TOWN AND COUNTRY PLANNING [MONEY] (Hansard, 5 February 1947)

HC Deb 05 February 1947 vol 432 cc1917-25 1917

§ Resolution reported: That, for the purpose of any Act of the present Session to make fresh provision for planning the development and use of land, and for purposes connected therewith (in this resolution referred to as 'the Act'), it is expedient to authorise—

A. The charging on the Consolidated Fund of the principal of and interest on stock to be issued under the Act in satisfaction of payments to be made thereunder in respect of interests in land which are depreciated in value by virtue of the provisions of the Act (not exceeding in the aggregate, together with payments to be made by virtue of any corresponding provisions which may be enacted in relation to Scotland, the sum of three hundred million pounds); the charging on and issuing out of that Fund of expenses in connection with the issue and management of any such stock; and the issuing out of that Fund of sums necessary to enable the Central Land Board to be established under the Act (in this resolution referred to as 'the Board') to pay interest on any such payments pending the satisfaction thereof.
B. The issuing out of the Consolidated Fund of sums necessary to enable the Board to make other payments under the Act in respect of interests in land which are depreciated as aforesaid, being land which has sustained war damage in such circumstances that the appropriate payment under the War Damage Act, 1943 is a, value payment, and to pay interest on such payments pending the satisfaction thereof.
C. The raising of money by the Treasury, in any manner in which they are authorised to raise money under the National Loans Act, 1939.—

(1) for the purpose of providing sums for the redemption of any such stock as is mentioned in paragraph A of this resolution;
(2) for the purpose of providing sums to be issued out of the Consolidated Fund as mentioned in paragraph A or paragraph B of this resolution, or of providing for the replacement of sums so issued.

D. The payment by the Board into the Exchequer, out of moneys provided by Parliament, of annual instalments equal in the aggregate to the aggregate amount of—
1. (1) any such payments as are mentioned in paragraph A of this resolution which are satisfied by the issue of stock; and
2. (2) any sums issued to the Board out of the Consolidated Fund as mentioned in that paragraph in respect of interest on such payments,
together with interest on the said aggregate amount; and the issue out of the Consolidated Fund of sums so paid into the Exchequer, and their application in redemption or repayment 1918 of debt or, in so far as they represent interest, in payment of interest otherwise payable out of the permanent annual charge for the National Debt.
E. The payment out of moneys provided by Parliament of expenses incurred by the Minister of Town and Country Planning (in this resolution referred to as 'the Minister') in making grants, in accordance with regulations made under the Act, as follows, that is to say:

(1) grants to local authorities in respect of expenditure incurred by those authorities under the Act or under the Town and Country Planning Act, 1944, in connection with the acquisition and clearing of land acquired or appropriated by those authorities for or in connection with the redevelopment of areas as a whole, or for the purpose of bringing derelict land into use (including sums paid by those authorities by way of compensation or otherwise in collection with any restriction on the development or use of such land imposed by or under any enactment), not exceeding—

(a)in the case of land acquired or appropriated for the redevelopment as a whole of areas of extensive war damage, or for the relocation of population or industry or the replacement of open space in the course of such redevelopment, ninety per cent. of the annual costs curred or treated in accordance with regulations as being incurred by the said authorities in respect of the borrowing of money to defray expenditure in respect of which the grants are made;
(b)in the case of any other land, eighty per cent. of the said annual costs;

(2) grants to local authorities—
1. (a)in respect of expenditure incurred by those authorities in the payment of compensation (other than compensation for the acquisition of land) under the provisions of the Act in that behalf;
2. (b)in respect of loss incurred by those authorities in connection with the acquisition and clearing of land other than such land as is mentioned in sub-paragraph (1) of this paragraph (including sums paid by those authorities by way of compensation or otherwise in connection with any restriction on the development or use of such land imposed by or under any enactment).
not exceeding sixty per cent. of the amount of the expenditure or loss in respect of which the grants are made;
(3) grants to local authorities in respect of expenditure incurred by those authorities (including expenditure incurred by joint committees of which those authorities were constituent authorities) under Subsection (4) of Section ten of the Town and Country Planning Act, 1932, or under that Subsection as applied by Section four of the Town and Country Planning (Interim Development) Act, 1943, or under Subsection (2) of Section seven of the said Act of 1943, in connection with applications for permission to develop land dealt with after the eleventh day of May, nineteen hundred and forty-three, or in respect of the revocation or modification, 1919 after that date, of any permission to develop land whether granted before or after that date.

