§ Dr. Ashok Kumar (Middlesbrough, South and Cleveland, East)I am grateful for the privilege of having this debate, in which I want to bring to the attention of the House the need to address issues affecting the ability to achieve brown-field land regeneration. Some of the points and suggestions that I shall make were raised recently in an excellent seminar organised by the Parliamentary Office of Science and Technology at the Institution of Civil Engineers.
I represent a Teesside constituency in one of the largest industrial areas in the UK. I shall concentrate on issues that are central to the development needs of Teesside, but which are applicable to other industrial areas in the country. I shall begin by making historical remarks, and then consider the current issues on Teesside and suggest practical Government measures that could help our local economy.
The core industries of Teesside are of long standing. Iron making from the 1850s onwards made way for steel making and heavy engineering in the latter part of the 19th century. That industry was complemented by the growth of salt extraction, and heavy organic and non-organic chemicals at the beginning of this century. Those industries were both land hungry and polluting. They were symbols of what the social historian Lord Asa Briggs called the "carboniferous capitalism" of the Victorian age.
Teesside steel was made from iron mined in the nearby Eston hills and was smelted in furnaces fuelled by coal from the nearby Durham coalfields. At that time, pollution was seen as a symbol of prosperity. When Prince Albert came to Middlesbrough, he was told that he would see "many smoking chimneys" and that that was for the general good because smoking chimneys meant business and employment. Indeed, those smoking stacks dominated Teesside's industrial heartland until comparatively recently.
Technological and locational changes in industry, combined with the rising costs of energy and the decrease in customer demand as the recession of the 1980s bit, meant that many sites were abandoned by industry. The retreat of industry left a great legacy of polluted land, dereliction and visual decay.
Making full use of Government funding, the councils of the day and other regional bodies began the slow and complex job of making good the polluted land and bringing it back into productive use. This work was complemented by the creation of the Teesside development corporation in the late 1980s.
As the Minister knows only too well, I have often criticised the TDC and the autocratic and secretive way in which it conducted its affairs. However, its record in derelict land clearance and remediation has been good. At a cost of some £400 million, it cleared up to 500 hectares of derelict land in its lifetime and brought them back into productive use. Today, the visual outlook of much of Teesside has been changed for the better, as new leisure developments, new offices, new extensions for higher education and new houses have been built on former brown-field land.
The River Tees, once a waterway that ran between the high walls of factories and warehouses, has in many places once again come into the public domain. 943 Teesside is a greener, cleaner place, but there is still a lot to do. There are still more than 800 hectares of derelict land fronting the River Tees, and there are still vast areas of land that have been levelled by their industrial owners, but no beneficial after-use has been properly considered.
There are still large riverside areas which could again become valuable industrial assets for Teesside, but which are effectively left sterile by the seeming disinterest of the landowners. Such land is an underused asset in an area which, as well as being an ideal location for new capital-intensive industry, is a hub in bulk logistics.
The port of Teesside and Hartlepool is one of the top three ports in the United Kingdom in terms of tonnage handled, and is probably the nation's number one export-import facility for chemicals and bulk steel. There is a regional need to build on these strengths. I have an ambition to see the development of what could be a UK Euro-port.
I have been impressed by what I have seen and heard of port-related intermodal development centres. These are developed by port authorities on mainland Europe in, for example, Rotterdam, Antwerp and Wilhelmshaven. I would argue strongly for such a centre in Teesside—a centre where all forms of surface distribution and the infrastructure to service it, as well as safe storage, warehousing and Customs and Excise facilities, could be housed on a single secure large site. It would be a great project, and there is more than enough derelict land near the existing port terminals to allow it to go ahead.
Despite the contractions in and shocks to the industrial heart of Teesside in the 1980s, the area is still one of the heartlands of heavy manufacturing industry. The development agencies on Teesside, especially the highly successful Tees Valley development company, tell me that there is still a steady stream of inquiries from potential investors. These potential investors are anxious to build on the skills, talents and abilities of the people of Teesside. That is our strength.
