HC Deb 26 January 1961 vol 633 cc451-64

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

8.53 p.m.

Mr. Denzil Freeth (Basingstoke)

I beg to raise on the Adjournment tonight a personal problem of one of my constituents. I do not think it will take up the whole of the time until 10.30 p.m., so if any other Members wish to raise subjects on the Motion they will have time to do so.

Even though the subject which I am about to raise is of primary importance to only one person in these islands I do not think I need apologise on that account. This is the question of a planning appeal to my right hon. Friend the Minister of Housing and Local Government on an application made to erect in the grounds of Mrs. Bagley's House, "Embers", at Upton Grey, near Basingstoke, a small cottage or bungalow.

Mrs. Bagley is a widow whose husband was killed in the war. In the last fourteen years she has lived in the village of Upton Grey where her mother is buried. She wishes to remain in the village but she finds that her house has too much ground. It has something between one-sixth and one-third of an acre. She also finds that it is too lonely, since the nearest dwelling is some 500 ft. away.

Therefore, as the grounds are too large for her to tend herself, as labour is dear and scarce, and as she wants somebody living more closely, she decided that it would be a good thing for all concerned if she erected a bungalow or cottage in part of her own grounds. The site would be 66 ft. by 106 ft.

"Embers" is at the western end of one of the prettiest villages in Hampshire. It is even pretty for the constituency which I have the honour to represent. Basically, the village runs down a long and twisty hill. The site the House is considering tonight lies at the western or top end of that hill before the curly descent to the pond at the cross roads at the bottom of the hill is reached. Therefore, I agree at the outset that we are dealing with a development on the outskirts of a village.

The road from Basingstoke via Tunworth passes by "Embers", which is an attractive house almost entirely hidden behind a hedge when approaching by the road from the west and almost completely hidden when approaching up the hill from the village. The plot of ground upon which development was proposed by my constituent does not lie direct on the road, but slightly to the north-west of the house fronting on to a bridle track which leaves the road at right angles.

Anyone coming from Basingstoke towards the site would be heading straight for the part of the ground upon which development was proposed. Therefore, it might be thought that to somebody coming from the west there would be an ugly building where at present there is country. However, the thick hedgerows and the range of trees providentially planted by our ancestors would make a building on the proposed site virtually invisible in all but midwinter.

The road from Basingstoke heads towards these trees, but it then bends right past the front door of "Embers". It is not proposed that development within the grounds of "Embers" would necessitate an extra entrance on to the road. There might well be a gate on to the bridle path. Vehicles would use the present drive of Mrs. Bagley's own house, so there would not be a dangerous exit, or even an extra exit, on to the road.

Mrs. Bagley submitted her application for planning approval in the usual way. It was refused by the local planning authority upon three main grounds—first, that the proposed development would constitute an unwarranted extension of the village of Upton Grey; secondly, that it would create a precedent which would make it difficult to resist proposals for ribbon development all along the road; and, thirdly, that it would be detrimental to the visual amenities of the area and particularly in respect of the approach to the village from the direction of Tunworth. My hon. Friend the Parliamentary Secretary has the unenviable job of defending his right hon. Friend's indefensible decision tonight, and I am grateful to him for coming to the House.

In the inspector's report which my hon. Friend was kind enough to send me, there is a fairly full history of the proposed development. It states that the property of "Embers" stands on elevated ground at the extreme western end of the village at the junction of the bridle road with the northern side of the the approach road from Upton Grey to Tunworth. It says that the property is about 500 ft. west of the nearest residential neighbour, and that further west farmlands extend on towards Basingstoke. It also gives Mrs. Bagley's reasons for wishing to build upon the site, and it mentions the fact that the appeal was determined on written representations on both sides.

There are one or two of the difficulties that we can cut out at once. First, water and electricity are available. There are many parts of the country where those supplies are not available, and where people seeking houses would give their eyes to have either piped water or electricity laid on. Indeed, it is only recently that I have been in correspondence with my hon. Friend about difficulties over water and sewerage in another part of the constituency. Here we have a site where both water and electricity are readily available.

Secondly, the proposed design of the bungalow or cottage takes account of materials and lines which would enable it to he in complete keeping with the raw materials and architectural lines of "Embers" itself. Mrs. Bagley has expressed in writing her willingness to do anything to try to make the proposed building fit better into the countryside.

