Sir South
Staffordshire (Con): I congratulate the hon. Member
for Coventry North West () on securing the debate and
leading it so well.
Some 91.4% of my South
Staffordshire constituency sits within green-belt
land, and the largest number of signatories to the petition—616
in all—are South
Staffordshire residents. That indicates the real
passion, concern and desire to protect the green belt
in South
Staffordshire
There are a number of things that the Government can do to make a
material difference to protect the environment, nature and
conservation—all things that every one of us in this House values
and wants to protect so very much. At the moment there is a real
lack of clarity in the Government’s approach to the duty to
co-operate. That puts enormous pressure on many local
authorities, especially ones that neighbour large urban,
metropolitan areas.
The Government have said that there will be changes to the duty
to co-operate, but they have not come up with the clarification
that authorities need to be in the best position to proceed with
local plans and understand what the new rules will be. I hope
that the new Minister will take the opportunity to set out
clearly what the new rules on the duty to co-operate, or its
abolition, will mean. If he is not able to do so, will he give a
date for when that clarification will come about?
It would also be useful if the Minister could speak to local
authorities that are in the process of developing their local
plans. In South
Staffordshire we are in a terrible situation. We
are having thousands of houses imposed on the green belt by Black
Country authorities and by Birmingham as a result of the
Government’s saying that they are going to abolish the duty to
co-operate but not clarifying what they will replace it with.
This is urgent. Will the Minister say whether authorities that
are proceeding with local plans are able to pause those plans and
make sure that they have protections so that they are not
vulnerable to unscrupulous developers coming forward with plans?
Authorities cannot properly proceed until the Government clarify
what the replacement for the duty to co-operate will look like. I
hope the Minister will be able to do that today...
For context, CLICK HERE
