Asked by Baroness Neville-Rolfe To ask Her Majesty's
Government, in the light of the comments by the Secretary of State
for Communities and Local Government on 22 October about investment
in housing, what steps they are taking to liberalise planning laws
in order to make it easier for new residential properties to be
built. Lord Young of Cookham (Con) ...Request free trial
Asked by
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To ask Her Majesty's Government, in the light of the
comments by the Secretary of State for Communities and
Local Government on 22 October about investment in housing,
what steps they are taking to liberalise planning laws in
order to make it easier for new residential properties to
be built.
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(Con)
My Lords, in February, we published a housing White Paper,
setting out how we intend to boost housing supply and
create a more efficient housing market, including changes
to the planning system to ensure we are planning for the
right homes and building those homes faster. We have
followed this with a further consultation, Planning for the
Right Homes in the Right Places. Feedback from this and the
White Paper will feed into a revised National Planning
Policy Framework to be published early next year.
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(Con)
My Lords, this is very welcome as far as it goes. The
problems are chronic, particularly in the south, with
millions more people living here than was predicted 20
years ago. Can the Government increase the supply of homes
by easing planning laws and being brave enough to do so in
undistinguished pockets in the green belt?
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I am grateful to my noble friend, and for her contribution
to our debate on housing last week. She will be aware that
there was a manifesto commitment to safeguard the green
belt. The planning policy indicates that the green belt
should be developed only where all other opportunities have
been explored, such as brownfield sites and building at
higher densities in urban areas. However, we go on to say
that if at the end of that it is necessary, to develop in
the green belt. Some areas of green belt do not live up to
their name; they are sometimes very unattractive pieces of
land. We are consulting on local authorities in the White
Paper; if it is necessary for them to encroach on the green
belt, they should make complementary provision elsewhere to
replace the amenity that has been lost.
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(Lab)
I refer to my local government interest in the register.
Apparently there are currently between 500,000 and 600,000
planning consents for houses, many granted years ago. What
action will the Government take to ensure that these are
used? Further, while I welcome today’s announcement by the
Prime Minister that the Government will not cap housing
benefit in the social housing sector, and the recent
announcement of £2 billion for all of 25,000 extra homes
over the next four years, will they remove the cap on
council borrowing for new building, and if not, why not?
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I welcome what the noble Lord has said about the Prime
Minister’s announcement on lifting the local housing
allowance cap on supported housing. That is welcome. We now
need to move on to an agreed model for supported housing.
On planning consents, the planning system granted consent
for 304,000 new homes in the year up to March this year,
which is up 15%. However, the noble Lord’s point is a good
one. A third of new homes granted permission between
2010-11 and 2015-16 have yet to be built. That is where we
need to focus. In the Autumn Statement last year, the
Chancellor announced £2.3 billion of funding for housing
infrastructure. That is to be focused on those sites where
we have planning consent but, for infrastructure reasons,
development is not taking place. We hope that will unlock
sites for 100,000 homes in areas of greatest need. On
raising the cap on local authority borrowing, he will see
from Hansard, in my reply to last week’s debate, that there
are circumstances in which we would consider lifting the
local authority borrowing restrictions.
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(LD)
My Lords, I remind the House of my interests in the
register. I do not think this should be about liberalising
the planning system, but rather about making the current
system work better. Is the Minister aware of the very
recent study by the Royal Town Planning Institute, which
shows that we need more, not less, planning for getting
large sites right without the delays and compromises we see
so often? Does the Minister agree with that statement
because, if so, there is an issue about the resourcing of
planners from planning fees?
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There is indeed an issue, which is why we have decided that
local authorities should be allowed to raise their planning
fees by 20%, as long as the proceeds are then ring-fenced
and ploughed back into the planning system. We are also
looking at the so-called viability assessments, which
sometimes hold up the planning process. The noble Lord will
know that Ministers have powers to intervene where, for
whatever reason, local authorities are dilatory in coming
forward with local development plans.
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(Con)
My Lords, is the Minister aware that it is not only about
planning but that local authorities need many more powers
returned to them and more direct control over housing? Has
he seen what is happening in London, where illegal letting
is reaching huge proportions? I know that some people in
council flats are subletting to illegal tenants without any
notification, and probably without paying any tax. Councils
need powers returned to them to be able to check these
situations.
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I am grateful to my noble friend. I believe that local
authorities have all the powers needed where illegal
subletting is taking place, which is a clear breach of a
tenancy agreement. I hope local authorities would take
prompt action where they believe that social accommodation
is being misused in the way that my noble friend has just
outlined.
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(Lab)
Is the noble Lord aware that even though we all agree that
additional housing is required, particularly affordable
housing, half of all threats of damage or destruction to our
precious and diminishing ancient woodlands are caused by
housing development? In the light of the Government’s
commitment in the housing White Paper to improving protection
for ancient woodland, what practical steps is the Minister’s
department taking to ensure that these much-needed houses
will not be built at the expense of irreplaceable ancient
woodlands and to make sure that the garden village initiative
is not just a front for enclosing ancient woodlands in small
zoos of concrete from which they cannot escape?
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I am grateful to the noble Baroness. She will know that in
the housing White Paper we consulted on the irreplaceable
habitats to which she has just referred. We will clarify the
strong protection for ancient woodland and aged or veteran
trees, which has been set out in the National Planning Policy
Framework.
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(Lab)
My Lords—
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Noble Lords
This side!
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There is nobody standing on that side, so I shall carry on.
The noble Lord mentioned the green belt. As he is aware,
there is a peculiarity in relation to this in national parks,
where many houses are disappearing from local occupancy and
being turned into holiday cottages, whereby they escape the
right-to-buy legislation and get 100% tax relief not only on
mortgage repayments but on all furnishings, and do not pay
council tax or a community charge. Will the Minister
negotiate with local authorities in these areas to see
whether we can manage this a bit more sensibly and provide
residences for local people?
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I agree with the objective that the noble Lord has outlined.
I am very happy to open discussions with the Local Government
Association on the specific issue that he raised to see
whether there are any further measures we can introduce to
meet the objectives we both share.
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