§ Lords Amendment: No. 8, in page 8, line 30, leave out "under section 27(1)(b) of the Town and Country Planning (Scotland) Act 1972".
§ Mr. MillanI beg to move, That this House doth agree with the Lords in the said amendment.
§ Mr. MillanThis is an improvement to the wording of Clause 9 to meet points raised in the House on Report. It was felt that there was a danger that the reference to Section 27(1)(b) of the 1972 Act—the reference to the planning permission being related to the end of a specified period—might be too restrictive. Both the right hon. Member for Orkney and Shetland (Mr. Grimond) and 659 my hon. Friend the Member for Greenock and Port Glasgow (Dr. Mabon) suggested that we should redraft the clause. We have done so by omitting particular words and adding further words at the end which correspondingly strengthen the clause. I believe that we can now assure local authorities that there will be no difficulty in operating the clause even if they are not able to put a specific date to the end of an oil-related development.
This is a substantial amendment, but I would not admit that, technically speaking, the clause as originally drafted was wrong. I accept that the amendment definitely makes it more explicit.
§ Question put and agreed to.
§ Subsequent Lords Amendments agreed to.