My Lords, regardless of whether the Labour Front Bench brings this amendment back on Report, it still encapsulates an important principle. Perhaps I can draw the Minister on the issue of infrastructure provisions.
It is true that the dash for the development of starter homes at all costs runs the risk of producing poor-quality homes that are inadequately served by infrastructure. Although we are not yet at the point in the Bill where we talk about permission in principle and, in particular, brownfield registers, it is important that we hear from the Minister, before we reach that point, how those provisions will take account of the need for planned infrastructure alongside fast-track provisions to get starter homes and new housing developments on to small-scale brownfield sites quickly. We need to hear how they will do so without transgressing the very important requirements for good infrastructure and principles of design.
I have asked the Minister in several ways and on several occasions—I keep promising her a letter which I have not yet written—for a flow chart on the “permission in principle” issue that shows when various factors will be taken into account and when various consultations will take place on the provision of infrastructure such as schools, doctors’ surgeries, roads, sewerage and plumbing, as well as an assessment of the downside of development on these sites, taking into account biodiversity conservation, flood risk management and an assessment of whether there is enough water available to flush away sewage.
I remember volubly—although I should not at this stage, on this day and at this time, give an anecdote—how in Basingstoke at one stage of its housing development there was enough water to allow people either to clean their teeth or to flush away their sewage but not enough for both. We have got to get these infrastructure issues right well before the fast-track development processes are put in place. Perhaps I may also press the Minister to give me my flow chart before we come to discuss the “permission in principle” part of the Bill. I will be extremely grateful if she does.