House of Commons Hansard Debates for 12 Mar 1991

Mr. Soley : I have much sympathy with that view. I know of cases in which people have got out of doing what they need to do simply by sending occasional letters saying that they will do it or that they are putting off doing so for various reasons. If they delay matters long enough, it becomes out of time. That is especially true of London with the building regulations. There are a number of areas in which we need to ensure that the matter cannot be put out of time and that local authorities have the power to step in and say, "You have done this without permission. You must put it right." That does not mean that we must always take a hard line. A development may be started reasonably and may not be out of character. One might then need to give retrospective development permission. Those are exceptional cases, but we can get the balance right if we put more faith in the local authorities.

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One of my criticisms of the Conservative party, in planning as in many other areas, is that Conservative Members tend to believe that local authorities are incompetent and useless, and that they should be got rid of generally. In fact, most local authorities are efficient and good. However, they need the right powers to do the job. They need the right structure of legislation from us--and that is our responsibility--and they then need to be told to get on with the job. We may need additional safeguards to ensure that they do the job of ensuring that the people who live in the area get the service that they deserve. We must not undermine the competence, management and morale of local authorities and then expect them to do the job well, because they will be unable to do so.

Mr. Patrick Ground (Feltham and Heston) : Will the hon. Gentleman give way?

Mr. Soley : I do not want to give way much more, because I am aware that many hon. Members want to speak. However, I will give way to the hon. and learned Gentleman.

Mr. Ground : I just heard the hon. Gentleman say that he wanted to make it mandatory for local authorities to enforce planning control. Is he saying that he wants them to stop having to consider whether it is expedient to enforce planning control, which has always been a fundamental aspect of the provision? If so, he is taking away a huge area of discretion for local authorities which some of us think is important.

Mr. Soley : I deliberately did not use the word "mandatory". I seek a clearer framework of planning powers for the local authorities which would allow them, as I suggested when I gave my example, to give retrospective planning permission. I want to ensure that the local authorities can use their planning powers effectively when there has been a breach of planning law. The present problem is that local authorities often cannot do that, either because the matter is out of time or because they do not have effective powers. We must get such matters right in the Bill ; we have not got them right yet. It is not merely an argument about mandatory versus expedient. It is more an argument for giving local authorities the power to act in both directions so that they can deal sympathetically with the genuine case of a person who has gone ahead with a building repair or change without following through all the regulations. The change may be perfectly reasonable. We want local authorities to allow such a case to be put right retrospectively, without at the same time allowing someone to turn a barn in a field into a mini-factory, which aggravates so many people in rural areas. The general duty for local authorities to ensure that planning controls are adhered to is important and we look forward to the debate on criminal sanctions. One problem is the appeal mechanism. I suggest to the Minister and to Conservative Members that we have an opportunity in the Bill to consider that mechanism, which is inadequate. In Committee, we may wish to consider whether we should take a bolder step and say that if there is a modern plan, drawn up by the local authority, by the regional government or by the county, it must be, as the Minister seemed to suggest it should be, the guiding light for planning development in the area. If it is, it follows that, if someone makes an application for a development that runs counter to the plan, there is a strong case for

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saying that there will be no appeal. However, if a person is refused a permission when it is in line with the plan, there should be an automatic right of appeal.

The critical point is that if the plan is out of date or if recent dramatic changes have taken place, such as the building of an airport which might change the nature of the area, there should be a case for appeal--perhaps a judicial review--to see whether the plan is sufficiently up to date for the local authority to decide to refuse permission. There should be a three- pronged approach : a right of appeal if a person's application has been refused when it is in line with the plan, no right of appeal when it is not in line with the plan and a right to judicial review if there are doubts. I do not give that structure in detail, although it is an area on which we have worked. We consider that it has sufficient potential to be considered for inclusion in the Bill.

As my hon. Friend the Member for Rotherham (Mr. Crowther) said, there is also a case for a third-party right of appeal. That needs to be tightly defined, because we do not want to provide another opportunity to delay development that has already been tried and tested. However, there are cases in which the local authority and the developer both want the development to go ahead for wider reasons, but in which the local people have genuine reasons for saying that the development would not be right or would be out of line with the plan. In such circumstances, we should try to draw up a tightly defined third-party right of appeal, which would go some way to meeting the point raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Rotherham. The third-party right of appeal troubles not only the south but the north. People sometimes feel that their views are not taken into account in some of the larger developments. There is a case for a third-party right of appeal.

