§ 6.45 a.m.
§ Sir George Young (Ealing, Acton)As a new Member I find the description of our proceedings utterly misleading. Anything less consolidated than the protracted debate that has been going on for the past 12 hours would be difficult to imagine.
I am grateful for this opportunity of raising the environmental planning problems of our cities. In particular I look forward to hearing from the Minister of State, Department of the Environment (Urban Affairs) what his Department has been doing. As someone who has sat on a London Borough Council and the Greater London Council I very much welcome the appointment of the Minister to undertake his special responsibilities. It is a recognition by the Government of the deteriorating condition of the quality of life in our cities. I hope that the Minister will not think me discourteous if I say that in this Parliament I do not think that he has had much opportunity to display his wares. Yesterday I took the opportunity to acquaint myself with his pronouncements by going to the weekly indices of HANSARD. I appreciate that that is fast becoming an unfashionable way of monitoring the proceedings of the House.
It would appear from the Minister's previous interventions that he has been concerned with less strategic matters than his title might suggest—for example, the Tower of London, Temple Bar, the Palace of Westminster Car Park, a bust of the Second Viscountess Astor, the school farmhouse at Wouldham and the demolition of Cruck Barn. If that is an imperfect reflection of his responsibilities, as I am sure it must be, I hope that he will so inform the House. I and other hon. Members have high expectations.
The subject of the debate is similar to one which took place at two o'clock this morning on tackling urban deprivation. That debate was answered by the Minister of State, Home Office. This debate is to be answered by a Minister from the Department of the Environment. There is now some confusion as to which Department is responsible for improving the bad environment in our cities. The important statement of 18th July to the 325 House of a comprehensive community programme was made by the Secretary of State for the Home Department. Indeed it is the Department that is to find the money. The objectives of the programmes are
to identify the whole range of economic and social and physical or environmental problems of the area.That might have seemed more appropriate if it had fallen within the terms of reference of the Department of the Environment. I personally welcome any attempt to tackle the inadequate environment in the cities but I wonder whether the Home Office is the appropriate agency for such a project. It does not have the close links with the local authorities that is enjoyed by the Department of the Environment and I do not think that the Home Office has the budget or the experience to tackle the problem. As the Economist said last Friday:The Home Office was given the task of co-ordinating the urban aid programme but it patently lacks the means to do so.If the Minister who responded to the previous debate is right in believing that the problems in our cities are among the most challenging that face us today, it is essential that central government should be clear in their own mind as to which Government Department should have the prime responsibility for solving these problems. I see little evidence of such clarity at the moment.The environmental planning problems facing our cities are numerous and similar to those that have to be faced in most cities in the developed world. There are, however, grounds for believing that we are doing a little better than some others in attending to such problems.
The problems can be summarised as the deterioration of the quality of life in the cities as shown by the decreasing reliability of the public services, for example, the shortage of staff in many key jobs such as the police, teachers, refuse collectors and street cleaners. As a result of all these factors it is the growing wish of more and more inhabitants to leave the cities and to live elsewhere. That applies particularly to city inhabitants who have families. That can create further problems—for example, social polarisation. If the people who leave are all middle class, rating problems can be created. An exodus of the population will leave be- 326 hind fewer people to shoulder the burden or urban renewal.
If we are to make our cities places in which people wish to live as well as to work we must do something soon to make them more pleasant places in which to live. Both Governments will accept that as an objective. Yesterday, with the help of the GLC I compiled a list of Acts of Parliament passed in the last 10 years that have been designed to improve the environment in the cities. I will not weary hon. Members by reading it out, but in the last 10 years this House has passed Act after Act with the sole aim of improving the environment in our cities.
It started with the wholesale reorganisation of local government, beginning with London and working out to other areas. In public transport, for example, there has been the wholesale writing-off of debts and it has been handed over to local authorities to make it more responsive to local needs. Governments have given more and more grants to transport authorities to buy new buses and trains. Yet we are faced with a deterioration in the quality of service of public transport and ever-increasing costs.
We have had the Housing Act 1969, the Housing (Slum Clearance) Act 1965, the Housing Subsidies Act 1967 and now the Housing Bill—all designed to improve the housing situation in our cities. Yet homelessness has increased along with the waiting lists in the London boroughs.
We have had the Road Traffic Regulations of 1967, the Transport (London) Act 1969, and the Heavy Commercial Vehicles Act 1973, We have instituted bus lanes, extended parking meters, installed clearways. Yet still we have traffic congestion, and life in the cities still appears to be dominated by the car.
