HC Deb 04 March 1998 vol 307 cc1032-8 1.25 pm
Mrs. Ann Cryer (Keighley)

I thank my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary for making the time to reply to the debate.

I preface my remarks with a disclaimer: to put the record straight, I am not on the side of the hunting and gun lobbies which paid for and organised the demonstrations in London last Sunday. I have large rural areas in my constituency and, for the sake of my constituents, I wish that they had organised their march 18 years ago. They might have saved rural bus services from deregulation, and our farmers from the enormous problems of BSE, which were brought about by the deregulation of the preparation of animal foodstuffs. They might also have prevented the selling off of nearly all our once much-admired village council housing and the closure of village schools and other facilities. However, village schools in the Keighley area have survived due to the support of our local authority.

I shall discuss the question of the erosion of the green belt at Silsden. I hope that such erosion can be avoided.

Nearly three years ago, friends at Keighley asked me to let my name go forward to Keighley Labour party, which was in the process of selecting a parliamentary candidate. I was already aware that many people in Keighley were still struggling to come to terms with the fact that the Conservative Government of 1970–74 had pushed the old borough of Keighley, the urban districts of Silsden and Ilkley, and the rural district parishes of Steeton, Eastburn and Addingham into the Bradford metropolitan district council area.

For me, the bolt from the blue was the Bradford unitary development plan, especially the main point at issue: the allocation of a beautiful area of the Aire valley around Silsden for the building of about 1,500 houses. Straight away, I questioned the need for using such a massive amount of green belt. I was told by the chair of Bradford planning committee that the Conservative Government had put a great deal of pressure on the committee to make large amounts of land available for housing. The three Bradford constituencies were heavily built up and there was little room for development, so the committee had to consider Keighley and the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Shipley (Mr. Leslie).

I was regarded as a nuisance for raising the issue. It was explained that none of the councillors for the Keighley area, including Craven, which takes in Silsden, had made representations on the proposals. The majority of Keighley wards, five years ago, were represented by Conservative councillors. Most are now Labour, and their councillors take a view similar to mine on the erosion of the green belt and the use of green-field sites.

People in some political circles take the view that the pressure put on councils by the previous Government to release land in attractive rural areas was not completely detached from the generous contributions to the Conservative party by companies involved in housing development. I have been discussing and corresponding about the unitary development plan with Bradford council for three years. After the general election on 1 May, my hon. Friend the Member for Shipley and I took the matter up with the Department of the Environment, Transport and the Regions. They all tell me the same—that it is too late. The plan has been approved, and nothing can be done.

As Silsden is only one of the areas with whose allocation for housing I disagree, I realise that—along with the various action groups—I shall have a very busy time in the next few years arguing against developments as and when developers come along with their detailed plans. Although I am disappointed that our Government can do nothing to revise the UDP, I am encouraged by the possibility that my constituents and I will be helped by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State and my hon. Friend the Minister when we argue against individual developments.

The Secretary of State has said: We are resolute in our desire to avoid unnecessary encroachment into the countryside. The presumption against development in the green belt will remain as strong as ever. But this does not mean that there will never, ever be any building on green field sites. I can accept the need for green-field sites in some areas to infill between already developed areas, but large encroachment on the green belt, as at Silsden, or removal of village green space—as the UDP proposes for Manor Garth, Addingham or Leeming at Oxenhope—is unacceptable if we are to retain our green and pleasant land.

The two developments on village green space were opposed by Bradford council, but the council was overruled by the inspector following an appeal by the landowners, one of whom has since sold his plot at an enhanced value.

I applaud the Secretary of State's comment: The vast majority of our people live in cities and towns. I want to see a renaissance of our cities. That will mean using existing empty houses, offices and warehouses for new affordable flats, not just for city yuppies. The type of housing that will be attracted to the new UDP areas will not help my constituents who are living in overcrowded or sub-standard housing in the middle of Keighley. They would be helped if we could return to the system of many years ago, when local authorities could lend money for home improvements that would be repayable on the death of the owner and/or the sale of the house. That was particularly helpful to older people and poorer families who were unable to raise a second mortgage on their homes.

