under new Section 12D(5) as meaning that they can opt out of addressing this important issue in their spatial development strategies, or at least not fully address it; in practice, however, I think it very unlikely that strategic planning authorities will be able to justify not addressing this issue in their SDSs, for two reasons.

First, the Bill sets out that spatial development strategies must include policies that are of strategic importance to the area. It is very unlikely that the SPA will be able to make a credible argument that housing is not of strategic importance to their area. Furthermore, the Bill sets out that SDSs must have regard to the need to ensure consistency with national policy. We intend to set out clearly in national policy that SDSs should address housing needs. If SDSs are not consistent with national policy, the Bill gives the Secretary of State the ability to exercise intervention powers to rectify this. I hope that, for this reason, the noble Baroness feels reassured and will not press her amendment.

Amendment 139ZA, from the noble Lord, Lord Jamieson, would require spatial development strategies to set out how infrastructure would be funded and what the potential implications would be of that funding not materialising. I thank the noble Lord, Lord Jamieson, for his concern, which I share. It will be essential for SDSs to be based on realistic assumptions about the availability of infrastructure and the likelihood of investment in infrastructure, where that is required. As I mentioned earlier, it will also be important for SDSs to be kept under review and updated to reflect changes in circumstances, one example of which could be where infrastructure improvements or investments do not happen, or happen to a different timescale than anticipated. It is also important, however, to acknowledge that, as long-term spatial strategies, SDSs will look beyond current local plan time horizons and beyond many confirmed investment programmes of infrastructure providers; indeed, SDSs will be part of the more integrated and joined-up approach to infrastructure provision that this Government have already set out, notably via the 10-year infrastructure strategy, published in June, and forthcoming spatial plans for specific infrastructure sectors, such as the Strategic Spatial Energy Plan. We can expect a degree of iteration between SDSs and these national and regional approaches, with each being updated to take account of other strategies.

The Bill already contains provisions about the need to keep SDSs under review, and the Secretary of State has powers to intervene where SDSs are not being updated. SDSs will be tested at examination. While it will be for the examiner to determine the matters to be considered at examination, it is likely that the implementation of the strategy can be expected to be one of the key aspects to be considered. One idea that was raised in an independent report by Prior and Partners earlier this year about our strategic planning proposals is that of creating an infrastructure board for each SDS, where the main infrastructure providers engage with each strategic planning authority. This is something that I am keen to explore and will give consideration to including in planning practice guidance for SDSs. While I therefore agree with the thrust of the amendment tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Jamieson, I think that his concerns area already covered. On that basis, and in the knowledge that I agree that this is a key issue for SDSs—just not one that requires a legislative approach—I hope that the noble Lord will feel able to withdraw his amendment.

I now turn to Amendment 140, which would expressly enable a spatial development strategy to specify or describe an amount or distribution of development for employment, industrial, logistics or commercial purposes. While I fully appreciate and support the intention behind this amendment, I do not believe it is necessary. This is because new Section 12D(1) already requires that an SDS must include a statement of the strategic planning authority’s policies, however expressed, in relation to the development and use of land in the strategy area that are of strategic importance to that area. In making this requirement, I would fully expect a strategic planning authority to plan for employment, industrial, logistics and commercial development, as we have seen the London plan do, which operates under similar legislative provisions.

I turn now to Amendment 140A, tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Warwick of Undercliffe, which seeks to specify housing needs, including of those who are homeless, sleeping rough or on housing waiting lists. This Government have taken some significant steps to address the issue of homelessness, including making a £1 billion investment into homelessness and rough sleeping services this year. We confirmed at the Spending Review that this will be protected for the next three years, along with the £39 billion for the Social and Affordable Homes Programme—the biggest boost to social and affordable housing investment in a generation. We are also developing a cross-government strategy, working with mayors and councils across the country, to get back on track to ending homelessness. While I support the noble Baroness’s goal in ensuring that the housing needs of homeless people can be addressed through spatial development strategies, I believe that this is already addressed in the Bill. New Section 12D(5) allows a spatial development strategy to specify housing requirements, including affordable housing, to meet the needs of homeless people, providing they meet the test of being of strategic importance to the area. I should also be clear that the Government expect strategic planning authorities to plan for—as a minimum—the cumulative total of housing needs for the constituent authorities of the SDS area, as calculated using the local housing need standard method. I hope that this gives the noble Baroness sufficient reassurance to withdraw the amendment.