Along with all this legislation, money has been poured into the cities through rate equalisation, the urban aid programme and the educational priority areas, and there is an increasing rate burden. Yet we do not seem to be making a big impression on the problem. Inevitably, therefore, we must ask whether the machinery of government is adequate for the task.
I believe that I can identify two deficiencies the rectification of which could make the problem easier to solve. First, the most unnecessary evil in our cities is 327 caused by planning blight, the urban decay which results from the inability of public authorities to make up their collective mind. In my constituency, there are two town centre schemes which may or may not go ahead. These two centres, the focal points of the communities of Ealing and Acton, are facing a slow death because the planners cannot make up their minds what to do with them. Hundreds of constituents may or may not be affected by road schemes, particularly the North Circular and the A4000. The consequence of this indecision is slow death of what should be the heart of a community.
It is happening all over our cities. As a result of planning blight, shops fall empty in the town centres because traders are reluctant to take on new leases in the uncertainty. Houses fall empty because no one will buy them, and then the squatters move in.
In many cases, Government Departments, particularly the Department of the Environment, are to blame. For example, the Greater London Development Plan was formulated in the mid-1960s, subjected to inquiry in 1971, and delivered to the Secretary of State in December 1972. We are still waiting for a decision on it. It is 10 years since the document was prepared. The whole framework within which our capital should be planned is still in abeyance.
In London one sees hundreds of acres in dockland not built on because the planners cannot decide what to do with them or how much to pay each other for them. Much of Piccadilly Circus, Soho and Covent Garden, the centre of London, is blighted because of planning indecision.
The problems of our cities are enough without the additional burden of planning blight. We cannot afford to let land lie idle year after year because we cannot decide what to do with it. I appreciate that the Dobry Committee has been set up to look into the problem of blight and I hope that it comes up with strong recommendations.
Secondly, we have split the responsibility for planning between two public bodies. For example, the Department of the Environment is busy building motorways between our cities. On the other 328 hand, local authorities such as the GLC have set their faces against building urban motorways. Both positions are tenable—that of the Department of the Environment and that of the GLC. But where both policies are implemented one gets what those in the computer industry call interface problems.
If one looks at a map of London one sees motorways coverging on London from all directions, yet there is not the road capacity within London to absorb the traffic they carry. A consequence of splitting responsibility for planning roads has been intense environmental problems on the outskirts of London.
Likewise, there have been similar problems where planning responsibility has been divided between the GLC and the London boroughs. For example, the GLC bus lane programme has been vigorously resisted by some local authorities, and the GLC proposals to pedestrianise some streets such as Oxford Street and the King's Road, have always been resisted by the local authorities. The consequence of the two tiers pursuing different planning policies is clearly something that we could usefully do without.
I put it to the Minister, therefore, that quicker decisions to remove planning blight and the rationalisation of the planning process are two solutions which could to some extent reduce the environmental problems in our cities.
I make two final points. Perhaps the major problem facing us in our cities, particularly in those areas where urban renewal is overdue and inevitable, is how to create a new and acceptable environment. When one drives around those parts of cities which have recently been rebuilt one often sees some council estates—very often tower block accommodation—or windswept and deserted shopping centres. If one were to ask one's children whether one would be handing over to them an acceptable environment and whether they were proud of the new areas in the cities that one had created, one's children would probably say "No."
Although we have correctly identified the problems in our cities, I do not think that we have as yet identified the right solution. The environments that we are creating with some of our comprehensive redevelopment schemes are somewhat artificial and lacking in community spirit, 329 and many of them will be the slums of tomorrow.
I come finally to a point about the population in the cities. If we are to set high environmental standards in the cities, as I believe we should, we must accept a balanced decline in the population. If we are to increase the amount of open space per resident, if we are to build houses with gardens instead of flats with patios, if we are to provide more garages off the streets and to reduce congestion in some of the schools, we have to accept a decline in population. But we must do this in a balanced way and make sure that where accommodation is provided outside the cities jobs are available to go with the accommodation. I believe that the cities can achieve higher environmental standards with a decline in population.
I hope that the Minister will offer fresh hope to the inhabitants of our cities. They want to know that the Government recognise the problems with which the citizen is confronted. They look to the Minister for reassurance that their problems of public transport, of the poor quality of the postal service, of traffic jams, noise and litter, are constantly in the Minister's mind. We look to him for the answers to all our problems at the earliest possible opportunity.
§ The Minister of State, Department of the Environment (Mr. Charles R. Morris)This has been a useful debate. I am grateful to the hon. Member for Ealing, Acton (Sir George Young) for the opportunity of dealing with the crucially important issues that he has raised. His speech has shown the degree of concern felt about these vital problems on both sides of the House. It has shown how diffuse and complex the problems are.
