§ 3.3 p.m.
§ Lord AVEBURYMy Lords, I beg leave to ask the first Question which stands in my name on the Order Paper.
The Question was as follows:
To ask Her Majesty's Government whether they will amend the law relating to inquiries on trunk roads and motorways following the case of Bushell and Another v The Secretary of State for the Environment, so as to make it clear that objectors have the right to challenge the validity of forecasting methods used by the department, in order to show that the proposed road is not needed.
§ Lord MOWBRAY and STOURTONNo, my Lords. The noble and learned Lord, Lord Diplock, and his noble and learned colleagues, restated with, if I may say so, admirable clarity the purpose and scope of public local inquiries into trunk road schemes as the Government had believed it to be. This is also consonant with the policies set out in the Report of the Review of Highway Inquiry Procedures, which the previous Administration undertook jointly with the Council on Tribunals.
An inquiry into an individual scheme is the right place for discussion of the details of the proposal—the route and so on—and of the application of the assumptions and methodology adopted nationally, but not of those assumptions and methods themselves.
§ Lord AVEBURYMy Lords, since the judgment is so clear to the Minister, can he explain whether it means that the whole question of need is to be excluded from cross-examination as being a matter of Government policy; or that inspectors should hear evidence on need but make no recommendations on it; or, finally, that the Minister has the power to restrict the scope of the inquiries in any manner he sees fit? Is the noble Lord aware that the inspector in the Aire Valley inquiry ruled just the other day, on 19th February, that he would make recommendations on need, but only because in that case he was considering a self-contained scheme and that, in the case of a motorway or a trunk road which was part of a larger operation, this evidence would not have been able to be put? Therefore, Ministers can exclude any evidence of this kind simply by dividing up the road into little bits.
§ Lord MOWBRAY and STOURTONNo, my Lords. I do not think that is true. Of course, local need can be taken into account and inspectors welcome people pointing out to them how the national methodology—to use that horrible word—applies locally. They are quite prepared to explain to an inquiry what are the national assumptions, and they are also quite prepared to hear arguments as to why they should not apply in a certain case. Anyone can object to their application in a particular case. As the noble and learned Lord, Lord Diplock, said, the methodology is a very complicated matter which the ordinary layman is not competent to deal with at an inquiry.
§ Lord AVEBURYMy Lords, if one cannot deal with these matters at a local inquiry, where can one deal with them, bearing in mind, as the Minister knows, that the forecasts that were made in 1960, 1962, 1965, 1969, 1972 and 1974 all turned out to be wildly over-stated, and that if we had relied on those entirely we should have built thousands of miles of trunk roads and motorways at the expense of millions of pounds to the taxpayer, which subsequently turned out to be unnecessary? Does the Minister not think that, if you exclude objectors from raising matters which are of importance to them at local public inquiries, 1338 they will seek unconstitutional means of raising their cases?
§ Lord MOWBRAY and STOURTONNo, my Lords. What the noble Lord exaggeratedly calls wildly over-calculated, is not necessarily the case. There is a steady growth. If there are mistakes, then the people who conduct these matters learn by their mistakes. Parliament is the obvious forum for dealing with these matters, and there is a permanent ongoing inquiry in the form of the Standing Advisory Committee on Trunk Roads Assessment, under Sir George Leitch This is going on the whole time.
§ Lord HANKEYMy Lords, are the Government aware that some sections of the M.25 have been delayed by the fact that the public inquiries have been disrupted by objectors brought from afar, some of them not even connected with the locality, causing very great distress to the people who live in the neighbourhood and who are pestered by the heavy traffic? Are the Government aware that the need for the M.25 is really very great, because the heavy traffic from Tilbury cannot get to the M.1 and the M.4 at present, without going through parts of London and this greatly reduces the amenities of London.
§ Lord MOWBRAY and STOURTONMy Lords, as the noble Lord and the House will be aware, the M.25 has priority in the Government's thinking and we want to get it right. We do not want any part of the M.25 to affect local inhabitants badly, if that can be avoided. But national need is there and that is what is continually under assessment. Local objections must point out that the assessment about one place or another may not be satisfactory. It is for the inspector to report, and for my right honourable friend then to consider how to mould all these things together and issue a balanced judgment.
§ Lord AVEBURYMy Lords, can the Minister finally say whether the ruling by the inspector, Mr. Chance, in the Aire Valley inquiry on evidence relating to need is correct, because, as the Minister is no doubt aware, counsel for the department, when pressed on the matter in the inquiry, declined to say what the Minister's interpretation of the judgment is?
§ Lord MOWBRAY and STOURTONMy Lords, if I heard the noble Lord correctly, I think that he is asking me about a particular case. If I may look at the report of what he said, I will write to him. I do not know the answer at the moment.
§ Lord HALEMy Lords, will the noble Lord say whether—and I regret putting a reactionary point of view—the Government have considered just how much public cost is incurred by inflation in the process of building a road, when an inquiry has sometimes continued almost interminably and when both local government and other authorities have power to make representations? Is it not a fact that vast and costly schemes are held up, often for very long periods, with immense additional cost to the country? Will the noble Lord consider, while preserving fully the democratic rights, the necessity of having really competent inspectors who know what they are there to do, who know the rules and who try to avoid litigation of that kind?
§ Lord MOWBRAY and STOURTONMy Lords, I fully accept what the noble Lord says and I totally agree with him. The cost to the country of getting valuable goods from one part of the country to another is also an important point.