I turn next to Amendment 144, which seeks to enable a strategic planning authority to consider the implications of viability of development on the SDS’s approach to the provision of infrastructure, affordable housing, nature recovery and restoration of biodiversity net gain. Again, I find myself agreeing with the noble Lord in principle; SDSs will need to consider the implications of viability for their spatial strategy and broad locations that they set, and any policies that they include, and vice versa, and the implications that the SDS itself may have on development viability will need to be considered. However, the National Planning Policy Framework and the planning practice guidance deal with how viability should be considered. I am keen to allow a degree of flexibility here, rather than using what inevitably would be a rigid approach set down in primary legislation, especially as these SDSs are intended to be long-term and bold strategies which of themselves may well affect what is currently considered to be viable.

In terms of the last part of this amendment, which seeks to enable the Secretary of State to set out guidance on the assessment of benchmark land values or other aspects of viability, this is not necessary as the Secretary of State is already able to issue guidance on these topics or other matters. Indeed, there is already planning practice guidance on viability, which sets out the Government’s recommended approach and includes reference to benchmark land values and developer returns.

I finally turn to Amendment 145A, from the noble Baroness, Lady Thornhill, which would require SDSs to contain a design vision for the strategy area, which is developed with the local community and stakeholders. I reassure the noble Baroness of the importance that I attach to ensuring that the planning system creates well-designed new development. To support this, a clear framework exists through the National Planning Policy Framework and guidance on design, including the National Design Guide and National Model Design Code. They encourage plans at the most appropriate level to set clear design visions and expectations through local design policies, master plans, codes and guides. The key aims for SDSs are to set a spatial strategy for their area that delivers the development that will enable the economy to grow, the housing that is required and the environmental protection and restoration that is needed, and for this strategy to guide local implementation through subsequent local plans.

As previously mentioned, new Section 12D(1) already requires that an SDS must include a statement of the strategic planning authority’s policies, however expressed, in relation to the development and use of land in the strategy area that are of strategic importance to that area, which could include policies on design. For these reasons, I ask the noble Lord to withdraw his amendment.

Lord Jamieson (Con)My Lords, I am grateful to the Minister for his reply and, cognisant of the time of night, I shall be brief. I understand that he is sympathetic to the case that we have all made but, unfortunately, does not agree with us. I hope that before Report the Government will reflect further on these sensible amendments and move closer to where we are aligned. With that, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment 139ZA withdrawn.

Amendments 139A to 141 not moved.

Amendment 142

Moved by

142: Clause 52, page 73, line 21, at end insert— “(c) the use of health impact assessments when considering applications for new premises licensed under the Gambling Act 2005 or applications to convert premises to gambling premises under the Town and Country Planning (Use Classes) Order 1987 (1987/764), and(d) the number of premises licensed under the Gambling Act 2005 to be limited on the grounds of the cumulative impact on the health and wellbeing of the public.”

Lord Foster of Bath (LD)My Lords, I declare my interest as chairman of Peers for Gambling Reform, and I congratulate the Government Chief Whip on keeping us here to a point at which my hearing aids are telling me that their batteries are flat. I shall move Amendment 142 and particularly speak to Amendment 185E.

Given the hour, I will not give the details, but I suspect most noble Lords are aware of the serious concerns about the large number of gambling premises, especially betting shops and adult gaming centres, in so many of our high streets. This is especially so in deprived communities. The NHS Office for Health Improvement and Disparities recently illustrated that the most deprived local authorities have three times as many gambling premises per head of population as the least deprived local authorities. Research shows not only clear links with increased crime but, crucially, with higher levels of gambling harm and the problems that that creates for individuals, their families and their communities.

A quick scan of local newspapers and community websites will show that communities right across the country are demanding that their local councils take action to stop this proliferation but, as we have seen in places from Peterborough to Brent and in many others, councils have come up against the stumbling block that is Section 153 of the Gambling Act 2005. This is the so-called “aim to permit” section, under which the default position is that a licensing authority must permit the use of premises for gambling unless there are specific reasons not to do so. Councils that have tried to block new gambling venues have come up against lawyers from wealthy gambling companies and, in most cases, they have lost the battle. Planning authorities need additional powers to regulate the circumstances in which they authorise or reject the use of premises for gambling.