F. The payment out of moneys provided by Parliament of the following expenditure, that is to say:—

(1) the remuneration and allowances of members, officers and servants of the Board, and any administrative expenses incurred by the Board for the purposes of the Act;
(2) any expenses of the Minister in connection with the making or amendment of a development plan under the provisions of the Act in that behalf;
(3) any expenses incurred by any Minister or by the Board in the acquisition of land under powers conferred in that behalf by the Act, other than expenses so incurred which are required to be defrayed out of the Road Fund;
(4) any sums authorised or required to be paid out of moneys provided by Parliament by virtue of any of the provisions of Sections nineteen to thirty of the Town and Country Planning Act, 1944, as incorporated with the Act;
(5) any additional expenditure incurred by any Minister in the payment of compensation under Section twenty-four of the Town and Country Planning Act, 1944; by reason of the provisions of the Act amending that Section;
(6) any expenses incurred by the Minister of Transport (other than expenses incurred in the construction or improvement of roads) under the provisions of the Act relating to the stopping up or diversion of highways;
(7) any sums payable into the Road Fund for the purpose of defraying expenses of the Minister of Transport which are payable out of that fund by virtue of any of the provisions of the Act;
(8) any sums required by the Board for the repayment, in accordance with the provisions of the Act, of sums received by the Board in respect of development charges (including sums received by the Board in lieu of such charges under the provisions of the Act relating to land of local authorities and of development corporations established under the new Towns Act, 1946) or for making contributions towards compensation payable by local authorities under the Act;
(9) any expenses incurred by any Minister or by the Board in the payment of compensation for damage caused in the exercise of any power of entry conferred under the Act;
(10) any expenses of the Minister in the payment of remuneraiton and allowances to the chairman and members of any tribunal, or in the payment of the expenses of any advisory committee, established for the purposes of the Act or of regulations made thereunder;
(11) any administrative expenses incurred by the Minister for the purposes of the Act.

G. The payment into the Exchequer of any sums received by the Board in respect of the disposal of land acquired by the Board under powers conferred in that behalf by the Act and of any sums received by the Board, in accordance with arrangements made under the 1920 Act in respect of Crown Land, in substitution for development charges thereunder."

§ Motion made, and Question proposed, "That this House doth agree with the Committee in the said Resolution."

§ 11.1 p.m.