An area once associated indelibly with one companyICI—now has manufacturing plants owned and operated by some of the world's largest corporations, such as Du Pont, BASF, Union Carbide, Phillips Petroleum, Amoco and Enron. For many of them, their Teesside operations represent their largest stake in UK manufacturing. They are companies with international reach and vision. They are powered by global concerns and strategies, and they are shaping our modern world. There is, I would argue, a UK imperative to ensure that their presence in this country is cemented, and that they become key players in the building of the UK's national capability in chemicals. To underpin that, we need a huge portfolio of available sites on Teesside. The essential problem is that in order to do that quickly and effectively, we need more powers and more resources.
I greatly welcome the setting up of the new regional development agency for the north-east. This will go a long way to meeting the development needs of the northern region and Teesside, but the RDA is only part of the answer. It is not the complete solution to bringing vacant sites back to life. More powers need to be devolved from central Government in order to assemble land and to encourage—if necessary, to push—landowners into the development process.
We must look afresh at and review the practice of compulsory purchase arrangements and at possible fiscal measures. The compulsory purchase order process is long 944 winded. A recent research paper by Drivers Jonas showed that a CPO can often take up to two years to implement, with another two years to settle compensation. A development agency or local authority with a good inward investment prospect anxious to move on to a site cannot afford to wait that long.
I have heard that inflated values are often agreed for land to ensure speedy possession, which involves buyers paying through the nose for land that is often contaminated and which requires new accesses and services. If that does not happen, a job-creating project could go elsewhere.
The CPO process is also complicated. Again, Drivers Jonas tells us that there are no fewer than seven principal Acts, as well as a host of circulars and reams of case law, which have a bearing on the CPO process. There is a cast-iron case for some form of consolidation so that people know where they stand.
I referred to the work of the Teesside development corporation. One of the powers of that body, as of all the other urban development corporations, was the power of acquisition for
the overall regeneration of the area. That phrase was enshrined in the Local Government, Planning and Land Act 1980, which gave special consideration and powers to the UDCs. They did not have to demonstrate any specific use for the land, and did not have to jump through all the hoops that local authorities and existing development agencies now have to negotiate. Why not reinstate that power for these bodies? I am sure that it could be done simply, either through a circular from the Department of the Environment, Transport and the Regions or by adding a single clause in any general local government or planning Bill.The other thing that the Government can do is to state forcefully that the scales are to be tilted in favour of active vacant brown-field land development. They should stress through a new planning policy guidance circular that there will be an active presumption in favour of the compulsory purchase of land that is substantially vacant or derelict. That needs to be backed by strong Government encouragement to large institutional landowners on Teesside, such as British Steel, the port authority and Railtrack, actively to review their land portfolio and market it actively.
I should like to make one final suggestion, which could be considered controversial, but which I hope my hon. Friend the Minister will study seriously. There has been much talk of a green-field levy to encourage developers to make greater use of brown-field land. That is one side of the coin, but we must look at the other side too. I would argue that there should be some fiscal stick to partner the carrot of a green-field levy. Why not consider a brown-field levy—say a percentage of the capital value of any site that has remained unused for a fixed time, and where there is no indication of any material progress towards a defined end use? I do not mind what time is fixed; that could be decided later.
Proceeds from such a levy could be ring-fenced, just as the landfill tax is used to fund environmental improvements. The levy could help towards remediation work on brown-field sites where active disposal and marketing are under way. It would be a spur to owners and provide financial assistance to central—and local—Government, who must fund the process. My suggestions could, of course, be applied nationally.
945 Teesside's derelict land problem must be addressed. The suggestions would, if examined, refined and adopted, have a great impact on its ability to enter the new millennium as a strong, confident manufacturing and trading region. I look forward to an encouraging response from my hon. Friend the Minister.
§ The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions (Ms Glenda Jackson)I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Middlesbrough, South and Cleveland, East (Dr. Kumar) on his helpful and perceptive contribution to this very important and continuing debate on brown-field land regeneration. He spoke not only in general, but in particular, and concentrated most of his arguments on Teesside, which he represents.
