Examination of Witnesses (Questions 560
- 580)
WEDNESDAY 13 OCTOBER 2004
MR KELVIN
MACDONALD
AND MR
DAVID BARRACLOUGH
Q560 Paul Flynn: The question of
the availability of land and release of land. You have some very
interesting figures talking about what the effect of this is when
new land is available and you talk about, I believe, moderate
impact on prices, but it would seem to be a significant impact
and a widening of the availability to people you see as an extra
thing: 4% of households on average would be able to buy a home
with the release of land. The amount of land clearly is finite,
but it seems to be a demand for land by various people. Most families—and
it would depend—have possibly half an acre for their homes
and gardens but, if you happen to be the Duke of Buckley or the
Duke of Cornwall or the Duke of Westminster, you will have 100,000
acres up to nearly 300,000 acres, which is not only not productive
but has probably a negative effect on the economy, it produces
possibly 1% for farming in terms of GDP, but the three people
I have mentioned are also entitled to £10 million up to £20
million in subsidies from the taxpayer. Is this kind of inequality
and disparity and the under-use of agricultural land generally
which could be used more productively for housing or other purposes
a factor that you would like to see addressed or is it entirely
a matter of planning and making the land available at a price
that is attractive to the earls and dukes?
Mr MacDonald: To start with the
figures, I think what we are saying here, without looking it up
again, is that we were quoting research which looked at the release
of land and the effect on house prices and trying to say at least
it is not as direct as one might think it is. Again, to take a
fairly trite example, as we know, in London, house prices may
be even falling, certainly the increase is ameliorating. We have
not just released a huge tranche of land on to the London housing
market. There is a whole range of other factors that affect house
prices. Planning is one of them and we are not denying that, we
are not stepping outside market forces, but we are saying that
if people think that if you release half of the south east, then
you are going to bring down house prices very significantly, then
that is only half the picture. So, just to clarify that. Land
ownership is another factor which I am wary of getting into.
Q561 Chairman: I should stay wary
if I were you. I am not sure that it is strictly relevant to our
inquiry.
Mr MacDonald: What planning did
in 1947 was to nationalise the right to develop, it did not nationalise
land itself, which was a very subtle distinction and I think we
are staying on that side of the argument rather than the other
side of the argument.
Q562 Paul Flynn: The situation is
that 70% of the land of the country is in the hands of a tiny
number of people and the rest of the population are confined to
a minute share of that.
Mr MacDonald: I am sure you know
that the New Statesman is running a campaign on land ownership
and housing and it is interesting that a lot of the responses
that are coming back is that it is not the land ownership that
is to blame, it is the planning system.
Q563 Paul Flynn: I am aware of this
and there was a very interesting book by Mr Kevin Cahill on this
subject a few years ago on how the rich and royal do have an enormous
amount of land which is actually under-used. You support the idea
of a national housing strategy as part of the UK spatial development
framework. Could you give us an outline of what your proposals
are as to the framework.
Mr MacDonald: Some of it is jargon,
so do not worry about the individual words.
Q564 Paul Flynn: We will prepare
ourselves!
Mr MacDonald: What we are calling
for is a UK wide, in this case—we need to start with England
as a whole as a good start—set of policies which have, apologies
for the jargon, a spatial implication related to location. This
is one of the starting points. We have a whole tranche of Government
policies which impact in different ways in different locations
but are not articulated in a way that you can demonstrate those
impacts. So, we need to bring those together for a start. We need
to look at the infrastructure needs of this country, not just
in terms of transport but in terms of deep water facilities and
in terms of water catchment, all these things, on a national basis,
not even on a regional basis, before we can start. We also need
to have a far better overview, coming back to the point of your
question, about the distribution of housing in this country. The
sustainable communities plan in a way could be accused of being
a south-east based plan. We have the northern way but it came
much later. If we had a national view of housing and the distribution
of housing in national terms, not just in south-east terms in
the four growth areas but in national terms, we might find and
I am sure we would find that some of that housing growth would
benefit other areas of the country far more than it would benefit
the south-east, but we do not have a forum within which that view
can be put forward. We certainly do not have an official forum
and we do not have an official planner. I am not necessarily talking
about old-style land use plan where you say, "We will have
a motorway here and we will have a port there", much as I
would love to do that, but I am talking about a set of policies
that take a national view as opposed to a series of regional or
local views.
Q565 Paul Flynn: I can remember these
land use plans as very great job creation programmes for planners
and I am sure this one would keep you going until way past your
retirement. I can remember the Monmouthshire land use transfer
plan that was published, I believe, in 1974 which forecast a motorway
going from Gwent right into the middle of Bristol that never came
about. Are the Government receptive to this idea? Do they see
it as practical or is it another case of planning upon planning
and report upon report that goes on ad infinitum?
Mr MacDonald: That is a key question.
They are not welcomed with open arms at the moment and one of
the reasons why they are not is that they do not think it is practical.
