Planning and Compulsory Purchase Bill (Programme) (Hansard, 8 December 2003)

§ The Minister for Housing and Planning (Keith Hill)
I beg to move, That the programme order of 17th December 2002 shall be varied as follows:
Consideration and Third Reading

1. Paragraphs 4 and 5 of the Order (Consideration and Third Reading) shall be omitted.

2. Proceedings on Consideration and Third Reading shall be completed in two days.

3. Proceedings on Consideration on the first day shall (so far as not previously concluded) be brought to a conclusion at the moment of interruption.

4. Proceedings on Consideration on the second day shall (so far as not previously concluded) be brought to a conclusion two hours after their commencement on that day.

5. Proceedings on Third Reading shall (so far as not previously concluded) be brought to a conclusion three hours after the commencement of proceedings on the Bill on the second day.

6. Proceedings on Consideration shall be taken in the following order: New Clauses standing in the name of a Minister of the Crown, remaining New Clauses, remaining proceedings on the Bill.

As the House will know, the Bill has received detailed scrutiny in Committee, both in its initial three-week consideration, and later, in the two weeks when it was recommitted so that the new provisions that we sought to introduce to cover the removal of the Crown's immunity from planning controls and some further provisions to improve the system of compulsory purchase could be considered. Recommital meant that, in total, the Bill was debated for some 55.5 hours in Standing Committee. I am grateful to all hon. Members who participated in consideration of the Bill for their constructive contributions.
Anxious as I am to make progress on the substantive rather than the procedural aspects of the debate, I should respond to the observations that the hon. Member for Cotswold (Mr. Clifton-Brown) made last week in his point of order, in which he complained about lack of notice on the amendments relating to planning contributions. The hon. Gentleman acts as though this is a dark plot to spring the amendments on him, but it is the end of a process that began back in December 2001, when we consulted on four options for reforming planning obligations. Our preferred option was the tariff. In July last year, having received and considered more than 500 responses to that consultation, the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister announced that although the objectives of the tariff proposal were widely welcomed by a majority of respondents, many could be delivered without legislative change.

§ Mr. Patrick McLoughlin (West Derbyshire) (Con)
Will the Minister give way?

§ Keith Hill
Of course—how can I resist giving way to my former opposite number?

§ Mr. McLoughlin
Can the Minister tell us how much of the Bill is in the original form in which it received its Second Reading in this House?

§ Keith Hill
The greater part of the Bill remains in its original form—subject, of course, to sensible 784 amendments, many of which were made in the light of sensible representations on the part of the loyal Opposition. Additions to the Bill were properly debated and scrutinised on its recommittal. We are now bringing forward new material that I will try to deal with in the course of this short debate.

§ Mr. Eric Forth (Bromley and Chislehurst) (Con)
Who decides what is sensible?

§ Keith Hill
Members of the House of Commons when they vote on the provisions of the Bill: I am sure that the right hon. Gentleman would entirely agree with that.
Work continued on the issues, especially in the light of the many representations that we continued to receive. We continued to explore how to offer developers and local authorities a straightforward way in which to shorten the time taken on negotiations. The proposals are a development of our earlier consultation about the tariff—they are nothing new; and they are optional, not mandatory.
I announced our proposals in a written statement to the House and published the consultation document on 6 November. In both I explained that we intended to take enabling powers in the Bill. I made a particular point of ensuring that the Opposition were in immediate receipt of the consultation document. If the hon. Member for Cotswold and his Liberal Democrat counterpart, the hon. Member for Ludlow (Matthew Green), happened to miss my statement and the consultation document, perhaps they had a chance to read about it in their daily newspapers. The Financial Times, The Daily Telegraph and The Times covered my announcement extensively, explaining that we intended to legislate, what we intended to legislate for, and that the detail of the proposals would be subject to further discussion. I do not know what the weekend reading matter of the hon. Member for Cotswold might be, but I am sure that, as a chartered surveyor, he takes the opportunity to catch up with specialist publications such as Property Week, Estates Gazette, Regeneration and Renewal and Housing Today, all of which made it clear that we intended, as I said on 6 November, to take enabling powers in the Bill.