Towards the end of his speech the hon. Gentleman said that people were looking to me and my ministerial responsibilities to offer the solutions to all their problems. Frankly, I cannot hope to make any such claims. All I can do is to show my concern for the environmental problems which affect our people as a result of living in Britain's cities.
The hon. Gentleman referred to a number of issues. I ask him to believe 330 me when I say that some of them which my right hon. Friend and I, and my colleagues, regard as vitally important, have engaged our attention from the first day we took office. It might be asked how we are meeting the challenge of improving the quality of life in our cities.
Perhaps it would be helpful if I outlined our broad strategy. The first significant step was the decision taken by my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister to recognise overtly, in Government, that urban problems do exist and that they need to be looked at in the round, bringing together all of the interests concerned. He did this by creating the ministerial post which I occupy. I thank the hon. Gentleman for his kind and courteous comments about my appointment. I have noted the points he made and the comments he voiced about my area of responsibility.
I accept that there is confusion in some minds over the lines of demarcation between my responsibility and the Home Secretary's overall responsibility for the problems of the urban areas. The problems of the big cities concern just about every part of my Department and of several other Departments, in particular the Urban Deprivation Unit of the Home Office. The issues which the hon. Gentleman raised, relating to staffing difficulties, local authority problems, difficulties associated with public transport and the migration of the young, active families from inner cities, are important and I hope to comment on them later.
These issues cover the whole gamut of my ministerial responsibilities. As Minister of State for Urban Affairs I shall be bringing before my colleagues my appreciation of the problems of urban living in the big cities and the ways in which I believe the Government should respond. This involves looking at the whole range of the activities of the Department of the Environment, and how they interact and affect cities. Among the tools I shall be using in analysing the problem and moving towards a solution are the Inner Area Studies currently being undertaken by private consultants in study areas in the London Borough of Lambeth, the City of Liverpool and the City of Birmingham.
These studies are beginning to produce valuable insights into the problems faced by local authorities in their administrative 331 areas on the ground. Reports are beginning to flow from these studies. I am sure that they will provide some useful guidelines on the way in which these problems can best be tackled. They may also contain lessons for central Government.
Increasingly, with the more positive policies we have been promoting I expect to see studies such as these, and other forms of partnership with local authorities, serve as a test bed for new ideas—ideas dealing with a more sensible community-based urban renewal policy, ideas dealing with area management of the major cities, to make the running of our big cities more effective and more humane. An experiment in area management is currently under way in the City of Liverpool with the support of the Inner Area Study. There is also an area system operating in the County Borough of Stockport.
I intend to find ways of following up these promising developments. I have considerable hopes in area management as a means of making local government closer and more responsive to the needs of ordinary people. In my view, it will be of particular benefit to the more disadvantaged, socially deprived areas.
Most of the problems raised by the hon. Gentleman can be attributed, at one level of thought, to lack of money. We would have a better transport system and we could deal with staffing shortage if we poured more money into these areas of administration. But perhaps that is too simple an analysis. There is not enough money to go round and we need to be much more critical about how we spend it. The growing emphasis on corporate management—and the hon. Gentleman, with his background of local government experience, will recognise that corporate management emanated from the Bains Report—at town hall level will help, but we need to go further and to make corporate management sensitive to areas. We need to give local quthorities the means of giving their deprived areas a better and fairer deal. This is where area management comes in.
Of the many specific problems to which the hon. Gentleman referred perhaps housing is the most central. The Government have rightly given first priority to housing and I hope that the hon. 332 Gentleman will accept that the Housing Bill, which recently completed its passage through the House, will provide a battery of new powers to the particular benefit of those living in stress areas in the big cities. I hope that local authorities will take hold of the provisions of the Bill in the spirit in which they were conceived and build on them a more comprehensive approach to the whole range of urban problems.
As part of the same concerted attack, the Home Secretary announced his proposals the other day for tackling the hard core pockets of deprivation through the comprehensive community programme. This is a new form of integrated interdepartmental approach. I described it at the time as the opening of a new front in the attack on urban deprivation.
So much for the broad policy. One might ask, "What about the specific items raised by the hon. Gentleman?" I hope that the House will forgive me if at this hour. I deal with them somewha selectively. Public sector staff shortages have been building up over the years and have caused some services, particularly public transport, to deteriorate. Other services have been maintained only by existing staff working long hours. The London Manpower Study has been set up to investigate the problem. The Department of the Environment and its officials are taking the lead with the Department of Employment, the GLC and the London borough associations as the other regular participants.