Planning gain is an important issue and clause 12 troubles us very much. I urge Conservative Members to look carefully, long and hard at clause 12. All who are worried about green-field development around their backyards will find the dangers in the clause. It would allow a developer to go ahead, having more or less decided what planning gain he or she will give. It does not allow the local authority the right to say no. That is profoundly dangerous, so we should not go down that road. There is a strong case for a far more carefully thought out approach to planning, gain. It is one of the most difficult areas of planning and we often come across it in our own constituencies. The Hammersmith Broadway project under Brederoe taught me a great deal. An enormous development was going ahead. It seems that the local authority says, "We will slow down your permission to develop if you do not give us certain things." The developer says, "We will fight you all the way, and make it very expensive and difficult for you if you do not give us something else instead." One ends up with a saloon bar face-off over who backs down first and who gets what. I am not saying that there should be no negotiating process in planning gain--it is almost impossible to avoid it--but if it is seen simply as a negotiating process and we tell the developer that he can keep his development if he gives us certain things, that is wrong. First, it must be decided whether a development is appropriate for an area,

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and that should be determined on the basis of a plan. Secondly, we need a clear method of deciding how planning gain can be written into that process, not only for the immediate facilities on the site but for the implications of larger sites that affect the surrounding countryside for some miles.

We must look long and hard at clause 12, which I find impossible to support in its present form. For the Minister's own sake, he should rethink it--it requires much thought and effort, and must be changed. Several other aspects of the Bill are important, but I shall not take the time of the House now. Constituents come to see many of us about developments that have taken place and complain that they were not made aware of their rights. One such difficult case involved my local authority allowing a housing development to go ahead. The windows in that development were not supposed to overlook my constituent's garden. Eventually, once the development had been owned by a couple of companies that had gone bankrupt, windows were installed and it was discovered retrospectively that planning permission had been given by delegated authority without the knowledge of local people.

I have many other examples of local people who were inadequately informed. There is a strong case for looking harder at the need to inform local people about the full impact of any development that may take place. There should be a duty to inform not only people who live in the vicinity but local interested groups, such as conservation groups. In that way, we could involve people in the planning process, as we should want to do.

It would be a sorry tale if we were to argue on the basis of development versus planning. Development should always take place. In a heavily urbanised country like ours, it should fit in with other needs and take on board the growing importance of green issues. We cannot continue with this nonsense of burgeoning development in the south, which we are in danger of concreting over from Andover to Dover, while there is a chronic shortage of housing and it is becoming almost impossible to move on public transport and on the roads. That shows that there is a failure in housing and transport policy as well as planning policy.

I regret that the Government have taken no steps to face those problems but we intend, in the Bill, to try to ensure that we have the opportunity to face them. Judging from the number of nods of support from Conservative Members, I think that they will be voting for me when we debate the Bill in Committee.

5.4 pm

Mr. Cranley Onslow (Woking) : I am sorry to disappoint the hon. Member for Hammersmith (Mr. Soley), but he did not have a nod of support from me, and I do not look forward to being on the Committee with him.

I shall focus almost entirely on the question of planning enforcement. Before doing so, I should say that I welcome the provision in the Bill increasing the penalty for defiance of tree preservation orders by increasing the fine. I hope that it will be within the scope of my hon. Friend the Minister's ingenuity to extend the reforming legislation on tree preservation by closing the loophole whereby a landowner appears to be able to anticipate and thus escape a tree preservation order by felling trees in an area of woodland of four or five acres and saying that the area is

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part of his garden. Such areas are an attempt to secure planning permission by creating a barren, unattractive area in place of an agreeable piece of woodland that formed part of a local amenity. I hope that my hon. Friend the Minister can bring such cases within the scope of the Bill.

I heard my hon. Friend the Minister's comments and I echo, to an extent, what the hon. Member for Hammersmith said about criminalisation. It would be going too far to bring every breach of planning control within the scope of criminal law, but I have considerable sympathy with the argument of the Council for the Protection of Rural England that unauthorised, irreversible development should be made a criminal offence. If my hon. Friend the Minister believes that that is wrong, he should say why. It is surely a crime to inflict such damage on the heritage that has been handed down to us if that damage cannot be reversed. Civil penalties are scarcely adequate in such cases. Some of my hon. Friends may wish to press that point further.

Problems of enforcement worry me most. When I saw that the Bill was coming up for debate and the general welcome that it received, I asked the planning officers of my two borough councils, Woking and Guildford, whether they could give me a sample of the worst cases with which they have had to deal in recent years. I also asked them how they hoped that the Bill might strengthen their hand in dealing with such cases in future. I had an interesting response, although I already have box files on more than one of the cases that they mentioned.

I am prepared to accept that the case of a householder who persists in putting a roof extension on his house, against the wishes of his neighbours and despite being told by the planning authorities that he is breaking the rules, will be covered by the powers in the Bill ; and that such a person can in future be stopped in his tracks because the local authority will be able to act quickly and effectively. I hope, too, that a case in which a disused shop is turned into a car hire and taxi business, and run as that for two years to the great annoyance of the neighbours and in clear defiance of planning regulations, can be brought to a halt more quickly than at present. I hope that the users of the Bill--the people on the other end of the planning process, not only those who apply for planning permission but those who are affected by the granting of permission and the breach of planning control--will judge it according to its effects on the speed with which regulations can be enforced and the scale of penalties for persistent breach of controls. In the two cases that I have mentioned, speed may be the only change that the Bill would bring, but that would be a considerable bonus. Another case in which marginal farm land is being persistently used for dumping materials to build up ground levels, with the clear anticipation of something more to follow, may also be stopped in its tracks. I hope that the people who carry out such action will be given clearly to understand that there are no gains to be had from it in the short or long term. Using land as a tip is profitable, even if such use is not authorised, and may also involve much undeclared money.