§ Mr. Geoffrey Clifton-Brown (Cotswold) (Con)
Of course, I read all those publications avidly, because I try to get into them as often as possible. However, what the Minister says is a travesty. Although we knew in principle that the new clauses were on the way, until we saw them in detail there was no possibility of our being able to table counter-amendments. The Minister sat on the matter for a month and tabled the amendments just two days—not even two full days—before all amendments had to be in or end up being starred and therefore unable to be debated. That is a manipulation of parliamentary procedure and a sloppy way of carrying on.

§ Keith Hill
Notwithstanding the hon. Gentleman's protestations, he succeeded in tabling no fewer than 20 amendments to two new clauses, so it appears that he
785 did not find the process of responding to the possibly late tabling of the new clauses a particularly arduous process.

§ Mr. Clifton-Brown
Although I do not have an entire ministerial team behind me, I was up very late into the night drafting amendments to try to ensure that the Minister and Government did not get away with it.

§ Keith Hill
I do not want to take away from the assiduousness of the hon. Gentleman, but his amendments' redolence of the midnight oil means that, unfortunately, I shall have to reject quite a lot of them.
The consultation document invited views on the general principles of reform. It was clear that we intended to legislate by making provision for a new optional planning charge that will give developers a choice between the current negotiated approach and the alternative of paying a predetermined fixed amount. I want to make it clear that we will publish the results of the consultation and our response to the points raised, as well as more detail on the form that the regulations will take, in order to inform the debates in the other place during January.

§ Sir Paul Beresford (Mole Valley) (Con)
The Minister will be aware that, in July last year, the Select Committee condemned most of the draft planning Bill, including the part dealing with tariffs. Considering that it did so on the basis of what had been said by the many people who came before it, and of the many memorandums that it received, would it not be more appropriate for such a delicate issue to be delayed—or at least for the relevant part of the Report stage of the Bill to be put off—until the results of the consultation are in and have been seriously considered by the Government?

§ Keith Hill
I do not think so. Our earlier consultation received precisely 505 representations on this subject. The broad outlines of the issue have been sufficiently adumbrated up and down the country, although of course we continue to discuss the matter with interested parties. In the circumstances, and in the light of the fact that these are enabling measures which will be subject to further detailed consideration in consultation, guidance and regulation, we feel that this is the right moment to introduce them.
We intend to issue a second, more detailed consultation document in spring 2004, which will be a draft circular setting out firmer and more detailed proposals. After that second consultation period, we will publish a new, revised circular to replace circular 1/97. I accept that we have shortened the consultation period to nine weeks from the 12 weeks that we usually allow. In this case, the period is shorter because we are looking for broad views on the general principles. As I have said, a further consultation document will set out our proposals in detail, and we expect to consult for longer at that time. In a nutshell, we have decided that we want to take advantage of this rare legislative opportunity to introduce the optional planning charge. Planning Bills are not introduced frequently, and the opportunity might not arise again for years.
786 I hope that these explanations will satisfy the House, and the hon. Member for Cotswold in particular. As I have said, the Bill has already enjoyed a lengthy Committee stage, in which there has been ample opportunity for the Opposition to scrutinise all its aspects. Moreover, it is precisely because we recognise that we are bringing new material to it, in the form of three new clauses and four amendments, that we are proposing this motion to increase even further the time available for debate. The programme motion tabled in the name of the Deputy Prime Minister and the Leader of the House provides that we consider the new material first. It is therefore entirely in the hands of the Opposition to decide how long we need to consider this new material. There will be no knives.
The Under-Secretary of State, Office of the Deputy Prime Minister, my hon. Friend the Member for Pontefract and Castleford (Yvette Cooper) and I eagerly anticipate an interesting day and a half of debate, and I hope that we can now move quickly to address the substance of the Bill without any excessive expenditure of energy on procedural wrangles.

