Planning Bill

I am looking at the clock and wondering how soon midnight might arrive. This has been a very interesting and helpful debate, and I will run through one or two points that arose, which I do not regret. I was slightly amused when the noble Lord, Lord Berkeley, wondered how we managed to reduce 16 areas down to five, and then began to talk about a uniform, overarching transport policy. That seemed to me to make my point. The subjects in Clause 16 can be reduced to the five headings that we gave in Amendment No. 27. The only thing that I want to say on the question of overarching policy across particular fields is that you have to cater for complete changes in circumstances. Historically, the obvious example is the impact of the railways on coaching and coaching inns. More recently, very much in our time, the channel ferries thought that they had it made until someone dreamed up the tunnel. We have to be able to cater for that sort of change. That is a particular area. I agree with the points made by the noble Lord and the noble Baroness, Lady Hamwee, about site specificity. This is very difficult. The fact of the matter is that the commission will be considering specific sites and, if granted, the permission will relate to the site and not to the owner or operator of the site at the time. If the current financial explosions were to have an impact on an applicant two or three years down the line and they had to pack up and go out of business, a successor would still have the benefit of the permission, and there would not be a problem. However, I find myself wondering about a subject that we have not mentioned tonight and which perhaps ought to be covered. What might the regulators make of this? All our major national undertakers are subject to regulators. We have not really discussed the question of regulators in relation to this whole issue. Regulators might well have a view if an undertaker had to change. At some point, we perhaps need to give that some consideration. The noble and learned Lord, Lord Boyd of Duncansby, also sympathised with our amendment and raised the question of flood risk and nuclear sites. My problem with flood risk is that one has to consider it in the context of timescales. In my area in 2001, we had a one-in-800-year flood. The problem with such a flood is that nothing prevents you having another one in the succeeding year. Thank heavens, that has not happened, but no one that I have read has considered what the potential sea level rise will be in 800 years if we continue along our present path. At that point it becomes very significant and perhaps we need to think about this matter strategically in relation to coastal sites for power stations. My view is that the insurers are doing very nicely out of that one-in-800-year flood. They have upped their premiums accordingly and they may take the money for 800 years before it is called on. We need to recognise that there are long-term risks out there that are longer than the timescales that we are used to thinking about. I am sorry that the noble Baroness says that our amendment on floods is too severe to be considered, but I am glad that she has some sympathy with it. I shall read the whole of her response with considerable interest, because she covered a number of points in great detail. I could go on for another 10 minutes, but I guess that at this hour the Committee would prefer that I did not. With the assurance that I shall read with interest her response to my noble friend Lord Jenkin and her statement, I beg leave to withdraw the amendment. Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.