§ Mr. Terry Davis (Bromsgrove)I beg to move Amendment No. 89, in page 62, line 30, leave out subsection (6).
The Bill extends the rights of citizens to receive compensation in a number of cases and at first sight subsection (6) also extends citizens' rights. As I understand the provision, it would not be necessary any longer for people who live in a designated area of a new town to wait for seven years after the designation order before they can obtain the purchase of their property. That would be a welcome improvement in the law for people who are living in new towns which have been recently established. I am concerned about the effect of the Bill on people who live in the new towns which were established more than seven years ago. As Ministers will be aware, there is a new town, Redditch, in my constituency. The effect of this clause has been drawn to my attention by the urban district council, with which I have had correspondence.
There are two main areas of concern. The first is the extent of the right to obtain the purchase of property by a development corporation. Earlier we had a debate on an Amendment to Clause 20 when the Minister said that he was very reluctant to create a right to compel a highway authority to purchase someone's property seriously affected by a new road or improvement. In the case of new towns this right already exists. Indeed, the citizen's right goes much further. He does not have to prove that his property has been or will be adversely affected; the designation of a new town is sufficient. In effect there is a guaranteed market. As the Bill is drafted, those people will lose their right. They will be able to serve a blight notice but this procedure has a major weakness because the citizen must prove blight.
I hope that the Minister will give an assurance that in practice the Government do not intend to introduce any change. 916 In other words, I am asking the Minister to confirm that new town designation orders will be automatically regarded as proof of blight and that new town development corporations will not serve counter-notices. I should perhaps say that I have already had a similar assurance from the hon. Member for Birmingham, Hall Green (Mr. Eyre), the Under-Secretary of State for the Environment in a letter, but I have also received a letter from the general manager of the Redditch Development Corporation, who appears to have a different interpretation of the Government's intentions. This is very important for people in new towns.
My second point concerns the sort of landowners who are entitled to serve blight notices on a new town corporation. The existing right is universal; anyone can compel the corporation to buy. This subsection would restrict the right to owner-occupiers of houses, owners of small businesses and agricultural interests. I should be grateful if the Minister could explain how small businesses are defined, and I should also like to know why the Government want to exclude larger firms and other bodies such as social clubs and churches. I have put these questions in a letter to the Department, but I have not yet received a reply. If we do not receive a reply this evening, it will be too late.
§ Mr. MulleyI rise only to support the case put by my hon. Friend the Member for Bromsgrove (Mr. Terry Davis) and commend him on his great patience and forbearance in having sat through six hours of debate waiting to make this very important point on behalf of his constituents. I am sure that the Minister will seek to meet it if he can.
§ Mr. Graham PageThe effect of this Amendment would be to omit from the Bill the proposed repeal of Section 11 of the New Towns Act 1965. That repeal we intend as part of a package which would extend the general planning blight provisions. By the Bill we are introducing at least half a dozen more cases in which purchase notices can be served, but we are extending the blight provisions to all inhabitants of a new town.
Section 11 enables any owner of land in a new town to require the corporation 917 to acquire his land at any time from seven years after making a designation order. As things stand, after that seven years he does not need to prove the occasion of blight as any other owner would have to do, but until the seven years is up he has no right to serve the notice. It is that section which we shall repeal with the intention of putting owner-occupiers of houses and small businesses on exactly the same footing as any other person.
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The provisions of Section 11 as they stand are very wide, applying to all owners of land, with no requirement to prove blight and no "counter-notice" procedure. The new town development corporations have over the years criticised the wide liability that this has imposed upon them, while on the other hand property owners have been critical that they have had to wait seven years before being able to require the corporation to buy.
This is a form of compromise to try to please both sides. We are giving a freedom to serve purchase notices if the house owner or small business owner is blighted during those seven years, and at the same time restricting the possibility of the corporation being forced to buy for any cause, or no cause, after seven years have elapsed.