§ Mr. Geoffrey Clifton-Brown (Cotswold)
Thank you for allowing me to catch your eye, Mr. Speaker.
The Minister is skating on pretty thin ice, considering the chronology of the Bill. I shall go through that in some detail, so that anyone listening to this debate or reading the report of it later can see the mismanagement of Government business that the Bill exemplifies par excellence. The programme motion provides that we shall finish our proceedings at the moment of interruption today, giving us just six and a half hours. Tomorrow, we shall have just two hours on further consideration, giving us a total of eight and a half hours. Points of order and the ministerial statement have taken up half an hour, so we will have in effect only eight hours to debate 23 new clauses and 78 amendments, most of which—certainly the substantive ones—are Government new clauses and amendments. These amendments are very technical and extremely important to the development industry.
What a way to carry on! I apologise for my point of order last Thursday, which was marginally incorrect. The Bill started its Second Reading on 17 December 2002, which is almost a year ago. The Government rushed it through Second Reading and Committee on a timetable of 12 sittings between 9 and 28 January, which meant that on the first go at this in Standing Committee only 30 clauses out of 90 and only I schedule out of six were discussed.
The Government were not content with rushing the Bill through at that huge pace. The whole thing went to sleep until June, when they introduced an unprecedented recommittal motion to recommit it to Standing Committee. That took place, and despite the fact that we had argued strongly for 12 sittings we were given only eight. Even on the second go, only 29 clauses out of 90 were discussed, and four schedules out of six were not even debated.
Despite the fact that the Government have had two goes at this legislation in Standing Committee, there are still huge chunks of the original Bill that have never been discussed. On top of that, during the second Standing
787 Committee stage, the Government introduced two new huge portions, which I estimate add about 20 clauses to the existing 90 on important matters to do with Crown immunity and compulsory purchase.
No sooner had that second Committee finished and while the ink was hardly dry, the Government announced that they wanted to add another huge bit on to the section 106 procedure—the alternative procedure that the Minister has outlined—in the highly complex clauses 1,2 and 3. Yet we are being allowed only one and a half days for debate on Report—in fact, not even one and a half days. That is totally inadequate. I suspect that at the end of Report stage huge chunks of the original Bill will not have been discussed, and neither will the other new clauses and amendments. I draw hon. Members' attention to the new list of amendments. There are 40 pages of amendments, which include 23 new clauses and 78 amendments. That shows the huge interest of a large number of Members who want to discuss various aspects of the Bill, yet we have this timetable motion. At the very least, we should have two days for Report.
There is no reason at all why we need to finish at 10 o'clock today. There is no reason why discussion of the Bill should not go on after the moment of interruption. That would allow Back Benchers to present the new clauses that they have tabled and to raise all the issues that pertain to the Bill.
I must express our serious reservations about what we will discuss today. The Government say that they had a consultation document way back in December and that they had 505 responses. That consultation paper led the Government to conclude that the tariff system was unworkable, yet for some extraordinary reason they have decided to bring it back in these new clauses. Not only is that an extraordinary way to go about things, given that we thought this whole tariff idea had been dropped, but the Government are bringing it back in the middle of their new consultation, which does not end until 8 January. Many experts wonder whether it is possible to subject this whole procedure to judicial review. The Government have introduced clauses not only in the middle of the consultation but at a time when the Treasury-sponsored Barker report is still not available in full. I thank the Minister for acceding to part of my request by ensuring that some of the responses are available on the website. However, we still have not seen the full Barker report, which touches on this matter.
The new clauses are both wide in scope and vague. I have no doubt that the other place will want to give this whole Bill huge scrutiny. It is reprehensible to bring forward these new clauses in such a vague form and in such a hurry.
There is no reason why these matters could not have been specified in the Queen's Speech, and subject to a separate Bill.
We all rely on the planning system in this country, but the Government have ripped up the present system and made the new system even more complicated. Once we have added to that the further complication that will be raised in today's debate, the system will probably be unable to cope.
788 These are important matters that touch on all our lives, and not least on the country's economic development, but the timetable only allows us about eight and a half hours in which to discuss them. This is a monstrous travesty of parliamentary procedure.

