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Lord Marlesford: My Lords, I so agree that the amendment is one of the most important that has been tabled to the Bill. One recognises that one of the objects of the Bill is, from the Government's point of view, where possible, to speed up planning. Where possible, I support that. However, when one comes to major projects of either national or regional importance, it is absolutely crucial that there be full consideration of all the implications of such developments. One simply cannot have a system whereby there can be a fast track for such developments.
I know how frustrating people find very long public inquiries, whether they be on something like a London airport or, picking one close to where I live, the old Sizewell B inquiry, which was immensely drawn out. In a sense, that was unnecessary, because the inquiry was overloaded all the time with questions about nuclear power, nuclear weapons and the CND people. It was archaic at the time that the arguments were being made, but it lasted for a long time.
None the less, it is important that we have a system of fundamental appraisal of need. My noble friend quoted from the Minister's slight duality of speech during the last stage, when I think my noble friend said the Minister should not take time querying the need but merely look at the consequences. However, very often, that fundamental question needs to be asked. The premise must be able to be questioned, and that will not happen through the normal planning system.
The amendment presupposes that the Secretary of State will decide on the instances in which the procedure proposed in the amendment would be used. That is important. In a sense, it is like the call-in procedure. There will obviously be cases where there is no dispute, but if the procedure exists it will have to be used. There will be also be marginal cases where the interest groups will argue for or against the new
procedure. But the important matter is that the procedure should exist and should be able to question the fundamental issue.I remember in my extreme youth when I was almost attracted to Marxism: it was only when one questioned its underlying fundamental assumptions that one understood its fallacies. The Minister might say that that is a far-fetched analogy, but I am trying to show that often when there is major proposal affecting the future of the country one really has to ask some fundamental questions. In the war, when we were fighting for our lives, we had to fast-track military airfields that would often be put up where they would never be set up today. That is a totally different situation. During wartime one could not have had the sort of proposal contained in the amendment, but one can now.
One of the appalling consequences of bypasses—which, in general, I favour—is that too often the territory between the bypass and the place that is to be bypassed is immediately seen as being suitable for in-filling. That might be undesirable, but is the sort of issue that should arise in the type of assessment covered by the amendment. At least, if it is decided to allow the proposal to go ahead, it should be laid down at that stage that, yes, there should be a by-pass; but that does not mean that the land will then be built upon.
Before the war, when such planning issues started, the ribbon development was the perfect example—one built a new road and immediately started to build either side of it. Had such assessments—which were launched by Sir Patrick Abercrombie and the founding fathers of protection of the countryside—existed then, many of the horrors would not have happened. So although we are unlikely to resolve the matter tonight, some of us feel strongly about the matter and it is now important, insofar as we are able, to insist that something appears on the face of the Bill.
10 p.m.
Lord Rooker: My Lords, I do not wish to belittle in any way the examples that the noble Lord, Lord Marlesford, has just given. He used one example regarding the speed and urgency with which airfields were built during the war. Frankly, with the human rights industry, some proponents of which are members of this House, if we tried that today I can imagine 10,000 arguments that they would be using over why we could not do that. We are in a different situation.
I also note the forensic checking of my comments in Committee, which were crucial, as all three speeches have made clear. This is a fundamental part of the Bill. In fact, I have been a little surprised—the timing is unfortunate—that we have not had longer to spend on the matter and the amendments have been small in number. Therefore, it is important. Given our current situation, I will stick to the note that I have been provided with. It is safer for everyone all round. Thinking about what I said in Committee, there is no
contradiction in the two quotes that were used. I suspect that we will come back to the issue at Third Reading, because it is so important.I conceded in Committee that the requirement for an economic impact report to be made in relation to an application that has been designated as a major infrastructure project by the Secretary of State is not necessary in the Bill. We would expect the promoter of a development of the type that we are talking about here to engage at as early a stage as possible with all parties concerned. This would mean that by the time an application for planning permission is made to the relevant local planning authority, the community will have already been actively engaged in the process. An inquiry would then be better able to focus on outstanding issues that have not been resolved at the pre-application stage. Assuming the application is called in, the inspector would consider the economic effects along with all the other aspects of the application as part of the inquiry. These would include environmental and any other impacts. Local people would have that further opportunity to raise their concerns.
On the second subsection of the amendment, again I reiterate what I said in Committee. Clearly, where there is a national policy statement White Paper, this will help to reduce the argument at the planning inquiry about the need for a specific development on a particular site. I did not say that it would get rid of the argument, but it would reduce the argument at a planning inquiry about the need for a specific development on a particular site. Where need is established by a national policy statement, the inspector should not have to spend inquiry time considering whether a need for the development exists, but should instead consider whether the need identified is outweighed by other factors.
It will be up to those who are opposed to a development to present their arguments against a specific development, and it is right that they should be free to do so and have that opportunity. This does not rule out the possibility that the inspector will spend some time looking at the need, but this will be in the context of what is said about the need in the national policy statement. I do not know whether that is the case currently, and I do not want to go down the byways—but it may be that that national policy statement in the form of the White Paper has been debated and voted on in this House and the other place. It gives it even greater weight than simply a document that is not debated or approved by both Houses.
The inspector must ensure that all relevant impacts of the specific development are considered during an inquiry. Therefore, all material considerations will be considered in his report, together with all relevant impacts, such as the economic or environmental impacts of the project. It is a fact—I am not carrying all the details with me—that a considerable amount of time was spent on the Terminal 5 inquiry because there were out of date or unclear policy issues. The recent
aviation White Paper happens to be a useful example of our stated aim that there should be a clearer government policy statement, which may be supported by clearer regional strategies, as part of our proposals for improving the handling of major infrastructure projects.The Government have set out their strategic framework for the development of airport capacity in the UK for the next 30 years. It does not authorise or preclude any particular development, but sets out a policy framework against which the relevant public bodies can plan ahead. That latter point goes a considerable way to meeting the points made by the noble Lord, Lord Marlesford, that we must not have planning by White Paper. We fully accept that we must not have planning by White Paper. The procedure set out in the Bill is a lot better than planning by Parliament, which was the original plan in the planning Green Paper. That would have been an unmitigated disaster. No one has ever come back and said, "We think this is a good idea. We think Parliament should have done all this".
As I have repeatedly said, it took myself, when I was planning Minister, and the Deputy Prime Minister five minutes of conversation to decide that we did not want to proceed in that way. We must still come up with a solution to how we deal with and process what would be defined as major infrastructure projects. Bearing in mind what had happened over Terminal 5, it would have been irresponsible to leave it to the status quo. That was clearly unacceptable for all concerned; the public, the developers, those who were opposed, Uncle Tom Cobbleigh and all.
We have a solution here, which remains open to scrutiny, but it will stand the test of time and scrutiny by both this House and the other place.
Lord Hanningfield: My Lords, I thank the Minister for that answer. We are in danger of creating new policy because of one bad example; that is, Terminal 5 at Heathrow. We all accept that the Government might want to find speedier processes, but I want to reiterate that there must be a democratic process in doing so. Enormous projects have a fundamental effect not just on the area in which they are located, but in the wider region. There must be proper pre-inquiry and inquiry processes. My amendments would help the Government in taking the matter forward.
At this late hour, we cannot debate the matter further but we shall certainly return to it at Third Reading. Perhaps the Minister and the Government will think again about it and will go further towards meeting our suggestions. They will help the Government but not go back to the Terminal 5 type of inquiry. I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
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