Another case involves somebody who set about laying hardcore, surfacing land within the green belt and subsequently placing a couple of caravans on it. In spite of the local authority's refusal to give planning permission and all its efforts to resolve the issue, the case has

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continued for the past two years, and the site has become a derelict eyesore. The perpetrator appears to have vanished--the police cannot find him--and despite two public inquiries, it is still impossible for any effective action to be taken to put the land back in its original order. Who will decide who should pay if the man has disappeared?

I have cited a relatively minor case, but a more serious case which attracted a good deal of public attention in my constituency concerns Brookwood cemetery. Anyone who knows what it used to be like and sees it now will be astonished to see that a large part of it appears to have been turned into a battlefield, with enormous piles of waste material and derelict earth-moving equipment parked on it. Although the cemetery owner is at last beginning to understand what needs to be done, and to co-operate with the local authority, that state of affairs should never have come about--it should have been prevented at the outset.

If the Bill has powers to do that and to prevent the deposit of rubble in sites of special scientific interest and the general vandalism of graves and desecration of a considerable national monument, I welcome it wholeheartedly, as will everyone else. The scale of damage done to sites such as Brookwood cemetery is not an everyday occurrence, as there are not all that many such sites, but there are plenty of places where things occur that need to be the subject of firm action.

Not far from Brookwood, in the neighbouring parish of Pirbright, a man named Mr. Crimes got hold of a piece of land on which, over a relatively long period, he has managed to dump thousands of tonnes of rubble. He built up enormous mounds around the site, to which he seems to have obtained unauthorised access across Ministry of Defence land. He has now vanished, and all the local authority's powers to stop the action are ineffective, in the sense that although action has now stopped, it cannot easily be reversed. It will be almost impossible for the county council to find the tens of thousands of pounds needed to restore the site to its former condition as a perfectly ordinary field. It is now a major eyesore.

It is no use looking to Mr. Crimes to make a substantial contribution towards the cost of restitution because he has disappeared. When my hon. Friend the Minister winds up, will he tell us more about restitution costs? Some of the perpetrators of such breaches of the law are very elusive people. Local authorities are not always fortunate enough to locate the perpetrators and make them understand that they must work within the ambit of planning regulations.

I will describe two more cases in which my constituents would like an assurance that the Bill will improve the position in which they have found themselves in recent months. The first may seem small, but it involves a long history of disagreement between neighbours, following the granting of planning permission at a small infill site. Events have culminated in the owner of the site having more or less deliberately defied the planning condition that he should erect a fence and not seek to establish access along one boundary. By erecting a fence with a gap, flanked by two brick pillars, he appears to be using the gap as a means of access. As the law stands, I do not know how long it will be before that relatively minor case is brought to a conclusion. On past form, it could easily be at least a year. I heard of the second case only at the weekend. Two of my constituents complained that a neighbour of theirs had recently started to use the land just beyond their garden fence as a dump for wrecked cars. It appeared to be

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impossible to bring any effective action to stop the neighbour. When I made inquiries, the local planning authority said that it was true that complaints about that activity on the land had started at the end of last year. The owner was eventually traced and said that the use was well established and went back many years.

The owner was given six weeks to apply for an established use certificate or whatever the relevent piece of paper might be. That time limit has expired and the council will have to debate the matter to decide whether to issue an enforcement notice, which will take time. Even more time has to be allowed for an appeal. Meanwhile, the unfortunate people living in the district can look forward to a scrapyard on the back doorstep for at least another 12 months. I hope that my hon. Friend will be able to say that the Bill will bring such breaches to a halt and make those who break planning regulations subject to effective action and penalties. It is high time they were, and unless and until such regulations are seen to be a feature of the planning system, I am afraid that public confidence in the system is bound to be diminished. Our task should be to reinforce and increase that confidence, and this is our opportunity to do so.

5.15 pm

Mr. John McAllion (Dundee, East) : As a Scottish Member, I have found one of the most striking aspects of the debate so far the high number of Conservative Back Benchers participating. That is not something to which hon. Members are accustomed when dealing with Scottish business. It is refreshing to see that Conservative Back Benchers take an interest in some of the Bills that pass through the House, if not the Scottish ones. That feature of the debate also reflects the continuation of the north-south divide in this country. The south of England contains the bulk of Government Back-Bench Members, the country's wealth, population and investment, both public and private. Consequently, the south of England has the greatest pressure on its land use and the greatest conflict between environment and development needs. Therefore, it is not surprising that such wide interest is shown by southern Members in a Bill that sets out to strengthen the planning process at the expense of the operation of the free market.