The extension of the blight code to new towns by Clause 60 means that the people most likely to be seriously affected by blight in new town designated areas—this is to say owner-occupiers of houses, small businesses and agricultural interests—will have much earlier blight cover than before. They will not have to wait seven years. They will have the same cover as any other person outside the new town. On the other hand, the repeal of Section 11 will take away the existing right of landowners of properties outside those categories to require their purchase by a development corporation.
We are depriving certain owners who have had a right previously—a right which is exceptional to them—but we are giving the ordinary dwellinghouse owner, small business owner and agricultural owner the right to serve blight notices at any time during those seven years after the designation of an area. This is a package deal and I think that it will bring 918 satisfaction all round, although in any compromise of this sort there may be some who feel hard done by because they may have just been going to take advantage of some benefit which they had under Section 11.
The hon. Gentleman asked whether a new town order would itself be a blight, and whether there would be a prohibition of counter-notices. If the new town order indicates compulsory purchase of the property, it will give rise to an entitlement to a purchase notice, but because we are putting the landowner in a new town on the same footing as anyone else in the country a new town commission will be entitled to serve a counter-notice. It would not be precluded from serving a counter-notice as it is now for seven years after designation. For a small business this is the same as in all the rest of the blight provisions. For the owner-occupier business with a rateable value of £750 we shall be bringing in an order to fit it in with the new revaluation list.
§ Mr. Terry DavisI am disappointed with the Minister's reply. The right hon. Gentleman described this as a package deal and said that some people will feel hard done by.
It is not a compromise even between residents in one town or between interests in one town. This is a situation where some people who live in new towns which have been established more than seven years are losing certain rights. No one else in the town gains, except the development corporation, and the development corporation is the Department of the Environment wearing another hat. Other people living in newer new towns will gain because they will not have to wait for seven years before requiring the development corporation to purchase their properties. But that is no offset. That is not a package deal.
Who was consulted about this compromise? The Minister did not say that there was any consultation with the Urban District Councils Association. The Redditch Urban District Council wrote to the Department and received a reply which did not go into the detail that we have had tonight. If it had not been for the attention given to the White Paper by a local government officer employed by Redditch Urban District Council, this would not have been unfolded in the 919 House at all and the Government would not have come clean.
The Minister did not say why the Government wished to make the change. I applaud the Minister's desire to improve the situation for people in recently established new towns. I am sure that both sides of the House will agree with that aim. But the right hon. Gentleman has not explained why it is felt necessary to diminish the right of people living in older new towns. He used the word "deprived" of an existing right, and I am disappointed that he is not able to look again at the situation.
The right hon. Gentleman has perhaps confused the position a little when saying that people whose properties are affected by a designation order will be able to adduce the designation order as evidence of blight. In most cases a designation order is a very broad brush order. It does not indicate that an individual house, social club, church or company's premises will be required. As I understood what the Minister said, the social clubs, churches and larger businesses in the new towns will be disadvantaged compared with the present situation.
If it were not so late, I could tell the right hon. Gentleman about several social clubs in my constituency which are very worried about the future. Now we have the news that they are not going to have the right to require the development corporation to purchase their old premises when they have been encouraged by the corporation to build new properties elsewhere only to find that the corporation's proposals have changed. The Minister's announcement will come as bad news to those who run these clubs. In my experience, a development corporation's specific proposals change from time to time. I have known the lines of roads to be moved after the original scheme has been put forward.
I repeat that I am disappointed in the Minister's response. I hope that he will look at the situation again and consult the urban district councils which are affected—those who represent the new 920 towns. It appears that he has only consulted the development corporations.
§ Mr. Graham PageI willingly give that assurance. I wish to let the clause stand as it is at the moment. But the hon. Gentleman has raised many points. I think that I was right in my explanation, but it was an explanation and perhaps not a justification. Therefore I will look at his points.
§ Mr. Terry DavisI thank the Minister for that assurance. I am grateful to him, and I look forward with pleasure to his reconsideration.
§ I beg leave to withdraw the amendment.
§ Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.