Schedule
2
Amendments
consequential on development consent
regime
Amendments
made: No. 148, in schedule 2, page 114, line 16, leave out
‘In’.
No.
149, in
schedule 2, page 114, line 17, after
‘authorisation)’ insert ‘is amended as
follows.
(2)
’.
No.
150, in
schedule 2, page 114, line 20, at
end insert—
‘(3) In
subsection (1A)(b) for “pipe-line which is the subject of a
pipe-line construction authorisation” substitute
“nationally significant
pipe-line”.
(4) After
subsection (1A)
insert—
“(1B) For
the purposes of subsection (1A), a pipe-line is a nationally
significant pipe-line
if—
(a) its construction
has been authorised by a pipe-line construction authorisation,
or
(b) development consent
under the Planning Act 2008 is required, and has been granted, for its
construction.”.’.
No.
351, in
schedule 2, page 114, line 21, leave
out paragraph 8.
No.
352, in
schedule 2, page 116, line 1, leave
out paragraph 17.
No. 353, in
schedule 2, page 116, line 16, leave
out ‘under the Planning Act
2008’.
No. 354,
in
schedule 2, page 116, line 19, leave
out ‘under the Planning Act
2008’.
No. 355,
in
schedule 2, page 116, line 19, at
end insert—
‘21A In section 37
(exemptions from offence under section 35) after subsection (1)
insert—
“(1A) Section 35
does not apply to the carrying out of any operations for which
development consent has been
granted.”
21B In section
61(1) (interpretation of Act) at the appropriate place
insert—
““development
consent” means development consent under the
Planning Act 2008;”.’.—[Jim
Fitzpatrick.]
Schedule
2, as amended,
agreed
to.
Clause
32
Applications
for orders granting development
consent
Mr.
Clive Betts (Sheffield, Attercliffe) (Lab): I beg to move
amendment No. 391, in clause 32, page 16, line 25, leave out
‘Commission’ and insert ‘Secretary of
State’.
The
Chairman:
With this it will be convenient to discuss the
following amendments: No. 392, in
clause 33, page 17, line 14, leave
out ‘Commission’ and insert ‘Secretary of
State’.
No.
393, in
clause 33, page 17, line 15, leave
out ‘its’ and insert
‘the’.
No.
206, in
clause 66, page 32, line 40, at
beginning insert ‘Subject to subsection (1A)
below,’.
No.
85, in
clause 66, page 32, line 40, leave
out from beginning to first ‘the’ in line 3 on page
33.
No. 284, in
clause 66, page 32, line 40, leave
out subsection
(1).
No. 207, in
clause 66, page 33, line 2, at
end insert—
‘(1A) Where the
applicant for development consent proposes, or it is subsequently
considered by the Panel that, any order granting development consent
should include provisions made in exercise of any of the powers
conferred by section 105(6)(a) or (b), the Panel has the functions
of—
(a) examining the
application, and
(b) making a
report to the Secretary of State on the application setting
out—
(i) the
Panel’s findings and conclusions in respect of the application,
and
(ii) the Panel’s
recommendation as to the decision to be made on the
application.’.
No.
285, in
clause 66, page 33, line 3, leave
out ‘in any other
case’.
No. 293,
in
clause 75, page 36, line 8, leave
out paragraph (a).
No.
208, in
clause 75, page 36, line 9, at
end insert
‘and neither
the applicant for development consent proposes, nor the
Commissioner considers, that any order granting development consent
should include provisions made in exercise of any of the powers
conferred by section105(6)(a) or
(b).’.
No. 294,
in
clause 75, page 36, line 10, leave
out ‘, in any other case’.
No. 209, in
clause 77, page 36, line 25, at
end insert—
‘(1A) If the
Council consider that order granting development consent should be made
and should include provisions made in exercise of any of the powers
conferred by section 105(6)(a) or (b) it shall refer the single
Commissioner’s report and a report of its views to the Secretary
of State for
determination.’.
No.
295, in
clause 77, page 36, line 31, at
end add—
‘(5) Decisions made
under this section shall be subject to approval by the Secretary of
State.’.
No.
210, in
clause 93, page 43, line 20, leave
out ‘66(2)’ and insert ‘66(1A) or
(2)’.
No. 211,
in
clause 93, page 43, line 22, leave
out ‘section 75(2)(b)’ and insert ‘sections
75(2)(b) or
77(1A)’.
No.
396, in clause 93, page 43, leave out lines
26 to 29 and insert ‘means the Secretary of
State.’.
No.
212, in
clause 105, page 50, line 23, leave
out ‘sections 106 and’ and insert
‘section’
Mr.
Betts:
This debate relates to one of the most important
issues in the Bill. I have had help with some of the drafting from the
Campaign to Protect Rural England. On some aspects of the Bill, I am
much more enthusiastic and sympathetic to the Government’s
approach than perhaps the CPRE is. Nevertheless, on the issue of who
should make the final decision on an application that is being
considered by the commission, I have come to a different view from that
of Ministers. The amendment, therefore, together with
other amendments that relate to later clauses, but are necessary for a
consistency of approach, would substitute the Secretary of State for
the commission as the final decision maker, as is the case under
current town and country planning legislation.
This is a
fundamental issue of accountability. The decisions that will be made
concerning major projects will be major, which is why we are setting up
a new procedure for dealing with national infrastructure projects. By
their very nature, they are important matters. More than one individual
in the commission will ultimately make the decision, but it is
important that individuals are accountable, at least to an extent. They
must be accountable in the sense that hon. Members know who they are. I
doubt that many people could name a single member of the Planning
Inspectorate, and I am sure that once we have a commission and the
commissioners have been appointed, not many people in the House will
know who any of them are. We know who the Secretary of State is,
however, and we know who the Ministers are, if a Minister makes the
ultimate decision because the Secretary of State has a particular
conflict of interest under current legislation. The Secretary of State
can be held to account in a number of ways: a debate in the House;
written questions; and oral questions. The general methods that the
House uses to hold Ministers to account can be used to hold them to
account for decisions on matters that would be considered and
recommended by the commission.
