§ 12.9 a.m.
§ Mr. John Stonehouse (Walsall, North)The subject to which I wish to refer has given a great deal of concern in and around my constituency and in many other parts of the country. It is referred to in Early-Day Motion No. 80, which I put on the Order Paper on 10th December and which was entitled "Weakness of Planning Procedures". In that motion reference is made to the opening of hypermarkets without appropriate planning permission, and that is the subject I wish to go into in some detail.
Before I do so, I should like to make some general comments. When winding up the last debate the Minister of State, Department of Health and Social Security referred to the arduous conditions in which many of his constituents work. I think that many hon. Members who come from industrial constituencies could parallel his description. Certainly my constituents in Darlaston and Willenhall are working in very bad conditions, but their work is producing a great deal of wealth for Britain. The tragedy is that the wealth is not being ploughed back into improving their environment.
The area which I represent is called the Black Country. It is called the Black Country for a reason—it is extremely black. It is an area which was blighted by the Industrial Revolution and it has not had enough money spent on it in the past half century to correct the evils that were done to what was once a very beautiful part of the country. The position has not improved in the past 20 years. In fact, it has got worse. Unfortunately, towns like Darlaston, Willenhall and Bilston, right in the centre of the Black Country, are being gradually destroyed by the inadequate attention being given to them by the planning authorities and by the effect of the measures to which I am now referring.
One of the reasons for this neglect was the municipal reorganisation which was pushed through some years ago. We now generally recognise that that reorganisation was too hasty, ill-conceived and did not achieve the economies which it set out to achieve. I have been fascinated to read the diaries written by our 1823 late colleague Mr. Richard Crossman. He described graphically the work which he did as a Minister during that important period. However, what he aimed to achieve during that period has not been achieved. The reorganisation of local government has not resulted in a better local government service for the British people. It has resulted in a growth of bureaucracy.
My right hon. Friend the Prime Minister, at a conference in Eastbourne a week or so ago, referred to the fact that the number of people employed in local government had increased in just over 10 years from 1.5 million to 2.5 million. We know that some services have increased, but that does not justify such an increase in manpower. Translated to an area like mine, small authorities which were close to the people and which had an intimate knowledge of the area have been swept aside in an anxiety for bigness which was subscribed to by the late Richard Crossman. That bigness has resulted in more centralisation, bigger authorities and less interest in areas which have been blighted by the neglect which has come about by the transfer of power from the peripheral areas to the centre.
We are talking about areas which have been neglected for very many years, so we do not expect to see any vast improvements overnight. However, the matters to which I am referring do not make the situation any easier. The planning machinery available to the local authorities is not powerful enough, or is being neglected. The result is that certain "get rich quick" organisations are able to drive a coach and horses through the regulations which have been established over the years to ensure that authorities are able to develop local communities, especially sensible shopping centres, which are the heart of these localities, and not have them destroyed by the development of unauthorised hypermarkets.
I am anxious to have an assurance that the Minister and his colleagues are aware of this problem and want to do something about it. I will refer him to the detail of the problem which particularly affects my constituency.
Many years ago, an organisation started to establish an hypermarket in the middle of an urban area. It eventually 1824 achieved planning permission in November 1971 for a building to sell household goods and furniture. According to the Walsall Borough Council, the application was approved on the understanding that it was for a wholesale warehouse only. The authority was not then aware that the organisation in question was connected with a major hypermarket group called Kwik Save, because it had made the application in other names and rather secretly.
The building which had been approved was built. But it became clear to local traders that something peculiar was going on, because, instead of a wholesale warehouse for the sale of furniture and household goods, they noticed that another type of building was being constructed. When they noticed that 600 car parking places were being provided, they became extremely suspicious. They suspected—rightly as it turned out—that some kind of retail operation was to be opened where one had not been approved.
The local authority was approached. In June 1975 it assured the traders concerned that their suspicions that a supermarket or retail operation was being opened were wild and unfounded. The local authority said that it was supremely confident that the building in question would be used only as a wholesale warehouse. Therefore, certain people were placated.
