Planning and Infrastructure Bill

Lord Cromwell Excerpts

Monday 24th November 2025 Lords Chamber

[Lord Lansley (Con)]

My Lords, I will speak to Motion B and Motion B1, which is the amendment in the name of my noble friend Lord Parkinson of Whitley Bay. Lords Amendment 2A, which has been sent back to us, in effect puts the Planning Act 2008 back into the position it was originally in. To that extent, it is not so objectionable. But we are looking to ensure, as my noble friend eloquently presented, both now and on Report, that when these decisions are being made we take full account of the protections that should be available for irreplaceable heritage assets.

In addition to the assurances about national policy statements that the Minister has given to my noble friend, I ask her whether she will look at the guidance, which Clause 7(2) provides for, that can be given about the preparation of local impact reports, which as she will know are a material factor in the decisions that have to be made by the Secretary of State under Section 104 of the Planning Act 2008. If that guidance makes it clear that the local impact report must make specific reference to the heritage assets that are to be affected, and to the impact on not only those assets themselves but their environment, that might highlight any potential adverse impacts for when the Secretary of State has to weigh up the adverse impacts against the benefits under the Section 104 decision. I hope that the Minister might add that to the ways in which the assurances might be bolstered to protect heritage assets.

[Lord Cromwell (CB)]

My Lords, I support Motion E1 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh of Pickering. In particular, I agree with her about the level of urgency and the slow progress that has been made on this, and about the de minimis rules, which need thoroughly updating to make it more possible to avoid drought situations. I have just one question for the Minister. She referred to a paper appearing later this year. Does she mean this calendar year—in which case it would be just in time for my Christmas stocking?

[Lord Borwick (Con)]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for her Amendments 31A and 31B, which is very similar, as she said, to Amendment 31, which I proposed.

The noble Lord, Lord Hendy, is a practical transport expert—he knows how to mend a bus—as I hope I am, although his expertise is wider than mine, which is based on taxis. I hope that he will agree that success does not come from changing the law alone but will come when disabled people are not limited in their use of charging systems for electric cars. Today, no doubt, there are people struggling with chargers that have steps that could be designed out and cables that are too heavy. Success can be declared when charging infrastructure is no longer a barrier to the purchase of a car for a disabled person.

Again, I apologise for the inelegant way in which this amendment was proposed at Third Reading; an amendment in Committee would have been more elegant. However, I am glad that this necessary amendment has been made. I look forward to the regulations being promulgated with lightning speed, and actual accessible charging points being seen widely even more quickly.

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[Baroness Young of Old Scone (Lab)]

My Lords, I too thank the Minister for the discussions and assurances she has given us on Motion K1. I was rather fond of Motion K1 and would have preferred the amendments in it being in the Bill—it represented a fair compromise. The reasons why it is very important are threefold. One is partly to provide some pacing for Natural England, because there is a real potential for it to overextend itself and not do any of the EDPs very well as a result.

Secondly, there needs to be proper evaluation, because this is a very new and untried system. The monitoring and evaluation should be not just about biodiversity but about whether this works for developers, because the whole point of the exercise is to try to unlock delays, and it is quite a complicated system for developers to operate in. So, on the early ones, we need to really examine our conscience and see whether they are delivering both for biodiversity and for speeding up the development process.

Thirdly, clarity for developers is important, and I very much welcome the fact that there will be a pipeline in the annual report that will enable developers to see what EDPs are likely to come up for development in the future. The usual situation, of course, is that when middle ground has been filled by concessions and assurances, you ask yourself why they cannot just be expressed in statute, since they meet many of the points that we have raised.

However, I recognise that this is probably as far as we will get on this one. I welcome the assurances and concessions that have come in the direction of the concerns that we have expressed.

[Lord Cromwell (CB)]

My Lords, on Motion K1, I want underline what the noble Baroness, Lady Freeman, said about the need for independence in the monitoring and evaluation. The noble Baroness, Lady Willis, referred to it, but I am not sure that the Minister did so—forgive me if I missed it. Can we please hear from her on this, just to put it beyond doubt?

On the remarks of the noble Lord, Lord Krebs, about the need for flowcharts, we are definitely going to need a definitive agreed one.

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[Lord Cromwell (CB)]

The Minister gave me encouraging reassurance about independence and referred to two bodies that would be doing the monitoring and evaluation. Could she repeat for me—I think I missed it—which bodies they are? Are they fully independent of Natural England and the Environment Agency?

[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

I have not made an approach to these organisations, so I do not want to commit them to doing this, but if the Environmental Audit Committee or the Office for Environmental Protection wanted to get involved in the scrutiny of EDPs, we would be very happy to facilitate that.