Some years ago, we had a similar problem when there was a growth in the number of premises selling alcohol. That problem was solved by coming forward with a solution that allowed the licensing committees of local authorities—having considered that there are already more than enough alcohol licences in a particular area—to publish, after consultation, a document called a cumulative impact assessment, which says, in effect, that enough is enough. It says that, if you are thinking of applying for an alcohol licence in this particular area, do not bother, because there are already enough licensed premises there and the community does not want any more, as it would harm its well-being.

03:00:00

However, there is nothing similar for considering the granting of a gambling licence. Peers for Gambling Reform and many other organisations, not least local councils, have been campaigning to have a similar cumulative impact arrangement for gambling licensing. Eventually, we persuaded the previous Government that this was what should happen, and they included it in their 2023 gambling White Paper. It said that the then Government

“will align the regimes for alcohol and gambling licensing by introducing cumulative impact assessments when Parliamentary time allows”.

I am delighted that the new Government have said that they agree with that approach. In a Parliamentary Written Answer on 9 June, the DCMS Minister said that

“cumulative impact assessments … would allow local authorities to take into account a wide range of evidence to inform licensing decisions and to consider the cumulative impact of gambling premises in a particular area. We will look to complement local authorities’ existing powers in relation to licensing of gambling premises … when parliamentary time allows”.

I am even more delighted that, only last week during Prime Minister’s Questions, the Prime Minister said that he also agreed. He said:

“It is important that local authorities are given additional tools and powers to ensure vibrant high streets. We are looking at introducing cumulative impact assessments, like those already in place for alcohol licensing, and we will give councils stronger powers over the location and numbers of gambling outlets to help create safe, thriving high streets ”.—[ Official Report , Commons, 3/9/25; col. 281.]

The Prime Minister said that only last week. We do not need to wait for further parliamentary time; we have the opportunity to do it within this legislation. If Amendment 185E were accepted, it would quickly give our councils the extra powers they need, it would ensure that the Government could deliver the Prime Minister’s promise and it would give the Government a quick and extremely popular win.

I am of course aware that, in the Bill’s final form, additional amendments will also be needed to ensure that a cumulative impact assessment approach to gambling is in line with that for alcohol licensing, which is covered in Section 5A of the Licensing Act 2003, and on which I have modelled my amendment. Today, I simply hope that the Minister will confirm at least an agreement in principle to my Amendment 185E and will agree to work with me and other interested parties to use the Bill as a quick and effective way to give councils and their communities the additional powers they need, and have been promised by this Government, to curb the proliferation of gambling venues, with all the problems that they create on our high streets. I beg to move.

Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP)My Lords, I declare an interest as a member of Peers for Gambling Reform. We have just heard an overwhelming case from its leader. I will make a couple of additional points.

First, in our debate on an earlier group of amendments many hours ago, we linked the need for improvements to this Bill to tackling public health challenges. This is a public health challenge. I point noble Lords who are not aware of it to the Lancet public health commission on gambling, which reported in 2024 and pointed out how much more we now understand, medically speaking, about the impact of gambling on our communities and on so many individuals. It lists damage including loss of employment, broken relationships, crime-related impacts, suicidality and domestic violence, and says that much of that harm is found among people who do not meet the diagnostic criteria for gambling disorders. It is a widespread problem.

I have to acknowledge here the work of many community campaigns, one of which I have worked with: Gambling with Lives, which is led by families affected by suicide linked to gambling. This is a toxic industry causing great harm.

I second the point made by the noble Lord about the timing and history of this. Many Member of your Lordships’ House were not here when the House of Lords Select Committee on the Social and Economic Impact of the Gambling Industry reported in 2019. The title of that report was Gambling Harm — Time for Action . As the noble Lord, Lord Foster of Bath, just said, different Governments have said, “Yes, we’re going to act”. The Select Committee said that. The Lancet commission is saying, “Act”. Here is the opportunity—please, let us act.

Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)My Lords, the principle behind these amendments is one that I support: allowing councils to link planning decisions, which are fundamentally about land use and placemaking, more directly with licensing concerns, which are about gambling regulation and mitigating harm. This serves as a practical and reasonable approach. Too often, local authorities find themselves frustrated by the rigid division between planning and licensing regimes and unable to respond effectively to the concerns of their residents.

I totally agree with the noble Lord, Lord Foster of Bath. We know from both research and lived experience that the clustering of gambling premises can have a damaging effect on community well-being and contribute to higher levels of problem gambling. The only question I have for the Minister is: will this Government bring in cumulative impact assessments in this Bill?

Lord Wilson of Sedgefield (Lab)My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Foster, for his Amendments 142 and 185E. I assure him that the Government intend to introduce cumulative impact assessments for gambling licensing when parliamentary time allows. This will strengthen local authorities’ tools to influence the location and density of gambling outlets. Local authorities have a range of existing powers and tools in relation to gambling premises, such as specifying local risks that operators must take steps to mitigate and attaching conditions to premises’ licences.

The Government are also of the view that the most appropriate body to assess the cumulative impact of licensed gambling premises is the local licensing authority, rather than the planning authority. My concern is that the noble Lord’s amendment would risk creating inconsistencies in the approaches of local authorities’ planning policies and the licensing authority’s statement of licensing principles. Local authorities already have the power to require health impact assessments for planning applications. Introducing health impact assessments in spatial development strategies would be duplicative.

Spatial development strategies have been introduced through this Bill to improve planning across local planning authorities and to ensure that we are sustainably planning to meet the nation’s development needs. By setting out a high-level spatial strategy and addressing challenging cross-boundary issues, SDSs will make the production of local plans more straightforward and quicker to add to what are, in essence, more localised issues. Although SDSs are not the right place for this matter to be considered, the planning system allows for local consideration of additional gambling premises, such as a betting office or a casino. National planning policy is already clear that planning policies and decisions should aim to achieve healthy places that enable and support healthy living; local planning authorities are able to put in place appropriate policies that are relevant to their areas in order to support this through their local plans.

For the reasons I have set out, I kindly ask the noble Lord to withdraw his amendment.

Lord Purvis of Tweed (LD)I have listened to the Minister. He said that the Government are intending to move when parliamentary time allows. This is the time of Parliament, so why are the Government not moving now?

Lord Wilson of Sedgefield (Lab)The Government are. We have given a commitment on cumulative impact assessments. We have a large armoury of regulations and ways in which we can mitigate these problems. This is something that we take seriously and see as important. Ultimately, we should watch this space to see what happens in future.

Lord Foster of Bath (LD)I wish to intervene as I will not be able to cover this in my summing up at the end. Local councils across the land are listening to this debate, so can the Minister explain in detail why he is saying that this amendment—with the additional parts that would be necessary, in line with the cumulative impact assessments for alcohol licensing—is not the appropriate vehicle to do what local councils want, what the Government say they want and what, last Wednesday, the Prime Minister said categorically the Government want?

Lord Wilson of Sedgefield (Lab)This is unnecessary, as national planning policy is clear that planning policies and decisions should aim to achieve healthy places that enable and support healthy living. Local planning authorities are already able to put in place appropriate policies to support this; this includes policies that they can implement through their local plan. In relation to betting offices, they can introduce healthy impact assessments and SDSs.

Lord Foster of Bath (LD)I am sorry to interrupt the Minister for a second time; I genuinely apologise, but this is really important. I know that the hour is late, but is the Minister aware that there has only been one occasion—in Sheffield, at a magistrates’ court—where a council has been able to block a gambling premises application? That is likely to be overturned because of the huge power and resources of the gambling companies to get their licences to do it. Frankly, the Minister is misleading the Committee, in my view, in arguing that the current legislation allows councils to do what he is saying they do. That is not the evidence that is available from all of the councils around the country.

Lord Wilson of Sedgefield (Lab)I am not misleading the Committee in any way. If the noble Lord cannot accept what I am saying, there is, I am afraid, nothing else I can say.

