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Lord Ampthill: Perhaps I may intervene at this stage. I say to the noble Lord, Lord Cavendish, that I am deeply upset that he should think that the Select Committee was not very concerned about environmental matters and St. Pancras station in particular. If I recollect his Second Reading speech correctly, he was then most concerned about gasholders, the water point and the chambers. All three of those matters have been satisfactorily resolved. The gasholders are to be pulled down and put together again; that is the three which are of the greatest concern because of the nature of the ironwork. They are to be reassembled and put to some use. I am doubtful as to what that use will turn out to be. The main thing is that he has got his way on that.
I hope the noble Lord feels satisfied--he did not mention it--about the arrangements which have been made for a competition as regards the chambers. There is a dearth of certain ideas as to what one can do with them. The Select Committee came to the conclusion that it could think of nothing better than an hotel, but we are hopeful that someone might come up with an even better use than that. However, they have to be put to active use. That is certainly the view of the Select Committee; otherwise the interiors will deteriorate beyond their present condition. The outside of the building has been very well restored by British Rail, but the inside, as I believe we say in our report, is a mess.
We now turn to the other matters concerning St. Pancras. It is the noble Lord's belief that we were not so interested as to give it all the time that it deserves. We gave it the whole day on 15th July. If the Committee will forgive me, perhaps I may read out a few excerpts from the evidence that was given, starting with Mr. Philip Davies, responsible for planning for London with English Heritage. He was a most excellent witness, as one would expect.
Very soon after he started his evidence, he said:
- "I think if I can make one point very clear, Chairman, that is English Heritage is an enthusiastic supporter of CTRL and we welcome the contribution it will make to London as a world city. We have made strenuous efforts to resolve our understandable
- concern by negotiation. Our sole concern relates to the future of the Chambers and the need for an adequate safety net for the buildings should LCR's current proposals not run according to plan. I hope in giving evidence I will be as brief as possible concentrating on that issue".
For the remainder of his evidence he spoke only about the chambers. We were therefore left with the belief that he felt that the negotiations which had been under way for many, many months with London Continental were bearing fruit. We were aware--although we were not shown it--that the Heritage Deed was in preparation.
I now turn to another paragraph, again taken from Mr. Davies' evidence. Counsel for English Heritage said:
- "That we appreciate but Union Rail has been around for a long time and so have you"--
- "and you have been talking to each other and you have been talking in an agreeable way and have managed to resolve all the other problems".
That was counsel for English Heritage speaking to its witness, Mr. Davies, who agreed by saying, "Indeed". English Heritage did not seem that day to be concerned about anything except the chambers.
That evidence was followed by another witness, Dr. Filmer-Sankey, from the Victorian Society. Points were taken up which we would have expected English Heritage to make because it was deeply concerned about the station and the train shed in particular. Dr. Filmer-Sankey gave evidence for the whole of the afternoon. He was an admirable witness, as one would expect, and he is deeply concerned about what may transpire.
Perhaps I may once again read two or three paragraphs from his evidence. I refer to Question 247 on page 923 of the transcript. The witness was asked:
- "There is no issue between us, as I understand it, that the regime described by the Planning Acts for listed building applications generally should be disapplied in this particular case provided an adequate replacement that is workable and effective can be devised?"
Dr. Filmer-Sankey replied, "Yes". He was further asked:
- "It is further right that English Heritage did not petition against the inadequacy of the heritage agreement which was being offered, you have seen the petition and you know that, do you not?"
- "Yes, I have seen the petition".
- "So the plain fact of the matter is that you will have taken up the cudgels for the parties who are going to be parties to the agreement and who are apparently satisfied with it?".
- "As I have said earlier, we have discussed this particularly following the submission of the latest draft of the Heritage Agreement at 7.30 on Friday night, and we discussed this with English Heritage briefly at lunch, and with Camden, and we understand they would support the concerns we have expressed and the remedies we have suggested,".