When I was brought into the picture, in September and October, I was alarmed to see evidence that the building was to be opened as a retail hypermarket, although everybody agreed that the original planning permission was for a wholesale warehouse to sell furniture and household goods. The local authority told me that, although it was concerned about the matter, it could do nothing about it because, if it stopped this organisation going ahead, it could be subject not only to legal costs, but damages which, in the long run, could amount to tens of thousands of pounds, which would not be an acceptable burden. Therefore, although people were aware that a retail operation was due to be opened, the local authority and the Minister were powerless to do anything about it.
The operation was conducted in conditions of great secrecy. Unmarked vans 1825 delivered goods. Work was sometimes done at night so as not to arouse suspicion. There was no publicity—no advertising. But on 23rd October the organisation concerned opened a retail hypermarket which has attracted a certain amount of custom. The result has been devastating for certain shops in the area, particularly in Darlaston. It has also affected Bilston, where a branch of Liptons has closed down and a branch of Marks and Spencer has decided to close after Christmas because of the effect of the hypermarket.
The hypermarket is going merrily along, although everyone agrees that it is an illegal operation. The local authority put an enforcement notice on the firm, but that was five weeks after it commenced its retail operation. As the organisation has appealed against that notice, it can continue trading. I understand that, because of the cumbersome arrangements in these matters, it could go on operating for very many years.
According to answers to inquiries about the organisation Kwik Save, this is not the first time that it has conducted experiments of that character. It has used this technique in many parts of the country. That is why it is a serious matter not only for my constituency, and that is why the Minister should do something about it.
In Bangor the organisation obtained planning permission to open a petrol station and then started to operate a supermarket for retail sales. It was not until three years after the date of commencement that the county council was able to bring the operation to a close. During that period the company was able to recoup most, if not all, of its investment. In other areas it has become so well established that no one has been able to dislodge it.
There is another curious aspect of this organisation's development. It made an application last Thursday in the Walsall court for a licence to sell spirits and wines. Although the local council has readily acknowledged that it had no planning permission to develop as a retail sales outlet, the council's solicitor said at the hearing that there was no council objection to granting a permit. It is a very curious state of affairs, which has given rise to much comment in the area.
1826 I believe that this may be a sign that the council is giving in to an organisation which has ridden roughshod over planning rules. The Minister should act quickly, but, unfortunately, he has not been willing to receive a deputation on the subject. He argues that he must adjudicate on the appeal and eventually make a decision. He says that therefore he cannot intervene at this stage. That means that he is impotent and that the organisation can get away with it for a long time.
Allowing Kwik Save to succeed in maintaining its trading operation will be a bad blow to local traders in many of the small towns in the locality. It means that they would be unlikely to maintain viable operations, that more shops would close down. Darlaston in particular, which has already become a ghost town, would deteriorate still further.
I hope that the Minister can assure us that something effective will be done to ensure that the planning permission which was given for this building will be applied and that its illegal operation as a hypermarket will be stopped and that the illegal operations of Kwik Save and similar companies in other parts of the country, to which I have referred in my Early-Day Motion, will be brought to an end.
§ 12.26 a.m.
§ The Under-Secretary of State for the Environment (Mr. Gordon Oakes)I am grateful to my right hon. Friend the Member for Walsall, North (Mr. Stone-house) for raising this subject and illustrating possible weaknesses in the planning system. But, as a former Minister himself, he will appreciate my difficulty in dealing with specific cases. That is why the Minister for Planning and Local Government felt unable to see my right hon. Friend on this subject. As he himself has said recently, enforcement proceedings have been taken by the appropriate planning authority in my right hon. Friend's constituency. That means that an appeal can be made, and no doubt will be made, to my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State.
This does not mean that my right hon. Friend is impotent. What he cannot do is comment while an issue is before him, or is likely to be before him. That would obviously be wrong. He appoints the inspector to look at the case, considers and judges the inspector's report, and makes 1827 his decision. If, in the meantime, he were to comment on, or, worse still, receive deputations, he would be apprising his mind of facts which had not come out at the inquiry. It would be unfair on the planning inquiry, the appellant and everyone else for him to behave in that way.
So it is not impotence which prevents my right hon. Friend from discussing the matter, nor is it discourtesy: it is just the constraint that we have at the Department of the Environment against making comments on any specific case while that case is before us or is likely to come before us. That is our difficulty with my right hon. Friend's Early-Day Motion: it mentions specific cases and undoubtedly some of them could come to the Secretary of State. Having said that about specific cases, I still think that it is valuable that my right hon. Friend has raised this subject, because it gives me an opportunity to deal with the general problem.