I was also struck by a Conservative Member's reference to the problem of gipsy encampments in fields where there was no planning permission, and the inability of local authority officials to do anything about it. The remedy suggested was to make it a criminal offence and call in the police. The Minister gave his reasons why that would not be a good idea and why he preferred a strengthened planning enforcement system and stiffer civil penalties.

A better approach might be to tackle the underlying injustice of lack of provision for gipsies and travelling people. Such an approach is attempted in Scotland, where we try to ensure that all local authorities provide travelling people with sites. It is then possible for the police to move unofficial encampments to official sites. It is in everyone's interests-- Government, local authorities, local people, travelling people and police-- that a sufficient network of such sites should be made available to gipsies and travelling people.

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Mr. James Paice (Cambridgeshire, South-East) : It does not necessarily follow that one solves the problem by simply providing more gipsy sites. At present, South Cambridgeshire district council, part of whose area I represent, is not a designated council under the Caravan Sites Act 1968. Over the past few years, numerous new sites have been provided, both privately and publicly, in that district. It has been possible to plot on a graph an exact correlation to show that the more sites are provided, the more gipsies move into the district and park along the roads. It is not necessarily the case that, if one provides sites, one solves the problem.

Mr. McAllion : The hon. Gentleman fails to understand that not all United Kingdom districts contain sufficient networks of sites. Therefore, if one region provides more sites, it attracts more travelling people and gipsies. If there were equal provision of sites across the country, every local authority accepted its responsibility and the Government accepted their responsibility to help local authorities provide sites through funding, it would be easier to ensure that provision was evenly distributed across the country and gipsies could travel their own routes without being attracted only to districts that provided sites-- [Interruption.] The Minister with responsibility at the Scottish Office looks restless. If he wants to intervene, I shall give way.

The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Scotland (Lord James Douglas-Hamilton) : This Parliament has established a large number otravelling people's sites in Scotland. One is soon to be established in the Dundee district, and an earlier one was turned down on the grounds of representations by the hon. Member for Dundee, East (Mr. McAllion) as well as others. All the facts must be taken into account.

Mr. McAllion : The Minister is right. He did not tell the House that I was merely the candidate for my constituency when I made those representations. But that is entirely beside the point. The original site was the wrong site. It was opposed by Tayside regional council in its entirety--Labour, Tory and Scottish National party members and everyone else. A far better site was available, which will now be provided.

Getting the site right is the problem for people in the local area. There is no doubt that sufficient sites must be provided throughout the country and not only in some areas. That is the approach which the Government should take, and in Scotland they have done so. I cannot understand why such an approach has not been taken in other parts of the United Kingdom.

Mr. Robert B. Jones : I should like to correct the hon. Gentleman. It is the approach in England. It is the law. The Government provide substantial financial assistance to local authorities. My hon. Friend the Minister will intervene to give the exact figure. I cannot remember whether the Government reimburse 85 per cent. or 100 per cent. of the cost to local authorities. But we are still left with a problem as a result of the difficulty referred to by my hon. Friend the Member for Cambridgeshire, South-East (Mr. Paice) and of the weakness of the original Liberal legislation of Eric Lubbock, which was woolly-worded and has led to all sorts of difficulties since.

Mr. McAllion : The Government have had 12 years to do something about woolly-worded laws which were

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passed before they came to office, and they have not done so. If the hon. Gentleman believes that it is the Government's fault, I shall not seek to dissuade him.

The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Environment (Mr. Tim Yeo) : First, the Government meet 100 per cent. of the cost. Secondly, the number of sites provided is now greater than the number of gipsy vans in 1979. It is only because of the massive and rapid growth in the number of gipsy vans referred to by my hon. Friend the Member for Cambridgeshire, South-East (Mr. Paice) that we continue to have a surplus of vans over sites.

Mr. McAllion : There is a surplus of vans over sites, and there will always be a problem until that surplus ceases to exist, and sufficient sites are made available for gipsies. That is the key approach which the Government should take. They should not seek to criminalise people's way of life or seek to force people into ways of life that they do not wish to follow.

I have not even started the remarks that I had intended to make. Conservative Members have had me going for six minutes.

Mr. Frank Haynes (Ashfield) : Almost seven minutes now.

Mr. McAllion : Yes, as my hon. Friend says, virtually seven minutes.

The Bill has been variously described as a pot-pourri of measures, an opportunity to complete the planning jigsaw and the first opportunity in over 20 years to overhaul the land use planning system and strike a balance between the need to protect the environment and at the same time satisfy the demand for jobs, housing development and economic growth. I have no quarrel with any of those descriptions. However one describes it, the Bill will surely be judged on how it answers a number of simple questions. Does the Bill make the planning system fairer? Does it make the planning system more efficient? Does that planning system strengthen rather than weaken the environmental policies that we are developing? Above all, is that planning system subject to democratic and local control?

