Clause 35. (Hansard, 22 May 1968)

§ Mr. Skeffington
I beg to move Amendment No. 89, in page 30, line 41, at the end to insert: 'other than works for which the local planning authority or the Minister have undertaken to grant such consent'. This fulfils an undertaking which was given in Committee to correct an apparent anomaly in the drafting of Clause 35. A case might arise, on consideration of a listed building purchase notice, where the local planning authority or the Ministers had not given listed building consent but had undertaken to give it. By Clause 35(l)(c) that undertaking could be taken into account by the Minister when he considered whether the land could be rendered capable of reasonably beneficial use, but by the last two lines of Clause 35(4) the works concerned might have to be disregarded. The Amendment makes sure, as I undertook to do, that subsection (l)(c) is right, by excluding, from the works which are to be disregarded, any works in respect of which an undertaking to grant consent has been given.

§ Mr. Allason
I am not sure, Mr. Deputy Speaker, whether we are allowed to discuss the Opposition Amendment to the Amendment.

Mr. Deputy Speaker
I understand that there is no objection to that Amendment being discussed.

§ Mr. Allason
It would add at the end of line 2: 'where the application has been made by the owner'. As the Parliamentary Secretary said, we are discussing the situation where a listed building consent has been refused and where a listed building is useless to the owner without that consent. Perhaps he makes a claim and the local authority resists the purchase notice and it cannot then be claimed by the local authority that other works, such as a new development or a change requiring a listed building consent, can make the building viable. The reason is obvious; that the owner should not be compelled to carry out other works which he does not desire to do.
The Government Amendment makes an exception to this, in that the local planning authority can avoid a purchase notice by claiming as an exception that the building could be made viable by works where consent has been given on an undertaking. If the owner has applied or intends to apply for this consent to save his ownership, that is fine. But we must remember that the application for planning consent is not confined to the owner. Any other person can apply for consent. It would, theoretically, be possible, although the owner does not wish to apply for listed building consent to substantially change his building, possibly to another use, for someone else to apply and for the Minister to undertake to grant that consent, so depriving the owner of his right to compensation. I am sure that this is not the Government's intention and the position would be made clear if the Amendment to the Amendment were accepted.

§ Mr. Skeffington
The Amendment to the Amendment would restrict the right of the Minister to direct the grant of listed building consent when considering a listed building purchase notice by making the grant subject to the agreement of the owner. This is not acceptable to the Government. As we explained when this matter was under discussion in Committee, if a local authority is to be com- 752 pelled to take over what may, in certain circumstances, be regarded as a white elephant, so to speak, it is proper that, if the authority feels that there is some reasonable beneficial use for part of the property, there should be no reason why the Minister should not be entitled either to grant the necessary consent or make conditions which would make that possible.
If the relevant land is capable of reasonable beneficial use by the granting of consent, it should be open to the Minister and the local planning authority to grant such consent without the agreement of the owner. In any event, it should not make any difference to the owner since, if the undertaking is given to him or to a third party, he, the owner, can still have the benefit of it. Thus, it would be wrong to say that this must be done only with the agreement of the owner. There must be some rights for the local authority in this matter, even if one considers the obligations which the authority is taking over.

§ Mr. Graham Page
We are talking about the circumstances in which an owner has been refused consent. Take the example in which the owner has a small Elizabethan cottage to which he wants to make alterations. He applies for a listed building consent and it is given, but the cottage is falling down and he serves a purchase notice. Then the Minister says, "You could build a Buckingham Palace on this site. We will give the permission." The owner may not be able to afford to make the alterations which the permission grants. It must be a permission with the owner's consent. Otherwise the Minister could give an outrageous permission and defeat the purchase notice because the owner might not have the means to carry out the permission given by the Minister. It is a ridiculous position if that is so. I may have misunderstood, but this is apparently what the Parliamentary Secretary said.

§ Mr. Allason
This—

Mr. Deputy Speaker
The hon. Member has exhausted his right to speak on this Amendment.

§ Mr. Allason
Do we move the Amendment to the Amendment?

Mr. Deputy Speaker
The Amendment to the Amendment has not been selected to be moved.