It is important that while
Parliament will eventually approve a national policy statement, in the
end it will be the commission that interprets that policy statement to
decide whether a particular application should be
approved. Therefore, ultimately, it should be a
politician who makes the final decision on whether the interpretation
by the commission is correct. I know that the response
will be that in such cases Ministers act in a quasi-judicial manner, not
as politicians, and I accept that. Under existing planning legislation,
Ministers act in not a purely political way, but a quasi-judicial
way—there is a difference. Nevertheless, they can still be held
to account to explain how they have acted. That decision cannot be
voted on in the House, a Minister cannot be second-guessed, and a
Secretary of State’s view cannot be challenged by tabling an
amendment to it, but at least the Secretary of State is can respond
across the Dispatch Box in the Chamber, or by replying to a
parliamentary question, and give reasons for a decision in a way that a
commission cannot. It
will be interesting to hear from the Minister precisely how the
commission might be accountable. If a Member tables a question asking
for reasons why a particular decision has been reached, will the
Secretary of State answer it, or will it be passed on
to the commission? How can a commission answer a parliamentary
question? We have struggled sometimes, when dealing with agencies, to
get questions actually responded to properly. Some of those decisions
will be very important, such as where a nuclear power station is
located or whether one should be located in a particular place at all.
We need to understand the nature of
accountability.
I have
great respect for my hon. Friend the Minister for Local Government. He
has taken the matters that have been raised very
seriously. However, the Government must understand that it is not only
groups such as the Campaign to Protect Rural England that have
concerns. Many of my colleagues on this side of the Committee also
share this type of concern.
If I ask my colleagues who are
not fortunate enough to be members of the Committee for their
impressions about what the Bill does, they say that it takes away
accountability from politicians and passes it to a quango. However, it
is a fact that there are good things about the Bill, such as the
attempt to take major decisions on major infrastructure projects by
using a better process—I believe that it is a better process.
The fact that it is often characterised as being undemocratic is
largely down to the fact that the Secretary of State is removed from
the process at the end.
Alun
Michael (Cardiff, South and Penarth)
(Lab/Co-op): My hon. Friend makes a good
case in his examination of what the Government propose. I look forward
to hearing the Minister for Local Government’s reply. However,
is part of the problem the fact that advice to Ministers is often
excessively inhibiting in terms of the application of common sense? I
say that with the experience of having had to make decisions on
planning appeals, when sometimes the advice of officials was that one
could not even look at the application in proper terms. Therefore,
something more clinical that allows the application of judgment within
a context set by Ministers might be a way of reintroducing common sense
into the examination of such matters.
Mr.
Betts:
I bow to my right hon. Friend’s greater
knowledge. He has been on the inside track and has been responsible for
some of the decisions that Ministers have to take. That proposal would
take my
amendment further. I am talking about not the basis on which decisions
are made, but who actually makes them. He goes one stage further and
asks whether, if a Secretary of State makes a decision, that decision
should be made on a different basis—a less quasi-judicial basis,
and a more common-sense basis, as he would term
it.
Alun
Michael:
Two aspects concern me. One is that
the degree of detail regarding a major or serious
application might require such an enormous amount of commitment from
Ministers that the situation would be rendered almost impractical. The
other is about the sort of advice that tends to become excessively
protective about what might be said about how a decision has been
taken. That constricts the process with which Ministers have to engage
at present when dealing with detailed and complex
applications.
Mr.
Betts:
I take that point, and I also accept the
point about the amount of information that the
Secretary of State would have to consider. There are obvious time
constraints, but that applies some pressure to limit the number of
projects that go through the process. Most of us are keen to see that
there should not be an open house for a large number of
projects.
With regard
to the number of decisions, Secretaries of State will, of course, have
to take such decisions on a range of issues that have gone into the
planning appeal system. They will not be kept out of decisions on
planning matters. The slight irony is that Secretaries of State will
make decisions on all sorts of relatively small projects, but not the
biggest ones. Today we have looked at the nature of the projects that
will go through the new process. Essentially, when we go through
clauses 13 to 26—I am giving a quick rÃ(c)sumÃ(c)
here—small projects go through the traditional planning route,
and larger ones take the new route through to the IPC. The same
projects will be considered, but some will be large and some will be
small. In many cases, the small projects will end up with the Secretary
of State and the large ones will not. There is something strange about
a situation in which the smaller and less important a project is, the
more likely it is that Ministers will be
involved.
5.15
pm
Despite
the intervention of my right hon. Friend the Member for Cardiff, South
and Penarth about the basis on which decisions are made, Secretaries of
State can come to a different view from inspectors under the current
planning regime. That is presumably because they can look at things in
a different way. During the evidence hearings, we had a good discussion
about the expertise that commissioners would need. One thing that they
need is an understanding of how the public regard things. That is not
the most important matter in planning decisions, but Secretaries of
State appear to be more able to apply a wider understanding of matters
than planning inspectors when reaching
decisions.
It is a
case in point that Brighton and Hove Albion football club probably
would not be looking forward to a new ground if the decision had not
gone through the Secretary of State. I am sure that the Secretary of
State made that decision in an entirely proper manner, but came to a
different decision from the planning inspector. I was in Snowdonia
national park last year
and saw the reopening of an old railway line. My understanding, again,
is that the Secretary of State—the Deputy Prime Minister at that
time—overturned the inspector’s
decision. That railway line will be a major tourist attraction and an
advantage to the area, but it would not have reopened if the planning
inspector’s decision had stood. The Secretary of State saw the
matter in a slightly wider and rounder
context. Ministers can
come to a proper view and they hold a role that is
different from that of the planning inspector, due to their particular
knowledge and experience. They come to decisions that are, presumably,
also different to those that a commission would make. There are
examples of when having the involvement of a Secretary of State proved
beneficial. I am sure that Ministers will not say that the decisions of
those Secretaries of State were wrong. If they were right, surely there
is an advantage in having them in that role. I will not take up too
much of the Committee’s time, but these are important
matters.
I
have heard the counter-argument that it is wrong for Secretaries of
State to take decisions because they can be the applicant and the
eventual determiner of the application, but that is not true in most
cases. I would be interested to hear my hon. Friend the Minister say
how many of the cases that will go to the IPC are likely to have the
Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government as the
applicant. We had a good discussion on clause 13 and I got assurances
that even new examples of projects would fall within the categories
listed under clause 13(5)(a) to (e): energy, transport, water, waste
water and waste. My understanding is that even if the applicant were a
Secretary of State, in those cases, they would be the Secretary of
State for Transport, the Secretary of State for Business, Enterprise
and Regulatory Reform, or the Secretary of State for Environment, Food
and Rural
Affairs.