§ Mr. StonehouseCould not my hon. Friend ensure that these buildings are closed while appeals are being considered? Otherwise, they could go on being used as retail hypermarkets for years while the appeals are going on.
§ Mr. OakesThat is something to which I will come when we deal with enforcement. This was a decommendation by Mr. George Dobry in his report.
On the question of warehouses, since the date that my right hon. Friend mentioned the Department has issued a circular to all local authorities—Development Control Policy Note No. 14. We are well aware of the problem of the definition of the word "warehouse". To most people, it means a building, possibly by a docks, where things are stored. But increasingly today it has come to mean a place to purchase things other than a normal shop. Current use has tended to translate its meaning into that of a discount store.
In the development policy note we urged local authorities specifically to be very careful when giving planning consents for anything described as a warehouse. We said that although there was no statutory definition of a warehouse, our view was that a warehouse was a place where goods were primarily stored, not sold, and that the kind of development where members of the public bought goods was a shop.
1828 The note was sent out either early this year or late last year. Many difficult problems arose from the Town and Country Planning Use Classes Order owing to the complexities of planning law. If planning permission is sought for premises for a particular use, but it is eventually intended to put them to a different use, it is quite possible that some changes will be necessary to the structure which will deviate from the planning permission. Thus the building of premises suitable for a supermarket rather than for a car showroom could be outside a planning permission for the latter and liable to enforcement action.
I should point out that a change of use of premises without a specific permission is not always a breach of planning control, since some changes of use are provided for in subordinate legislation. But it should be said immediately that such changes of use mean a change from an established use to another use. To make use of premises for a purpose different from that for which planning permission has been granted, but not started, is not a change of use within the meaning of the Town and Country Planning Use Classes Order: it would not be covered by any permission and would be liable to enforcement action.
As I have indicated, changes of use are provided for in statutory instruments. The Town and Country Planning (Use Classes) Order 1972—the current version of a long-established document—sets out various kinds of uses, grouped together in classes. It provides that a change of use within the same class is not development, and so does not need planning permission. Class 1 deals with retail shops. Within this a change, for example, from a furniture shop to a food shop, would not require planning permission. The change of use of a car showroom to an ordinary shop can also take place without a specific planning permission, but this time under different arrangements. A car showroom is specifically excluded from the definition of shop for the purposes of the use classes order, since it is not a use which is likely to be appropriate to a shopping area. However, a change of use in the opposite direction is generally unlikely to be open to the same objections and the change from a car showroom to a shop covered by Class I of the use classes 1829 Order is made "permitted development" by the general permission granted by Article 3 of the Town and Country Planning General Development Order 1973. Class III of Schedule I to that order contains the reference to this change of use.
I do not consider that the freedom to change the use of premises in this way is by any means a weakness in the system that we should alter. Its objective is to prevent local planning authorities from being burdened with a host of trivial applications for permission to change the use of all the shops and so forth in their areas so that when a shop goes from one retail use to another, the planning authority would not have to be concerned, so that it should not have to follow up every change of use.
Moreover, it is open to a local planning authority to limit particular premises to a specific use or uses if it thinks it appropriate and has good reasons for that belief. It can do this by placing conditions on the planning permission. As I said, it must have good reasons, legitimate planning reasons, for imposing those conditions. The effects of additional traffic would be such a reason, but the lack of need for another supermarket, or its effects on other traders, would not be.
It is not the function of a planning authority or of planning control to stipulate or prevent competition between traders or control the occupation of premises. Planning control is essentially to do with land use. Therefore, when my right hon. Friend the Member for Walsall, North told the House of the difficulties experienced by some of the traders because of the operations of hypermarkets or supermarkets in their areas, I am bound to say that that is not primarily a planning matter. The use of the land is a planning matter: the effect on the trader is not.
It would be quite wrong for a number of reasons for my Department to intervene in that way. It would be wrong because undoubtedly patterns of trading change. People now have cars and they tend to buy for the week rather than the day, as they did in the old days. Consequently, there has been a change of pattern, not only in this country, but throughout the world. It is not the function of our planning laws to stop a change 1830 of trading in that way if people want that change.