No objection has been raised on drainage grounds—and, heaven knows, at the present time there are parts of my constituency where people are suffering severe difficulties with flooded and overflowing cesspools and septic tanks. Those people would give a great deal to have property where the drainage was as well organised as it is on this site. The two dwellings would use the same vehicular access, and it has not been suggested that the site is too small to accommodate the two dwellings.

The report of the local area planning committee says, first of all, that this would be ribbon development; secondly, that it would create a precedent for more ribbon development and, thirdly, that it would be detrimental to the visual amenities of the area and would …in particular, detract from the pleasant approach to Upton Grey from Tunworth. I should like to emphasise that at all times Mrs. Bagley has been at particular pains to point out that she would be willing to take almost any trouble in order to preserve the rural character and beauty of Upton Grey, and also to preserve the pleasant rural approach to the village from the west. Mrs. Bagley does not consider that the proposed development would offend any planning principle or in any way harm any local amenity.

Let us first of all take the question of ribbon development. Ribbon development is development in a line along the road. Here we do not have ribbon development but consolidation, because the proposed property would not front on to the road; it would be at the side of "Embers" on the bridle-path leading towards the north. We shall there have filling in, or consolidation, which is surely a good thing. It is surely good that there should be in a village where there are some houses a few that are closer together. I believe that it is good on planning grounds that they do not then spread out into the countryside ruining sight lines and defacing the general beauty. I believe that it is good on social grounds that people should have neighbours to whom they can turn and who live nearby. When one finds this particular situation on land which at present is going to seed because Mrs. Bagley cannot afford to have somebody to work it and cannot work it herself, the social and planning needs of the community would suggest that the erection of a pleasant building on the site would not be detrimental to the amenities of the village of Upton Grey.

It has been put to the Minister, I think, that this is a village of large houses. I do not think that this is true, although the further up the hill one goes the larger are the houses. But some of these large houses in fairly extensive grounds have cottages belonging to them, necessary, no doubt, if the work of the countryside is to go on. Why it should be accepted that cottages for some of these houses are right and proper in the village whereas it is wrong for there to be another cottage by Mrs. Bagley's residence is something which I find hard to accept.

It is suggested by Mrs. Bagley that the proposed development would not be visible from any existing development in the village. Having visited the site myself and having been over it, I say that, to the best of my knowledge and belief, that statement is correct. It would be visible only from the west, and from there barely at all except as a grey shape through the trees in the autumn and winter visible by somebody approaching along the road from the west. In the main, if there were a position from which this particular site could be seen and from which somebody might view the proposed cottage, this would be from the farm lands. That is something which could easily be dealt with by the planting of trees.

It has been suggested that this is ribbon development and outward expansion of the village. I hope I have answered that. I am sure that, if my hon. Friend looks at the plan again which I see he has so thoughtfully brought with him, he will agree that I am right. Secondly, the suggestion that a building here would act as a precedent for further ribbon development out to the west is, surely, completely untrue. First and foremost, this proposed cottage would be built within the garden and close to an existing house. It would not take the extension of the village any further along the road and it would not itself even stand on the road. It cannot, therefore, be argued that there would be a precedent for ribbon development.

The inspector himself comes down on Mrs. Bagley's side about this. He has been to the site, which I do not think my hon. Friend has, and which I am quite certain my right hon. Friend in whose name my hon. Friend speaks tonight has not done. His inspector from the Ministry did go, and his view of the matter accords exactly with mine. In paragraph 19 of his report, dated 10th October, he said: I thought it was taking the matter, academically, to a rather fine point to suggest that the development of that part of the curtilage of Embers' furthermost from the village would be an outward extension to the village". Secondly, on the question of whether, in the future, a building here on the proposed site would make the prevention of ribbon development more difficult, the inspector in paragraph 20 of his report said: Admittedly, there were orchard and other lands, in other ownership, to the east of 'Embers', with frontages directly on to the road. But I found it difficult to accept the view that approval of the proposed development at Embers ' would make it difficult to resist proposals elsewhere. Applications had to be considered on merit and approval here could not, in my view, influence considerations elsewhere one way or the other. Moreover, as the actual appeal site did not have frontage directly on to the road, but on the bridle road, it was, I felt, difficult to uphold refusal on the ground that it would be similar to ribbon development along the road. The inspector then deals with the question of the visual amenities and whether the erection of a well-planned building would destroy the beauty of the approach from the west by road or the beauty as seen from neighbouring countryside. He says in paragraph 21: From one viewpoint only would the proposed dwelling really be noticeable. That was from the west—from the adjoining farmlands, and from the approach road to the village from the direction of Tunworth where it would stand on elevated ground on the northern side of the road, where there was a curve in the road on an uphill gradient. From that viewpoint the upper part and roof of Embers' were visible. The building "— that is, the building of the existing house— of pleasing external appearance, stood against the background of mature trees, with hedges in the foreground and some trees in the garden. There were mature trees along the southern side of the road. The inspector's conclusion in the following paragraph is: ' Embers' did not harm visual amenities The second dwelling to be built at its side, with external appearance in keeping, would not, in my opinion, be harmful to the visual amenities at the approach to Upton Grey from the direction of Tunworth. The inspector, who had seen the site, therefore recommended to the Minister, who had not seen it, that the appeal should be allowed. Having waited, apparently, from 10th October, the date of the inspector's report, to 1st December, when a letter was written on his behalf to my constituent's agent, the Minister in one short paragraph sees fit to throw on one side the evidence of his own inspector who has considered the matter on the spot.