Quite
possibly, the Secretary of State would not be the applicant at all,
because while they would be responsible for the national policy
statement on nuclear power stations, for example, it would be likely
that a private company would be the applicant. In how many cases is it
likely that the applicant will be the Secretary of State for
Communities and Local
Government?
Robert
Neill:
The hon. Gentleman makes a powerful case and I
agree with his point. Perhaps he might also consider that his logic is
reinforced, while that of those who object to his amendment is
undermined, by the situation in London. The Mayor of London was given
planning powers through the Greater London Authority Act 1999. Some of
us made the objection that the Mayor might find himself as the judge of
a matter in which he was the applicant and the promoter. The Government
took the stance that that was not a problem because it was highly
unlikely that the Mayor himself would ever be the applicant, and it was
more likely that the applicant would be Transport for London, which is
part of the empire that he controls, but not
him.
The
Secretary of State for Transport is far less directly controlled by the
Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government than Transport
for London is by the Mayor. If such an argument was valid for the
Greater London authority, it is even more valid in this instance. I
hope that the hon. Gentleman will take that
argument as something that reinforces his point. There is a precedent of
the Government conceding to his
argument.
Mr.
Betts:
I take that intervention as reinforcing my
point, subject to anything that my hon. Friend the
Minister might say to correct it. I will take the argument at face
value.
Under existing
planning law, it is possible for the Secretary of
State to be the applicant and the determiner. It is quite possible for
the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government to put in a
planning application for a new office building, an alteration to an
existing office building, or any other project. However, just because
the Secretary of State could be the applicant under current planning
legislation, and will remain the applicant for all but major projects
and the determiner in such circumstances in the future, we should not
amend the whole of existing planning law and remove the Secretary of
State as the final arbiter for appeals within that legislation.
Because, for the occasional project, a Secretary of State could be the
applicant and the determiner, is there really a case for removing the
Secretary of State, in every circumstance, from being the final arbiter
on these most important projects?
I am not sure
that the case has been made for why these major projects should be
treated differently from every other appeal on every smaller planning
application that is made. If the fundamental argument is that the
Secretary of State should not be the applicant and the determiner, in
how many cases, realistically, will the Secretary of State be the
applicant? Probably one, occasionally, out of the 40-odd that will be
appear before the commission each year. If that is the only reason
behind the approach, for all other reasons—accountability, the
general view that is taken of the Bill, consistency, and the fact that
the Secretary of State just might bring to bear a different viewpoint
that might occasionally mean that a decision of the commission is
changed—I hope that my amendment will be given careful
consideration.
Robert
Neill:
I congratulate the hon. Gentleman on
tabling the amendment and on putting forward an
extremely cogent and powerful case. It is hard to say much more than
that my hon. Friends and I agree with it. The case is compelling. I
urge Ministers to think again about this because it harks back to the
concern that many of us have expressed almost from the beginning of our
consideration of the Bill. The good in the Bill—the idea of the
separation of national policy from the consideration of specific sites
to save time at inquiries, and the virtue of the single consent
regime—could all be undermined by a lack of public confidence
arising from an ultimate lack of accountability.
From the public’s point
of view, it is desirable that the decision maker should be capable of
being put on the spot. That is precisely the point that the hon.
Gentleman made. The Minister, even acting quasi-judicially, can be put
on the spot in this House. If Ministers get a reputation and it is
perceived by the public and, let us be blunt, by the Prime Minister and
others, that they are too often put on the spot, they will not remain
Ministers for much longer. There is a
discipline on Ministers, when exercising even quasi-judicial powers, to
make sure that they get things right because they can be put on the
spot either by hon. Members or in the courts. There will
also be a professional discipline on members of the IPC to get it
right, but the big difference will be the public perception of whether
that discipline is exercised clearly and transparently. We can have as
much confidence as we would hope that members of the IPC will get
things right, but that is not the same as the fact that the ultimate
arbiter is someone who is elected. Ultimately, if we dislike a decision
enough, we can kick out the person who reached it or their party. When
we are talking about decisions that profoundly affect the lives of
those immediately concerned, that seems to be right and proper, which
is why we strongly support the amendment moved by the hon. Member for
Sheffield, Attercliffe and hope to have a chance to vote for
it.
Our
amendments in this group are less ambitious in scope, but if, for any
reason, the hon. Gentleman’s amendment does not succeed, we will
want to return to them. If one looks at subsequent clauses in the Bill
that are linked to this, such as clause 66, one sees that there is a
dangerous circumstance in which it will be possible for the commission
effectively to disapply certain legislation when making its decisions.
The point of our amendments is to address that and change it
consistently throughout the Bill.
Amendments Nos. 206 and 207 set
out the scheme of what we are seeking to do. They
would insert in clause 66 a new subsection (1A) so that if it was
proposed that a development consent order would apply, modify or
exclude legislation—that power will reside with the
IPC—such cases should be decided by not the IPC, but the
Secretary of State. It seems to us that that represents a more middle
view than the hon. Gentleman’s amendment. Even if the Government
persisted in giving the ultimate power of decision to the IPC, it
cannot be right constitutionally, never mind in terms of
accountability, for an unelected and unaccountable body to have the
power to apply, modify or exclude legislation that has been passed by
the House. The decision to exclude or modify legislation passed by the
House should be taken only by someone who can be put on the spot in
this House and who is directly accountable to it, and that means the
Secretary of State. I hope that the Committee will go further by
accepting the hon. Gentleman’s argument that that should apply
across the board, but we think that the power is a striking example of
how transparency and democratic accountability will be seriously
undermined if we leave the provision as it
is.
Dan
Rogerson:
I support the comments made by the hon. Member
for Sheffield, Attercliffe, who raised a question
that concerns many Members in the Committee and others in the House.
The ultimate test will be when constituents come to us regarding one of
these applications and ask what the next stage is and how things will
work. They will be surprised to find that, ultimately, the decision
does not rest with the Secretary of State, which is what they are
accustomed to. The hon. Member for Bromley and Chislehurst also made
some strong points in that regard.
The amendments in this group
that we tabled propose a different way of giving the Secretary of State
the ultimate responsibility for taking such decisions. I
certainly support the hon. Member for Sheffield, Attercliffe and hope
that he will continue to press the Government on the
issue.
Alun
Michael:
I want to challenge one of the points that was
made by the hon. Member for Bromley and Chislehurst.
