Clause 37.—(ADVANCES AND CONTRIBUTIONS TO HIGHWAY AUTHORITIES IN RESPECT OF LAND ACQUIRED FOR ROADS.) (Hansard, 23 March 1959)

§ Mr. Hay

I beg to move, in page 51, line 34, to leave out from beginning to "any" in line 38 and insert: to make advances under the said section eight shall also include power to make such advances in respect of either or both of the following, that is to say.— (a)". I think it would be convenient if we could take this Amendment together with the following two Amendments in the name of my right hon. Friend, and, possibly also, the Amendment to the Title, in line 13, to leave out "and contributions."

Clause 37 arises from the same problem of planning blight that we have been discussing for the last half-hour, and the Committee will have seen how Clause 32 make it obligatory for what is called the appropriate authority to purchase land which has been blighted by planning decisions in advance of its requirements. Among the appropriate authorities are local highway authorities, and, as my right hon. Friend told the House a few minutes ago, it is the intention of the government to put local authorities so far as possible in a position in which, financially, they can undertake this rather new duty imposed upon them in the interests of people whose property is affected by blight.

This Clause is an indication of how we go about it. The Clause gives the Minister of Transport extended powers to pay grants where a local authority purchases blighted land, and that is provided for in 1034 subsection (1). Subsection (2) is a general extension of the Minister's power which enables him to contribute towards any loss which a local authority may incur from the time when it purchased the land up to the time when it comes to use it for the appropriate highway purpose. It does this by permitting the Minister to make annual contributions towards the amount by which the annual expenditure by the local authority on the land exceeds any annual income which it can obtain. Annual expenditure is explained in subsection (2). It is the cost of maintaining the land plus any loan charges which are payable. May I point out to the Committee that the third Amendment to Clause 37, in page 52, line 3, ensures that "loan charges" in this context includes the repayment of principal as well as interest.

That was the broad picture of the Clause, but during the Second Reading debate the hon. Lady the Member for Peckham (Mrs. Corbet) pointed out a rather unexpected circumstance. It appears that the power of the Minister of Transport and Civil Aviation to make annual contributions of this kind under the 1909 Act was tied by the wording used by the draftsmen to his power to make contributions towards the cost of maintaining new roads. It happens that by Section 85 of the Local Government Act, 1929, such maintenance grants—I think they are called classification grants, but they are grants for the maintenance of new roads—ceased to be payable to, among other authorities, the London County Council, and also to county boroughs. I am told that a similar situation has arisen in the case of large burghs in Scotland. This was a deplorable situation which obviously we could not allow to continue without redress, and we seek to put it right by these Amendments.

The Amendments have a further effect which I think will commend itself to the Committee. They extend the power of the Minister to pay grants on an annual basis so long as the loan charges are still running even although the construction of the road has been completed. We think this will be much more flexible and certainly more reasonable. The Minister should have the power to continue to pay grant on an annual basis. The consequential Amendment to the Title is a purely drafting Amendment. It 1035 deletes the reference to contributions. I hope the Committee will accept the Amendments.