The Minister thinks—and here I quote from the letter signed on his behalf— that the development would constitute an outward extension of the village and indeed an incipient 'ribbon ' of development—. A large part of the inspector's report was taken up with showing that that was exactly what would not happen. The Minister's representative continues that the Minister thinks that the inspector gave insufficient weight to the argument that it would be a bad precedent even though there might not be similar cases in the immediate neighbourhood of the site. Anyone who has seen the site or who has looked at the plan cannot but agree that this one house, tucked away down the bridle-path, could not possibly be regarded as the outward ribbon of development of the village of Tunworth.

I think that the Minister, in overruling his inspector's recommendation, has been guilty of a major error of judgment. It is an administrative act and I think that he has judged and acted rightly. I do not suggest that in all cases Ministers of Housing and Local Government should automatically obey arid agree with the recommendations of their inspectors, but I suggest that when an inspector, on an isolated site in a case in which no great questions of policy are involved, suggests that a planning appeal should be allowed, where there is sewerage, although I admit a septic tank, water and electricity and a will to build, and where there is a community into which the new dwelling and its inhabitants would naturally fit, the Minister should take very great care before throwing overboard the considered opinion of someone who has interviewed the person who proposes to develop and has seen the site.

The question is, where does my constituent go from here? It may be that my hon. Friend the Parliamentary Secretary will argue that the Minister, having given his decision, has no right to alter it. The damned are damned even though they are proved to be innocent later and the Minister has announced ex cathedra and for this round of the argument that he can do nothing.

What I should like my hon. Friend to do is to say that if my constituent puts in a fresh planning appeal, he will look again with great care at the stupid and synthetic arguments that were adduced by the Minister in his letter and that. should my constituent once again go through the tedious and expensive process of having to submit plans to the area authority, perhaps having them rejected. having to resubmit and to appeal to the Minister, my hon. Friend will give an assurance in the name of his right hon. Friend the Minister that the matter would be looked at afresh but bearing in mind the debate we have had tonight.

9.16 p.m.

The Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Housing and Local Government (Sir Keith Joseph)

My hon. Friend the Member for Basingstoke (Mr. Denzil Freeth) has said that this case effects only one person. That may be true, but it is none the less important for that. It is a sad thing that somebody like Mrs. Bagley, who is obviously extremely attached to the village of Upton Grey, who has lived there for fourteen years of her life, who is now living there again and who is a widow, should not be able to do what she likes in her own garden. This is very sad, but I hope to be able to defend it and to show that, intolerable though these limitations on private rights are, they are justified because they secure the rights of others.

I congratulate my hon. Friend and Mrs. Bagley on the extremely vigorous way in which he has put her case. I am sure that it could not have been more strongly put. I should like to make it plain that, although I shall have to say a number of apparently arid and negative things, it is not because I do not realise how extraordinarily irritating, and worse, it must be for Mrs. Bagley to be in this position.

The fact is that when I said that the limitations on the rights of each private citizen exist only for the protection of other private citizens, I was speaking about the citizens of the future. We who have to administer the planning laws passed by Parliament and who have to appear sometimes draconic in our decisions—and somebody has to take those decisions—are acting as the custodians of our inheritance for generations to come. We are, as it were, the ancestors of our descendants and what we do is to protect what they may bless or curse us for.

To come from the general to the particular, Mrs. Bagley knows very well the village of Upton Grey. She has spent a large part of her life there. When she bought the house "Embers", she knew, or should have known, perfectly well, or must be assumed to have known, that it was a relatively isolated house and that she might well be lonely in it.