There can be no doubt that developers' demands, opportunities in the marketplace and possibilities of making profits do not always coincide with what is best for the local environment and countryside and, indeed, the well-being of present and future generations of local people. The tension between those two factors is very real indeed. That is why the Government had to resort to introducing enterprise zones, which are areas free of not only local taxes and rates but planning restrictions which might be placed on incoming developers.

We must always remind ourselves that we are not discussing the Bill in a vacuum. Particularly in areas such as mine, there is mass unemployment and poverty, created by the lunatic economic policies pursued by the Government. Local industries, employment and investment have collapsed. If new employment, industries and investment are to be attracted back, the enterprise zone logic means that it will have to be on the terms dictated by those who make key investment decisions. That means that there is no role whatever for planning authorities or people who live in the area and no place for any democratic input.

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Whatever the developers want, they get. If they want a retail superstore instead of a housing development, a retail superstore will be built. If they want an office block instead of a travel interchange, an office block will be built. If they want car parking instead of a local museum, car parking will be provided.

The criteria are always the same in areas similar to mine in the north, Scotland and Wales--to maximise the return on the developers' investment and to squeeze every last ounce of profit out of the investment. If that damages the local environment, defeats the aspirations of local people for different types of development and ensures that the jobs created are part- time, low-skilled, low-paid jobs, it does not matter to the Government. In areas of high unemployment, we are not given any choice. We either take it or leave it. We either take what the developers want or have to do without any investment whatever.

Of course, enteprise zones are the exception rather than the rule, but they reveal the real nature of market forces in Britain. They throw into stark relief the true instincts of developers and uncover the driving force of economic decision making in the United Kingdom. It is always profit. It is profit first, profit last and profit before everything else. That is why it is absolutely essential that in this Bill we begin to build in the necessary safeguards to protect people, places, the environment and all of us against the worst excesses of the pursuit of private profit.

The Bill is absolutely right to tackle what has been described as the weakest link in the planning system. Enforcement powers need to be strengthened. I understand entirely that local authorities must be left some discretion in the exercise of their enforcement powers. Inevitably, there are cases in which there is a genuine conflict of interests between protecting amenity and encouraging business activity in an area. A balance must be struck between the need to secure jobs and economic growth by sanctioning a particular development and the need to protect the environmental amenity of residents who happen to live immediately adjacent to the development.

The Glasgow Herald this morning contained a report about a £70 million project to build a hotel, housing, a business park, a golf course and a visitor centre at Dunblane in Scotland. Local residents, who fear that it will destroy the amenity of two local villages, have objected to it. The councillors in the surrounding area are divided on the matter. The project was given permission by only a narrow margin--a majority of one. The project has gone to appeal to the Secretary of State for Scotland.

The case at Dunblane highlights the tensions that exist in ordinary parts of the country. It shows that any legislation should give preference to allowing such decisions to be taken locally. The particular circumstances of each area vary. The surest way to facilitate a proper balance is to allow the local authority, which knows all the local circumstances, to make a local judgment. It it makes the wrong judgment, it is an elected body and it can be dealt with by the local people at the next local elections. There is also the local safeguard of an appeal to the Secretary of State to protect local interests.

It cannot be right to deny all discretion to local authorities and insist on the strict enforcement of planning legislation, when such enforcement may in itself be against the interests of local people. That is why I especially welcome clause 28, which sets up a new discretionary procedure-- the planning contravention notice--for

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Scottish planning authorities. It will allow local authorities to obtain information on suspected minor breaches of planning control and to increase the penalties for those who fail to comply with such a notice. Above all, it will allow local authorities to consult those involved, to offer advice and to make recommendations, without resort to enforcement through a stop notice. Therefore, the procedure allows for compromise rather than confrontation. All hon. Members will welcome that clause.

I also welcome the breach-of-condition notices in clause 29, which will enable local authorities to deal simply and swiftly with instances where a planning condition has been breached. There are many such instances. The right hon. Member for Woking (Mr. Onslow) referred to some of them. What are essentially businesses are sometimes run from the front gardens of local houses or the streets of local housing estates in clear breach of planning law, which requires planning permission for such activities.

Such activities clutter up and disfigure the environment for all the neighbours who have to put up with the activity. Too often, the existing procedures for dealing with such problems are insufficiently clear and flexible or unduly cumbersome, so far too often, nothing is done about the selfish practices of the few, which are allowed to proceed unchecked and make everyone's life a misery. It is to be hoped that the new breach-of- condition notices will enable local authorities to take swift and effective action in such instances, and to give justice to local people.

I welcome too the provisions of part IV, which improve home loss payments to those whose homes are compulsorily purchased for new road and rail developments. I only hope that those encourage the Government to make the kind of road and rail investments in Scotland which have been required for the past decade but which have so far gone largely unnoticed.