A short diversion, I hope: one of the ways in which we are trying
to prove this wrong is to start the process ourselves of starting
to think about the data needs and the policy needs and how you
put this on a land-use base in different sorts of ways to try
and persuade the ODPM that, yes, it is practical. If this is one
of your worries, then the process is perfectly feasible. Having
said that, we know that the ODPM is undertaking a project at the
moment looking at inter-regional trends saying that if these trends
continue on a straight line basis, then what will be the effect
on policy? So, they are starting to have this thinking that crosses
regional boundaries and so we always have great hopes that they
will see the light.
Q566 Mr Thomas: I think I am right
in remembering that there is a Wales spatial development plan.
Mr MacDonald: Yes.
Q567 Mr Thomas: Is that the sort
of thing you are talking about for the UK as a whole?
Mr MacDonald: Absolutely. There
is a Wales spatial plan and nowadays a Scottish one as well. Northern
Ireland has its regional strategy and the Irish Republic has a
national—
Q568 Mr Thomas: So, it is not the
regions or the nations, it is ODPM.
Mr MacDonald: It is England that
does not have one.
Q569 Paul Flynn: How does sustainable
development including sustainable construction fit into this plan?
Mr MacDonald: In its broadest
sense, using the Egan definition and using the ODPM's own definition,
in the sustainable community's plan it will be at the heart of
this.
Q570 Paul Flynn: What is your view
of the sustainable communities plan? Do you think it is strong
enough to encourage decent and good development?
Mr MacDonald: Not in itself. I
think it is a good start, having criticised it a bit for being
south-east based. It is a good starting point because it has started
this thinking process in a lot of people's minds and it brings
a lot of different aspects together. In itself, I suppose one
of the difficulties is that, in their definition and indeed in
definition, there is almost internal conflict in that definition.
Can you achieve these sustainable communities when you are trying
to achieve high and stable economic growth and you are trying
to achieve the protection of the environment when you are trying
to get rid of social exclusion? A lot of things appear mutually
contradictory. I think that we need to put it into practice more
to see how it is going to work. In itself, it started a process
but it is not strong enough in itself to change practice that
much.
Q571 Paul Flynn: Do you see the role
of planners as vital in ensuring that sustainable development
in housing within the context of Barker takes place? Is that one
of your jobs as a planner?
Mr Barraclough: Yes. Of course,
people quibble with the use of the term but there is a sort of
statutory purpose in the Planning and Compulsory Purchase Act
to promote sustainable development. The new planning system at
both regional and local level requires a sustainability appraisal
which has never been part of the system previously and that obviously
will have to embrace the requirements of the EU Strategic Environmental
Assessment Directive. So, I guess we are really looking very seriously
at the planning system to deliver sustainable development
Q572 Paul Flynn: Part of the criticism
of Government is the claim that they have been focusing too much
on building houses too cheaply and too quickly to the detriment
of environmental considerations. Is this a criticism with which
you would agree?
Mr Barraclough: There is no subsidy
for proper planning.
Mr MacDonald: Yes, it does come
back to planning. In a way—and do not take this wrong—it
would be good if they had built more houses more cheaply, so maybe
they are concentrating on that in policy terms but we have not
had the outputs yet. Certainly, the overall agenda does seem to
be focused on certain things at certain times. Quite rightly in
many ways because of what I was saying earlier about my own view
of the housing situation in this country. We are focusing on the
moment but perhaps it is going too far. There is a Government
consultation and an ODPM consultation at the moment encouraging
local planning authorities to look at their employment allocations
to see if they can be turned over for housing. In some cases,
maybe they can but, if we are looking at truly sustainable communities
where people have access to jobs, then you still need land allocated
for employment. You cannot just focus like a sort of narrow spotlight
on one particular policy issue. Sustainable communities, if it
means anything, means that you do not just focus on one particular
outcome.
Chairman: Could I possibly intervene
to get us to move on because I, for one, am going to have to leave
in about six minutes' time—I do apologise for that—and
there may well be other issues arising from that dialogue which
we might like to take up with you in writing, if that is at all
possible.
Q573 Sue Doughty: I would like to
turn to the Egan Skills Review for sustainable development because
Barker commented that 90% of companies are experiencing a shortage
of skills. Her interim report concluded that a modest growth in
output would require 70,000 more workers in the house building
industry and a substantial expansion could increase this up to
280,000. When Egan looked at what skills would be required for
sustainable communities, he found a big shortage of generic skills
amongst both core professionals and amongst sustainable skills
and this was in about 100 occupations in total ranging right across
the professions, even including town planners and transport planners.
So he suggested the national skills centre. You contributed to
this report; what did you feel about his conclusions?
Mr MacDonald: In some senses,
they are totally right. Whether a national skills centre is the
right answer is another matter but, with only six minutes, I will
not go into that. In some senses he is right, there is a need
for different skills to be brought in. Where we thought he was
not necessarily right was in recognising the work that was being
done already particularly on generic skills. There are far more
cross-professional degrees now and there is far more concentration
on the skills that Egan mentions as being generic, project management
and all those sorts of things. In many ways, this has been at
the heart of planning education. Having been an academic in a
previous existence, I know this. I do not think that Egan has
recognised this but we are not complacent of course. We, for example,
have instituted a one-year fast-track degree for planners, a postgraduate
one-year degree for planners, which has come on stream this year
with the help of the ODPM who have provided bursaries for students
on that. They are all full up. So, we are changing our agenda
to meet this and maybe the situation is not as totally bleak as
Egan would paint it.