I am aware that English Partnerships, in consultation with local authorities and major landowners on Teesside, has decided that a strategic view of regeneration needs to be taken towards the under-used and derelict land along the Tees. That has resulted in several comprehensive studies in order to provide a programme of action to achieve regeneration, ranging from environmental improvements to providing employment opportunities for the region. My hon. Friend is right to point out that, despite the progress in the past decade in derelict land clearance and the return of sites to productive use, there is still much to do.
When my right hon. Friend the Deputy Prime Minister launched our policy document "Planning for the Communities of the Future", he made it clear that one of our most testing challenges as we approach the millennium is how to create a more sustainable environment and more sustainable communities. In so doing, we must ensure that the best use is made of the many thousands of previously developed—brown-field—sites.
An urban task force was established in April, under the chairmanship of Lord Rogers of Riverside, to identify strategies that will encourage the regeneration of our towns and cities through the redevelopment of previously used land. One of its responsibilities is to look at practical means of ensuring the delivery of development on brown-field sites. It will consider, for example, whether any improvements should be made to the system of public land acquisition. It will examine whether there is a strong enough presumption in favour of acquisition, and whether the process could be simplified. It will address other mechanisms for achieving the goal of assembled land, including lessons from abroad.
The urban task force will also be looking at the possibility of speeding up site preparation by, for example, improved measures for the remediation of contaminated land, and the potential use of fiscal measures and the removal of financial disincentives. Lord Rogers's urban task force will produce its report in the spring.
We are also assembling data for the first stage of the national land-use database, which will provide crucial data on the amount of previously developed land in England. That is a vital step in the process of maximizing 946 the redevelopment of sites. We are, of course, actively working on the new planning policy guidance notePPG3—on housing.
My hon. Friend the Member for Middlesbrough, South and Cleveland, East discussed the mechanism of compulsory purchase and, like many others who wish to encourage urban regeneration and the provision of better housing, highlighted perceived deficiencies in the system. It is often said that the way in which the compulsory system operates is not the equal of 21st century conditions. Indeed, last year the interdepartmental working group on blight concluded, among other things, that compulsory purchase and blight are inseparable bedfellows.
I am told that local authorities that wish to clear life-expired housing stock are frustrated that their powers seem insufficient to the task; or that the compensation code seems to reward delinquent landlords; or that people in negative equity are put in an impossible position if their properties are compulsorily acquired. In other circumstances, such as those described by my hon. Friend, authorities report that they have inadequate powers to acquire sites for regeneration. Several authoritative reports have demonstrated that the system can be very slow.
In the face of such overwhelming evidence of a reported mismatch between the tasks that we expect local authorities to perform and the tools given to them to enable them so to do, it was plainly essential that we should take the system to pieces—so to speak—and subject it to detailed scrutiny. Therefore, in June my hon. Friend the Minister for the Regions, Regeneration and Planning announced the institution of a fundamental review of compulsory purchase and compensation. The review—the interim report of which we are considering—is indisputably the most thorough examination of this complex law for a generation.
The House will know that my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister has made clear his determination that policy making should be a far more inclusive process. For that reason, and in recognition of the magnitude of the task, we have secured an eminent advisory group to assist us in the review. With top lawyers, planners, surveyors, academics, representatives of local authorities, the farming community and other property interests represented on the group, we can be confident that no stone will be left unturned and no argument left unvoiced. If there is an answer to the problems with which we are apparently faced, I have no doubt that the group will find it.
I am sure that my hon. Friend will forgive me if I do not divert into a paragraph-by-paragraph consideration of the interim report. It is detailed and exhaustive, and warrants close consideration before publication. However, I am equally sure that he will be interested—I hope encouraged—by some of the group's earliest findings. They were sufficiently important, and advocated by the group with sufficient confidence, for us to take its advice and act without waiting for it to submit its interim report.
