§ Sir Sydney ChapmanTo ask the Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions what responsibilities are to be given to the(a) mayor and (b) Greater London Assembly with regard to matters relating to (i) Grade I, (ii) Grade I* and (iii) Grade II listed buildings, respectively. [117719]
§ Mr. HillAs part of the Spatial Development Strategy (SDS), the Mayor may frame policies for the conservation and protection of London's built environment, working closely with English Heritage (EH) and the boroughs. The Assembly will be consulted by the Mayor before formal public consultation on the draft strategy.
Primary responsibility for dealing with listed building consent applications remains with the boroughs, in consultation with EH. Neither the Mayor, nor the Assembly will have a role in deciding applications.
§ Sir Sydney ChapmanTo ask the Secretary of State for the Environment, Transport and the Regions for what reasons he plans to amend the regulations in Greater London to permit consent for works to Grade II listed buildings to be handled by individual London boroughs. [117720]
§ Mr. HillAt present, most applications for listed building consent for all grades of listed building within Greater London must be made to the relevant London borough who must in turn notify English Heritage. Also, certain cases are referred by English Heritage to the Secretary of State. However, since the Greater London Council was abolished, English Heritage has been working with the London boroughs to build up their expertise in relation to such applications. We are satisfied that the London boroughs are now in a position to take on full responsibility for determining the majority of listed building consent applications on a similar basis to the arrangements outside London. We therefore issued proposals for consultation last year for changes that would lead to a significant reduction in the number of listed building cases that would need to be notified to English Heritage and the Secretary of State and thus enable decisions on applications to be made more quickly. Copies of the consultation paper 'London Heritage Notifications' were placed in the Libraries of both Houses at the time. English Heritage would, however, continue to be consulted on applications for works to Grade I and
548WII* buildings and works to certain categories of Grade II buildings. We plan to announce shortly how we intend to proceed.