Lord Foster of Bath (LD)As is the appropriate procedure at this stage, I will of course withdraw the amendment, but I can assure the Committee that it is my intention to return to this matter. It would be enormously helpful if, rather than this rather negative approach that we have heard from the Minister, he could agree—with at least a nod from a sedentary position—that, as a matter of urgency, a meeting will take place with myself and other relevant bodies to discuss this further so that we can make progress and achieve what the Prime Minister himself said only a few days ago he was desperately keen to achieve. I am still looking for a nod from a sedentary position. The Committee and others will note the absence of such a nod and, therefore, the apparent breach of the promise from the Prime Minister.

Lord Wilson of Sedgefield (Lab)I have no problem with meeting the noble Lord. I just ask him to calm down.

Lord Foster of Bath (LD)I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment 142 withdrawn.

Amendment 143

Moved by

143: Clause 52, page 73, line 21, at end insert— “(c) a specific density of housing development which ensures effective use of land and which the strategic planning authority considers to be of strategic importance to the strategy area.”Member’s explanatory statement This amendment requires strategic planning authorities to include a specific housing density in their plans which ensures land is used effectively where it is considered strategically important.

Baroness Coffey (Con)I signed this amendment tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb. I note that the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett of Manor Castle, is here as well and probably has a more extensive speech. To me, this comes back to the wider point about how we are pulling together land in order to maximise the amount of housing somewhat. It may be that we have different opinions on what the density should be, but I made the point recently when I was considering whether this sort of decision should be delegated to officers where planning applications have been made where the housing density is considerably lower than what had been agreed by councillors. It comes back to why this matters.

03:15:00

It matters because, when the amount of land that is being allocated to homes is not reaching the density that was expected, for a variety of reasons, we therefore have to keep allocating even more land. This is a cumulative effect, reflecting the comments I made earlier about the fact that a lot of land is already allocated to homes that have not yet been built, but have consent. One of the reasons I have stayed an extra hour and a half is to make this point about spatial development strategies. I appreciate that we have not quite finished debating this: it is the one clause in the entire Bill that actually got substantial debate in the House of Commons—nearly four hours, and I can assure the Committee that that is unprecedented nowadays in the Commons. It is vital that we get to the bottom of this, because I am afraid that, even at the other end, the Minister was not as forthcoming as was perhaps wanted, which is reflected in the variety of amendments we have today.

With that, I am conscious that, dare I say it, the clerks, the doorkeepers, Hansard and others—the press, even—are being very patient at this time, but it is right that we at least have this opportunity. I am sure that Clause 52 will become very popular again on Report. I beg to move.

Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP)My Lords, I rise with pleasure to follow the noble Baroness, Lady Coffey, who both signed the amendment in the name of my noble friend Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb, who is currently on medical leave, and did an able, if unexpected, job of introducing this group of amendments. Before I get on to this, I feel that, after our last discussion, I should declare my position as a vice-president of the Local Government Association, since the debate went in that direction. I will also declare that I have a personal qualification to speak in this area of a Bill that I was not otherwise engaged in, since I can also, like the noble Lord, Lord Lansley, and others, dust off my experience as a veteran of the Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill back in the day.

To speak to the specific details of this amendment, it is about the density of housing development and the effective use of land. My noble friend Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb has personal experience of this as a London Assembly member. What happened in London was that the Mayor was given the power to ensure greater density of housing in particular, and that had demonstrable positive impacts in London. To go back to 1961, the very famous theorist Jane Jacobs, in her book The Death and Life of Great American Cities , said that one of the key things that helps cities thrive is a sufficiently dense concentration of people, particularly a sufficiently dense concentration of housing. We have gradually seen this being pushed forward, and of course we are, as we saw in London, going back to something we knew before.

Georgian squares in London actually have a greater density of housing than many modern developments, and they are great places for people to live. What we are talking about is the fact that quality and density together have excellent outcomes, and this amendment, in this really important part of the Bill, as the noble Baroness, Lady Coffey, just said, brings that forward, so I am hoping against hope that we might hear something positive from the Minister at this stage.

I am just going to say one sentence on Amendment 224 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Hodgson, on VAT costs and buildings. I would have signed it had I noticed it, and I am just going to cross-reference my earlier amendment about embodied carbon. Because of our tax and VAT rules, we are emitting so much carbon, in embodied carbon, in the destruction of buildings.

