Examination of Witnesses (Questions 240-259)
13 DECEMBER 2004
LORD MCINTOSH
OF HARINGEY,
KEITH HILL
MP AND MR
ALASTAIR DONALD
Q240 Mr Cummings: Would you encourage
them to do so?
Lord McIntosh of Haringey: I do
not think I need to because, as I have said, I do not think I
need to any more because I think they do.
Q241 Mr Cummings: How do they do this?
Are there any agreed procedures?
Lord McIntosh of Haringey: I believe
that they encourage the local people to write in; I believe that
a lot of representations are made to CABE by local organisations
and as far as I know, the situation is entirely satisfactory.
Q242 Chairman: Would it be of some concern
to you to learn that some local groups do not quite feel that
and feel that somehow they are not in the loop when it comes to
advice from CABE and that some of that advice is given behind
the scenes and they never really find out what it amounts to.
Lord McIntosh of Haringey: Well,
that may happen in some cases. If so, it is a pity, because, except
in the case that I was referring to last week, which was certainly
in commercial confidence and was brought in confidence, I think
it is desirable that they should be as transparent as they possibly
can.
Keith Hill: Although it is worth
pointing out of course, that once an application is formally submitted
then the views of CABE are published and can become a material
consideration.
Q243 Mr Cummings: In an interview last
week, CABE's incoming chairman said he is quite happy with the
way CABE's design review system works and does not propose to
change it. In the light of much of our evidence, which highlights
the lack of transparency and suspicions about potential conflicts
of interests, do you share his confidence?
Lord McIntosh of Haringey: I am
sure that John Sorrell, when he comes to work with CABE, will
examine and learn a lot more about the design review process.
I am sure that he will, as I have, observe the process in action.
I imagine that he will be as impressed with the quality of the
design review process as I have been. As to what views he might
form about the way in which it should be conducted, that is a
matter for him, which he will no doubt discuss with his fellow
commissioners.
Q244 Chris Mole: As ODPM is CABE's major
funder, yet it is accountable to DCMS, so you write to cheques
and the noble Lord calls the tune, is it not an odd situation?
Keith Hill: I think you slightly
understate the contribution in funding terms made by DCMS. ODPM
funds at a rate of about £2 for every £1: DCMS contributes
and of course there are other government departments who also
make contributions, though not on the scale of either of these
departments. We are entirely content with the arrangement. DCMS
are the sponsor and they are accountable to Parliament and public
accountability seems to me entirely fair.
Q245 Chris Mole: So how do you co-ordinate
your input into policy setting and supervising CABE?
Keith Hill: There is a lot of
practical joint working. Obviously as ministers, we operate in
our day-to-day contacts primarily through officials; both DCMS
officials and ODPM officials work perfectly happy together. This
seems to me really to be a very good example of what we are all
constantly exhorted to achieve, which is joined-up government
and it does seem to me that DCMS and ODPM fulfil complementary
roles. DCMS has its focus on architecture and on young people
and on improving public spaces, they are focused on culture. Our
culture, our emphasis is obviously on the broader aspects of regeneration
and housing development.
Q246 Chris Mole: Are you not worried
that there can be some potential conflicts of issue there. How
do you ensure concerted coherent management when perhaps your
interest in regeneration may clash with some of the conservation
perspectives of DCMS?
Keith Hill: In practice it does
not pose itself very frequently as an issue. My Rt Hon and noble
Friend has referred to the statistics on satisfaction with the
work of CABE: 87% of local authorities expressed themselves satisfied
with CABE's work. It is interesting that on the basis of analysis
over the past three years, 83% of schemes have been modified in
the light of CABE's input, which suggests a degree of satisfaction.
Only about six of the projects looked at by CABE each year seem
to provoke a degree of contention, which is a very low proportion
of the work that CABE does. So in practice we do not find that
these issues of conflict or contention arise very much.
Lord McIntosh of Haringey: I think
it is worth putting on the record that we do consult ODPM on all
appointments to the commission and we would not go ahead if there
were disagreements; we would act accordingly if there were disagreements.
Not that there have been disagreements, so the question has not
arisen.
Q247 Sir Paul Beresford: I think you
would possibly agree that this is an area which is fairly subjective.