The major quarrel that Opposition Members have with the Bill is not so much what is in it as what is not. No power is given to local authorities to require environmental assessments from developers where the local authorities believe that such investments are necessary. There is no ending of Crown immunity. Surely, at a time when the very survival of the planet is at stake, no one, no matter how high, should be exempt from planning control. Nor is there any increased involvement of ordinary people in the planning system. That system needs to be opened up to democratic influence, and planning decisions must be taken openly and in a manner which allows them to be accountable to those affected by them.

Above all, the Bill fails because planning law as it now stands allows the indefensible to continue. For example, any decision by Nirex to site a nuclear dump at Dounreay in Scotland will be taken in opposition to the local planning authorities, local opinion and public opinion in Scotland. Such a decision can only be taken if there is a Tory Secretary of State for Scotland to side with Nirex against the Scottish people. Any planning system which allows that farcical situation to persist cannot be defended, although the Government try to do precisely that. Even after the Bill is passed, that indefensible situation will continue.

The Government have had more than enough opportunity to do something about that, and they have

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failed to do so. It is at least in part because of that failure that the Government will fail too when they finally find the courage to face the British people.

5.31 pm

Miss Emma Nicholson (Torridge and Devon, West) : Britain suffers from a lack of space. We are a vastly overcrowded and highly mobile population. When I looked up the figures this morning for this brief speech, I saw that 40 per cent. of the population of Islington moves every year. None the less, it is tempting to think that they are forced to do so because they have one of the worst Labour councils in Britain. That may be the mobile gipsy population that has been mentioned. However, the rest of us move once every five years and inevitably, therefore, there is great difficulty in finding enough room to accommodate all of us in the areas in which we wish to live. Planning controls of any sort are a large interference in the way in which people move around. As a Conservative, I regard planning controls as an extreme interference in the marketplace, forcing up the price of land and resulting in house prices being too high. Essentially, therefore, I deeply regret the need for any planning controls at all. They give power over local lives and livelihoods which almost matches that of the mediaeval landlord.

Parish councils--the bodies most representative of local views--have no power and scant influence over irrevocable decisions which destroy their lands and carpet them with concrete. I should like parish councils to have some sort of planning teeth, even if they are only milk teeth, with a delaying ability. District councils wield the real power, but most decisions there are taken by officials and not by elected members. The only weapon of the county councils is the county structure plan. Although county councils consistently oppose the districts they are fundamentally powerless.

I will give some examples of what I see as weaknesses in the current legislation and why this new debate is badly needed. They have, of necessity, to be constituency examples ; I make no apology for that, because planning is so much a local matter. I use them to put forward five points of national importance.

Compensation for farmers who are not always willing sellers is currently determined under present use. Why should we not ask privatised companies to pay a premium, or even development value, where it is clear that the land is to be developed? Roadford reservoir in my constituency was opened last year by the former Secretary of State for the Environment, my right hon. Friend the chairman of the Conservative party. The inspector at the inquiry authorising that huge development said that all development subsequent to the reservoir being created should be modest and in harmony with the beauty of the place. Plans are now being put forward and will probably be implemented, including a large time-share hotel and probably other property developments. I should have liked the farmers, who were not all willing sellers, to be compensated at those prices.

Tenant farmers have an even rougher time. Many of them are pushed out of the business completely because they are not compensated within our current planning regulations at sufficient value to enable them to go to another farm. Despite the consultation paper, which I and the National Farmers Union warmly welcomed, that my right hon. Friend the Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries

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and Food announced three weeks ago, those of us with farmers in our constituencies know how difficult it is for a tenant farmer to find a tenancy. It will continue to be difficult for young farmers and older existing tenant farmers to find new farms, despite the fact that the new agreements should be more favourable towards them. I should like to see tenant farmers treated more kindly in the new debate. Involvement is of vast importance. The Opposition have called for a right of appeal by the third party. That will be difficult, but I welcome the continuing exercise of the calling-in procedure where the county structure plan is not being adhered to. Within half a mile of where I live in Winkleigh a large development is postulated on a disused airfield which the district council tells us will incorporate 1,000 houses, another time-share hotel and a golf course. Half a mile into a different district council over the boundary is another plan outside the county structure plan for another time-share hotel, another golf course and more development.

I value the county structure plan immensely and great thought should be given to going against it. It matters to me and, I am sure, to other hon. Members because it reflects local discussion, local creation and a local plan. It has gone through the parish, district and county council structure. It is the one part of the planning process which genuinely involves all levels of local people. That is why I find it so important and beg my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary of State to continue to focus strongly on the calling-in procedure. Other hon. Members have talked about the criminalisation of unauthorised development. I am not sure whether criminalising it will help. That would be a heavy weapon to use on something that my constituents and I find not just irritating but somehow worse than that. West Devon borough council is scrupulous in its planning processes, but we have another planning authority--Dartmoor national park committee--which has sometimes let unauthorised development go through.

