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The Lord Bishop of Liverpool: My Lords, although I have never served as a local councillor, I have for the past four years chaired the New Deal for Communities programme in Liverpool in the Kensington area.
It is not an exaggeration to say that it has been one of the most demanding yet instructive and inspiring experiences of my life, working with local people to make their neighbourhood a better place in which to live and work—in short, turning their neighbourhood back into a community.
On behalf of local people working for the regeneration of their areas, I, too, welcome the Bill, both for its tenor and much of the detail. I can assure your Lordships that many of the measures will bring benefits to neighbourhoods.
In Kensington, Liverpool and on Merseyside, some of those measures have already been piloted to great effect. Local strategies, led by partnerships of local people and statutory agencies, are already in place. For example, alley-gating, as has already been mentioned, and which I have seen, has turned dangerous back streets of terraced houses that were vulnerable to burglaries, prostitution and drug dealing into safer territory where elderly people especially feel more secure in their own homes.
Furthermore, again working with the statutory services, involving local people in projects to clear their streets and keep them clean has restored to local people a sense of pride in where they live. The Government are to be commended on introducing legislation that assists local people who are keen to stay in and regenerate their neighbourhoods.
That is what has impressed me about my involvement with New Deal for Communities. Observers often criticise inner-city and outer estate neighbourhoods for their poor record in voting in elections. But that low turnout at the polls has to be
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compared and contrasted with well attended and, often, especially in Liverpool, feisty local meetings, where people turn out in their hundreds to talk about housing, schools and cleaner neighbourhoods. At one such meeting, I asked people to say how much time they had spent on local, voluntary, community activity. More than half the people at the meeting responded, saying that they had spent 10, 20 or 30 hours in the previous week. One or two of them said that they had spent 40 hours. At the end of the meeting, a young mother said that in the previous year she had been to 174 meetings, most of which lasted for three to four hours. When I informed a Minister, he rightly said, "That's a full-time job". Indeed, there are many people in such communities who work to that degree.
They work on citizens' panels, neighbourhood planning groups, housing action groups, school governing bodies and local environment groups. In our cities and on outer estates, it is not an exaggeration to say that there are small dynamos of regeneration that will be well served by the legislation.
Yet, a word of caution. We are at the outset of a major housing programme—especially the housing market renewal initiative with proposals for massive compulsory purchase and relocation of local people. My anxiety comes in a question to the Minister. Do the Government have a policy to keep within areas of regeneration the very people with a proven track record of serving their community? My worry is that with relocation, we shall remove from the neighbourhood the very people who are so vital to its regeneration—what pundits call the social capital.
Renewing communities is not just about smartening the fabric but about giving confidence to local people to take the lead in shaping the future of their communities. Cleaner, greener, safer neighbourhoods need legislation. They also need local people who have the skills of survival and the commitment to both place and community.
I warmly welcome the Bill and ask the Government to bear in mind that people as well as legislation make neighbourhoods clean and environments green. In short, people as well as legislation turn neighbourhoods back into communities.
8.6 p.m.
Lord Grantchester: My Lords, the Bill takes a strategic, cross-governmental approach to local environmental issues, which affect everyone's quality of life. It highlights the important link between the state of the immediate local environment, petty crime and anti-social behaviour. People want to live in communities that are not castigated by litter, graffiti, vandalism and burnt-out cars. It is a universal problem that is not limited to disadvantaged urban areas. It equally affects village life and rural communities.
I declare an interest as a dairy farmer, a director of Dairy Farmers of Britain and a director of the Cheshire and Warrington Economic Alliance.
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The Bill is a direct response to requests from local authorities and the Environment Agency for better powers to deal with local environmental degradation. The Local Government Association welcomed the measures saying,
It used the word appropriately.
The Environment Agency is strongly supportive and has worked closely with Defra in developing these measures, which form a key part of the Cleaner, Safer, Greener agenda and build on the Anti-social Behaviour Act 2003 and the Crime and Disorder Act 1998.
Although local authorities have some concerns regarding the set-up costs, it is acknowledged that in the longer term these proposals should save money as local authorities will be able to retain and reinvest income from the newly established fixed penalty notices. There are also proposals in the Bill to allow improvements in cost recovery for investigation and enforcement (Clause 42) and clean-up (Clause 43) in cases where there have been successful prosecutions.
The biggest problems in rural areas are associated with fly-tipping, which is most acute at the urban fringes where farmers and growers have to contend with dumped rubbish, burnt-out cars and waste tipped by developers. One of the vital provisions in the Bill—at Clause 54—allows for regulations requiring developers of large construction and demolition projects to prepare site waste management plans. About a quarter of all illegally dumped waste comes from construction, demolition and excavation activities.
The main provision dealing with fly-tipping is Clause 50, which seeks to amend Section 59 of the Environmental Protection Act 1990. Under that Act, a notice can be served on an occupier of land requiring dumped material to be cleared. An occupier can appeal against the notice on the basis that the material was fly-tipped. Clause 50 extends the power to serve a notice on owners, but it retains the defence for the owner if the material was fly-tipped. It is commendable that it is recognised that the innocent owner or occupier of land should not be penalised for material being fly-tipped. However, that seems to be at odds with Clause 20, which introduces a new Section 92A in replacement of Section 90 of the Environmental Protection Act 1990. New Section 92A allows a local authority to designate an area to be litter-free and thus enforce an owner or occupier to clear dumped material without allowing the defence that the material was fly-tipped. That does not help to endorse the "polluter pays" principle and it will put a considerable burden on owners and occupiers.
In reality, many occupiers of land in rural areas clear rubbish and fly-tipped material at their own cost to prevent further incidents and damage to equipment and livestock. However, workable solutions will be found only when local authorities and the Environment Agency appreciate local realities, and Clause 20 will need close examination in Committee. The preferred position is to
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be able to use the powers under Clause 50 to require the person who deposited the waste to remove it, whenever possible.
The other provisions in the Bill are generally welcome. It is pleasing that under the "nuisance: lighting" measures, lighting for sports will be exempted under Clause 103. Speaking as a trustee for the Foundation for Sport and the Arts, which seeks to encourage grass-roots participation in sports, we have constantly funded lighting to sports facilities as that greatly extends participation. However, the measures regarding noise in Clause 84 extend the powers under the Noise Act 1996 and could potentially be used against sports facilities.
I have been informed that apparently local residents near South Hampstead High School objected to the extension of sporting facilities on the grounds that young girls playing netball would cause a nuisance with the noise made while playing. In the light of the desire to promote sports to improve the health of the nation, it would be regrettable if exceptions could not be made to sporting facilities along the same lines as the exceptions made for them in regard to lighting.
To return to the subject of fly-tipping, the number of incidents dealt with by the Environment Agency increased from 3,055 in 2000 to 5,399 in 2004, and yet the number of prosecutions increased to only 254 from 221. The countryside needs this Bill to deal effectively with the problem, and I look forward to seeing its successful passage through your Lordships' House.
8.12 p.m.
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