Neighbourhood Planning Bill

Lord Horam Excerpts

Committee: 4th sitting (Hansard): House of Lords
Wednesday 8th February 2017 Grand Committee

[Lord Tope (LD)]

My Lords, I support my noble friend Lord Shipley’s amendment, which I think has the same purpose as that of the noble Lord, Lord Kennedy. I declare my registered interest as a vice-president of the Local Government Association. I am not sure whether a liking for real ale is a declarable interest, but I am happy to declare it.

I support the amendment because of a particular local interest. When I looked at the website for a Member of Parliament in a neighbouring constituency, I found his campaign to save one of his local pubs. It included the statement:

“I would be interested to hear your views. I do have real concerns about the loss of pubs, which are an important focal point for local communities”.


The constituency is Croydon Central; the Member of Parliament is one Gavin Barwell. To be fair, it was a year or two ago, but the quote is still there on the internet—it is there for ever. I wonder how much he still has that concern, because the situation for pubs has certainly not improved in the year or two since he put that statement on his website.

I am particularly motivated to speak because of an issue causing considerable community interest in the ward that I represented until three years ago. A pub in that ward for most of the time I was a councillor was known as The Cricketers but more recently it became known as The Prince Regent, because allegedly the Prince Regent used to pass it on his way to Brighton and there was a vogue for changing pub names. We are talking about an outer London suburb and a time before the railways had brought the population to outer London. This pub had its origin in cottages built in the 1790s. That may not be very old in many parts of rural England, but in suburban London, the 1790s is quite old—it is one of the oldest buildings in London. In the 1850s, the Sutton Cricket Club was formed as the suburb started to grow. It used to play on the green opposite the pub, hence the pub becoming known as The Cricketers for more than a hundred years. So it has considerable historic interest. Whether it has architectural or historical merit is for others to determine, but it certainly has considerable historic relevance for the people who live there.

There is now a proposal to demolish the pub and build instead a nine-storey block of flats, considerably larger than the 18th or 19th-century building. The local community is campaigning hard to prevent the demolition of this historic monument, one of the very few in the area. It has applied to register it as an asset of community value, which has been exempt from permitted development rights only since 2015, so not too long ago. That process is under way and will, I hope, be successful, because the pub is considerably valued by the local community not so much as a drinking establishment but more because it represents something historic in a London suburb before the railways came, and is therefore of considerable historic significance. I hope that it will achieve registration as an asset community value, but I understand that even the status of assets of community value have their drawbacks.

I have spoken to our planners about this issue. They are very much in favour of this amendment and point out that if permitted development rights were withdrawn for all pubs, it certainly would not mean that they would all be preserved for ever regardless of the circumstances. Of course that would not happen; it would be absurd. If a public house is not viable and has no other beneficial use, it does not deserve to be preserved. However, simply to knock down a pub because it might make more money if it was turned into nine-storey flats is not in itself a justification for doing so. The removal of permitted development rights would mean that any proposal for demolition or development would be subject to the normal planning regime and to consideration by the planning authority. A decision would be made on whether the pub was viable and should be retained as a pub, with marketing conditions and a planning policy if necessary, or whether it was not viable but the building should be retained as part of a street scene, which may well be appropriate in the circumstances I am describing, or whether a complete redevelopment of the site should take place.

Another drawback to assets of community value, which I think was one of the most valuable measures introduced by the coalition Government under the Localism Act, is that the registration is valid for only five years. After five years you can apply to have the asset registered again, provided somebody remembers to do that, but there is no guarantee that it will be registered again. Therefore, while the provision is extremely valuable, it is not necessarily long term and is not without risk. Given the value that is attributed to pubs in particular circumstances, we are losing them speedily. I am told that 16 of the 69 pubs that existed 10 years ago in my London borough have gone. That is two a year disappearing from a London suburb with a growing population. Therefore, I strongly support both these amendments. I hope that our Minister will share the views expressed by the Housing Minister before he was the Housing Minister. I hope he will recognise that this is an important issue, that there is a way properly to resolve the situation, and that these amendments provide that solution.

[Lord Horam (Con)]

My Lords, if my noble friend has ever studied the history of the most successful political party in Britain, as I am sure he has—I refer, of course, to the Conservative Party—he will know very well that for many periods in its long history it was supported financially by the brewers. The brewing industry played a very large part in supporting the Conservative Party in times gone by. They obtained some recompense for that support. My noble friend will recall that there was a period in history when the peerage was known as the “Beerage” because of the amount of compensation received by individuals who had supported the Conservative Party. Those people would turn in their grave if they thought that the Conservative Party of modern times was in any way against public houses which, as has been said eloquently by many noble Lords and noble Baronesses, perform an important role in not only our urban but our rural life.

