Mrs.
Lait: The Minister has set out a convincing argument, but
it still begs a number of questions. He refers to inappropriate
development in the green belt. I would suggest that that is the issue
about which local communities might get most exercised. They wish to
feel, as we have set out clearly, that there is recourse to a
democratically accountable person—the Secretary of
State—because green belts are regarded as being precious in
urban
communities. The
other concern that I have, which applies to the green belt planning
permission that my hon. Friend the Member for Bromley and Chislehurst
referred to, is that once there is any form of infrastructure
development such as a pipeline, pylons or an electricity sub-station,
the land around it tends to degrade. Over the last few years we have
heard the argument that the minute the green belt has degraded, it
becomes ripe for development. We are concerned that this planning
system should in no way lead to the degradation of the green belt.
Therefore, I will press the amendment to a
Division. Question
put, That the amendment be
made:— The
Committee divided: Ayes 7, Noes
12.
Division
No.
17] Question
accordingly negatived.
Mrs.
Lait: I beg to move amendment No. 418, in
clause 105, page 50, line 12, leave
out paragraphs (a) and (b).
The
Chairman: With this it will be convenient to discuss
Government amendments Nos. 430 to
432.
Mrs.
Lait: We tabled the amendment to delete even more sweeping
powers than were set out in the green belt provisions in subsection
(4). Subsection (6)(a) and (b) will give the IPC the power to override
Government decisions. It will be able to amend or repeal any
legislation. If that reading is correct, a fundamental principle of
democracy is being swept aside in order to speed up the planning
system. Doubtless Ministers will have a very clear explanation for
giving the IPC this power. We all wish to see the process speeded up,
but under this proposal the IPC could ride roughshod over the
democratic rights of the British public and of Parliament. I find that
fundamentally difficult to contemplate, let alone
accept. Again, we
want to hear what the Government have to say on the matter. Unless
their rebuttal of the amendment is convincing, it seems that we are
moving back to a situation in which the Executive pay absolutely no
attention to the people who are democratically accountable. Without
going too deeply into one of our continual criticisms of the Government
over the past 10 years, that is all of a piece with their ignoring
Parliament and wishing that they could ride roughshod over us and that
we would all do exactly as they wished. On those powerful grounds, I
have tabled the amendment.
Jim
Fitzpatrick: We oppose the amendment. I will explain why I
hope that it will be withdrawn, subsequent to my explanation, or
resisted by my hon. Friends.
The clause sets out which
matters can be included in an order granting development consent for an
application. In particular, the clause allows an order granting
development consent to apply, modify, or exclude legislative provisions
relating to matters covered in the order, subject to certain
limitations. The ability to do that is modelled closely—I got
into trouble last week for using the word “modelled”; I
have checked this time and I am using it in the right context—on
the powers already available to the Secretary of State in making orders
under section 5 of the Transport and Works Act
1992. I appreciate
the hon. Lady’s concerns about the fact that the Bill would
allow legislation to be applied, modified or excluded by a body other
than Parliament. I hope to reassure colleagues about that and to
demonstrate that a deletion of the provisions in paragraphs (a) and
(b), as envisaged in the amendment, would be the wrong step to take.
Before the Committee considers the amendment, it might be worth while
to reflect on why the 1992 Act and the Harbours Act 1964 contained the
legislative provisions that we are now trying to incorporate into the
Bill. In the past,
promoters of several types of nationally significant infrastructure
project have found that there are statutory provisions regulating
existing infrastructure that they propose to upgrade or improve. In
particular, railway infrastructure is frequently covered by one or more
private Acts of Parliament, which gave the original promoters of the
railway the ability to construct it in the first place. Often, the
provisions of the existing legislation are inconsistent with proposals
to upgrade or improve infrastructure.
