Letter
to the Leader of the House of Commons, Rt Hon Harriet Harman QC
MP, from the Chairmen of the Business and Enterprise Committee,
Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee and Transport Committee,
10 December 2007
We are writing about the announcement by the Secretary
of State for Communities and Local Government on Planning Reform,
which accompanied first reading of the Planning Bill [27 November
2007, c 12 WS].
We note that the Planning White Paper referred to
the need for Parliamentary
scrutiny. However there
was little or no suggestion about the form that scrutiny might
take.
The ministerial statement less than two weeks ago
invited the House to consider establishing a new Select Committee
to consider draft national policy statements, with membership
drawn from the existing Committees on Business, Enterprise and
Regulatory Reform, on Transport and on Environment, Food and Rural
Affairs.
We recognise that our Committees do contain the necessary
expertise to carry out this type of scrutiny. However we would
welcome an early opportunity to discuss the way this process would
operate in practice.
You will appreciate that your proposal will have
important implications for our Committees, especially with reference
to the resources currently made available to us to undertake our
existing scrutiny work. If a quality job is to be undertaken by
the House of reporting on these items of major national importance,
then I hope you would agree the merits of the proposal for such
a meeting and explicitly commit the Government to hold such a
discussion with us as part of the Government contribution to today's
Second Reading of the Planning Bill.
We are copying this letter to the Secretary of State
for Communities and Local Government and to the Chairman of the
Liaison Committee.
Yours,
Peter Luff
Michael Jack
Gwyneth Dunwoody