He said that the pressure in the current system is pressure on
Ministers to get things right, but I suggest that that is not actually
true. The pressure on Ministers is to play safe and anticipate the
legal challenges that might arise if they do not get the procedure
right. That is an inhibition, rather than an encouragement to come up
with the right decision, and that is why, along with one other issue
that I shall address in a moment, there is a need to reconsider how we
have been doing things up to now.
5.30
pm
My hon. Friend
the Member for Sheffield, Attercliffe rightly referred to the decision
taken by my right hon. Friend the Member for Kingston upon Hull, East
(Mr. Prescott), the former Deputy Prime Minister, to reopen
a railway in north
Wales.
I
remember that application and the discussion around it particularly
well—not just because I am a north Walian and I know that part
of that county, but because I was Secretary of State for Wales at the
time and followed the deliberations and the decision of the then Deputy
Prime Minister with great interest. I think that he made the right
decision, but it was also a decision that took a certain amount of
courage because, as my hon. Friend said, a Secretary of State took a
different decision to that recommended by an inspector. Indeed, the
opinions on both sides of that particular debate were very strong
indeed. Rather than taking the courageous step of re-examining the
issue and trying to make the right decision, the easy option would have
been to say, “I will do what the inspector says because that is
the safe option and no one can criticise me for it”.
I suggest to
the hon. Member for Bromley and Chislehurst that the pressures in the
system actually relate to safety. Another type of inhibition that
Ministers may face is the way in which actions can be misinterpreted.
When I was Secretary of State for Wales there was an application where
the pros and cons did not make sense on paper, and I was advised by
officials not to visit the site because it would be interpreted as
becoming involved with the details. In that particular case, the
argument was whether granting planning permission for a single house at
the end of a row would create a precedent for opening up further
applications for development in the open countryside. When driving
through that particular area, as I did after ignoring the advice I had
been given, it became clear that although on a plan the area seemed to
be the next stage into the open countryside, the next site to the
appeal site was a hill that was so steep a house would have to be hung
off it to build there. Absolutely no precedent at all was being
created; it was simply an obvious infill site. As I said, the hon.
Gentleman is wrong to suggest that all the pressures are in the
direction of good decision making. It is greatly to the credit of
Ministers that often they pursue the idea of taking the right decision
against the play-safe advice.
Mr.
Richard Benyon (Newbury) (Con): Of course I defer to the
right hon. Gentleman’s experience in these matters, but in his
intervention on the hon. Member for Sheffield, Attercliffe he
seemed to suggest that the process could on occasion swamp a
Minister’s ability to take a decision. He also suggests that to
take the right decision, a Minister often has to show some courage. To
pursue the logic of that argument, he is saying that we should not go
down the proposed path because of process and the likelihood that
Ministers would lack courage. I have a slightly more generous view of
human nature and of the strength of the will of the electorate. I also
believe that a Minister’s superiors would get rid of poor
Ministers who lack courage and that Ministers should improve the
process so better decisions are taken. Am I being
naive?
Alun
Michael:
The hon. Gentleman is of course
being naive, but he is also doing what Members of
Parliament do best: jumping into the middle of an argument to avoid
understanding the full logic of it. I was about to continue the point
about the system not acting in the way that naive Conservative Members
seem to believe to develop a point about the complexity of
issues.
Another
application with which I had to deal was the final stages of whether
the New Forest should be declared a national park. At that time, I was
dealing with the matter as Minister of State at the Department for
Environment, Food and Rural Affairs rather than as a Secretary of
State, so I was not under quite the same pressure as a Secretary of
State, who has to focus for a considerable time on the complexities of
a major application; nevertheless it involved carving out lots of time
trying to understand complex issues and arguments that had continued
for about 40 or 50 years—it was a long, drawn-out process. I had
the benefit of the inquiry report and so on, but I had to study a great
deal of detailed information to apply logic to what the outcome should
be.
I therefore
suggest that in balancing the accountability issues it asks an awful
lot of Ministers for them to deal with the whole of a major
application, because the bigger the application and the more serious
the issues the greater the detail. In such circumstances, there is an
alternative, which has merit: the principles are decided by Ministers
and a body is established to consider the details and decide whether
those principles will be fully applied in respect of a big, complex
application.
I agree with
my hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield, Attercliffe, who made a strong
case for ministerial accountability. However, sometimes the pressure of
playing safe combined with the complexity of taking major decisions
does not necessarily result in a satisfactory process and that must be
weighed in the balance with my hon. Friend’s conclusion. I shall
be interested to hear how our ministerial colleagues came to their
conclusion to introduce the Bill.
Mrs.
Lait:
I support my hon. Friend the Member for Bromley and
Chislehurst and the hon. Member for Sheffield, Attercliffe and add my
congratulations to those of others on his common-sense approach to the
proposal. I was particularly struck by the irony of the Secretary of
State having to make decisions on small but controversial planning
applications but not having
any responsibility for the large ones, although the Minister will
probably tell us that they will have been dealt with by Parliament
under the national policy statements
procedure.
This debate
brings us back to the responsibility of Parliament, which the Bill
ignores. The Government are taking away the role of Members of
Parliament to hold Ministers to account on matters that are of deep and
immediate concern to the electorate.
The point is
not just about small decisions being taken by the Secretary of State
but about how we hold the IPC to account. I do not want to put words in
the Minister’s mouth but I suspect that he will say that the IPC
has to provide the Secretary of State with an annual report. That is
hardly the same as a written question, an Adjournment debate or
bringing Ministers to the Floor of the House to answer for their
decisions.
Another,
slightly mischievous, thought crosses my mind on the matter of small
but controversial planning applications. Despite our concerns that an
ever-increasing number of planning applications will go to the IPC and
bearing in mind the discussion that my hon. Friend the Member for
Clwyd, West had about offshore wind farms, it could be in the interests
of developers to put together a project rather than a development so it
does not have to go to the Secretary of State but is, theoretically,
dealt with more speedily under the IPC process. In that case, our
constituents would feel doubly offended that they had no right of
recourse to the House on planning applications, many of which should
have been decided by the Secretary of
State.
Mr.
Jones:
I am interested in my hon. Friend’s example,
which is not far-fetched. My constituency seems to have been targeted
by different wind farm developers who make separate applications and
large tracts of it are being covered by wind turbines. I can see the
attraction to those developers of putting together a concerted
application so that it can be dealt with by the IPC rather than having
to go through the planning process and suffering the opprobrium of
local
people.
Mrs.
Lait:
My hon. Friend is absolutely
right.
