Localism Bill

My Lords, I am grateful to all noble Lords who have taken part in the debate. My first and pleasant duty is to welcome the noble Lord, Lord Kennedy of Southwark, to the opposition Front Bench. We did business the other day on his interesting question about Thameslink. Because it was topical, it required me to work pretty fast. The Government are committed to increasing housing supply to meet housing needs and to supporting growth to boost recovery. Along with planning system reforms, we need better incentives for communities to support and accept new development. The noble Lord, Lord Best, touched on that in his valuable contribution. However, it is vital that we provide clarity on how such incentives relate to the statutory planning system. This is not a new phenomenon, as my noble friend Lady Hamwee pointed out. Voluntary agreements between landowners and local planning authorities to provide things needed as a result of development have been in use since 1932. Nowadays, Section 106 of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990 makes provisions for planning obligations. The use of planning obligations is regulated by statutory and policy tests. A developer cannot be made to sign up to a planning obligation, but planning permission can be refused if, without one, a particular development would be unacceptable in planning terms. Community infrastructure levy powers introduced in 2010 allow local planning authorities to collect and pool mandatory developer contributions, based on charges per square metre of new buildings. While planning obligations must relate to the planning merits of the specific development that they relate to, community infrastructure levy funds can be used to support development across a wider area. The new homes bonus is even more flexible, as local authorities can spend it as they see fit. The Government’s hope is that the community infrastructure levy and the new homes bonus will encourage and support more ambitious development planning, by increasing the resources available for local authorities to spend in their areas over and above what they can reasonably seek as planning obligations. However, they are both new on the scene and questions have been raised over how such measures relate to the statutory planning application system; in particular, can they ever legitimately be taken into account in decisions on planning applications? The Government are therefore keen to clarify the legal position on this. Clause 124 provides this clarity by amending Section 70 of the Town and Country Planning Act to clarify that such considerations should be taken into account in relation to planning applications but only where they are material to the particular application being considered. In answer to my noble friend Lady Parminter, Clause 124 does not challenge the probity of the planning system. It does not change what can be material or how much weight to give to each material consideration. It does not give any particular level of weight to local finance considerations, nor does it require greater consideration to be given to local finance considerations than to any other material consideration. The discretion to determine the weight to be attached to each material consideration remains with the decision maker, and we are fully confident on these points. I will come back to the example sought by the noble Lord, Lord McKenzie, in a moment. My noble friend Lady Hamwee asked why we are resorting to primary legislation. Clarification of the current legal position could be provided in guidance, as she suggested, or policy. However, the benefits of using the Localism Bill were that the Bill was already proceeding so provided a more immediate opportunity to give the desired clarification, and the high profile of the Bill meant that clarification was likely to come quickly to the attention of concerned parties, and it certainly has. My noble friend Lady Parminter suggested that the clause will undermine the integrity of public confidence in decisions. I do not agree. Indeed, allowing the current uncertainty to linger is much more likely to undermine the system’s integrity and affect public confidence. My noble friend also asked about the pre-eminence of local finance considerations. This clause simply draws out local finance considerations as a potential subset of other material considerations. The development plan has special status as a lead factor in planning decisions not because it is mentioned in Section 70 but because of Section 38(6) of the Planning and Compulsory Purchase Act 2004, which says: "““If regard is to be had to the development plan for the purpose of any determination to be made under the planning Acts the determination must be made in accordance with the plan unless material considerations indicate otherwise””." We have no intention of, and we are not, amending Section 38(6). My noble friend Lord Reay asked me when the NPPF will be published. The Government hope to publish the draft NPPF imminently.