Lord Lucas (Con)My Lords, I very much support the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett. That is not always the case, but we are lucky in this House to have the remaining two sane members of the Green Party. In this amendment, her colleague is advocating gentle density—the noble Baroness, Lady Bennett, mentioned the Georgian squares of London and how much density and beauty you get from them. You also get a city that can thrive as a city. You get an ability to hold a variety of retail and entertainment premises. You get transport systems that work. Where you get something much more scattered—such as in the town I live in, Eastbourne—you get ridiculous inability to manage public transport because everything is spread out all over the place, the roads are all higgledy-piggledy and nothing hangs together or works. That is why I have proposed Amendment 159.

Land readjustment schemes have been immensely successful, particularly in Japan, where they found a role after the war. About 30% of the urban land in Japan has been subject to land readjustment schemes. These schemes enable a bit of urban land that has been seriously sub-optimally developed to be transformed into something much better. You have a promoter, who can put together a scheme that creates a large amount of additional value. You then work with the local authority and the local people to the point where the local authority is happy and at least two-thirds of the people who will be affected are voting for you, and then you do it. It is not an instant thing—it takes the best part of a decade to go from start to finish—but it is immensely effective in transforming urban landscapes and making good the car-borne optimism of the past, so that we can have something that we are likely to be able to live in today.

I encourage the Government to look at this as a potential way forward. If it does not find a place in this Bill, I hope that it will at least find a place in discussions and that the Government will be open to a meeting to pursue how this might become part of future policy.

Lord Shipley (LD)My Lords, Amendment 160 is in my name and that of my noble friend Lady Pinnock. Given the debates and discussion that we have had on recent groups, it is increasingly important.

Amendment 160 seeks to implement a long-term spatial strategy, a “national spatial framework”, to bring together all the national plans and strategies across all sectors and across all Whitehall departments. It would integrate plan-making across the country at a local level. Two or three groups ago, the noble Lord, Lord Lansley, referred to the coming patchwork quilt of spatial strategies. He is right in that respect. A framework, which has been proposed by the Royal Town Planning Institute, would be increasingly important.

Currently, there are several existing and emerging national strategies. For example, the 10-year infrastructure strategy recognises that national spatial strategies are needed. Similarly, the English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill has included a duty for mayors to collaborate to improve the economic, social or environmental well-being of the people in their area. A national spatial framework would provide the strategic direction and evidence base to enable mayoral bodies to discharge such duties.

As new plans are developed and existing plans are updated in the future, there would then be a clear connection between all existing plans from the framework. This would improve alignment of plans. It would help the Government achieve their goal of building homes and growing the economy, and on the natural environment and clean energy. It would mean that collaboration between Whitehall departments could be prioritised.

This amendment, which, as I said, originated from the Royal Town Planning Institute, is a very positive set of proposals, which I hope the Government will be prepared to listen to, think about and adopt. I look forward to hearing the Minister’s views. As I said a moment ago, I have come to the conclusion that, given the complexity of all the different spatial strategies—the levels and places—they need to be brought together. The context of a framework at a national level would be extremely helpful for the Government.

Baroness Hodgson of Abinger (Con)My Lords, I shall speak to Amendments 222 and 224 in my name. Both refer to regeneration: supporting brownfield sites and repurposing buildings in preference to the use of new sites in the green belt, cutting into our countryside. Amendment 222 inserts a news clause after Clause 106 to ensure that a full brownfield review is commissioned within six months of the day the Bill is passed. Proposed new subsection (1) sets out the power for the Secretary of State to commission the review within this timeframe. Proposed new subsection (2) specifies what the review is to investigate. Meanwhile, Amendment 224 introduces a new clause that will enable a VAT exemption scheme for building materials used for repurposing and redeveloping an existing building to provide housing.

Surely, it should be obvious that focusing on brownfield and repurposing sites first is a double environmental win: saving our countryside and green spaces that are rich in nature and play a crucial role in responding to the climate emergency. This approach also clears up environmental issues on brownfield sites that, so far, have been ignored or put on hold rather than grasped. What could be more sustainable than that? Surely, sustainability, which has been used as an argument throughout this debate on planning and infrastructure, should be at heart of our planning system.