The
Minister for Local Government (John Healey):
He is
not.
Mrs.
Lait:
But our purpose in trying to get this sort of
information out of Ministers is precisely to test whether our
suppositions are right and whether there is a robust reply to them. For
example, it is not beyond the bounds of possibility for a new nuclear
power station to be built in Dungeness, which would indeed be a
nationally significant infrastructure project. A wind farm is already
going up not far from there and there could be another application for
a wind farm. We are still discussing the size of hazardous waste
facilities and with the development of technology there could be
applications for smallish facilities to be built into the nuclear power
application.
It would
not be difficult to put together a series of developments that would go
to the Secretary of State if they were taken singly, but put together
as a project would have to go through the IPC, when we would not be
able to raise the issue on behalf of our constituents.
If the Minister could answer all our questions about the role of
Parliament and Ministers’ responsibilities we would be
exceedingly
grateful.
John
Healey:
I welcome you back to the Chair, Sir
John.
This large
group of amendments tries to do two different things: one block, tabled
by my hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield,
Attercliffe and others would make the IPC a recommending rather than a
decision-taking body, requiring the panel of the IPC or a single
commissioner to report their recommendations to the Secretary of State
for his decision. The other block of amendments would allow the IPC, in
certain circumstances, to take decisions but not when orders that
granted development consent included the application, modification or
exclusion of other
legislation.
My
hon. Friend was right to say that this is one of the most important
parts of the Bill. The arguments have had a good airing both this
afternoon and in our debates on parts 1 and 2, as my hon. Friend
acknowledged, and he made some clear and important points. I am glad he
accepts that Ministers with a planning role act in a quasi-judicial
way; he also recognised that in that capacity Ministers’
decisions cannot be challenged or overturned in Parliament as that is
for the courts.
My
hon. Friend’s main concern, however, was that under the Bill as
drafted, the IPC can take decisions in a limited number of cases and
Ministers cannot be questioned. His argument was that at present
Ministers can at least be questioned in the House but he was concerned
about whether the IPC could be
questioned.
5.45
pm
Clearly,
there are differences. It would not be possible to call the IPC to
account on the Floor of the House, but there are ways of doing so and
some of my hon. Friends are used to doing just that with bodies such as
Ofsted.
If the House
accepts our proposal to set up a special Select Committee, that
Committee could regularly be active in requiring the chair and the
commission to account for the decisions that they take, rather than
simply explaining the work that may be periodically set out as
decisions included in an annual
report.
As with
Ofsted, it is possible to table parliamentary questions that demand
answers directly from the IPC. I say “directly from the
IPC”, but of course the convention of the House is that answers
are routed through Ministers. Nevertheless, the answers are given by
the bodies. When I was Minister responsible for statistics, I performed
that function regularly with the Office for National Statistics. If the
answer is in a letter to any hon. Member, that information and
explanation is printed in Hansard. It is available to all hon.
Members via the House’s procedures. It is not the same, but
there is considerable scope for holding the IPC directly to account for
its work and
decisions.
Mr.
Benyon:
Is the Minister not simply saying that a
Minister is, therefore, a mouthpiece for an
organisation, rather than the accountable person at the end of the line
with whom the buck stops?
John
Healey:
Not precisely. In the case of the Office for
National Statistics, I was not even a mouthpiece in respect of
questions that were properly for the national statistician. I was the
postbox, and, in many respects, the post boy. The questions came to me;
I passed them to the national statistician. I got the answers back,
then passed them on to the Member of
Parliament.
In the
context of planning, it is not that the Minister is the mouthpiece. The
House can challenge Ministers to explain decisions that they take in
their planning capacity. It is not for Parliament to challenge or to
overturn those decisions. Any challenge or overturning of a decision
that a Minister takes in their planning capacity must be done through
the courts. The same would be the case for rights to challenge and
methods to overturn any decision that may be taken by the
IPC.
Alun
Michael:
The example of statistics that my hon. Friend has
just referred to is quite illuminating in the context. Does not he
agree that, in acting as a postbox for the Office for
National Statistics and in transmitting those replies on to Members of
the House, he would have been informed and aware both of the concerns
being raised by hon. Members, and of the answers being given,
independently, by the Office for National Statistics? Did he not find
that experience useful when he came to deal with the Statistics and
Registration Service Bill not many months ago, when, as a Minister, he
was accountable for the legislation going through the House? The
relationship is not merely one of passing pieces of paper, it is an
intelligent engagement with an independent body pursuing things that
have been decided by Government or
Parliament.
John
Healey:
I did, indeed. My right hon. Friend knows that
well, as he also served on the Statistics and Registration Service Bill
Committee, for which I am grateful to him. I found that useful in that
context. As the Minister responsible for the Office for National
Statistics, I did not answer those particular
parliamentary questions for the national statistician, but I did answer
those that were a matter of statistics
policy.
My right hon.
Friend says that that is an illuminating comparison,
as it is, in some ways. Planning policy would remain a matter for
Ministers, although the accountability and explanation of the
IPC’s work and decisions would be a matter for itself, in
operational
terms.
Robert
Neill:
With all respect to the Minister and to the right
hon. Gentleman, is there not a world of difference, to the people
concerned, between a decision about statistics policy and a decision to
put a nuclear power station in their neighbourhood? That is really what
it comes down to at the end of the
day.
John
Healey:
Of course there is, but at the moment we are
trying to test out, within the established procedures of the House,
what the House could decide to do, within the framework of the
proposals we make relating to the Bill, to hold this important body to
account to explain the very important decisions that we are charging it
to make. Of course there is a world of difference. I do not use the
comparison in any way to belittle the importance of what we are
discussing. I am
trying to cast some light on what may be possible. I hope that the hon.
Gentleman can accept that. I see him nodding, and I am grateful to him
for that.
Alun
Michael:
Opposition Members should be careful about
belittling the importance of that matter. The suggestion made by
Conservative members of the Statistics and Registration Service Bill
Committee when we were debating the independence and the processes was
that it was pretty nuclear in terms of its
importance.
John
Healey:
My right hon. Friend is right in his recollection
of the rather odd and slightly inconsistent approach taken, not by
Conservative members of this Committee, but by some of their
colleagues.
Robert
Neill:
I appreciate the serious intent with which the
Minister raises the matter, but may I make one final point for him to
take on board? Occasionally a Secretary of State will come to a
decision that is different from the recommendation of the inspector.