§ Mr. Andrew Mitchell (Sutton Coldfield)
I am grateful for the opportunity to speak briefly. The Minister knows how deeply some of the issues in the Bill concern us in Sutton Coldfield and it worries me that insufficient time has been allocated to them. The Minister was good enough to reply to a late night Adjournment debate about some of those issues in the summer, within minutes of taking up his post. He will therefore know that planning decisions and the way in which they are made is one of the most important issues.
I am particularly concerned about two matters that the motion may prevent us from discussing. The first is misuse of brown land. I have always suspected that the Minister feels some sympathy for us in Sutton Coldfield where that is concerned. Under current legislation, developers can wilfully misinterpret the definition of brown land. They can knock down large houses with large, mature gardens—I gave the Minister a specific example last summer—and replace two or three of them with enormous blocks of flats. They can increase density in areas where that is wholly inappropriate. I suggested to the Minister that he might like to undertake a journey from Sutton Coldfield to Birmingham, as en route he would see what both he and I would consider proper and legitimate brown-land development. But I fear that the wilful misinterpretation that I have described cannot be discussed adequately in our debates.
The second issue is that of appeals. Under current legislation, a developer whose application is turned down by a planning committee can appeal if he can persuade the appeal authorities that he has been denied the opportunity of proceeding with his development. The problem is that when a developer is given permission under the current legislation—even when the planners would have preferred not to give permission, but the planning department believes that it must do so under the legislation—my constituents have no right of appeal.
When the matter was discussed at length in Committee, the Government's response was that it was an extremely difficult issue. that they would think about it, but that they had no plans to act. If more time were available today, we might have had an opportunity to consider ways of redressing the balance more in favour of our constituents and less to the advantage of developers. It might, for instance, have been possible to argue that when a large number of local people object to a decision in favour of a developer—

§ Mr. Speaker
Order. The hon. Gentleman can advance these arguments at a later stage. We are discussing the programme motion, which is very tightly and strictly drawn.

§ Mr. Mitchell
I am most grateful for that guidance, Mr. Speaker, and I am about to bring my remarks to a conclusion. If this programme motion were more extensive—if it gave us greater opportunity to raise such 789 points—the very important issues of appeals, and of the current injustice affecting my constituents and the developers, could be addressed.

§ Mr. Clifton-Brown
My hon. Friend will be aware that I argued very hard in Committee for our amendment on this issue. Indeed, I tabled new clause 9, which would have achieved precisely what his constituents are asking him to achieve, but because of the constraints of the timetable motion that we are discussing it will not even be discussed. That is yet another example of why the timetable motion is inadequate.

§ Mr. Mitchell
My hon. Friend makes the point extremely well. The timetable motion is so tightly drawn that his excellent new clause, which I fully support, cannot be discussed. That is a cause of dismay to my constituents, who will of course hold the Government absolutely to account for not enabling my hon. Friend's new clause to be debated.
I draw my remarks to a close by making one final point. I have yet to decide whether to vote in favour of, or against, the programme motion, so I shall listen with great care to the Minister's response. He has been most helpful. He has agreed to visit my constituency and to take tea with me and others to discuss these very matters, and I look forward to that occasion. There is no more important issue in Sutton Coldfield than this one, and the question of whether I shall support the programme motion will depend on the Minister's response.

§ Matthew Green (Ludlow) (LD)
I am relieved to hear that the Minister is so worried about losing votes these days that he is offering to take tea with Conservative Members to ensure that they vote with him on programme motions. Unlike Conservative Front Benchers, I shall not express indignation. The Bill spent a long time in Committee—some 55½ hours, as the Minister said—and virtually all its substantive elements were covered at one time or another.
If we had considered the Bill on Report immediately after last January, I, too, would have argued against the programme motion, because the way in which business was conducted in Committee at that time was appalling. The Bill was simply pushed through and there was no real attempt to have a debate. However, the new Ministers have taken a completely different, much more welcome and open approach during our recent Committee proceedings. There were no knives, and we were able to deal with all the substantive business with which the Government and the Opposition wanted to deal. Again, there are no knives in this programme motion—

§ Mr. Clifton-Brown
Will the hon. Gentleman clarify what he just said? In view of what I said about the number of clauses and schedules that were not discussed in either Committee, his observation that we were able to deal with all the Government's and the Opposition's business is simply not true.

§ Matthew Green
I will clarify what I said. Because of talks conducted through the usual channels, we were 790 able to move up the order those elements that we considered most important so that we could discuss them. That is a very agreeable and sensible way forward. Frankly, many clauses would not have detained the Committee because they were minor or required no amending; indeed, no one indicated that they wanted to speak against them.