§ Sir John Mellor (Sutton Coldfield)
I must renew my protest against the terms of this Resolution. In particular, I must protest against the insertion in the Resolution of the figure of £300 million as the ceiling of compensation for depreciation of land value in consequence of the Bill. The Government have taken the course of inserting this figure of £300 million in the Bill. They have also inserted it as a maximum in the Money Resolution, and this renders it impossible for the amount put in the. Bill to be amended upwards. Hon. Members will be able to move Amendments in Standing Committee to reduce the figure below £300 million, but if the terms of this Resolution stand, it will be impossible for any Amendments to be moved to revise the figure upward. It seems to me that the proceedings of the Standing Committee in this respect will be very one-sided.
Last Thursday evening, when I raised this matter, the Minister of Town and Country Planning said, on the Committee Stage of the Resolution: The House having voted, I think it can now be taken that the House, by a large majority, is satisfied that £300 million is the right figure, and therefore, I submit, quite properly, that it goes into the Financial Resolution."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 30th January, 1947; Vol. 432, c. 1248.]. I think that that statement of the Minister's was a very inadequate review of the situation. The Bill covers a very wide field. This question of compensation is one very important element, but the Debate in the House ranged over a very much wider field. Therefore, I think it is hardly fair for the Minister to say that the House had obviously decided that £300 million was the right figure; that there should be no other figure, but that the amount should stand as in the terms of the Money Resolution. In the course of discussion of this figure, the Minister went into considerable detail in calculation. It was evident that in his view it had not been easy to arrive at this figure. But he had arrived at it, and expressed the view that it was the right figure Other people, however, are 1921 entitled to take a different view. In Committee the Opposition should have the opportunity of putting forward Amendments and to argue what in their view the figure should be. The Minister described this as one of the most controversial parts of the Bill but if the whole matter is to be considered as concluded, because the House gave a Second Reading to the Bill containing this figure of £300 million, then the later stages of the proceedings will be rendered very largely abortive. Last night the Minister of Fuel and Power pleaded for elbow room in regard to the figure to be adopted in the Money Resolution on the Electricity Bill. All I am asking is that the Standing Committee should have elbow room in considering the figure of £300 million in relation to this Bill.
I think that it is perfectly right that the House should require some limit of compensation to be inserted in the terms of the Money Resolution. But, I submit, that figure should be something greater than the figure inserted in the Bill, if only to permit adequate discussion in Standing Committee. I am going to read a very important statement which was made in 1937, by the present Prime Minister when he was Leader of the Opposition. It is a statement which, if I may respectfully say so, does him great credit as a Parliamentarian. I quoted this on the Money Resolution of the Bank of England Bill, but it is not unreasonable to quote it again on this occasion. This is what the present Prime Minister said. on 8th March, 1937: I deem it to be my duty as Leader of the Opposition, to call attention to what I consider to be the danger of Members losing their privileges in this House. There is no party issue raised. It is entirely a matter for this House as a whole. I hold that it is vital that we should preserve this House as the greatest democratic assembly in the world and that we should not allow its former rights to be taken away by the growth of usages contrary to its tradition.—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 8th March. 1937; Vol. 321, c. 815–820.] That is a view which should be given very respectful and serious consideration by the House in relation to the Financial Resolution, now under discussion. In my submission, either that view should be taken and the Financial Resolution drafted sufficiently widely to enable Amendments to be moved in Committee, or else if the whole thing is to be decided at this stage, and if a ceiling has to be put on, it ought not to be treated as a matter for 1922 debate at this time of night, but should be brought on as one of the really important Orders of the Day and taken at a reasonable hour. I feel that these Money Resolutions are treated too much as a sideshow by the Government. If they are going to draft them widely, they will not meet with opposition, but if these Resolutions are to be as narrow and restricted as this one is, so that they bind the Standing Committee, and tie up subsequent consideration of the Bill, they ought to be threshed out in a full day's debate. We cannot, of course, amend these Money Resolutions by increasing the charge, therefore, the only way in which this matter can be put right, is either to have the Resolution be withdrawn, or to have it rejected by the House. I would propose that it should be rejected.

§ 11.10 p.m.

§ Mr. Manningham-Buller (Daventry)
My hon. Friend has given some reasons for objecting to the ceiling, in this Financial Resolution, of £300 million. I do not know whether that limit is a correct estimate or not. It is clear from the right hon. Gentleman's Second Reading speech that he formed his figures in relation to development of land for building only. He sought to justify the figure by pointing out the greater development of land outside towns in the prewar years, 45,000 acres a year. Valuing that land at £200 an acre, he arrived at the sum of £9 million. At 16 or 17 years' purchase, he arrived at £150 million. He then estimated that another £150 million would be required for development or redevelopment in urban areas. I think he will agree that in making those estimates he was only counting development values in relation to land for building. If that be so, I would put a question to him. Clause 76 (1) provides: In relation to development consisting of the winning and working of minerals, the provisions of this Act shall have effect subject to such adaptations and modifications as may be prescribed by regulations. Therefore it must be contemplated—because we do not see the Regulations and do not know the scheme in relation to minerals—that the Bill will apply to the building of houses on land and to the extraction of minerals from land in precisely the same fashion. If that be so, the Minister ought to give us a specific answer to the question: Is it the case that out of 1923 this £300 million no compensation will be given in any case of hardship in respect of the loss of mineral rights? If the answer is "No," it means that all those who own agricultural land under which there are minerals, will lose those rights of development. If the answer is "Yes," does it not follow that the Minister's ceiling of £300 million is inadequate to provide compensation? The right hon. Gentleman made his estimate for building development, and provided nothing for mineral development, so that any sum given for hardship for loss of mineral rights will have to be added to the £300 million. In that respect, the limit fixed in the Money Resolution is wrong. I do not know what the answer is to the question I have put and I suggest that the right hon. Gentleman should tell the House the answer before we pass this Resolution, having regard to the fact that the £300 million is only his own guess. We should have a higher limit than this and should be enabled to thresh out the matter properly in Committee.
A further point is that mineral owners may not always be landowners. They will be deprived of the development value, and will have to pay, under the Bill, development charges of an unfixed and unknown amount. This is a question of no small importance when one realises that leaving coal out of the question the amount of minerals extracted from our land in 1938, was something like 100,000,000 tons. I assume that the amount is now very much larger. If it be the case that the people who are extracting minerals are going to receive something from this £300 million, it might follow that very little of that £300 million would be left for division among the building developments to which the right hon. Gentleman referred in making his estimate. I do not want to take up any further time developing this point. [HON. MEMBERS: "Oh."] It is a serious point, and a point worth developing, even by hon. Members opposite who made that interruption. I am not however going into it at any greater length because I want to give the right hon. Gentleman an opportunity of dealing specifically with it.