For example, Network Rail might
be under an obligation to provide or maintain a certain infrastructure,
perhaps a bridge or footway, that would be incompatible with the
provisions to upgrade a site. It was with that problem in mind that
Parliament previously granted the Secretary of State the extensive
powers in section 5 of the Transport and Works Act 1992, including the
ability to make an order that
can “apply, modify or
exclude any statutory provision which relates to any matter as to which
an order could be
made” under
that Act. The 1992 Act also permits the Secretary of State to make
amendments, repeals and revocations of statutory provisions of local
application as appear to her to be expedient in connection with an
order. The Harbours Act makes similar provision in respect of local
Acts in relation to harbour
developments. Clause
105(6) of the Bill is based on the wording in section 5 of the
Transport and Works Act 1992, and the similar provisions in the
Harbours Act. As we have seen in part 3, many of the types of projects
to which the 1992 Act applies will in future be classified as
nationally significant infrastructure projects, and, as such, will
require development consent under the Bill. Clause 29(2) has
specifically excluded the 1992 Act or 1964 Act orders from being made
in relation to those projects. That will prevent the use of orders
under those Acts to amend legislation in relation to such
projects. For the
reasons I have already given, many of such projects could be
incompatible with existing legislation. Unless that is dealt with, the
single consent regime will be unworkable. The options would be to
retain the provisions of the Transport and Works Act and the Harbours
Act in relation to relevant nationally significant infrastructure
projects, or for promoters to be required to promote private
legislation to enable schemes to proceed. We do not believe that either
of those options is
sensible. On the
issue of private Bills, we should remember that the
huge amount of parliamentary time that was taken up debating private
Bills was one of the prime reasons why Parliament created the Transport
and Works Act regime in the first place. If we required a promoter to
obtain an order under the Transport and Works Act or Harbours Act, in
addition to consent under the new regime, it could result in exactly
the kind of duplication of effort that the new regime seeks to avoid.
It would mean that the decisions would continue to go to the Secretary
of State, which is the subject we debated previously. As has been
mentioned previously, that would add time to the process and reduce
predictability, because there would be multiple decision makers. In any
case, we do not believe that such a system would lead to better or
different orders because of the safeguards that we have already built
into our proposals.
First, and
most basically, the only pieces of legislation that can be altered are
those that the promoter includes in the application. The IPC will not
be able to make orders on a subject other than for that which is
applied. Secondly, the form of the draft order is based on model
provisions that are set out for the Secretary of State by order, as we
discussed under clause 33. Those will be similar to the model
provisions currently set out in relation to Transport and Works Act
orders. Any Member will have the ability to scrutinise those model
provisions and force a parliamentary debate on them.
Thirdly, the decision maker
will only be able to approve the application and make an order when
that is in accordance with the relevant national policy statement.
Again, that will have been set out by the Government and scrutinised in
Parliament. Fourthly, where the IPC intends to use the powers in clause
105(6), it will have to send a copy of the draft order to the Secretary
of State ahead of time. If the Secretary of State thinks that the terms
of the order would contravene Community law or any of the convention
rights, she has a power in clause 106 to direct or require the IPC to
change the terms of the
order. It should also
be remembered that powers set out in clause 105(6), under which
legislation may be amended, apply only in relation to the particular
development that is under consideration. Those powers do not permit the
commission or the Secretary of State to usurp the functions of the
legislature. They are powers of limited scope and application. I hope
that the explanation of the safeguards on the use by the IPC of
legislative powers gives comfort to the Committee and the hon. Member
for Beckenham. I therefore ask her to withdraw her
amendment. Government
amendments Nos. 430 to 432 are technical in nature. They are intended
to ensure that when the IPC needs to use its legislative powers under
clause 105(6), those allow amendments not only of legislation but of
statutory provisions. Without that provision, the IPC would not be able
to amend previous Transport and Works Act orders or Harbours Act
orders.
Mrs.
Lait: I am grateful to the Minister for that comprehensive
explanation, which goes some way to reassure me. On the basis of that I
shall seek to withdraw the amendment, but I will probably have to do
some more research to see whether we need to return to the matter on
Report. I can understand the arguments about the Harbours Act and the
Transport and Works Act. I am concerned that the national policy
statement is a much wider system and that the conjunction of all those
provisions might enable the IPC to make rulings much more widely than
the Government envisage. I beg to ask leave to withdraw the
amendment. Amendment,
by leave,
withdrawn.