Q574 Sue Doughty: That is very interesting
because, bearing in mind what you have just said, obviously there
are steps that you are putting in place, but realistically how
long is it going to take to get not only the depth in the skills
but the whole breadth in terms of the number of people we are
going to need?
Mr MacDonald: In planning terms,
I cannot remember the exact figure but I think most recent studies
have shown that we are something like 4,000 professionals down
on what we need and I can check that if the Committee wish. So,
with an output of I am not sure how many, 250 a year, it would
take eight years. What we need to do as well is to say, can the
job be done by bringing other people in, by not just focusing
on the narrow professional agenda but involving communities and
involving others in doing this job as well and getting away with
these very narrow professional boundaries which I think the RTPI
has done already?
Q575 Sue Doughty: This worries me,
particularly with the skills we need in terms of management and
ownerships of sustainable buildings, not only just the design
and builds but the long-term ownership. Sustainable buildings
seem to be a particular problem and all the buildings have this
particular problem in getting over that hump where people feel
confident about investing in sustainability because it is not
just what we want, it is what developers are prepared to go for
and where people owning the buildings want to know that they are
doing the right thing. Do you see an impact on that to have actually
the confidence to go forward right from the beginning saying,
"Yes, we are going to be build sustainably"?
Mr MacDonald: I think in a way
it is the other way round, that if we have strong enough planning
and building regulations and other policies, then the skills will
have to follow. Perhaps we are in an interim period where certainly
the proponents, the evangelists of new types of building and new
schemes and modern methods of construction and all these things,
are ready to take the field, but perhaps it is too easy to resort
back to the old ways of doing things and the new ways do need,
as you say, a whole new set of skills and a whole new set of competences
as well, but I think it is not worth waiting until the skills
are in place. We do need to take a lead through the planning system
and other ways to set that atmosphere where the skills are going
to find a home.
Q576 Mr Challen: You say in your
memorandum in response to the question about ensuring sustainable
infrastructure, transport and water supply, happening in a timely
and efficient manner but this has always been somewhat problematic
because of the number of players involved in the planning, delivery
and infrastructure of the major developments, each with their
own programmes and priorities. Which of these players do you want
to see removed from the process?
Mr Barraclough: I do not think
that we were talking about removing anyone, just looking for mechanisms
which meant they would get their act together better. Again, it
sounds as though I have an awful lot of faith and confidence in
this new planning system that they have just embarked on but the
very fact that the new development plans are to be spatial plans
and the local planning authority is charged with the duty of having
regard to or integrating and bringing together the spatial aspects
of the programmes over the whole range of players, whether it
is the utility companies or the house builders or whoever, I think
there is some prospect there that you will actually get to a situation
where the services provision, for instance, for a new development
is actually coming forward in sympathy with the—
Q577 Mr Challen: What about the hierarchy?
Is it regional level or Government level? The people earlier talked
about quality of life assessments, they are talking about local
people being involved and there is clearly a mismatch now, is
there not?
Mr Barraclough: It is above. What
I have just said applies to regional spatial strategies, so the
broad strategy and the broad programme for development in the
region should be embodied in the regional spatial strategy to
which the water companies and Transco and all the other—
Q578 Mr Challen: But not local people.
How can they become involved at that level?
Mr Barraclough: That is a very
good question and ODPM expects the regional planning bodies or
regional assemblies to involve local people. I think, as Kelvin
said earlier, there has to be a combination of bottom-up and top-down
in the formation of regional policies. So, to that extent—
Q579 Mr Challen: It sounds like a
somersault.
Mr Barraclough: It is saying,
for example, that if it had been at local planning level, there
are real problems in achieving a particular . . . The housing
capacity, if you like, is way below the figure that would naturally
go to that district, then that has to feed into the process, so
the regional strategy does not overload that district with a totally
impractical number of houses from a physical provision point of
view. It is cyclical rather than somersault!
Q580 Mr Challen: I hope so!
Mr MacDonald: Just to add a couple
of points, Kate Barker spoke at our national conference in the
summer and she said at the end of her talk that, if she had been
starting this report again, it would have focused on infrastructure
far more. I suppose where you involve the people is through the
planning process. What is happening is that places are getting
planning permission—Kate Barker says 40,000 homes in the
south east are held up because of infrastructure problems, not
for planning problems. So, if you involve the people in the planning
process, then you do not expect the Highways Agency or others
then to start imposing conditions after that democratic process
has taken place.
Chairman: Thank you very much indeed
and, as I say, we may be writing to you with a few further questions.
You have been most helpful this afternoon and we are grateful
to you for coming.
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