I am familiar with a pub in the West End of London off the Edgware Road which dedicated itself to members of the Royal Air Force during the war and had pictures of all the great names from The Few, and so forth. The chap who ran the pub had a handlebar moustache; the pub was an object of great interest to tourists and others and was a great business. However, that pub has gone because the value of the property as a residential building was much greater than it was as a pub. Frankly, that is a tragedy for the tourist industry and for London. The closure of pubs affects the personality of our country not only in London but also in rural areas. I plead with my noble friend as a Conservative Peer to look at this issue most sympathetically. I hope that he will do so when it comes back on Report.

[Lord Hodgson of Astley Abbotts (Con)]

My Lords, I have not participated in proceedings on the Bill before, so I apologise to the Committee for coming late in the day. In the light of what I am going to say, I also owe an apology to the noble Lord, Lord Kennedy, the noble Baroness, Lady Deech, and other noble Lords who have put their names to the amendments in this group as I am going to urge my noble friend to resist them. They are perfectly well meaning, but they are the statutory equivalent of trying to make water flow uphill. They can only inhibit, or slow, pub closures. The brutal truth is that there are too many pubs for modern Britain, too often they are in the wrong place and the whole sector is insufficiently profitable. In cases on the margin, where they could, perhaps, be profitable under other ownership, the opportunity to list as an ACV exists, as several noble Lords have said. Pubs are perfectly adequately protected.

This is an issue which arouses strong emotions. Until February 2014—more than three years ago, and therefore outside the time during which I have to declare a past interest—I was a non-executive director of a major integrated brewery and pub operator. It had five breweries from Cockermouth in Cumbria down to Ringwood in Hampshire and operated more than 2,000 pubs. Some were managed—there was an employee running the pub—and some had tenants and were tied, as was the case in those days. It is often overlooked, but that is a very easy way for people to set up their own business because you have a business offered to you, which you can operate, and you can begin straightaway without having to put up much, if any, capital. While under the old system, you had to buy your beer and soft drinks from the owner, food was down to you. I declare that interest because it is important as this is an issue which arouses strong emotions. The last time we got into this discussion, which was last summer, I managed to obtain a starring role in Private Eye as a result of CAMRA’s intervention. My speech was described as “the high point in an otherwise undistinguished political career”, which I thought was fair dues. So are you listening, Private Eye, as I want to get that on the record?

Why does this issue arouse such strong emotions? The noble Lord, Lord Cameron, touched on it. It is because of how people view a community. A community has three aspects that people think are important. They think there should be a shop or post office, some place of worship—a church—and a pub. They do not necessarily want to use them a lot. They will go to the shop or the post office when they have forgotten to buy bread and milk at Tesco. They will not go to church very often. They will go at Christmas and Easter, if they are Christians. They may want to get married there, they may want to have their children christened there and to be buried there—hatches, matches and dispatches—but they will not go much apart from that. They will go to the pub occasionally, but not regularly. The reality is that if you do not use it, you lose it. Most of the pubs that are under pressure are not attracting sufficient custom to be a profitable operation, but because of what is in people’s view of a community, if any of those three pillars is going to close down, people will get exceptionally excited about it and believe that somehow, something must be done—hence the emergence of the ACV procedures.

The second reason people feel so strongly about it is the belief which CAMRA has assiduously fostered—I pay tribute to its campaigning capability because it has been the most enormously successful pressure group—that somewhere in this operation there is a pot of money, that someone is making a lot of money somewhere, and if only it got down to the pub and the pub owner all would be right and the pubs would be happy and we would be in the sunlit uplands once again. The reality is that the sector is under enormous economic and societal pressures. There is not a lot of money in the sector and the idea that somehow pub owners or brewers are making huge profits at the expense of landlords does not tie in with reality. The reality is very different. It is a sector under stupendous strain—and I shall give the Committee three or four quick reasons for that. First, there is exceptionally cheap supermarket alcohol. If noble Lords go to a supermarket on the weekend before a bank holiday weekend, when things are on offer, they can probably buy lager for 60p or 70p a pint. If they go to a pub, they will pay £3 for it. So a lot of people are increasingly buying alcohol in the supermarket and drinking it at home.