My hon. Friend did not mention this, and I may be wrong, but I gather from the papers and the dates that Mrs. Bagley's first application for planning permission to build the development which we are discussing tonight was put in to the local planning authority before she actually bought the house. If that is so, it cannot be said that she had any misconception. She knew when buying the house that she would be in a relatively isolated position. I believe, although I may be wrong—I am not pinning anything on this—that she had had a refusal for the planning permission before she actually concluded the purchase. What I do not know is whether she was morally committed to purchase at that stage. In any event, nothing depends upon that. All I am saying is that Mrs. Bagley was not a stranger to the village. She could not have had any surprise about the nature of the house.

The fact is that after buying the house, Mrs. Bagley again sought planning permission. Again, she was refused. Here we come to the first appeal, which, as my hon. Friend said, at her request was conducted by written representation. That appeal was dismissed.

A couple of months later she sought, once more, planning permission. I think that on this occasion she moved the site of her proposed house a little way, but she received a third refusal. This was the occasion when she made her second appeal and, quite rightly, as she was entitled to do, asked that it should be conducted by means of an inquiry. My right hon. Friend then sent an inspector down. An inquiry was held and, as my hon. Friend has stressed with quiet under-emphasis, the inspector recommended "Yes" and my right hon. Friend decided "No".

My hon. Friend made no bones about this. He said, rightly, that he does not object in principle to my right hon. Friend coming to a different conclusion from his inspector's recommendation, and I congratulate him on his perspicacity. My right hon. Friend is responsible for making these decisions and is responsible to the House. His inspector is an adviser and makes recommendations, but the decisions must be the Minister's. In about 5 per cent. of the cases in each of the years 1958 and 1959 my right hon. Friend came to a decision opposite to the recommendation made by the inspector.

In this case, the inspector recorded his views and recommendations and, of course, I saw the papers. My hon. Friend commented that it took six weeks for a decision to arrive. I hope he realises that we are dealing with something in the nature of 10,000 appeals a year. A great deal of study has to be given to the recommendations and decisions. When there is a case that has many sympathetic elements about it, as this has, we do not hurry over a decision which means so much to an individual.

I saw the papers, studied them carefully, and came to the conclusion that I was bound to advise my right hon. Friend that, in my view, the inspector had given insufficient weight to two aspects which, in combination, seemed to me, and to my right hon. Friend when I advised him, extremely strong. I will try now to explain which are the elements to which I believe the inspector gave insufficient weight.

The first is that he underestimated the positive fact that this development on the outskirts of a village, as my hon. Friend said, would spread the village to some extent. It is a far cry from that to say that it would be the beginning of ribbon development, but if one allows individual items to grow on the outskirts of a village they add up to ribbon development.

One of the objects of the planning laws passed by this House is to keep as clear a distinction as possible between town and country, to maintain town as town, and country as country. One of the principle objects of the House is to keep development as compact as may be and to avoid straggle—the sort of random development all over the country which took place in the past and which we now so much deplore. If we are to achieve this object we have to back up local planning authorities in setting a limit on villages and individual communities.

We back them up only when those same planning authorities provide other villages and communities where they allow development. We make sure that there is enough accommodation on the land for our increasing and increasingly prosperous population to find homes, while on the other hand trying to keep the major planning objects.

The house which this lady bought is already on the westerly edge of the village, which is, by common agreement, an extremely pretty one, and which, I believe, is an unusually unspoilt one. Not only is it on the westerly edge but it is also 500 ft. from its eastern neighbour. This is not, therefore, a case of a solid packed village, with "Embers" on one extreme wing. The village has already begun to straggle when we get to "Embers". In fact, further development would increase that straggle. I do not see how there can be any two opinions about that.

My hon. Friend tried to maintain, I thought almost disingenuously, that if one builds one house next to another, that is consolidation. But he made it plain that "Embers" is on the outskirts of the village and he also made it plain that "Embers" has a gap of 500 ft. from its nearest neighbour. To my mind, when one builds on the outside edge of an outside edge, that is not consolidation but straggle. Of course it would have been a different matter if a gap were being filled in, but this is a clear case of expansion.

Mr. Denzil Freeth

Do I gather that if this house were not in fact on the north-westerly side of Mrs. Bagley's house, but on the easterly side, it would then be regarded as consolidation? Will my hon. Friend look at the map again, because the natural end of the village is the bridle-path going north? I fully accept with him that there would be no earthly case for building a house to the west of that bridle-path, but on the east of the bridle-path is Mrs. Bagley's own garden, where she could presumably erect a farm building of modest dimensions without planning permission. To suggest that that is straggling and ribbon development is going a little far.

