HC Deb 22 July 1957 vol 574 cc180-90

Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.—[Mr. Oakshott.]

10.44 p.m.

Mr. Anthony Marlowe (Hove)

The matter to which I wish to draw the attention of the House tonight may at first appear to be one of purely local interest. To some extent it is, but it also raises much wider implications about the relationships between various kinds of local authorities, especially the increasing extent to which friction may arise between a non-county borough and the county council of which it forms part.

The matter with which I am concerned relates to the siting of a new police headquarters in the Borough of Hove. It has long been agreed on all sides that a new police headquarters has been required, and before the war a plan was already afoot for such a new headquarters to be built. In those days, the Borough of Hove had its own police force and, therefore, had autonomous jurisdiction over matters of this kind. However, by Socialist legislation passed in 1946, and perpetuating a temporary wartime arrangement, the Borough of Hove ceased to have its own police force, which became merged with that of the County of East Sussex.

When an attempt was made by the Borough of Hove to build a new police headquarters on a site which was of its own choosing, interference came from the East Sussex County Council, which, being the police authority, probably has the last word in matters of this kind today. In correspondence which I had with the Minister he failed to appreciate the point at issue, which is that it is my contention that a non-county borough of the size and status of Hove is entitled to have its police headquarters built in a place of its own choosing and not somewhere dictated by the outside authority, that is to say, the county council.

I do not want to weary the House with a great deal of detail about the differences between the two sides. The argument centres around the following. The present police headquarters forms part of the town hall and is centrally situated for police and magisterial jurisdiction. The edict of the county council will have the effect of removing the police headquarters from its present very convenient situation to a site which has none of those advantages. It will be a site half a mile away from the town hall—and I shall have something more to say about that in a moment—and it will be almost on the eastern boundary of the police and magisterial area. It will be a place where buses are a great deal less convenient than they are at the present situation, and, above all, it will involve those concerned in the administration of police work and the administration of justice in a great deal of inconvenience and extra expense.

It is very convenient to have a police headquarters adjacent to and, if possible, in the same building as the magisterial court. There are two magisterial benches in the Hove Town Hall, and heretofore it has been very convenient to have the police headquarters in the same building. There is, of course, continual coming and going between the police headquarters and the magistrates' courts. From 3rd August to 3rd September last year, a test was made on this subject. It was found that in that period 166 visits were made to the magistrates' clerk's office by members of the police force, as many as 16 being made in one day. During the same period it was necessary for members of the magistrates' clerk's staff to visit the police offices on 99 occasions. It shows how inconvenient it is bound to be if these two buildings are separated by half a mile.

It is said that the cost of siting the new police headquarters on a site similar to that which it occupies at present would involve a little more expenditure than the site proposed, but the question that arises is, Who pays? Is my hon. Friend aware that the great non-county borough of Hove contributes one third of the total expenditure of the East Sussex County Council, which could not exist but for the rate precept which it takes from Hove? To all intents and purposes the expenditure would fall on the ratepayers of Hove, and if these people want their police headquarters in the municipal buildings, it is difficult to understand why authority is not given for that to be done.

The Minister has completely failed to understand the importance of local feeling in this matter and the very natural pride which such a borough has in deciding its own affairs. Why should Hove have its police headquarters put in some place not of its own choosing but decided upon by the county council?

There has been an inquiry, which in no sense directed itself to the point at issue. It was simply a planning inquiry. My hon. Friend wrote to me about it on 2nd April this year and said: The Minister did, of course, give full consideration to the views expressed by the council at the local inquiry, but, as you will see, from the decision letters, he came to the conclusion that there could be no valid planning objection to the Holland Road site"— that is, the alternative site, which the Borough of Hove does not want.

That is not the issue I have been raising with the Minister. No one disputes that the alternative site is perfectly good from the planning point of view; the point is that it is not the one that the people of Hove want. They want their police headquarters in a place of their own choosing.

It is clear that the inspector who held the inquiry and made the report on which the Minister has acted has not directed his mind to that question of local pride and prejudice. He sets out in his report three of the main contentions made on behalf of the borough council and then says that the Minister had considered these and had come to the conclusion that the alternative site has inherent advantages over the only suggested alternative site…adjoining the town hall. That brushes aside the whole issue. We do not say that the proposal has not inherent advantages over that which the people of Hove desire. The report makes no attempt to deal with the main arguments which were put forward on behalf of the local authority. My hon. Friend has the report; perhaps he will look at the foot of the second page and at the top of the third page; there he will see the contentions of the borough council set out. In his report or conclusions, however, the inspector makes no attempt to deal with them. It is no doubt for this reason that he has directed his mind, and the Minister following him has also directed his mind, solely to what I might call the planning issue and has given no weight at all to local preference and local knowledge.