Amendments made: No.
430, in clause 105, page 50, line 12, leave
out ‘provision of or made under an
Act’ and
insert ‘statutory
provision’. No.
431, in
clause 105, page 50, line 14, leave
out ‘provisions of or made under a
local
Act’ and
insert ‘statutory provisions of
local
application’. No.
432, in
clause 105, page 50, line 22, at
end insert— ‘(6A) In
subsection (6) “statutory provision” means a provision of
an Act or of an instrument made under an Act.’.—[Jim
Fitzpatrick.] 11
am Dan
Rogerson (North Cornwall) (LD): I beg to move amendment
No. 398, in
clause 105, page 50, line 23, at
end insert
‘and to a resolution of both Houses of
Parlaiment made under the super-affirmative resolution procedure as
defined by section 18 of the Legislative and Regulatory and Reform Act
2006’. I,
too, welcome you back to the Chair, Sir John. Whether this will be one
of the sittings where we make speedy progress or whether we will slow
down again remains to be seen, but I am sure that you will enjoy
watching our deliberations and keeping us in
order. The amendment
is similar to that tabled by the hon. Member for Beckenham and is about
the power to disregard legislation. We are spending a great deal of
time in this Committee. We have 14 sittings in which to debate the Bill
and potentially to put it into law. We do that because we take
legislation very seriously and want to get it as right as is possible.
If we then set up bodies that can disregard legislation and make
decisions that will affect the lives of people in the areas concerned,
we are going down a very dangerous
road. I did not speak
to the last amendment because many of the issues addressed by it are
addressed by this amendment. I hope that the Minister will forgive me
if I reflect on what he said when debating the previous group. He made
the case that the Secretary of State is already able to disregard
legislation in some circumstances under other Acts. However, there is a
fundamental difference between the Secretary of State and the IPC. We
have had that argument
before. There is a
difference of opinion between the Government and the Opposition parties
about whether the IPC is comparable to the Secretary of State. I do not
think that they are the same. People are willing to accept that the
Secretary of State may, for certain technical reasons—as long as
it is in the spirit of the legislation—exempt certain provisions
in certain cases. I think that people will find it much harder to
accept that an unelected, appointed body, at some distance from a
democratic mandate, will have those powers. There are real differences
between the two. The
amendment would use the super-affirmative resolution procedure, which
sounds very exciting and was set up under the Legislative and
Regulatory Reform Act 2006. It would still allow exemptions to be made
from legislation, but there would be a powerful means of parliamentary
scrutiny to ensure that such departures have been properly considered
and that elected Members have had the opportunity to examine them in
detail. I accept what
the Minister says about there having to be a facility to do such things
to avoid going back to using private Bills. The amendment would provide
for such a procedure, but it would be a little more onerous, it would
give hon. Members the opportunity to participate in the process and it
would take the power away from an unelected body—that is the
fundamental point for
me. I hope that the
Minister is prepared to consider my arguments. I hope he will see that
this is not a black and white issue between the very lengthy procedure
of using private Bills and the IPC having this power. There are other
possibilities and, as the hon. Lady said, I hope that he will reflect
on that and come back to us at a later stage. I am also interested to
hear what he has to say now.
As we heard, the Bill is aimed
at simplifying the planning procedure for major projects. It should
make the whole process more straightforward and transparent. It should
also cut out some of the repetition of areas of controversy and ensure
that they occur at an earlier stage in the process. However, I still do
not see that delaying something by a matter of a few weeks or months is
crucial. We have talked about schemes in the past that have been
delayed by five, 10 or 20 years while those processes have rumbled on.
The important thing is that we get the decisions right. Allowing
Parliament the opportunity to examine whether a case has been made for
legislation that it has made to be disregarded in that way is an
important part of the process, and I hope that the Minister will
consider whether there might be a middle way between private Bills and
the IPC having the power to throw out legislation whenever it
wants.
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