Sir K. Joseph

As my hon. Friend knows. I cannot possibly answer a hypothetical case about what the local planning authority might say about a different planning proposal from Mrs. Bagley. I hope that nothing I have said tonight will give him a wrong impression about that. It may be that people can do certain things in their gardens which do not count as development, but that is not what we are discussing this evening.

I want to meet the strongest part of the case made against me. It is said that if the development were allowed it would be hidden. It is said that trees exist or would be planted so that for half the year at least nobody would see the new development, and that, whether there are trees or not, the proposed house could be seen only from the western approach. The fact is that here we are getting a little mystical. Is it to be said that the countryside can be invaded with houses and that that invasion shall not count as development if every house is to be surrounded by trees? It is as much physical development of the countryside even if it is totally invisible. But my hon. Friend made it plain that for half the year, namely. during autumn and winter, the house would be visible as what he called "a grey mass through the trees from the west. That is one of the approaches which I understand to be particularly cherished in the neighbourhood.

Mr. Denzil Freeth

If we were talking about building a new house on a site where no building stood, I would have enormous sympathy with my hon. Friend, but we are talking about building another house by the side of one already there. There is no question of having the most heavenly view blocked by building. The view is virtually blocked by a building anyway when the trees are not in bloom.

Sir K. Joseph

It is neither here nor there that the house happens to be in the garden of another house. In a number of years Mrs. Bagley might decide to sell the house in her garden and there would then be two owners. We have to look to the long distant future and houses are very permanent objects.

It is true that one house of itself makes very little difference, but how can we possibly set a limit to a village or community if every time we set that limit it is argued that one more house will not make any difference? I am not maintaining that my right hon. Friend has a cast-iron rule that the limit of a village is the limit whatever happens. There must be cases 'in which a combination of circumstances makes us or the local planning authority break what is normally our practice, but in this situation there is not a strong enough combination of circumstances to bring the case outside normal planning criteria.

The fact that my right hon. Friend dismissed Mrs. Bagley's first appeal was not conclusive either. Had it been possible for my right hon. Friend to be convinced either that the facts had changed, or that new arguments had been put forward, or that his first decision was wrong, I assure my hon. Friend that my right hon. Friend would have had no hesitation in changing his mind.

We are not dealing with a case of consistency for the sake of consistency. I hope, therefore, that I have shown why my right hon. Friend and I feel strongly that the inspector, with the very best of motives obviously, came, legitimately, to a decision which to our minds underestimated the physical extension of the village that would be caused by this development.

The second underestimate which we thought he made was that he underestimated the insidious danger of precedent. Precedent is not alone a strong argument, but on the merits of the case against development there is a strong reason for being firm-minded particularly if a decision the other way would lead to damage in the future. My hon. Friend knows the pressure that is brought on my right hon. Friend by people seeking development. They use every precedent that goes their way to persuade him that they are entitled to the decision.

We have to face the fact that precedent is a very powerful weapon. If we give way out of sympathy and against the interests of future generations, we injure our descendants. I realise that all these long phrases sound pompous when dealing with a small house in a garden, but my hon Friend did not hesitate to use equally large words in claiming that the house should be allowed. If we allow one bad decision we are being unfair to all the other people whose equally strong or equally weak applications have legitimately been turned down.

The inspector says, in a phrase which my hon. Friend quoted most effectively, that treating one extra house as an extension of the village may be academically a rather fine point. I strengthen his phrase by saying, "particularly with trees around it, particularly in a garden, particularly when it has no access to 'the road", but whatever the inspector may have recommended, the fact remains that that extra house is development. It is an extension. The village would have grown, and it would have grown beyond its outskirts. It would have lost some element of compactness. 'It would have become even more of a straggle.

For those reasons I feel no shame at all in having recommended my right hon. Friend to come to a decision different from that recommended by his inspector.

I come back now to the human side of this. Sympathetic as I am towards Mrs. Bagley, I must repeat that she bought this house evidently with her eyes open, though, as I say, even if she had not, it would not be proper to take that into account in coming to a decision. Limitations on the rights of an individual citizen are justified to preserve the inheritance—particularly in a lovely village like this—of our descendants.

I hope that my hon. Friend will be able to reconcile Mrs. Bagley to the decision which, I am afraid, unless the facts changed very remarkably, would only be likely to be repeated if any further appeal came to my right hon. Friend.

Question put and agreed to.

Adjourned accordingly at twenty-six minutes to Ten o'clock.