There is no doubt that the use of the alternative site will lead to considerable disadvantages of the kind which I have already described by separating the police headquarters from the magisterial courts by about half-a-mile, involving a great deal of journeying to and fro. I have already pointed out that the expense in any event will fall on the local ratepayers, and if they choose to spend their money in this way I do not see why they should not. Quite apart from that, the views of those who know the local conditions is that the site which they prefer—the town hall site—although it might involve more immediate capital expenditure, will prove more economical, in the end, because it will eliminate the journeying between the two buildings.

The Minister has professed himself to have no further powers in the matter. The attitude which he adopts is, "The inquiry has been held and I can do no more about it." I cannot be satisfied with that. The Minister of Housing is also the Minister of Local Government and, as such, it is part of his duty to try to do justice between the various organisations of local government when, as inevitably happens, they come into dispute with one another over such matters as this.

The report completely avoids the real issue of what the local feelings and preferences are. It is a report of just the kind which the Franks Committee deprecated in its recent Report. It makes it clear that the real issue has not been before the inspector and, consequently, not before the Minister, who can rely only upon the report. The fact that by Socialist legislation the police force of Hove has been absorbed into the county council is no reason for a Conservative Government making the situation still more difficult. But for that legislation the Hove police force, as it existed before the war, could have built its headquarters at any place of its own choosing without interference from the county council.

I take the view that it is the Minister's duty in matters of this kind, acting in his capacity of Minister of Local Government, to do justice between these authorities. Unless there are overwhelming reasons to the contrary, he should in such a matter come down on the side of the local authority in whose area or district the building is to be erected. It is a matter in which the local authority concerned should have the last word.

Finally, I think the Minister responsible for local government also has a duty to protect what I might call the smaller authorities against the overriding power of the larger authorities. Or does the Minister take the view that merely because it is administratively convenient to allow the large county councils to have their way he has no duty to protect the smaller authorities? I realise that this inquiry having taken place the Minister can, of course shelter behind it, but I hope that he will not regard the matter as closed.

In conclusion, I have two suggestions to make to him. One is that he should use his influence with the East Sussex County Council that it should reconsider the matter and withdraw its objection to the Borough of Hove building its police headquarters where it wants to. The Minister has considerable influence with the local authority, and I feel sure that if he chooses to exercise it, the county council would give due weight to it, if the Minister would only point out to the county council that the smaller authority of Hove has its rights and should have preference in this case.

My alternative suggestion is that he holds an entirely different inquiry, not a mere planning inquiry such as has already taken place, but one directed towards the real issue of determining whether or not the preference which the ratepayers of Hove have for seeing the police headquarters built at the town hall is justified. I can tell him quite plainly that there is no doubt whatever that if a local vote or referendum were taken there would be overwhelming support for the plan put forward by the borough council, and that the East Sussex County Council would be heavily defeated.

I ask my right hon. Friend to give consideration to this, and to say that just because one authority is smaller in area and jurisdiction than another it should not be over-ridden by the larger.

11.3 p.m.

The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Housing and Local Government (Mr. J. R. Bevins)

My hon. and learned Friend the Member for Hove (Mr. Marlowe)was good enough to communicate with my right hon. Friend some little time ago about this subject, and then made it clear—as, indeed, he has tonight—that a good deal of the feeling that exists on this matter is due to a sense of affront felt by his friends in Hove, in that they have not had the real say as to where the police headquarters building should go.

I am bound to say to him, however, that the authority that is entitled to select the site here is the appropriate police authority, which happens to be not the Borough of Hove but the East Sussex Standing Joint Committee. That is the police authority responsible for the district of Hove and, as such, has the responsibility for saying, in the first place, where it would prefer its own premises to be located. That body having done that—obviously, after certain discussion with the local authority, as my hon. and learned Friend rightly says—the only issue is whether planning permission shall be given for the site that the police authority requires.

The issue here is a very simple one. There is no dispute whatever that a new divisional police headquarters is required in Hove. The only dispute is where that headquarters building shall go. The view of the police authority—that is, the East Sussex Standing Joint Committee—is that it should be located in a place known as Holland Road, which is, I think, near the county cricket ground, where I have seen my hon. and learned Friend's county play. The other site is at Tisbury Road, near the centre of Hove, and is preferred by the Hove local authority.

There was no agreement between the Standing Joint Committee and the Hove local authority as to which site was to be preferred, and, accordingly, there came before my right hon. Friend two planning applications. One was an application from the county council for planning permission to use the site at Holland Road for a police headquarters building, and there was a further appeal from the Hove Borough Council in respect of a planning application by a building developer who desired to erect, I think, a matter of ten houses on this same site in Holland Road.

There has been a public inquiry, and although primarily such inquiries are planning inquiries, it is nevertheless the fact that whatever the various interested parties wish to represent at these inquiries, they are listened to and heeded by the inspector who takes them. It is rather misleading of my hon. and learned Friend to suggest that some of the considerations which bear on this matter which have wider importance were not referred to at the public inquiry or taken into account either by the inspector or by my right hon. Friend.

Mr. Marlowe

I did not say they were not taken into account at the inquiry. I said that his report makes clear that he had brushed them aside and given no weight to them.