The village of Mary Tavy is a case in point. The Dartmoor national park committee tells me that stopping such developments relies on neighbours spotting things going wrong. That conjures up a vision of neighbours running up and down with rulers, measuring roof heights and trying to see what is going on--a ridiculous situation. We have two planning authorities for one patch of land. Dartmoor national park committee has allowed unauthorised development to continue even after it has been pointed out that it is outside the agreed plan that the committee itself passed.

My answer would be slightly different from criminalisation, which has already been proposed. I believe that at least one third of the membership of a national park committee should be elected from the parish councils which encircle the national park. It is the local people who care--not those who are nominated or delegated by other bodies to sit upon the committee.

I hope that in Standing Committee we shall debate the importance of architecture. How can planning people, who are elected councillors, know sufficient about architecture to be able immediately to unravel plans put before them at open council meetings? Could we not have guidelines or rules dealing with the pitch of the roofs in a village, or the type of materials used? In Devon we have veritable mushroom farms of drably designed little bungalows, which are very unappealing visually and which

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neither reflect the local architecture nor enhance the villages. They provide homes for local people, but what will future generations think of the way in which we have allowed the individuality of the United Kingdom to be so diluted?

Mr. David Nicholson (Taunton) : My hon. Friend has made some excellent points, but the last was particularly important. I raised it in a debate about two years ago. Perhaps Department of the Environment rules lay it down, but many modern constructions are of a size which dwarfs the traditional cottages and farm settlements. I hope that my hon. Friend will persist with the point.

Miss Nicholson : I wholly support my hon. Friend. The point is of keen importance in the western area, not just to us but to those who holiday there and to the many thousands who want to live in our beautiful countryside, because they believe that it is still an area of outstanding natural beauty. It is indeed, but we need to work a great deal harder to keep it so. Back-pedalling needs to take place on matters such as architectural guidelines. It can be done. The French do it. Why cannot we see what our friends across the channel are up to?

Environmental assessment should be at the heart of our planning system. It is a Government policy priority, but I should like to see it on the face of the Bill. Land today must have multi-faceted use. It is not enough to say that it will be for ever agricultural, for ever Dartmoor national park land, for ever heath, or uplands or lowlands, or for ever covered with houses. Things can change rapidly ; bad buildings can be pulled down.

The problem is ownership. Here I differ strenuously from Her Majesty's Opposition, who speak so gaily of regional planning, regional ownership and of regional requirements over local people. As a true Conservative, I believe that decisions should be taken as close to home as possible. What matters is the ownership of a project. It is a case of "me and mine" being so much more valuable to a human being than "us and ours". Certainly, in the west, I cannot think of Bristol or Bath as having anything to do with Devon. I sincerely hope that we have no regional planning godfather--that would be a very unfriendly prospect.

The Minister stated that the Bill was basically good, and I strongly agree. I hope that I, and colleagues fortunate enough to serve on the Standing Committee, can make it an even better Bill. 5.44 pm

Mr. David Bellotti (Eastbourne) : I welcome quite a number of the reforms in the Bill ; I hope that in Committee they will be improved upon.

One of the biggest points missing from the Bill is environmental impact assessment. In every constituency, we know of developments which have taken place without anyone assessing their impact until it was too late. Very often, there is a highway impact because thousands of cars go through streets which are not equipped to take them. Often, the impact on smaller communities, perhaps rural villages, is not seen until it is far too late. It is essential for an impact assessment to be done on every development before it is approved. In a more micro manner, there are impacts from shops. For example, we see litter from takeaway shops in the nearby streets. Trolleys are wheeled half a mile from

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supermarkets and left in the streets. Had environmental impact assessments been done earlier, regulations could have been attached to the planning applications to ensure that the local environment was not affected. Whether it be highways or supermarket trolleys that cause the problem, if an environmental impact assessment were done first, it would lead to better results for the local communities, however large or small.

The Bill has fudged the enforcement question. I should have thought that the House would want unanimously to condemn any person or party who deliberately flouts rules by producing a plan in contravention of what has been set in concrete by the local authority. If that is not made a criminal act, we are encouraging it. I hope that, in Committee, the Government will consider criminalising such action ; that would be a step towards improving enforcement.

The Bill has also fudged the whole question of Crown immunity. Why should the Crown be immune from regulations which the rest of the people have to follow? I hope that, in Committee, the Government will permit a debate on that. It has always seemed unfair to my hon. Friends and me that the Crown can get away with not being subject to the laws it makes.

We should also consider the way in which planning regulations are interpreted locally. It has not been mentioned so far, but the debate impinges largely on the review which the Secretary of State is undertaking of the structure of local government. Far too often, a district council, having considered plans submitted to it, thinks that the only reason for refusal is a highway ground and leaves the decision to the county council. When it gets to the county council, it takes the view that, because the district council has considered the plan and has not objected, it would be foolish for it to object on that ground alone. That has happened often in East Sussex, with many examples in Eastbourne.