§ Mr. Andrew Turner (Isle of Wight) (Con)
The hon. Gentleman may be aware of amendment No. 26, which is on today's amendment paper but was not reached in Committee, even though it deals with a very important issue. That clearly demonstrates that we were unable to move everything up the agenda. Indeed, it is quite impossible to move some things up the agenda without moving others down it—even the hon. Gentleman must recognise that. Some planning authorities are very concerned that they will get their consultation process on the local development framework under way, only to find that they have to go through it again.

§ Matthew Green
The hon. Gentleman may have a point in respect of a particular amendment, but we were able in Committee to discuss many of the new clauses and amendments tabled by both Opposition parties, and to deal with the Government's new clauses.

§ Mr. John Hayes (South Holland and The Deepings) (Con)
I understand that the hon. Gentleman thinks that he is making a reasonable case, but—notwithstanding the fair point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Cotswold (Mr. Clifton-Brown)—does he think it reasonable that there will be very little time to debate the measures added on Wednesday regarding section 106? These are matters of fundamental importance; surely they concern him just as much as they concern us.

§ Matthew Green
I understand that there would have been one day for Report but for the introduction of the section 106 measures, which has resulted in the addition of another half-day. Once again, that is reasonable. This is a complex and detailed Bill, but it is not one of high politics. It is a Bill best dealt with in Committee. I am sure that, in the other place, their lordships will pore over it and table many amendments. It is a different sort of Bill from those concerned with foundation hospitals and tuition fees.
The Government's recent handling of the Bill has been satisfactory; they have placed no knives and allowed us to move around the order. I should like to see such an approach used with other Bills—compared with others Bills that I have experienced during the past year, I find the Government's approach to be satisfactory. I hope that we will get through the business. I suspect that whether we do or not will depend largely on the length of speeches from Conservative Members, the factor that probably had the largest impact in Committee.
The Liberal Democrats will not be opposing the motion, which we believe gives sufficient time to deal with the major salient points. We would have liked some proposals to be selected, but they were ruled out by the Clerks. With that proviso, we are happy to support the motion.

§ Sir Sydney Chapman (Chipping Barnet) (Con)
I shall detain the House for as short a time as possible, and I can do so particularly because I agree almost entirely with what my hon. Friend the Member for Cotswold (Mr. Clifton-Brown) has said. It is worth referring back to the original Bill, which had its Second Reading almost exactly a year ago. We were told by Ministers—not the same Ministers who are on the Front Bench now—that this was an important, fast-track Bill that needed to be on the statute book as quickly as possible. It was rushed through Committee—only 26 out of 90 clauses and only three out of six schedules were examined. Last June, we heard that instead of bringing the Bill to the Floor for Report, the Government were going to send it back into Committee, which was a unique experience in my time in the House since 1970. I note that the Bill now has 117 clauses and nine schedules.
I disagree with the hon. Member for Ludlow (Mr. Green). There is not enough time to consider the new clauses and those clauses that were not examined at all during last year's Committee stage. The Government are represented by two courteous, fair and considerate Ministers, and I do not blame them. However, rather than deciding to bring the Bill back to Committee with the intention of adding new clauses on planning contributions, the Government managers should have let the original Bill proceed normally last June. Then, after consulting on planning contributions, they should have proposed a second planning Bill, suitably named, either later in this Session or in the next one.
I do not believe that fewer than six hours today and two or three hours tomorrow—depending on how long we spend on Third Reading—is sufficient time to deal properly with 117 clauses and nine schedules.
The Government's latest topical spin phrase is "the big conversation". I say to them that what we badly need in this House is more conversation and more scrutiny of Bills, so that the other place does not have to work overtime to deal with all those matters that cannot be considered tonight.

§ Mr. Clifton-Brown
My hon. Friend is making a cogent case. He has not only architectural but planning and other professional experience, so he knows a great deal about these matters. Does he, with his long experience in this House, agree that the Report stage of any Bill is the only opportunity for those Members who were not members of the Committee to table amendments and new clauses, so the effect of this timetable will be to squeeze out many of those Members?

