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Lord Clinton-Davis: My Lords, perhaps I may point out to the noble Viscount that it was not the noble Lord, Lord Stanley, who supported the idea; indeed, it was the noble Lord, Lord Stanley Clinton-Davis, who did so.
Lord Stanley of Alderley: My Lords, I should point out to the House that I wrote to my noble friend the Minister. No doubt he got muddled between us. However, I also supported the idea.
Viscount Goschen: My Lords, I must apologise for being over-familiar with the Opposition.
As my noble friend Lord Jenkin correctly said, there is the further protection that the Secretary of State, before exercising his compulsory purchase powers, will wish to be satisfied that LCR have acted reasonably. I quite accept that the undertaking does not go as far as guaranteeing that there will be licences in every case where land is not needed permanently, because this may be unworkable in some cases where there are other interests in the land. Also, LCR cannot be bound to accept any terms regardless of their reasonableness. However, the undertaking still provides a valuable and additional safeguard and support.
During the course of the debate we heard a great deal about the Crichel Down rules. A further protection is that where land that has been acquired by compulsory purchase becomes surplus, the normal Crichel Down rules will apply. That is a contractual requirement on LCR which has been specifically written into the development agreement between the Secretary of State and LCR.
The noble Lord, Lord Northbourne, asked for more detail about the Crichel Down rules and their relevance to land disposed of after compulsory purchase. The standard arrangements are for land to be acquired before construction, and then any that becomes surplus after the works have been completed, is--with specific exceptions--offered back to the original owner under the rules. Those exceptions relate to situations where the land is still required in the public sector, or where the site has been materially changed by development on it as part of the project for which the land was acquired. The noble Lord also asked whether there was a problem about not knowing if land was required permanently or temporarily in relation to the application of the Crichel Down rules. I can assure the noble Lord that there is no problem about that specific issue.
Down the years, and for projects of all sorts, those standard arrangements have generally been accepted as providing the best and fairest balance between the interests of the original owner and the body that acquired the land. But for the CTRL project, the House is being asked to accept that the standard rules should no longer apply. Instead of those rules, some totally different arrangements should be substituted which are completely untried and have never been put to the acid test of operational practicability for a project of this sort. The project is much too important to the national interest to be used as a guinea pig.
I understand that some noble Lords have general objections to the Crichel Down rules, but they have stood us in good stead. Indeed, successive governments have believed that they give the fairest balance between the national interest and the rights of the landowner. I strongly believe that a hybrid Bill for one particular project is not the place to mount an argument for a change of potentially general application. There is no means by which the issues can be considered in the round by looking at a single project. I have sought to highlight the dangers of the uncertainty that the amendments would produce.
Making changes to the normal arrangements just for one project would raise the question of whether this sets a precedent for others. I suggest to the House that it can never make good legislative sense to try to change long-standing national policy from the narrow base of a project-specific Bill--and a hybrid one at that. I hope that the noble Lord, Lord Cornwallis, will not feel the necessity to press his amendments, but if he does I hope that noble Lords will follow me in voting against them.
Lord Cornwallis: My Lords, this has been an extensive and most interesting debate. I am most grateful to everyone who has taken part in it. The Crichel Down rules are continually referred to, but there are several gaps within them, in that land can be held for anything up to 50 years before it is returned to the original owners. One of the objectives of the amendment is to limit the time in which the promoters could decide whether or not they needed the land permanently. As regards land taken temporarily, I do not believe that there is any undertaking within the Bill, as the noble Lord, Lord Jenkin of Roding, believes.
No matter what the noble Lord, Lord Berkeley, says, individual landowners have to be dealt with individually. As far as I am aware, there is no method by which the Government or anyone else can make a blanket compulsory purchase over the 68 miles of the railway line without dealing with those who happen to be living along it. It is amusing to say that one cannot build a petrol station by the railway line because the train does not stop. However, if we do not build this line soon, it probably will. However, I anticipate that there are roads that cross the railway line at different places, and there could well be land adjacent to those roads which could be used for development sites of one sort or another and not be returned to the owner.
These amendments were not tabled simply because we thought it would be nice to get the land back. These amendments were tabled in the light of experience. The amendments were tabled because for years landowners have suffered from not getting their land back in spite of promises to the contrary. Therefore, as I believe I said in my closing remarks on 31st October, we are not overgiven to being trustful. I can tell the Minister that there are at this moment--and there may well be others--three instances that we are aware of in which the undertakings given to the Select Committee are not being dealt with as they were supposed to be according to the undertakings given by the promoters. If that is already happening in respect of the purchase of alternative sites, what faith can we have in the ability of the promoters to honour the other undertakings?
We are not against compulsory purchase. We believe that the compulsory purchase rules should be strengthened in favour of the landowners. I have made my next point before and I was told--as I have been told this afternoon--that this is not the right Bill to deal with the point. It never seems to be the right Bill. I hope someone will tell me when the right Bill comes along to deal with the point.
In the meantime it is quite obvious that the Minister will not give way. In the light of what has been said I do not believe that the House is in favour of these amendments. I hope that we have made a strong point to the Minister with regard to the problems that arise. Perhaps the Government can be persuaded to look at the rules at some time or other to consider how they may be brought up to date. If my memory is right, the Crichel Down rules are now some 50 years old, and things have happened in the past 50 years. Having consulted with the noble Lord, Lord Stanley, with great regret I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Clause 5 [Acquisition outside limits shown on deposited plans]:
Viscount Goschen moved Amendment No. 3:
After Clause 40, insert the following new clause--
(".--(1) Section 2(1) to (6) of the Law of Property (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act 1989 (under which a contract for the sale etc. of land can only be made by incorporating all the terms agreed in one document) shall not apply in relation to the variation of a development agreement.
(2) This section shall be deemed to have come into force on 31st May 1996.").
The noble Viscount said: My Lords, this is a highly technical drafting amendment which is intended to deal with problems arising out of a recent Court of Appeal interpretation of Section 2 of the Law of Property (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act 1989. I beg to move.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
Clause 44 [Acquisition of land]:
Schedule 4 [Acquisition of land within limits shown on deposited plans]:
Schedule 8 [Heritage: rights of entry]:
5.45 p.m.
Viscount Goschen moved Amendment No. 6:
The noble Viscount said: My Lords, in moving Amendment No. 6 I wish to speak also to Amendments Nos. 7, 8 and 9. This addition has been requested by English Heritage. The amendment extends the power of entry already given to it, by an amendment agreed by the Committee of the Whole House, to inspect and observe works to listed buildings authorised by Schedule 7 of the Bill. The amendments extend these rights to include non-listed buildings in conservation areas. To be consistent with English Heritage's rights under normal legislation, however, the rights of entry for both listed and non-listed buildings in conservation areas will apply only in Greater London. I beg to move.
On Question, amendment agreed to.
Page 174, line 32, after ("land") insert ("in Greater London").
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