HC Deb 17 April 1946 vol 421 cc2851-2

Lords Amendment: In page 5, line 15, leave out "the agreement to acquire the land" and insert "agreement."

Mr. Key

I beg to move "That this House doth agree with the Lords in the said Amendment." In this case we desire to make a certain modification in this Subsection for this purpose. The Clause, as drafted, deals with the question of the acquisition of land under the Town and Country Planning Act of 1944, whereby the Minister can make an Order for its acquisition without compensation, the actual price being paid being that of the site value. In order to make this plain, and to be certain that it does not operate except in the cases where actual possession has been taken of the land, this series of Amendments has been put down.

Lords Amendment: In page 7, line 42, at the end, insert new Clause A (Application of S. 1 to local Acts).

(1) Where, apart from this Act, power to authorise a local authority to purchase land compulsorily is conferred by any enactment contained in a local Act and in force immediately before the commencement of this Act, the Minister of Health may by order made on the application of the local authority direct that section one of this Act shall apply in relation to the enactment as if the enact-merit were contained in a public general Act:

Provided that nothing in an order under this section shall empower the authorisation of a compulsory purchase in accordance with the provisions of section two of this Act.

(2) Where an order has come into operation under this section the last foregoing section shall apply as if the local Act to which the order relates were specified in the Fourth Schedule to this Act, and as if there were specified in the second column of that Schedule such amendments of the local Act as may be provided for in the order, being amendments appearing to the Minister to be consequential on the making of the order.

(3) Any order under this section made after the expiration of two years from the commencement of this Act shall be subject to special parliamentary procedure.

Mr. Key

I beg to move That this House doth agree with the Lords in the said Amendment."

The reason for this new Clause is that many authorities have local Acts which give them powers for the compulsory acquisition of land. Certain of those powers will be repealed by this Bill, and therefore it was felt necessary to bring the operations clearly into the Bill. I would point out that these operations apply only to the Clause 1 procedure, and the proviso in Subsection (1) definitely prohibits their use for the purpose of the quicker acquisition of land under Clause 2.

Mr. W. S. Morrison

I do not rise to voice any disagreement with this Amendment. I think it is a useful qualifying procedure, but I think it would be as well to draw attention to Subsection (3) of the proposed new Clause, which says: Any order under this section made after the expiration of two years from the commencement of this Act shall be subject to special Parliamentary procedure. I understand that after a lapse of two years from the commencement of the Act, the further safeguard of special Parliamentary procedure is to apply to Orders made under this new Clause.

Mr. Key

Yes, that is so.