§ Sir Sydney Chapman
I entirely agree, and that was the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Sutton Coldfield (Mr. Mitchell).
Returning to what the hon. Member for Ludlow said, it may be that on some clauses there are no party political divisions. I do not know that, but I suspect that in general terms there are no such divisions. However, whether or not any of the clauses are non-contentious and will not divide the parties, they all concern matters that are important to many outside organisations. 792 Planning affects each and every one of us. It is a sensitive issue and we really should have had much more time to deal with these important matters.

§ Mr. Andrew Mitchell
My hon. Friend has put his finger on precisely the point. There may not be a political divide, but he has made it clear that 64 of the 90 clauses were not discussed in Committee—that is a phenomenal figure. Many outside professional bodies, in which people earn their living and have a great expertise in these matters, need to see in Hansard what the effect of the clauses will be. They need us to ventilate the issues in the House, and the fact that we are unable to do so today is a retrograde step. The business managers should think again.

§ Sir Sydney Chapman
I entirely agree, and while I am on that winning streak I shall resume my seat.

§ Andrew Selous (South-West Bedfordshire)
I wish to express my concern that the programme motion may not allow us to come to new clause 17, tabled by my Front-Bench colleagues. I raise the matter because it is of great concern to my constituents, and it would provide a remedy for the unauthorised development of land by Gypsies and travellers. I have seven such sites in my constituency and feeling is running extremely high among my constituents on this issue. I find it surprising that the Government have not seen fit to deal with the matter in the Bill or to table an amendment, and I am extremely concerned that the time allotted to us today may not allow us to reach this vital new clause.
The new clause would allow the enforcement of stop notices, preventing the continuing development of sites. At present, people who develop sites illegally are able to play the appeals system until the site is fully developed. I can think of nothing more calculated to cause disharmony between the settled community and the travelling community than such a state of affairs. It is a matter of great regret that the programme motion will very likely not allow us to reach new clause 17, and I am extremely concerned that the Government have not seen fit to propose measures on this subject.

§ Keith Hill
With the leave of the House, Mr. Speaker, I shall briefly respond to some of the points that have been made.
I say immediately to the hon. Members for Sutton Coldfield (Mr. Mitchell) and for South-West Bedfordshire (Andrew Selous) that, as far as the Government are concerned, there is no reason why the issues of concern to the hon. Gentlemen should not be reached. The Government will certainly not seek to delay the proceedings—it is not in our interests to do so—but of course we shall certainly endeavour, in an entirely proper fashion, to expound our proposals and our responses to the amendments tabled by the Opposition.
The hon. Member for Sutton Coldfield said that he had an open mind about how he should vote in the event of a Division on the programme motion.
As a former deputy Chief Whip, I am not sure that I approve entirely of such an approach, even by an Opposition Member. In an attempt to win him over, however, perhaps I can deal with the issue of scrutiny in Committee.
793 I was grateful for the kind remarks from several Opposition Members, and particularly for those from the hon. Member for Ludlow (Matthew Green), and I agree totally with his observation about scrutiny in Committee. Ultimately, the fact is that as a result of the five weeks that we spent in Committee, all the substantive provisions of the Bill were scrutinised. Hon. Members can play this numbers game how they like. The Bill has 117 clauses, but the House ought to be aware that many of them are of a procedural, interpretive and/or technical nature: 47 clauses are of that character; four clauses relate to the slip rule, which is about the correction of errors, on which I have been very broad-minded; 15 clauses are general provisions, regulation-making powers, supplementary or interpretation provisions, repeals or provisions relating to commencement, extent and so on; 19 clauses relate to Wales; and nine clauses simply apply provisions to Scotland and are the same as the English ones in principle and application.
Today, we are talking about only three new clauses for debate. The remainder of the Government amendments are of a minor and technical nature. I would bet my bottom dollar that the Opposition will not wish to take any length of time to debate our new provisions on tree preservation orders. There are a large number of those, and I shall of course endeavour to describe properly the new provisions. I would be extremely surprised, however, if that large number of amendments were the subject of much discussion.
The simple fact is that we can play games with numbers however we want to do it, but in this case the numbers bear no relation to reality. I very much hope that we can now get on to the substance of the Bill.