That may be the courageous thing to do, as the right hon. Gentleman
said. But the whole point is that it is very clear to the public that
the Secretary of State has done that. The public might well conclude
that it was a pretty tight decision under those circumstances. I do not
criticise a Minister who does that, but it is there, it is on the
record and it is very accountable.
If it is within the IPC and it
is dealt with by the panel or by an individual commissioner, how do we
know whether the commissioner decided to go against certain technical
or expert advice that he had in-house? If it is a decision of the
panel, how do we know whether the chairman of the panel dealt with it
on his casting vote or something like that? It is not a small thing. If
people can review the decision, see that it was tight and that the
Secretary of State chose, perhaps bravely, to go down a different route
and can be questioned about that here in this House, albeit that it is
subject to the rules of being quasi-judicial, is that not a significant
difference in transparency? How, if the Minister is right, will we
achieve a similar degree of transparency about the decisions and the
reasoning processes of the IPC
?
John
Healey:
I am glad that we are moving off the question of
statistics. I hoped I had left that behind when I left the
Treasury.
John
Healey:
We are both suffering from a blast from the
past.
I do not accept
that there is a difference in principle between a decision that a
Secretary of State may take in a planning case where they happen to
agree with the inspector, and a decision where they disagree. The
important question the hon. Gentleman was posing was how open and how
clear will the process of making the decision that the IPC undertakes
be, and how clear will it have to be about the reasons for the
decisions that it comes to. We come on in part 6 to the process of
considering applications and making decisions. On the question of being
clear about the reasons, the IPC will
be required to publish an explanation of the decisions it reaches, and
its reasons for doing so. That will give those with an interest plenty
of opportunity to understand the IPC’s
stance.
Jeff
Ennis (Barnsley, East and Mexborough) (Lab): Just to add
my two penn’orth on this point, the main
difference with the Secretary of State’s
involvement under the new model, with the involvement of the IPC in
major planning decisions, is that it will be front-loaded through the
national policy statements. He will set the framework within which the
IPC must work. Not only that, but under clause 6 it will be incumbent
on him to review the overall policy contained in the national policy
statement at regular intervals. There is therefore a check and balance
for the Secretary of State to ensure that the IPC is conforming to the
model that he has laid down in the national policy
statement.
John
Healey:
My hon. Friend is right. The national policy
statement framework within which the IPC will make decisions, which we
have set out, will be very different to the regime within which the
Secretary of State and the planning inspector currently operate. That
is recognised on both sides of the Committee as an important element of
the new system and it creates a different basis upon which decisions
will be taken.
As my
hon. Friend quite rightly said, there is not just a
front-loading of ministerial involvement. There is a significant
strengthening and front-loading of parliamentary involvement because of
the role that Parliament will play in developing national policy
statements.
I turn to
some of the substantive points that my hon. Friend the Member for
Sheffield, Attercliffe and others have raised. There
was a question over whether Secretaries of State will be left, as they
are now, to make decisions on certain smaller projects, but not larger
ones. It is precisely because these projects are bigger and nationally
more significant that the current system is not up to dealing with
them. It is because of that that we believe that we need a new system
together with the IPC. I will come on to some of the reasons for the
IPC in a moment. It is because there are relatively few nationally
significant infrastructure projects and because they are reasonably
predictable that we can be confident that we can set out clear,
detailed national policy statements to cover
them.
Nationally
significant infrastructure projects are different from commercial
developments and large-scale housing developments, which the Planning
Inspectorate and the current Town and Country Planning Act regime will
continue to deal with. There is a substantive difference with the few,
more predictable national projects that we envisage, for which we can
set out national policy statement frameworks within which decisions
should be taken and which Parliament will have a very strong role in
developing.
In setting
out the national policy statements, we can do what my hon. Friend the
Member for Barnsley, East and Mexborough mentioned and set out the
basis for separating policy making from decision making. Policy making
is properly the province of Ministers, along with Parliament. Decision
making is an area for an independent, expert panel through the
commission.
Those projects that will still
be dealt with under the current regime, such as
commercial housing developments, which are exercising my hon. Friend
the Member for Sheffield, Attercliffe, come in all shapes and sizes and
vary considerably, as the collected experience from all of our
constituencies would demonstrate. They are much more difficult to
capture in the new framework. It is more difficult to set out detailed
policy statements that cover all such cases. That means that the
Secretary of State might occasionally need to call in certain cases due
to an exceptional set of circumstances or because policy issues are
raised that require a decision for
clarification.
In our
view, there is a good reason why there should be a
distinction between bigger projects and smaller ones. Rather than the
latter undermining the case for the former, that distinction allows us
to make the proposals to treat them
differently.
6
pm
I hesitate in
some ways, Sir John, because I have already gone over the principal
benefits that we believe will come from an independent IPC. I have
stated them in some detail in giving evidence and in the scrutiny part
of the Committee stage. Suffice it to say that in summary, the benefits
are three-fold. We believe that the IPC will increase the speed and
efficiency of decision
making.
Mr.
Betts:
I have trouble listening to what my hon.
Friend is saying, particularly about the greater
certainty that the policy statements will give to the commission when
it looks at individual projects. Can he foresee any circumstances in
which the policy statement might not be absolutely comprehensive? For
example, there might be gaps in it whereby the commission would have to
arrive at an interpretation of policy if there is a dispute between the
parties about what the policy is. Does he see the danger that, under
those circumstances, we could end up with a situation where policy is
made by the commission without any review of that decision by the
Secretary of State?
John
Healey:
The intention of the system is clear.
Policy making is rightfully for Ministers together
with Parliament. The Bill specifically provides for circumstances where
the policy is deficient, either because it does not cover the required
areas or because it is out of date. The second principle benefit of the
IPC is the belief that it will improve the quality of the decisions
taken. Thirdly, it will improve clarity and transparency within a
system that currently, and my hon. Friend dwelt on this, could include
a situation where the same Secretary of State is responsible for
policy, interested in the promotion of particular applications and is
ultimately the decision taking authority. It is likely to be less a
matter for the Secretary of the State of my own Department, and more
common in the areas of transport.