There are also straight economic reasons for a change in the pattern of trade. Very often the bigger shops and hypermarkets are able to sell commodities to the public more cheaply than the smaller shops, because they buy in bulk. Therefore, it is not the function of planners, planning authorities, or my Department to alter economic forces at work. That is not a planning matter. Planning is concerned with land use.
My right hon. Friend quite properly dealt with the question of enforcement. Successive Governments have wrestled with this problem of getting enforcement within a reasonable length of time. It takes a long time to get any enforcement action through the courts. This is no fault of the Department or planning departments, but is due to the tortuous nature of the legal system in which there can be considerable delays in deciding an enforcement case.
Where development is carried out without planning permission, it is open to the local planning authority to institute enforcement action. It is not, however, and never has been an offence to carry out development without planning permission, although the law requires planning permission to be obtained.
Before an offence arises, the local planning authority must initiate action which in effect puts the owner and occupier of the land on warning that what he is doing is considered to be in breach of planning control. An enforcement notice has to allow a period of not less than 28 days at the end of which it comes into effect, and during that period it is open to persons on whom the notice is served to appeal to the Secretary of State. An appeal stays the coming into effect of the enforcement notice until such time as the appeal is determined or is withdrawn.
I accept that this is bound to lead to some considerable time elapsing before the notice comes into effect. My Department is doing everything possible to deal with appeals as quickly as possible, but at the present time the average period from the receipt of an enforcement appeal to its decision is about 14 months. This is due mainly to the effects of a backlog of appeals which built up during the time 1831 that the intake of normal planning appeals was very heavy and when local authorities were unable to accept dates for inquiries because of special pressures following local government reorganisation. We hope to improve on the present performance in the coming year and where in individual cases the authority seeks priority handling because the development is giving rise to serious problems locally, we do our best to comply with its requests.
My right hon. Friend in his intervention asked if anything could be done to stop the trading while an enforcement appeal is heard. In his report of the Development Control System Mr. George Dobry, QC, made a number of recommendations concerning the speeding up of enforcement procedures. One of these was that local planning authorities should be able to serve stop notices in respect of changes in use of land in the same way as they can serve such notices where building or engineering works are commenced without planning permission. This would enable a use of premises to be stopped effectively while the enforcement action was pursued and would meet some of the criticisms implicit in my right hon. Friend's arguments.
In the detailed statement made by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State on 12th November setting out his conclusions on Mr. Dobry's report, he stated that he generally accepted the recommendation on this and allied matters. But he pointed out that they would require amendment of the 1971 Act, and this he proposes to seek when there is a suitable opportunity for legislation. I regret that I cannot at present give my right hon. Friend any indication of when such legislation will be introduced, but I can assure him that we are very aware of this weakness and that we shall rule to deal with it as soon as possible.
I noted that in his Early-Day Motion my right hon. Friend referred to a case in Wales including one that took three and a half years to determine. The same procedure applies in Wales as in England, but specific cases in Wales are matters for my right hon. and learned Friend the Secretary of State for Wales.
I appreciate that the existence of a new trading pattern, and indeed the very 1832 word "warehouse", can create difficulties for a local planning authority. My right hon. Friend and I trooped through the Lobby together against local government reorganisation. However, we have got it.
In general, one of the difficulties, particularly in my right hon. Friend's area, was the smallness of some authorities. The new authorities have been in existence for only 18 months. It is because of the problems that they inherited from the previous authorities that they are in such great difficulties with so much of their environment. Everything cannot be cleared up at once. It is for the local planning authority to pass a plan in the area or to move for enforcement procedures. It is not for my Department. My Department can act quasi-judicially, but control is with not the Department of the Environment but the local planning authority concerned. It appears from what my right hon. Friend said that in his constituency steps are being taken by the local authority with regard to the development about which he complains.
I hope that I have satisfied my right hon. Friend that powers exist to stop development without planning permission and that we accept that there are weaknesses in the enforcement system. One of the biggest problems has been delay. I again assure my right hon. Friend that efforts will be taken to correct this and that legislation will be introduced at the earliest possible opportunity. I hope that my reply has satisfied my right hon. Friend that we in the Department are aware of the problems. I again ask him to forgive me for not dealing with specific cases, for reasons that I explained.