The proposed new developments are likely to be four-bedroom, two-garage detached houses that most of my constituents could not afford or even consider in their wildest dreams. They will be bought by well-paid professionals working in Leeds, Bradford or even Manchester. They will be dormitories, generating the sort of traffic and environmental problems that our Government are trying to plan against.

In an excellent edition of "Panorama" on 19 January, the Silsden town action group presented its arguments with clarity and intelligence. We saw the splendid Lister's, Manningham Mills, in the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Bradford, West (Mr. Singh). Yes, it would take a great deal of money, imagination and enterprise to convert that memorial to West Yorkshire's magnificent industrial past into flats for people, but it could and should be done.

There are many smaller mills and warehouses in Keighley that could be converted. The once elegant but now rotting royal arcade was to be given new life by our local authority in a living-over-the-shop scheme—an idea that would not only breathe new life into the centre of Keighley, but combat crime and vandalism. I hope that problems with the owners of the arcade will eventually be overcome, and that the scheme will reach fruition.

A few months ago, I was shown derelict but still sound warehousing on various stretches of the Leeds-Liverpool canal. Some were in the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Shipley (Mr. Leslie).

Mr. Christopher Leslie (Shipley)

My hon. Friend called the debate in order to talk about housing problems in her constituency, with specific reference to Silsden. My neighbouring constituency—also a rural area—contains many examples of the way in which dormitory, executive, spec-built housing developments of the sort that my hon. Friend has described have begun to encroach on green-field sites.

The whole of the Bradford UDP was framed in the last Conservative Government's planning legislation. It is very unfortunate that so much green space was set aside, never to be recovered once it had been built on. I am glad that the new Government have indicated that they will encourage more use of brown-field or recycled sites.

My hon. Friend has mentioned recycling existing buildings. As she has said, my constituency also contains many mills and listed buildings that need to be reused. I hope that the Government will consider giving local authorities some support, helping them to intervene proactively in the market, to find developers and to match them up with derelict sites. If we leave it to the market to find recycled land—

Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Michael Lord)

Order. The hon. Gentleman is making a very long intervention. If he has the permission of the hon. Member for Keighley (Mrs. Cryer) and the Minister, he may make a brief contribution when the hon. Lady has stopped speaking.

Mrs. Cryer

The regional manager of the British Waterways Board tells me that the board is anxious to dispose of the derelict warehouses, and has asked for my assistance. Although intact, the warehouses are looking a little decrepit, but they would make very attractive flats. They would not be suitable for families with small children, because of their position near the canal, but in other respects they are beautifully positioned, with lovely views.

The warehouses would be suitable apartments for others, if only we can persuade developers to consider that sort of challenge rather than the easy profits of green-field sites. Perhaps a levy on green-field site development will remedy the imbalance about which I understand my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State has some ideas.

I look forward to the provision of new or improved council housing following the release of council house receipts, which is already in our programme, and the redressing of 18 years of Tory neglect of our towns and cities to make them again into places where people want to live.

All those changes must—and, I hope, will—come. I only hope that the shift from rural to urban housing does not come too late to save the lovely green areas around our towns, without which we, our children and our grandchildren will be much poorer.

1.36 pm
Mr. Christopher Leslie (Shipley)

I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Keighley (Mrs. Cryer) for giving way to me earlier. When she did so, I raised the whole question of green-field development throughout the Bradford district. Incidentally, when we talk about the Bradford district, people tend to forget about Keighley and Shipley. In fact, Bradford is the fourth largest metropolitan district in England and Wales. It is a significant piece of land in the Yorkshire region, and also a very built-up area in which half a million people live.

My hon. Friend has made some valid points. In a built-up area such as Bradford district, there are planning pressures to develop incrementally, by attrition, on the surrounding green-field sites. Part of the difficulty encountered by Bradford council relates to the calculation of the amount of land that must be set aside for development. The last Administration gave the council a calculation that it met virtually in full, but, unfortunately, it did so largely by allocating large chunks of green-field land.

