English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill

Baroness Young of Old Scone Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 27th January 2026 Grand Committee

[Baroness Willis of Summertown (CB)]

My Lords, I support Amendment 46, tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Lansley. We must ensure that any spatial development strategy underlines and works with the principles of the Environmental Improvement Plan and the upcoming land use framework, as the noble Lord rightly pointed out. Particularly regarding the latter, it makes no sense to have two systems dealing with how we use our land pulling in different directions—which is the risk here. We have these central government legally binding environmental targets, so we need to use the Bill to ensure that this new devolved governance structure means that each tool is deployed in an effective but consistent manner. Consistency is key here.

Bluntly, I do not see how we can halt biodiversity loss, let alone restore it, without giving authorities the duty to work towards meeting these targets. A recently published global biodiversity assessment highlighted the threats to the UK’s national security and prosperity from biodiversity loss and really stressed the importance of delivering the 30by30. This is a very tall target at the best of times, but if we have the devolved Governments pulling in different directions on this, there is no chance that we will reach anywhere near it. We are a long way off right now—at 7%—so have an awfully long way to go in the next seven years.

This amendment would mean that authorities think about nature recovery, soil, water and land use from the outset, rather than as something to be dealt with at a later stage. We had a long-standing debate on this in the planning Bill. This is often where the delays are, caused by nature and environmental considerations. If we consider the environment strategically before we get into this whole planning process, I hope many of those delays and debates will go away, so we do not have them. This will reduce conflicts and create more consistency in how we achieve our environmental targets. It is a very good amendment and it has my strong support. I see it as essential but also proportionate.

[Baroness Young of Old Scone (Lab)]

My Lords, I speak in support of Amendment 46, tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Lansley. Spatial development strategies are a really big opportunity and much to be welcomed. We have long needed a spatial view at that sort of level, so we have to get this right because there is a lot that they can deliver.

However, to be frank, if spatial development strategies do not play a key role in delivering things such as the Environmental Improvement Plan statutory targets, I am not entirely sure how government will get those statutory targets delivered, because the land is fundamental to delivering those targets. The question really is: if there is not some strong guidance that the spatial development strategies must play a role in delivering the Environmental Improvement Plan statutory targets, how will government ensure that these targets are met? Is it envisaged that there will be guidance rather than something in the Bill?

We should not underestimate the importance of the environment for growth. I remember years ago, when some of the big drug companies were thinking about where they were going to put production facilities, they came to the conclusion that England’s green and pleasant land was a pretty good place to come. Not only was there a reasonably stable economy in those days, but there were also excellent places for the people they would have to attract—potentially from other countries but also from other parts of the UK—to come and work for them. They were also potentially attractive places for those businesses to come and pursue sustainability and growth as part of their global strategies. Therefore, a pleasant, productive environment not only provides security against climate shocks, flooding, heat and all those things if done on a big enough scale; it is also an attractive place for businesses to come because they can get good staff who want to come and live in pleasant places. That is a crucial element that the noble Lord, Lord Lansley, has rightly pointed out.

I have stood up and talked about the land use framework many times; I do go on about its importance. For me, it has two major importances. First, it brings a degree of rationality to considerations and discussions about competing land uses, which is absolutely what regional—spatial—development strategies ought to be doing as well, so they are very complementary. As the noble Baroness, Lady Willis, pointed out, the land use framework is also a means of reducing conflict.

We all too often see development being delayed because there is local or county-level antipathy by the public to what is being proposed. A land use framework approach is a way of getting that dialogue going across multiple land uses—including land for climate, biodiversity and other environmental management, and land for development—that can introduce a note of calmness, conciliation, balance and rationality to the debate. The land use framework is important and the big problem right now of course is its timing. We have been a very long time waiting for it. My understanding, and the Minister can perhaps confirm this, is that it is in a good enough shape for write-round, but we hear that it may well be delayed.

The reality is that we are up against a hard deadline. The hard deadline for me—and this is a purely personal view, not the view of my party, I am sure—is that we are going to have a rough time in the elections in May and there could well be all sorts of reshuffles emanating from that. The last thing that any of us wants is for a brand-new set of Ministers to be appointed as a result of a reshuffle, or even a few Ministers to be appointed as a result of a reshuffle, who quite rightly, in the case of something as important as the land use framework, will want to delay and have a look at it themselves to make sure that they understand it and that they are behind it. That could cause even more delay, so if we do not get it agreed and published by late April, we could be stuffed—I think that is the technical term. Perhaps we could persuade the Minister to tell us what it would take to get this announced by April.

There is one further requirement that the amendment from the noble Lord, Lord Lansley, does not cover, which is the whole issue of local nature recovery strategies. Those noble Lords who have played a role in local nature recovery strategy development and approval will realise just how much sweat and blood has been magnificently used at a county level to produce these agreed strategies. They are very much another brick in the wall of the rational approach to land use. There has been a huge amount of engagement of local authorities, communities and NGOs at the county level to get these strategies going. They are incredibly valuable, because they have been a meeting ground for all these competing land use bodies. One has to ask: what is the point of a local nature recovery strategy if it does not play a role and does not figure in the spatial development strategy? Can the Minister assure us that local nature recovery strategies will be material in local development strategies? If so, why not put it the Bill? Depending on her answer, I may have to egg on the noble Lord, Lord Lansley, to add that into consideration on Report.

[Baroness O'Neill of Bexley (Con)]

My Lords, I am happy to support my noble friend Lord Lansley’s amendments, but can I probe the Minister, for when she responds, about what happens in London? In London, all 33 boroughs—or 32 plus the City, if you want to be pedantic—would all have their own local plans, and out of those local plans would come all our different plans. Then, of course, you have the London Plan, which potentially trumps—I am going to take on board some of the language just used, but I think “trumps” probably is the best phrase to use—what is done locally. Not only can it contradict what is done locally, which has quite often cost an awful lot of money, time, sweat, tears and everything else, but in addition to that it creates uncertainty. When the Minister responds, perhaps she could think about the London scenario, please.