The CPRE reported in 2022 that there were a record-breaking number of brownfield sites, identified for redevelopment, lying dormant—enough for 1.2 million homes on 23,000 sites adding up to 27,000 hectares. The CPRE highlights that the majority of brownfield sites are in town and city centres, where there is both the most need and the scope for new homes and regeneration. As I said earlier in the debate, it is not simply a question of more homes; we need the right homes in the right places. Much of the current urban brownfield land is known to blight the communities where it exists, leading to poorer socioeconomic indicators.

It is much better to reuse already developed urban land and buildings as the carbon emissions are lower per capita than greenfield development. Urban areas also have existing infrastructure and services in place or, when new infrastructure is needed, it can more easily provided, unlike in remote rural areas. It also has the benefit of saving our green fields to be used for food security, preserving rural character and environment benefits.

Too often, when I ask why more brownfield sites are not being used, I am told that the cost of cleaning them up, before they can be built on, eats into profits and makes the housing less viable. We need to break this cycle, so we do not unnecessarily destroy more green fields, and are not left with derelict sites in urban places. Amendment 224 would help to provide a tax break to those companies willing to refurbish empty homes and repurpose buildings to provide housing. Not only is this cheaper but, as mentioned, it is much better than tearing down buildings and replacing them, which comes at huge carbon cost.

The high street is changing; there are often empty buildings, no longer used. Surely, it is much more beneficial to repurpose them for housing. We need the priority of brownfield first and to bring existing empty homes and buildings back into use, and we need to make it more attractive for companies to do so. I commend my amendments to the Committee.

03:30:00

Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)My Lords, in a country as small and as precious as ours, every acre of land must be put to best and most fitting use. Housing, regeneration and protection of the natural environment are not discrete issues but facets of the same question: how do we steward the land of England wisely for this generation and those to come? Amendments 222 and 224 from my noble friend Lady Hodgson of Abinger go to the heart of this Bill. Our policy is clear: we support brownfield development, oppose greenfield development and will protect the green belt. In our 2024 manifesto, we made that commitment to fast-track brownfield development in all our cities.

Optimising land use is the essence of the matter. Optimising means not only building more homes but building them in the right places, at the right density and with the right protections for our natural inheritance. It means preserving the chalk streams, unlocking urban sites through readjustment and holding to a national framework that ensures consistency and foresight. It means delivering the brownfield renaissance we have promised and speaking plainly about what role the tax system can play. I look forward to the Minister’s reply on this debate but, due to the lateness of the hour, I certainly have not had the opportunity to say all I wanted to on this important group of amendments. I think there are other Members who feel exactly the same, so I will be bringing this debate back on Report.

Before I sit down—and with the Committee’s agreement—I would just like to say a very big thank you and put on record my thanks to all the staff across the House who have stayed until what will be nearly 4 am by the time they go home. I really appreciate it, and I am sure all my side appreciate it as well.

Lord Wilson of Sedgefield (Lab)First, I echo the sentiments about the effort the staff, the clerks and everybody else have put into staying up tonight until 3.30 am. As the noble Baroness said, it will be probably beyond 4 am before people leave.

I am grateful to everybody who has taken part in this debate and tabled amendments. I appreciate the intentions of Amendment 143, moved by the noble Baroness, Lady Jones. It seeks to allow strategic planning authorities to specify or describe a specific density of housing development. As I have set out, SDSs will be high-level documents that will set out broad locations for growth. This amendment would not be practical because SDSs cannot allocate specific sites for development and so would not be able to set specific densities for precise locations. New Section 12D(1) already allows for policies in relation to the development and use of land, provided they are of strategic importance to the area covered by the strategy. For these reasons, I kindly ask the noble Baroness to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment 148, in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Jamieson, would require spatial development strategies to promote the use of brownfield land and to reduce the need to travel. I agree with the intent behind this amendment; however, it is already comprehensively covered in the National Planning Policy Framework, with the promotion and reuse of brownfield land being a central part of chapter 11 of the NPPF, on making effective use of land. The Bill sets out that strategic planning authorities must have regard to the need to be consistent with national policy when preparing their spatial development strategies. As this issue is already addressed in national policy, this amendment is not necessary and I hope the noble Lord will not press it.