Would you suspect that the success that CABE has had is because
it is very much easier to take a plan through a committee of a
planning authority, from the point of view of the developer as
well as the planning committee, if it has a stamp on it that says
"CABE was here" so to speak?
Keith Hill: There is absolutely
no doubt that in its period of activity CABE has acquired a very
high reputation and my experience is that local authorities are
keen to get the CABE imprimatur as well. I was very interested
when last Thursday I visited, in a rather hectic day, Chester
in the company of my honourable Friend the Member for Chester.
I then went on to Liverpool and ended up in Sheffield. In Chester,
where I saw some very attractive new development and regeneration
work, I asked whether they had consulted CABE. The answer was
yes. In Liverpool, where I was shown the models for the extremely
ambitious Paradise Street development, again I asked the question,
and yes, CABE looked at the matter there. I saw what I can only
describe as a breathtaking development in the centre of Sheffield
and again it emerged that CABE had been involved. I think local
authorities go to CABE because they cherish its advice and it
adds confidence.
Q248 Sir Paul Beresford: I am sure these
were magnificent developments, but they could have been magnificent
developments on paper before CABE came along. I do not know and
I suspect you do not either. Would you not agree that one of the
difficulties CABE has is that their position is such that local
authorities and developers tend to use them just to make it easier
to get through their planning?
Keith Hill: Equally I have no
evidence to suggest that. What I do know, however, is that CABE
each year looks at some 500 projects of significance and, as I
said earlier, 83% of those projects are modified in some fashion
as a result of the input of CABE. So it does seem to me that CABE
is having a material influence on the projects, presumably for
the good.
Q249 Sir Paul Beresford: That could equally
support my position as well.
Keith Hill: It seems to me that
if you are asking whether it is easier to take something through
the planning process if it has been improved, then I think the
answer is probably yes and I think that is probably right as well.
Sir Paul Beresford: That is not what
I was saying.
Q250 Christine Russell: Can I assure
my friend across the table that the input of CABE on the particular
design which the minister saw last week did improve it considerably.
The question I should like to ask is that I believe last year
you generously disbursed about £50 million to local planning
authorities for improving the planning system. Do you actually
know what they spent that money on and was any of that money spent
by any of the local authorities on actually improving the standard
of in-house planning designers or was it all spent on processing
planning applications perhaps more rapidly?
Keith Hill: I think you are referring
to planning delivery grant.
Q251 Christine Russell: Yes.
Keith Hill: In the current spending
review period this is running at £350 million and I rather
suspect, without having the figures immediately to hand, that
it was considerably more than £50 million which was disbursed
in that year. You ask me if we know whether it goes into—
Q252 Christine Russell: I think the £50
million was referred to in your report as being spent on employing
more planning officers. So really the question is what those additional
planning officers were doing. Were they simply employed in order
to process the applications more quickly or were perhaps some
of them employed in order to improve the in-house design skills
of the department?
Keith Hill: Since we know from
surveys that some 46% of the 98% of planning delivery grant which
is ploughed back into the local planning system went on staffing
purposes, then £50 million probably does sound right. As
to whether it went into architects or urban design consultants,
I have to say that I do not know the answer to that. What we do
know is that about 15% of authorities only have that kind of expertise
at their disposal, which is very low, which is too low, but I
think probably reflects the very scarce resources that local authorities
have had for their planning departments historically and also,
I suspect, the relative scarcity of that kind of expertise. I
say absolutely clearly that we would like to see that figure boosted.
However, we are very encouraged by the fact that now some 43%
of local authorities have local design champions. These are, generally
speaking, elected members of course, but that represents a doubling
over a period of two years. It indicates, like the fact that about
two thirds of authorities are now running local design award schemes,
that is also a doubling in a two-year period, that local authorities
are taking these issues of design very seriously indeed.
Q253 Christine Russell: But during the
1980s and 1990s so many local authorities actually got rid of
their architects' departments, they were privatised or transferred
or whatever. Some local authorities now argue that the resources
that ODPM put into CABE should in fact be given to them to re-employ
architects and designers. How do you answer that—not criticism—comment
that the money would be better spent by local authorities, rather
than by CABE?