Following the first meeting, the study group decided to invite a TUC representative to join it. The problems of a number of public service employers will be studied. It will not be a quick exercise. The study group hopes to report by January 1975. To the extent that the same problems exist in other cities, the work of the London study group should help to throw light on them.
The hon. Gentleman referred to young families moving away from cities, and he readily accepted that some reduction in the population of the cities, particularly London, is desirable. Understandably, authorities are worried about the steady loss of the most economically active part of their population because of their inability to get a decent standard of living in the area in which they have been 333 brought up. For this reason some authorities have been assisting young people by a number of schemes. One is by building for sale—a scheme which was initiated by the Borough of Newham. The scheme makes use of land owned by the local authority, upon which a private developer erects dwellings for sale to purchasers nominated by the local authority. We hope that this scheme, if followed by other authorities, will make a contribution towards resolving the difficulties referred to by the hon. Gentleman.
The hon. Gentleman referred to the deterioration of public transport services. I will indicate briefly the measures which are being taken to improve productivity. London Transport is converting the Circle, Hammersmith and City trains to one-man operation. Further conversions will be made in due course, but it is a costly process in advance of normal stock replacement schedules. Additionally, about 40 per cent. of London's buses are planned to be one-man operated. It is not proposed at present to go further than that. An increasing use of bus lanes and other priority traffic measures for buses are under active consideration. Equally, a new source of manpower—or perhaps I should say womanpower—is available in that the use of women bus drivers has been agreed with the unions and is in operation. New signalling on British Railways is being put into operation to enable reductions to be made in the signalling staff.
I hope that the hon. Gentleman will accept that we are mindful of the difficulties to which he referred. I have described how we are tackling particular issues, and the hon. Gentleman may ask how we mould our efforts together. I mentioned earlier the inner city studies. I am speeding up the results of the studies but, in the nature of things, the time scale is medium-term rather than short-term. The aim is to get better understanding of urban problems by those who deal with them in Parliament, in the town hall and in Whitehall. The result will be better-informed decisions at all levels. The problems of our major cities are both acute and pressing. Where we can already see what action is needed there should be no delay.
The comprehensive community programmes to which I referred and which are to be developed by my right hon. 334 Friend the Home Secretary will have a time horizon of no more than five years. They will be concerned with areas of most acute urban deprivation.
The urban conferences which I have already begun with local authorities in the six metropolitan counties are aimed at getting to grips with the wider problems of the provincial conurbations. They are concerned with the whole range of urban problems to which reference has been made. The purpose is two-fold. The first purpose is to get the local authority's assessment of the problems and priorities for action over the next few years. The second purpose is discussion of the implications in terms of action by both central and local government. These are not academic studies or seminars. They are frank exchanges between decision-makers about what needs to be done and how it can best be done promptly.
The local authorities in the cities have to deal on the ground with problems of urban living, and they have a vast amount of knowledge and experience of them. Through these conferences, I want the Government to benefit from this knowledge and experience. In these matters, I am convinced that Whitehall—or even Marsham Street—does not always know best.
Though my own responsibilities lie within the Department of the Environment, I am holding the conferences with the full support and help of my right hon. Friends, the Home Secretary, and the Secretaries of State for Employment, Industry, Education and Science, and Social Services. The problems of our cities do not respect the neat boundaries of Government organisation, and it is little use asking the local authorities to adopt a total approach to problems, if Government Departments fail to respond in like manner. At the end of the first round of conferences, towards the end of this year, it is my intention to present to my colleagues my conclusions on the whole range of such problems.
The hon. Gentleman referred to blight and the problems that arise from indecision on planning proposals and referred to two particular town centre schemes in his constituency. I am prepared to consider any submission he wishes to make to me on those matters.
335 Let me say a word in conclusion about the general goals which I have set myself in discharging my responsibilities. First, I recognise that there is still a very great deal to be done to renew and improve the fabric of our major cities and to make life in them comfortable and rewarding, but the process of renewal can itself jeopardise the quality of urban community life. Therefore, I want to try to see that the process of urban renewal and improvement is humanised. The lives of people in the deprived areas can be blighted—because plans take too long to prepare, because plans when prepared take too long to implement and, above all, because people do not know what is happening to their homes. The process must necessarily involve some stress and strain, but I want suffering to be limited as much as possible.
Secondly, I want to see a better social balance in our cities. The trend is for younger people, the more energetic, the better off, and the more articulate to move out to the suburbs and the countryside near cities. The result is sometimes that the more deprived who are left behind get less than they deserve of the money and resources that are already available. I want to see that they get what their problems and needs warrant and deserve. I want to see that our urban policies work towards a more balanced social structure, for I believe that this is necessary for the health of our urban society.