§ Mr. Gallacher (Fife, West)
Was it not a slip of the tongue when the hon. and learned Member said that the minerals were taken from "our land" last year?

1924

§ Mr. Manningham-Buller
The hon. Gentleman's views on this country are well-known. When I was speaking of "our land" I referred to Great Britain. The hon. Gentleman can speak for another country as often as he chooses.

§ 11.16 p.m.

§ The Minister of Town and Country Planning (Mr. Silkin)
The hon. Baronet the Member for Sutton Coldfield (Sir J. Mellor) has returned to the attack, as I expected him to do, and has made very much the same speech as that which was heard from him on the Committee stage of the Money Resolution. May I say I am bound by the Rules of the House just as he is, and I am not in a position to do anything about the question of Order. It is a fact that Part IV of this Bill was very fully debated, and I accepted the assent of the House to the Second Reading of the Bill, as being an assent to the fixing of the amount to be paid by way of compensation, in the form of a global sum. The amount of that global sum is £300 million. If the House had chosen to express strong disagreement with the figure of £300 million, they could have done so, but I am bound to say that, in my view the assent of the House to the Bill included assent to Part IV of the Bill and the global sum of £300 million.

§ Sir J. Mellor
Does not the right hon. Gentleman think it desirable that we should be able to discuss the adequacy of the figure of £300 million, as a separate item, during the Committee stage?

§ Mr. Silkin
Surely that formed the subject of most of the speeches that were made during the two-day Debate, and there must come some finality. I do not want to repeat all the things I said on Second Reading. I will just point out that in fixing a global sum, we accepted the recommendation of the Uthwatt Committee. It is for the House to say whether £300 million is the right figure or not, and we are inviting the House to agree with that figure. If the House thinks it is hopelessly inadequate, it still has the remedy of rejecting this proposal on the Report stage. To the hon. and learned Member for Daventry (Mr. Manningham-Buller) I would say that I gave the figures by way of illustration, and I made it quite clear that it was not intended to be a detailed estimate. So much so that I referred to 15 or 16 years 1925 purchase, at £9 million, although 13 years purchase would be £135 million, and not £150 million. I was talking in very round figures; indeed, I think I established that £300 million was a very generous figure. A good many hon. Members thought so themselves, and in their heart of hearts, a good many hon. Gentlemen on the other side of the House as well as this side, think it is generous. It is intended to include mineral rights, and the Bill says so in terms. The amount of these mineral rights—while not pretending to give an estimate—would be a relatively small amount. It can be taken out of the £300 million, and will not seriously affect the rights of owners of land. We will examine this matter and if it turns out that I am hopelessly wrong, we shall have to think again.

§ Mr. Manningham-Buller
That is one of the things I am seeking to preserve—the right to correct it if the Minister proves to be wrong. I do not know if the figure of £300 million is right or wrong, but I do ask the Minister to preserve the right to correct it, if it is wrong.

§ Mr. Silkin
I think the amount of the mineral rights is relatively small. It can be taken in our stride.

§ Sir J. Mellor
The Minister has indicated that if he is wrong he will take steps in Committee to put it right. Does that mean that he is prepared to change the Money Resolution?

§ Mr. Silkin
I would point out that I am speaking in very narrow terms. I am speaking of mineral rights, and not about the global sum, which must stand. The House has approved it. On this question of mineral rights, I follow the hon. and learned Gentleman's point. He is right in saying that in the calculation which I made, I did not, in terms, take account of mineral rights. The amount, as I have said, is small, but I allowed a considerable margin, and I think it will be found to be all right. If I am seriously wrong, as I say, the matter can be considered again.

§ Question put, and agreed to.