HC Deb 25 April 1977 vol 930 cc705-6
12. Mr. Molloy

asked the Secretary of State for Industry what proposals he has for the regeneration of industry in inner city areas and especially in Greater London.

Mr. Alan Williams

My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for the Environment outlined a number of proposals on 6th April designed to improve inner city areas. London stands to benefit from these proposals.

Mr. Molloy

I am very grateful to hear that London, too, will benefit from these proposals—and not before time. May I point out to my right hon. Friend, however, that there is a very serious menace to job creation and industrial reorganisation, particularly in the Greater London area? It has been caused by the ease with which applicants for warehouse building can get planning permission on former industrial sites. If this goes on at the present rate, industry will be prevented from returning to London. Will my right hon. Friend look at that problem?

Mr. Williams

My hon. Friend is quite right in saying that in certain areas, particularly the area which he represents, there has been conversion of that sort. The local authorities as well as the central Government are involved in such a situation. I think he will bear in mind that the various easings of the IDC policy have already benefited London and the other conurbations, and I hope that the proposals which will eventually be embodied in a White Paper will give a certain extra flexibility to the GLC to help remedy its problems.

Mr. Townsend

Does not the Minister understand that Government planning restrictions on industry in Greater London are not only extremely damaging to industry but are making it much more unlikely that the plans recently announced by the Department of the Environment for the stress areas will be successful?

Mr. Williams

I am afraid that the hon. Gentleman makes a rather sweeping survey of industrial strategy and industrial policy with which I could not associate myself at all. I invite him to wait until the White Paper is published. I think he will find that, within the proposals that the Government will bring forward, there has been a real attempt to meet the problems which analysis has shown to exist in London, without in the long term undermining the basic regional policy, which must still have priority.