Probably the most interesting of the early conclusions was that the lack of local authorities' use of compulsory purchase powers, or their lack of success in deploying them, was less a question of sufficiency of powers and more one of authorities' lack of expertise in and understanding of such powers. That is hardly surprising because if one does not use a skill, one loses it.
947 As the group rightly says, it would be nonsense if we were to allow so basic an impediment to efficiency, effectiveness and fairness as a lack of expertise in operating the system to persist. It has therefore recommended that a comprehensive CPO manual, combining procedural guidance and best-practice advice, should be drafted, to which we have already committed substantial funds. In case anyone should dismiss the idea of a guidance manual as trivial, I should say that initial responses from authorities and professionals have been uniformly enthusiastic. "We could have done with this years ago" was the opinion of one local authority planning officer—from a highly CPO-proficient authority.
Despite the group's conclusion that the erosion of the skills base was a significant factor in the low use made by authorities of their CPO powers, it nevertheless considered very carefully the issues that my hon. Friend has set out so succinctly. In particular, the group examined the proposition that local authorities could not achieve their regeneration objectives because they did not have the powers to do so.
It is true that urban development corporation powers are different from local authority powers, just as it is true that UDCs and local authorities are distinct creatures in statute. However, different powers do not mean less effective or less appropriate powers. As constitutional lawyers will remind us, powers are closely related to statutory functions: UDCs had very precise statutory functions, and powers were given to each UDC only after Parliament had been assured that a specific, geographically circumscribed need had been demonstrated.
As regards local authorities, Parliament does not, cannot and should not interest itself in the detail of individual schemes: those are matters for discussion, resolution and accountability at local level. Given that the nature of the two types of body is different, their powers are different, too, although equally appropriate and equally adequate.
I shall give two examples. In Leicester, the successful delivery of its city challenge regeneration strategy necessitated the acquisition of several acres of land which was under-utilised or, in the context of the overall scheme of regeneration, inappropriately utilised. The city council deployed the powers available to it under the Town and Country Planning Act 1990 and acquired the land. With good title to the land and vacant possession, the council attracted sufficient interest from developers to undertake a remarkable transformation of the area, in terms of both economics and aesthetics. More recently, a compulsory purchase order, using the same power, was successfully used by the then Rochester city council for the regeneration of part of its riverside area.
I urge my hon. Friend and his colleagues on Teesside metropolitan borough council to examine, with their professional advisers, those cases of the successful use 948 of existing compulsory purchase powers for regeneration-linked purposes, to see whether the perceived impediments to their use are, in fact, real. If my hon. Friend and his colleagues remain convinced of the mismatch between task and tool, I will ask the working group to visit Teesside to explore with him and his colleagues why that may be so and what may need to be done to rectify matters.
I welcome my hon. Friend's interest in the role of ports in local economic regeneration. That is a key theme of our integrated transport strategy, and will be developed in a ports policy paper on which we hope to consult shortly.
I applaud the expansion that has taken place at the port of Tees and Hartlepool, which was undertaken by the port authority and involved studying market potential, making commercial judgments and backing those judgments with development plans. I would expect any further expansion at the port to follow the same process.
It is for the Tees and Hartlepool port authority to consider what future direction it wishes to take. Some ports might expand by offering added-value facilities, potentially improving logistical efficiency. In other cases or trades, ports may do better to focus on providing a seamless link between supplier and customer. Those are matters for commercial decision by the port authority.
Finally, my hon. Friend came up with what he called a controversial—I prefer to call it interesting—suggestion of a brown-field levy, as an incentive for people holding previously developed sites to develop them. That would encourage people who are just sitting on land to develop it or release it for others to develop. He will, of course, understand that tax issues are a matter for our right hon. Friend the Chancellor.
We are currently considering some of the options for taxes that would give the right signals to developers. If my hon Friend has any further details of his proposal for a brown-field tax, I would be happy to look at it.
§ It being before Two o'clock, the motion for the Adjournment of the House lapsed, without Question put.
§ Sitting suspended, pursuant to Standing Order No. 10 (Wednesday sittings), till half-past Two o'clock.