Mr. Bevins

I have studied the report and cannot accept the view that those considerations were brushed aside by the gentleman who took the inquiry.

It was represented by Hove authority that this particular building should be near the town hall and the magistrates' courts. It was argued that the course of having to go between the site proposed by the county council and the town hall and the magistrates' court would involve the authorities in a good deal of expense which would more than offset the initial saving by going to the Holland Road site. It was argued by Hove that to put this building at Holland Road would lower the standard of amenity in a good-class residential district, and finally, that the Tisbury Road site adjoining the existing town hall would be more accessible to the public. Those considerations were certainly in the inspector's mind.

Mr. Marlowe

He does not deal with them in his report.

Mr. Bevins

I do not know whether my hon. and learned Friend has had an opportunity of studying the report.

Mr. Marlowe

I have it here.

Mr. Bevins

In view of what he says, I feel fairly confident that he has not had the opportunity of reading the inspector's report but that, on the contrary, he is quoting from the official decision letter issued by my right hon. Friend. I am sorry to say that, but I am fairly certain he is giving that impression.

Mr. Marlowe

Of course, my hon. Friend is right. I am relying on the decision letter—but that is all we are provided with.

Mr. Bevins

If that is the case, I do not know by what right my hon. and learned Friend purports to quote from the report of the inspector. After all, the inspector's report is a very full document, which sets out in detailed form the evidence put forward and representations made by all parties to the inquiry. These reports are not at present published, either to the parties concerned or to members of the public or hon. Members of this House. But they are naturally, in the nature of the case, available to my right hon. Friend, and it is on the basis of that report and any other considerations which my right hon. Friend cares to take into account that he comes to his decision.

Certain other considerations were put forward by the county authority. They took the view that separation of the magistrates' court from the police building would be no disadvantage to the police, that the building in Holland Road would not be out of place, especially as it adjoins an existing telephone exchange, and they also urged that to locate this building at the rear of the town hall would involve an additional expense of at least £10,000 over the cost of the alternative proposition. After my right hon Friend had considered all these representations, all that was said by the inspector, and all he know of the case, he came to the conclusion that the right thing to do was to grant planning permission for the police headquarters in Holland Road, and to allow the developer to develop the balance, about half, of the site.

On the question of amenity, so far as appearance goes, I think it is worth while pointing out that in 1948 a planning application was made to Hove by a private building developer to build on this land, and planning permission was then given to erect two blocks of flats, to a height of 77 feet. That is worth bearing in mind. The present proposed police headquarters building will, it is true, be three storeys in height, but owing to the fall of the land at this point only two storeys will be visible from pavement level. I have had an opportunity of seeing the drawings and the designs of this proposed police building. It is contemporary in design. It is attractive. It will take up approximately half of the site in Holland Road, and I find it hard to believe that it will interfere with the amenity of this district.

There have been complaints, I understand, that the siting of police headquarters would create undue noise in what is a relatively quiet residential district. That was alleged by the Hove authority at the inquiry, but if my hon. and learned Friend does not wish to pursue that matter, neither do I.

On the question of whether it is desirable that police headquarters should be situated within reasonable access of the town hall and the magistrates' court, all I would say to my hon. and learned Friend is that the Home Office view is that there are, generally speaking good reasons for keeping a police building away from the magistrates' court building.

On the question of cost, which is of very great importance, my hon. and learned Friend referred to the difference in the cost between the proposal of the Hove authority and the proposal which has now been approved by my right hon. Friend. At the inquiry, the difference was put at a figure of £10,000. If we had preferred the Tisbury Road site, it would have involved the demolition of, I think, eight three-storey Victorian houses which are in very good condition and worth about £3,000 apiece. My estimate, for what it is worth, is that the proposition advocated by my hon. and learned Friend would have cost not £10,000 but nearer £20,000 more than the proposition which has been approved by my right hon. Friend.

It is true, as my hon. and learned Friend says, that a good deal of this money in any case will be found by the ratepayers of Hove, but it is the policy of Her Majesty's Government even now to economise in public expenditure, both capital and current, as far as possible, and really my right hon. Friend could see no reason why in a case of this sort, which is not offensive from an amenity point of view, he should condone the excessive spending of public money.

I listened carefully to what my hon. and learned Friend said, and I would very much like to be able to reassure him and to say that we are prepared to go back to the East Sussex County Council and make representations to them in the sense that he indicated. But I must say that having been into this in the greatest of detail, although I am prepared to re-examine what my hon. and learned Friend has said and bring it to the attention of my right hon. Friend, I cannot in all honesty think that I should be justified in giving an undertaking of that sort.

Mr. Marlowe

In the moment that remains I can only say that I regard my hon. Friend's reply as entirely unsatisfactory. I do not see why a Conservative Government should be implementing Socialist legislation which interferes with the local freedom of people to make their own choice.

Question put and agreed to.

Adjourned accordingly at thirteen minutes past Eleven o'clock.