I return to
the question at the heart of my hon. Friend’s
concerns—that of how the IPC will be accountable. I will try to
set out a number of ways in which that will be the case and I hope that
he will reflect on them and feel reassured. First, the IPC will always,
and only, operate within the legislative framework set by Parliament,
and within the policy framework set out by Ministers
and scrutinised by Parliament in the national policy statements. As I
have said, it will be required to give reasons for any decisions that
it takes, and it will account to Ministers and to Parliament for its
performance and for those decisions. The commission’s annual
reports will be available to Parliament via Ministers. We have suggested a special
Select Committee to deal with national policy statements and elements
of the new system, and it will be able to call the chair of the
commission to give evidence before it—something that I am sure
all members of the Committee expect to happen. The commission will be
subject to freedom of information provisions
and, in the case of maladministration, to the parliamentary
commissioner for administration. Ultimately, the Secretary of State can
remove a commissioner from office if he or she is satisfied that the
circumstances meet the criteria set out in the Bill.
The second group of amendments
deals with the IPC’s powers to apply, modify or exclude
legislative provisions. Perhaps I could first attempt to reassure the
Committee that this is not a swingeing new power to amend the
legislation. It is a narrow and confined area of
competence for the IPC. The sorts of primary legislation that we
envisage the IPC will need to discharge its primary function of
allowing the development consent are Private Acts of Parliament in
relation to transport projects, many of which, as hon. Members will
know, date from the 19th century. There will also be some byways and
other provisions.
I
appreciate that this is a controversial area. As it underpins some of
our later deliberations as well as these amendments, I would like to
try to demonstrate why the IPC needs these powers and emphasise the
safeguards that are in place to ensure that they are used
appropriately. We believe that putting the IPC in charge, not just of
examining applications, but of the decisions that are essential to
speeding up the process on national infrastructure projects, will
improve the quality of those decisions and make the system clearer and
more transparent. Those points lie at the heart of our
proposals.
The problem
is that the sorts of infrastructure projects that we are talking about
are different from many other sorts of projects. Particularly with
railways and ports, alterations to existing infrastructure—often
built under the authorisation of Local Acts of Parliament in the 19th
century and sometimes earlier—cannot be made without minor
changes to existing legislation. As soon as anyone starts to develop or
plan the concepts, they run up against the statutory provisions that
regulate the existing infrastructure and would not permit those works
to take place. Almost from the word go, questions about minor
amendments to legislation are integrally bound up with the preparation
and consideration of any planning projects for major infrastructure.
That is particularly clear with railway infrastructure, where no
alterations can be made to such infrastructure and therefore no further
projects can be built on such land, unless the original Acts of
Parliament are changed.
It is precisely because of that
problem that under the previous Government, Parliament recognised and
granted the Secretary of State powers under section 5 of the Transport
and Works Act 1992, which included the ability to make an order that
can apply, modify or exclude any statutory
provision relating to any matter
on which an order could be made under that Act. The
Act also permitted the Secretary of State to make
amendments, appeals or revocations of statutory provisions of local
application, as appeared to him or her as expedient in connection with
an order. In clause 105(6), which is at the heart of the provision, we
have used wording that is closely modelled on the Transport and Works
Act—it is not something that we have created specifically for
the IPC. If we do not give the IPC these powers it simply will not be
able to deal with projects, such as railways and ports, that cannot be
built without making minor amendments to existing
legislation. I
understand the argument of some hon. Members that we
should treat those cases as a special case and have the IPC report them
and its consideration of applications to Ministers, but I hope that
hon. Members will accept that were we to do that, we would be back
where we started. We would lose the advantages of the single consent
regime and the potential benefits that lie in creating the IPC and
giving it this decision-making role. We would have a functionally
separate process for the consideration of the application and for the
derivative legislative changes and we would have separate
responsibilities for those two areas. In other words, we would not have
an independent planning commission, but an extension of Ministers. That
would not speed up the decision-making process because we would have
the same two-stage process with two separate bodies going over much of
the same ground, separately and sequentially. We would not get improved
decisions because the commission would be just a reporting body to
Ministers; a sort of souped-up Planning Inspectorate. Finally, we would
not have greater clarity regarding roles and responsibilities because
Ministers would be setting policy and still taking decisions to deliver
it.
Robert
Neill:
I do not understand how what the Minister has just
said about delay and undermining the IPC fits with his earlier
observation that the power to amend or disapply legislation is narrow
and confined. If it is narrow and confined, it is likely to be used in
a very discrete set of circumstances. I do not see how either two
parallel structures or inordinate delay will be created. If Ministers
are efficient and it is simply a question of a recommendation being
made to them, that is not unscrambling the whole of the IPC. I hope
that he does not misunderstand that, and I should like to know the
basis for his suggestion. Surely, Ministers can come to a swift
decision on a narrow and discrete, but important, constitutionally
sensitive point.
John
Healey:
I repeat that the IPC will absolutely have a
narrow, confined and well specified competence within which to exercise
the powers. I am tackling the proposition in the amendments that when
there are to be primary legislative changes as a result of an
application, the application and the changes should automatically be
referred to the Secretary of State for decision. That would be a
two-stage process, with two bodies going over the same ground and
losing the greater efficiency, speed and certainty of the
decision-making
process.
We are back
where we started. I said that I would spell out some of the safeguards
that I hope will reassure hon. Members. The use of the IPC’s
legislative modification powers must be contained within an application
for a particular infrastructure project. The
application must be in the form of an order that
has
been drafted according to model provisions in the
Bill and must be in accordance with the national policy statement. The
draft order must be submitted to the Secretary of State, who may demand
changes if the modifications would contravene European Union or human
rights legislation. Given those reassurances and
comments, I hope that hon. Members feel that we have had a good,
important debate and will not press their amendments to votes. If they
do, I urge my hon. Friends to resist.
Mr.
Betts:
I thank my hon. Friend for thoroughly addressing
the issues that I and other hon. Members have raised,
and for doing so in his usual helpful and thorough fashion. However, he
has reassured me only partially, because his explanation about the
IPC’s accountability is that it will be partially accountable. I
am not convinced that it will have the same accountability for its
decisions as the Secretary of State would have.
I understand that
Ministers’ recommendations and parliamentary
votes will determine the national policy statements within which the
IPC must operate, but I would be happier if the Secretary of State were
to oversee that that is properly done on an individual application. I
am still struggling with the fundamental reason why having the
Secretary of State as the final arbiter would cause a considerable
problem, and I am not fully reassured on that. I shall not press my
amendment to a vote, but I think that we will have to return to this on
Report, because it is a big issue, and I expect that other hon. Members
will want to enter the debate. I beg to ask leave to withdraw the
amendment.