Were multi-purpose authorities to be introduced in the review of local government, that not only would help to speed up planning applications but would lead to better decisions that were better informed.

The comment of the Opposition spokesman, the hon. Member for Hammersmith (Mr. Soley), about regional authorities is helpful. It has been my view for a long time that local authorities should not be judge and jury on their own planning applications. The results of that can be seen across the country, again certainly in East Sussex. It would be interesting and helpful to consider submitting a planning application by a local authority to a regional authority rather than to the Secretary of State. Regional authorities have much more local knowledge than the Secretary of State.

In the context of the review of local government, it is important to acknowledge that, time after time, local council officers do not have the time to follow up what happens to planning applications after they have been approved. They are unable to check what is happening on the ground. That is due to the Government. Government grants to local authorities are such that local authorities have to consider carefully the allocation of tasks within local government departments. All too often, there are insufficient staff in planning authority enforcement departments. I hope that, in his review, the Secretary of

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State will look again at the help the Government are giving to local authorities so that they are able to enforce their planning decisions.

Recently local authorities have not been helped--this certainly applies to my constituency--by what is referred to as twin tracking. If a developer submits a planning application to a local authority, one often finds that about eight weeks later he submits another one. That places an enormous burden on local authority staff. Moreover, it confuses local people. If they are objecting to or making comments about a planning application, they are confused if another planning application relating to the same land is submitted. Twin tracking ought to be dealt with by the Government in Committee. Before Third Reading, I hope that they will come forward with proposals to avoid it.

I hope that the Government will also examine the question of planning gain. When local council officers discuss plans with developers, they often gain something that will benefit the local community. However, due to this country's economic situation, the land is often sold on ; the gain is subsequently lost in the ensuing negotiations. If a planning gain is obtained for the benefit of the community it must be passed on if future applications are made concerning land for which planning consent was previously obtained. In Sussex, as in other parts of the country, we have a beautiful coastline, and we want it to be preserved as far as possible. A plethora of Government bodies have an interest in the coastline. Therefore, it is impossible for Sussex to protect its coastline when planning applications are made. I refer specifically to the Crumbles, an enormous development in Eastbourne. It will certainly lead to a much poorer coastline.

When planning applications are made, local authorities ought to be provided with far greater powers over coastal development. I visited another coastal area about 10 days ago, the Ribble estuary, in the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Southport (Mr. Fearn). The planning approval granted for developments in the area has caused considerable concern about wildlife in the estuary. No assessment has been made of the impact of those developments upon it. Local authorities ought to have the power to take environmental matters into consideration.

The Bill does not provide for public participation. I served on local authorities for a number of years. I was always surprised by the fact that the general public felt that they were genuinely participating in the planning process when I knew that in many cases they were not. Members of the public ought to have the right to address planning committees on issues that cause them concern. The Government should consider granting them that right.

As for the shire part of East Sussex county council, particularly Lewes district council, on which I served as a member, I was appalled by the fact that parish council comments were often reported verbally and extremely briefly. Their comments were not given the same weight as those made by developers when submitting their planning applications. I was often surrounded by maps and beautiful drawings provided by the developer, but I heard only a few brief verbal comments on behalf of the parish council, which plays an important part in the planning process. It ought to be given more credence. The ability of third parties to appeal is another matter that ought to be considered in Committee. They should be given the right to appeal when the permission granted is

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contrary to the local plan. Such a right would be seen to work, and would be fair both to those who are in favour of a development and to those who oppose it.

All hon. Members could refer to constituency examples of plans that have gone wrong and of people who have a justifiable grievance about what has happened, subsequent to the granting of approval. We could all refer to local authority staff who have a very difficult task to perform in trying to get the plans altered late in the day, or enforcing them after they have been approved. The Bill ought to provide that, if constituents draw planning irregularities to the attention of their local authority, they can be put right. In my constituency, planning permission has been granted for garage premises. The cars being repaired stand on the highway in a state of disrepair. They are taken in at night and put out again in the morning. Garage owners will always obey any police instruction. Moreover, when the local authority's environmental health officer and planning officer visit a garage, the garage owner always complies for the time being, but thereafter the situation deteriorates again. When applications are made for garage premises, we ought to be able to ensure that regulations are in place that will prevent that. Houses have been built in Eastbourne that are a metre nearer the road than they ought to be. Planning officers are in a delimma about enforcement. The consequence for local people is that, in order to keep a road the right width, the pavement has to be very narrow, so it is not as safe as it ought to be. The Bill ought to enable local authorities to take all the action that they need to improve the local environment.

The test in Committee will be whether the voices of our constituents on both smaller matters and larger structural matters are heard and listened to. The test will also be whether the House decides to support local authorities that have a difficult enforcement task to perform. The question whether local authorities and our constituents are to be supported ought to be uppermost in the Government's mind in Committee.

Several Hon. Members rose--

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