I would now like to turn to the Heritage Agreement. This is a document which has been negotiated not only through our sittings but for many months before. I believe it is a document which, according to the understanding of the Select Committee, is all right as
far as English Heritage is concerned, with the exception of Section 4(5), where there is a bit of doubt as to the "consultation" that is being offered, which is a weaker word than "to seek agreement", which appears in the rest of the document. I believe that is all that English Heritage is presently worried about.We felt that the promoters had gone as far as it was reasonable to go after those many months. The disappointment that the noble Lord expressed relates, I believe, to only those three or four words. About that he may wish to speak further to the Committee.
6 p.m.
Lord Clinton-Davis: I have listened with great interest to what the noble Lord, Lord Ampthill, has just said. This has been a very interesting and important debate. Leaving aside the definition of "elsewhere", living in Camden as I do, I hope that there is no intention to encroach on my home. I doubt that very much.
We are dealing here with two connected and very important issues. First, there is the protection of the historic parts of St. Pancras station, which is a Grade I listed building and a very beautiful one. The second point is that of conservation policy more generally as regards historic buildings which might be affected by projects which are organised under the PFI or, in the future I hope, under the public-private partnership schemes of the Labour Party.
The Government's attitude towards St. Pancras will, I am sure, establish a strong precedent--that is the point made by the noble Lord, Lord Cavendish--for relaxing statutory controls in a pretty drastic way. So these are issues of profound importance. The first question that arises is how far are the Government trying to relax conservation and other planning controls in order to assist the PFI.
The noble Lord, Lord Ampthill, said that English Heritage seemed to be satisfied with everything except Section 4(5) of the agreement. Representations have been made at least to me by English Heritage that that would raise a serious allegation. The Minister can put it in whatever perspective he thinks appropriate. The allegation is that the promoters can undertake any operational railway works at their discretion within the train shed without having to seek agreement with English Heritage or the London Borough of Camden.
That would involve all aspects of the scheme. I understand that that is what English Heritage is saying. In other words, a blanket exemption for any works affecting the train shed other than shops is being contemplated. Is that a fair and reasonable interpretation of the position? If it is, how is such a blanket exemption justified? Is there any precedent for such extensive powers for major works to Grade I listed buildings without any actual plans for the works having been disclosed? As and when London and Continental produce those plans, how is it possible to supervise, control and regulate their implementation? After all, the Bill disapplies statutory controls on demolition or alteration to any part of the station.
Apparently, the Government say--we shall hear from the Minister in a moment--"Don't worry about it. We can use a number of simplified streamlined actions, including design guidelines in the planning and heritage minimum requirement". Additionally, I believe that they will say that an agreement with English Heritage and the London Borough of Camden requires the promoters to reach agreement with them on certain aspects of the plans and that, failing agreement, there would be a right of appeal to the Government for a quick and binding decision. I stand to be corrected on that, but I understand from English Heritage that that is the substance of the Government's case. There is, however, an exemption clause in paragraph 4(5). The promoter would be under no duty to reach agreement and English Heritage and the London Borough of Camden would have no right of appeal.
I should like to ask the following questions. Do the Government and/or the promoters insist that any appeal procedure would constitute an unreasonable obstruction or an unreasonable delay? Would they not be in a position to do what my noble friend Lord Kennet argued and to have a streamlined right of appeal in any event of perhaps two or three months? Do not the Government have a sanction against the council if they deem that the council has been unreasonably obstructive?
There is an interesting parallel to this in principle in the case of CrossRail where the Government took a rather different decision. When the CrossRail Bill was before another place in 1993, it was then agreed that English Heritage should be allowed a right of appeal on any aspects of the actual plans and that the Government should be in a position to make a binding determination. What difference is there in principle between the CrossRail Bill and this Bill?
I turn now to the role of the Department of National Heritage. What consultation has taken place with that department? Is the Minister able to reveal the position of that department, if any? Why was not the position of that department made clear to the Select Committee? Is it not self-evident that proper advice from the Department of National Heritage should have been available, and, if not, why not?
I think that that will suffice for now because we have had an interesting debate. I have raised a number of questions and I hope that the Minister will be in a position to answer not only my questions but those raised by other noble Lords also.
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