Amendment,
by leave, withdrawn.
Robert
Neill:
I heard what the hon. Gentleman said.
I hope that I am keeping myself in order, but at an
appropriate point I would seek to press our amendment No.
206.
6.15
pm
The
Chairman:
Indeed. I was about to say that a large number
of the amendments that were grouped with amendment No. 391 will come up
later in relation to other clauses. If Opposition Members wish to press
any of them to a Division, it would be helpful if they let me or the
Clerk know. It should probably be the Clerk, as I may not always be in
the Chair—it could be my co-Chairman. If you would let the Clerk
know which amendments you wish, at the appropriate time, to press to a
Division, that would be entirely in
order.
Robert
Neill:
I am grateful, Sir John. I have given that
indication and will be content to be guided as to when we can register
a vote on the
matter.
Robert
Neill:
I beg to move amendment No. 227, in clause 32, page
16, line 31, at end
insert—
‘(e) be accompanied
by evidence that the applicant has taken all reasonable steps to secure
conformity with the Local Development Framework policies of the
affected local planning authority and where applicants have departed
from local policy, an explanation for any such
departure.’.
I
shall endeavour to be concise. The amendment deals with a separate
issue, but it and amendment No. 201, although separately listed, are in
large measure linked. We are concerned to ensure
proper and appropriate
consistency in the handling of applications. In
addition to the requirements and specifications that are already listed
in clause 32(3), we seek to add, via a new paragraph
(e), “evidence that the
applicant has taken all reasonable steps to secure conformity with the
Local Development Framework
policies”,
and, if the
applicant has departed from that, an explanation for any such
departure.
That is
consistent with the Government’s approach of
seeking to front load as much as possible, so that issues of
controversy and debate are flagged up at the earliest possible stage.
Several witnesses raised with us in various ways
their concerns about how the national policy statements regime and the
way in which statements are handled will or will not satisfactorily
interface with existing policy documents and frameworks. We seek to
clarify that at an early stage by requiring the applicant to say
whether he can comply and, if not, set out his
reasons.
I understand
why there may be a departure from that for a major piece of
infrastructure, but it is far better to have it
flagged up in advance so that it can be effectively dealt with in the
pre-application hearings, which we will discuss later. I hope the
Minister accepts that the amendment will strengthen the working of the
Bill and that he will respond favourably to
it.
John
Healey:
I had regarded the amendment as over-prescriptive.
I had not quite understood it, but I think I now divine the hon.
Gentleman’s underlying concern. It seems to be to ensure that
controversies and local views are, to use his words, flagged up early
and, ideally, in advance of the application
process.
The amendment
is over-prescriptive principally for this reason.
Once a national policy statement is established, it should, of course,
be reflected in relevant local development frameworks or regional
spatial strategies. However, the hon. Gentleman will know well, given
his experience, that local development frameworks do not necessarily
respond immediately, and such a framework may not have the opportunity
to reflect and take into account the provisions of a national policy
statement. Instead—this deals with his underlying concerns
rather than meeting the terms of his amendment—the Bill requires
any promoter to consult local authorities that will be affected by the
proposals and to have regard to their views. During that consultation
process, local authorities will be able to raise all relevant local
concerns and controversies, enabling the promoters to take account of
their views early and in advance of the application process. That will
enable applications to be better prepared before being submitted. The
Bill allows local authorities to bring up relevant concerns both at the
pre-application stage and during the inquiry
phases.
I hope that
the hon. Gentleman will accept that his concerns are
met by provisions and that the terms in which he proposes the amendment
may be too prescriptive and not help his
cause.
Robert
Neill:
I am grateful to the Minister for setting out the
position clearly. I am grateful to have that on the record, and against
that background I beg to ask leave to withdraw the
amendment.
Amendment,
by leave, withdrawn.
Robert
Neill:
I beg to move amendment No. 201, in clause 32, page
17, line 5, leave out ‘section 42(5)’ and insert
‘sections 37, 42 and
43’.
The good
news is that this will be the last that hon. Members hear from
me—for a little time, at any rate. The amendment follows on from
the principle that I referred to, which is about
embracing the Government’s argument about front-loading as much
of the work as possible. We are seeking to enhance the consultation and
publicity at the early stage of the application. The amendment would
extend the scope of the consultation report that is required to be
provided to consultation under clause 37 and to publicity under clause
43, as well as what is in clause 42, which can broadly be referred to
as the community consultation element. We do not have a problem with
that. It seems sensible that there should be early community
consultation, and to a high and robust standard—I think that
that is the phrase that the CBI used in its evidence. However, we think
it appropriate that the report that sets out how that has been gone
about should embrace all the elements of consultation that have to take
place. That would include the local authorities under clause 37 and the
way in which publicity has been gone about under clause
43.
We are seeking to
make the consultation report more comprehensive at that early stage.
That seems sensible. Again, it would be likely to
concentrate the minds of applicants and would ensure consistency. It
certainly appears to be consistent with, for example, the approach
adopted in clause 49(5), to which our explanatory statement refers.
There is a desire on our part to seek clarity early on. That would add
to the efficiency that I hope we and the Government want to achieve,
even if we might sometimes disagree about the
means.
John
Healey:
We wanted to give special weight to the
consultation under clause 42, rather than spreading the importance of
it more widely. That is why clause 42 requires that a statement be
drawn up setting out how the applicant proposes to
consult the local community—a statement on which local
authorities must be consulted—and provides for it to benefit
from guidance from both the commission and the Secretary of State as to
what should be in
it.
However—this
deals with the hon. Gentleman’s wider concerns—the
applicant must have regard to responses to the consultation and
publicity under all three provisions to which his amendment refers.
Similarly, the commission must have regard to the adequacy of the
consultation representation made by a local authority consultee as part
of the evidence and information that it has towards the end of the
pre-application process. I hope that that gives him sufficient
reassurance.
Robert
Neill:
As ever, I am grateful to the Minister,
particularly for the spirit in which he approached that, and do not
think that there is any difference between us with regard to intent. We
will come to issues such as the model guidelines in due course and I
hope that we can build in the appropriate safeguards, without making
them too prescriptive, to ensure that those matters are ticked off.
Against that background, I will not seek to press the amendment to a
vote and am grateful once more to have the Minister’s assurance
on the record. I beg to ask leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave,
withdrawn.
Clause
32 ordered to stand part of the
Bill.
Clause 33
ordered to stand part of the
Bill.
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