Amendment 159, in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Lucas, proposes the power for the Secretary of State to introduce urban land readjustment schemes. I am grateful to the noble Lord for raising the important issue of how to unlock regeneration and higher-density development on fragmented urban sites and for proposing a means to do so. While there is potential benefit to such schemes, we need more time to come to an informed view, given the importance of the human rights of those with an interest in the affected land. That is why the Government will be rejecting this amendment but committing to looking at the issues more fully. We would like to work with the noble Lord, Lord Lucas, to do so.

Amendment 160 provided a further opportunity to debate the important issue of a national spatial plan and seeks to ensure better co-ordination of development and infrastructure between national and local policy. While I recognise that there is interest in a national spatial framework as a possible solution, I assure noble Lords that we are progressing a number of initiatives to achieve this outcome. The Bill as drafted introduces a new national system of strategic plans to replace the current piecemeal approach. England- wide coverage of spatial development strategies will provide a more effective way to plan across local authority boundaries and co-ordinate development and infrastructure delivery.

The Government’s 10-year infrastructure strategy describes how SDSs fit within a broader approach to improved spatial planning. They will be complemented by a set of spatial plans for key infrastructure sectors, such as the strategic spatial energy plan, a land use framework to promote better decision-making on land, to be published later this year, and the establishment of the National Infrastructure and Service Transformation Authority. NISTA will play a key role in providing strategic and spatial direction and supporting co- ordination between departments, regulators, arm’s-length bodies and local delivery partners. It will lead the development of the Government’s new national infrastructure spatial tools.

In addition, the land use framework will provide a long-term view of land use change to support climate change mitigation and adaptation, economic growth, housing delivery, food production, clean energy, and meeting statutory targets for nature recovery. It will lay out how the Government intend to align the different incentives on land, promote joined-up decisions at national and local levels, and make accessible and high-quality data available. Together, these reforms will provide the necessary co-ordination between policies, plans and decisions that is needed to drive delivery. In the light of this work, I hope that the noble Lord, Lord Shipley, will not press his amendment. Amendment 222, tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Hodgson, seeks to require the commissioning of a review of brownfield sites. The Government are clear that the first port of call for development should be brownfield land. This includes, for example, bringing derelict sites back into use and making better use of existing land and buildings. That is why the Government have strengthened national planning policy to incentivise brownfield development. In December 2024, the revised National Planning Policy Framework set out that proposals for brownfield development should be approved unless substantial harm would be caused. The NPPF therefore provides strong support for making as much use as possible of brownfield land and sets a high bar for refusal.

Last year, the Government proposed options for a “brownfield passport”, to ensure that the default answer to suitable proposals is yes. We are now considering the views received to decide what further action could be taken to support development of brownfield land. In addition, the Government already provide funding to unlock suitable brownfield sites for housing where this provides good value for money.

The Government’s new national housing delivery fund will make around £5 billion of capital grant funding available over the next spending review period to unlock new housing and regeneration, much of it on brownfield land. In addition to that funding, the department is making available over £1.8 billion this financial year. We intend to establish a new, permanent national housing bank to act as the Government’s investment arm and which may be used to support the development of brownfield land. As a result, the Government are already advanced in their thinking and actions on how best to incentivise brownfield development. For these reasons, I hope that the noble Baroness is reassured and will not press her amendment. Amendment 224, tabled by the noble Baroness, Lady Hodgson, proposes an exemption on VAT for materials used in repurposing existing buildings. The Government recognise the importance of reusing existing buildings and already encourage this through the VAT system. That is why residential renovations are subject to a reduced rate of VAT of 5%, if they meet certain conditions. Any reduction in VAT rates must represent value for money for the taxpayer. Ultimately, the Chancellor is responsible for making decisions on tax policy and these decisions are taken at fiscal events. For these reasons, I hope the noble Baroness will not press her amendment.

Baroness Coffey (Con)My Lords, it is 3.40 am and, in the words of the Black Eyed Peas, “I gotta feeling’” that we are going to do this again on Report. The Minister gave a comprehensive answer but it is obviously still frustrating. However, with that, and recognising that I will meet the noble Lord, Lord Shipley, when we reconvene for our Select Committee in about six hours, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.

Amendment 143 withdrawn.

Amendment 144 not moved.

House resumed.