I am concerned about Warren lane and Clarendon road in Gilstead, and Sty lane in Micklethwaite. These are valuable spaces, separating communities. As my hon. Friend pointed out, Silsden has a community integrity that is all its own. Gilstead, Eldwick and Micklethwaite also have long histories, but those villages will be subsumed in the growth of commuter-type housing in an area that does not really have a town centre. There are no proper planning considerations for village or town life—even for shopping facilities—and there is very little consideration for traffic generation. The Bradford area is very hilly, and narrow valleys cause transport problems.

The local authority has allocated many sites, including Silsden, in its unitary development plan, but I hope that, when it considers planning applications in the light of sewerage constraints, highways constraints and so on, it will go through the details with a fine-toothed comb, and possibly adopt some of the arguments that my constituents and those of my hon. Friend the Member for Keighley are using, to say that development should not go ahead on those sites.

1.39 pm
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions (Angela Eagle)

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Bradford—

Mrs. Ann Cryer

Keighley.

Angela Eagle

I am sorry—I meant my hon. Friend the Member for Keighley (Mrs. Cryer). I must have the Bradford unitary development plan on my brain. I congratulate her on securing the debate, and I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Shipley (Mr. Leslie) on his contribution to it.

My hon. Friend the Member for Keighley has raised some important issues relating to planning policy and the way in which it has been developed in Bradford. She has also rightly pointed out that the background against which these often complex and difficult issues are decided is in the process of being changed by the new Government. However, until we can put the changes into effect, these issues must be decided according to the existing planning rules. My hon. Friend also knows that unitary development plans evolve on a rolling programme; I hope that that gives her hope that she can start to have an effect on the way in which the plans become reality.

The issues are complex, as my hon. Friend the Member for Keighley acknowledged, and they are by no means easily resolved. Therefore, the planning system attaches considerable significance to development plans, which are formulated after examining local issues in great detail. Such plans provide the framework for resolving development issues at local level.

Responsibility for Bradford's UDP rests with Bradford city council. In preparing the plan, the council is required to take account of development issues throughout the metropolitan district; to follow established procedures; and to consider objections made to its proposals.

The city council started work on the current UDP before 1993. In November that year, the draft UDP was published and made available for objection by the public. I understand that many objections were made, including a considerable number about the proposals for Silsden to which my hon. Friend the Member for Keighley refers. More than 1,500 objections each were made to the four sites zoned in the plan for housing development and to one that was earmarked for industrial use.

Those proposals meant that about 50 hectares of the green belt would be taken at Silsden. I know that it will be of no comfort to those in the Aire valley, but I believe that the matter must be viewed in perspective. It is worth recalling that the total green belt in the metropolitan district as a whole is more than 23,000 hectares, so between 0.2 and 0.3 per cent. of the green belt is involved.

The development plan system is subject to rigorous procedures. A very important safeguard is the right for anyone who has made an objection to have it considered by an inspector at a public inquiry. The inspector is independent, and reports directly to the local planning authority.

In Bradford, the UDP inquiry was held between May 1995 and February 1996. Any local planning authority must give very serious consideration to what an inspector has said about a plan. I know that Bradford city council accepted almost all the inspector's recommendations, including those about Silsden. Although he noted that some sites are subject to constraints on their development, the inspector considered that the principle of development at Silsden was justified.

In the inspector's view, the needs for effective long-term planning and economic regeneration constituted exceptional circumstances to justify the removal of the land from the green belt. Acceptance of that view then became a matter for the council's judgment. Decisions about planning issues in local areas are usually best taken locally.

Obviously, there is a debate about whether the council has the detail of its planning strategy exactly right for the metropolitan district, but I am firm in my view that the development plan system is the best way of reconciling all the different views that there may be about the way ahead in each locality.