Keith Hill: I think we ought to
have some notion of scale on this. As you know, currently ODPM
invest something like £8 million into CABE; £6 million
for core funding, about £2 million actually specifically
to improve skills in exactly the areas that we are talking about.
Although these are significant sums, even against the sums of
investment available through planning delivery grant that I mentioned
earlier, they are not vast. I think actually I would certainly
want to defend the investment which goes through CABE which serves
broader purposes, but actually certainly serves both to enhance
skills and also raise the profile of design at the local level.
Q254 Christine Russell: May I move on
to ask you about the old versus the new. Several amenity societies
and conservation groups have given us evidence saying that CABE
is only interested in new buildings and icon new buildings at
that. How do you answer that criticism?
Lord McIntosh of Haringey: I think
that CABE and English Heritage are complementary in this. I was
listening from the back to the evidence from Richard Simmons and
Paul Finch and I agree with all of what they said. I think that
it is important to have heritage champions making their views
known to government, both central government and local government,
and encouraging the preservation of our heritage and its continuing
use. That is what English Heritage does. I think it is also important
that you have a champion, which is CABE, which is responsible
for trying to improve the design of new buildings and also for
recommending to government and to the public the preservation
of new architecture which has already been constructed, let us
say over the past 30 years. That sometimes means that when the
issue of the listing or possibly even the demolition of a relatively
new building comes along English Heritage and CABE both express
views to government. They may not be the same but they are coming
at it from a different point of view and why not? I really do
not see any conflict there.
Q255 Christine Russell: There may not
be any conflict but surely often there can be a lot of expense
if one of them is saying to developers or to local authorities
that the answer is demolition and new build and the other one
is saying, no, the answer is re-use, refurbishment.
Lord McIntosh of Haringey: That
is a much rarer occasion. What much more often happens, and this
seems to be entirely proper and not in the least extravagant,
is that you have a listed building which it is proposed to replace
with a new building. English Heritage has the responsibility for
recommending to the Secretary of State whether a building should
be listed and therefore whether it should be preserved or subject
to listed building consent. The Secretary of State has to respond
to that only in terms of the quality of the existing building.
That way the heritage is preserved without being muddied by the
quality of the proposed redevelopment, otherwise all heritage
could be a risk. CABE on the other hand, and I have seen this
happen in individual applications, says that a new building is
a good new building or is not a good new building and they do
not have regard to the quality of the building it replaces. Both
of those points of view need to be put.
Q256 Christine Russell: But it is not
a good advert for joined-up government when two arm's-length bodies
are both appearing at a public inquiry for instance into a planning
application on different sides of the fence.
Lord McIntosh of Haringey: I do
not see why not; they are judging different things. It seems to
me that the heritage's interest, the interest of the historic
environment, would be weakened if there were not a body dedicated
to putting forward the best case for that and it seems to me that
the quality of new design would be weakened if there were not
a body dedicated to putting that forward. Both of them are proper
considerations and it is up to the people concerned, the local
planning authority, local people, everybody else, to make a judgment
in the light of those views. They are both legitimate views.
Q257 Andrew Bennett: In your tour of
northern England was it just accident that you did not call in
to Denton? I raise the point because CABE does not seem to have
reached Denton. We have just had a new Morrison's, which is hardly
an advert for modern architecture and Crown Point North. They
both provide very attractive jobs. Are you happy that CABE is
really getting to the parts of Britain that it needs to reach?
Keith Hill: Actually, if I might
say so Mr Bennett, your constituency experience is a little unusual
by comparison with most of your colleagues sitting around this
table. In our careful research for this particular session, we
did look to see whether CABE had been present in the constituencies
represented. It certainly has been present in mine, because you
will know that two years ago it designated Streatham High Road
the worst high street in the country. But that is another story.
Q258 Andrew Bennett: If you could come
up with some good news, I would be pleased, but it does not look
as though you are going to get any good news.
Keith Hill: Let me just say remember
that the onus is on the local authorities to come to CABE.
Q259 Andrew Bennett: No, no; the onus
should be on CABE to get to those parts of the country where good
design does not seem to be dominating their thinking.
Keith Hill: Well I think it should
work both ways.
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