Inevitably, some decisions will not be to the liking of objectors; but the system allows for open discussion and independent arbitration about them. Any plan that takes more than four years to complete is testimony to the thoroughness of the process. Although our document "Modernising Planning" considers ways to speed up the process, the process will not be speeded up at the expense of safeguards and people's rights to object to a plan and to have those objections fully considered.

It is important, too, that each local planning authority sticks to the correct procedures for the preparation of its development plans. I understand that, for some proposed development sites in Bradford, there is concern that the council decided not to hold a second public inquiry, but that is a matter for the council, which has a duty to follow the statutory regulations.

My right hon. Friend the Deputy Prime Minister carefully considered arguments made to him in the light of existing guidance regarding ministerial intervention in development plans—I emphasise "existing". The powers of intervention in plans are used very sparingly and as a last resort, such as when a plan raises issues of national or regional importance or gives rise to substantial controversy—for example, extending beyond the area of the plan-making authority.

In this case, our considered judgment was that it would not be appropriate to intervene. The Bradford UDP was formally adopted by the city council on 23 January 1998, so, as I am sure hon. Members recognise, my right hon. Friend has no further jurisdiction regarding the policies contained in Bradford's UDP.

That is not to say that we are unconcerned about the general issues that arise from the concerns of my hon. Friend the Member for Keighley. She has drawn particular attention to the location of land for housing, arguing for greater attention to housing and development opportunities in the urban areas. The planning system allows for assessment of those issues in deciding how best to accommodate future development.

In March 1996, the previous Administration published regional planning guidance for Yorkshire and the Humber region. That is being reviewed, and we shall ask for views about its content. The review will take account of better information about the capacity of the region's urban areas to accept new development. More important, it is our intention that there will be much more of a regional contribution to the guidance, and a greater regional input in the way in which we plan for new housing.

I know that my hon. Friend the Member for Keighley has campaigned vigorously on behalf of her constituents in Silsden to express their concerns about the UDP, and I congratulate her on her attention to their views and her determination in ensuring that we know what they are. She has contributed to the debate on planning for the communities of the future, and she has written several times about the issues for Silsden, notably on behalf of the Silsden town action group, while raising issues for other parts of her constituency.

Hon. Members will recall that, in a statement on 23 February 1998 on planning for the communities of the future, my right hon. Friend the Deputy Prime Minister set out a range of measures to meet future housing needs. I need not repeat that statement, but I would respond to a point that my hon. Friend the Member for Keighley raised about recent decisions.

In the case of Bradford city council, the UDP has been adopted, so my right hon. Friend has no further jurisdiction in the matter. However, we propose to move as quickly as possible to the new approach set out in my right hon. Friend's statement, and the reviews of regional planning guidance that are under way provide an early opportunity to put that into effect.

When new regional planning guidance is ready, it will be open to local authorities to review their development plans. I believe that my hon. Friend the Member for Keighley has already made a few suggestions for that review. She came up with some interesting ideas about recycling land and putting it to housing use, which is the essence of the policy change that the Government have inaugurated.

However, it is important to remember that green belts are not a national designation. They are established by local authorities by means of development plans. The general extent of green belts is fixed in structure plans, taking account of regional planning guidance. It has always been open to local authorities to propose changes to green belt boundaries; but exceptional circumstances are required to justify alterations. That happened several times under the previous Administration.

My hon. Friend the Member for Keighley spoke about the strength of feeling in her constituency on the issues that she raised today; my hon. Friend the Member for Shipley did likewise regarding his constituency. The Government have set out their proposals for tackling the issues at the heart of this debate, which are about regenerating our urban areas and looking for the most sustainable solutions to meet our long-term development needs.

Our statement of 23 February charts the course for taking this issue forward. We have emphasised that we want to stimulate debate, particularly at local and regional level. I have listened carefully to the debate, and I am sure that Bradford council will pay careful attention to it. We shall continue to listen and to provide strategic leadership in what will, I am sure, be a continuing debate in the coming months.

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.