Transparency of Lobbying, Non-Party Campaigning and Trade Union Administration Bill

Lord Horam Excerpts

Tuesday 22nd October 2013 Lords Chamber

[Lord Horam (Con)]

My Lords, I rise to make my maiden speech in this House. First, I thank the staff of all departments of the House of Lords for their unfailing helpfulness and kindness over the past few days. Secondly, I thank all those Members who have welcomed me here in the Chamber and outside, including the noble Baroness, Lady Hayter of Kentish Town, and the noble and right reverend Lord, Lord Harries of Pentregarth. I was delighted to find from the remarks of the noble Baroness that I was mentioned positively 12 times in her book. I can think of no other book where I am mentioned 12 times positively. I must pop out to buy a copy and thumb quickly through the index—perhaps that was her intention all along. I also thank the noble and right reverend Lord, Lord Harries, for his kind remarks. It is good of him to think that after 31 years in the other place I am still capable of independent thought. That is a wonderful idea and I shall hold it to my breast.

The reason I have elected to make my maiden speech today is that Part 2 of the Bill places many additional tasks on the Electoral Commission, and for 18 months or so I have been one of the 10 electoral commissioners—although I should say immediately that today I am speaking for myself and not for the commission. The commission has sent out a very comprehensive and succinct brief to everybody, which I think noble Lords will possess.

The other commissioner in the Lords is my good friend, the noble Lord, Lord Kennedy of Southwark. There are four commissioners nominated by the political parties, as he and I are, and six without any background in politics. Obviously we are there for our splendid independence of judgment, as has just been mentioned by the noble and right reverend Lord, Lord Harries, but also because we probably know a few of the dodgy things that go on in politics. Of course, he and I are both saints in that respect, but no doubt we are aware of some things that are done by other parties in general elections and are there for that reason as well.

As I have discovered in my 18 months on the Electoral Commission, it is a well run organisation, with a dedicated staff, and I know that the Government will pay attention to what it is saying during the course of this Bill and the discussions around it. The Electoral Commission regulates all elections and referenda held in the UK. That covers the whole business of monitoring what parties do with funds: how they raise them and how they spend them within the compass of electoral law. It does not have anything to do with parliamentary boundaries or local authority boundaries, which many people think it does. It does not have anything to do with those issues and I think that it is rather glad about that. However, the UK is fortunate to have two such organisations as the Electoral Commission and the group of Boundary Commissions to monitor and regulate matters in this area.

If one looks across the Atlantic to where they have no such organisations, one sees absolute gerrymandering of seats, which produces the sort of extreme politicians who have led to such difficulties in Washington over the past few weeks, and the super-PACs, which distort politics in the USA. It is this final point which is addressed in Part 2 of the Bill. I agree with the noble and right reverend Lord, Lord Harries, that the UK is nothing like the United States. Obviously, that is so; the political climate is wholly different. But the fact is that spending in elections by third parties, whether they are single-issue campaigners, trade unions or voluntary organisations, has become an issue. Therefore, just as political parties are limited in what they can spend and how they can spend it, so should these other organisations be. This is the principle behind this Bill.

Nevertheless, as has been said on many occasions in this debate already, there is a balance to be struck. It is important not to damage civil society or freedom of speech. In my view, the original Bill cast its net too wide as regards Part 2. My noble friend Lord Lang of Monkton said it cast its net too narrowly in relation to Part 1, and the noble and right reverend Lord, Lord Harries, put forward an effective analogy about the trawler, which was rather interesting. Clearly we are swimming in rather deep waters here, and the Government are as well. None the less, the net was cast too wide in relation to Part 2. Sensibly, therefore, the Government have already recognised this and made some amendments in the other place. The definition of controlled expenditure, which was a matter of contention, is now back to what it was in the Political Parties, Elections and Referendums Act 2000, which has worked well in two general elections, as the noble Baroness, Lady Hayter, mentioned.

I remain concerned about Clause 27 and the lowering of the threshold for registration. This seems unnecessary. The big spenders—the Bill is about them—already register and are caught by the reduced cap and the wider scope of what is to be controlled, but why go so far down the route to seek to register groups that are spending £5,000 in England and £2,000 in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland? You do not get a lot of campaigning for £2,000 these days. These are the “little platoons” that Edmund Burke talked so evocatively about, and they must be treasured. It is in everybody’s interest that my noble friend the Minister looks at this again. If the Government went back some way, at least, towards the Act of 2000 in this respect, as they have with the definition, they would attract a great deal more support than they have at the moment. It would be a wise move. It would not detract from the central purpose of the Bill and would reassure many people who currently are unnecessarily worried.

I hope that the Bill becomes law, because it will improve our electoral arrangements—and they need improving. Only in the past 18 months, we have legislated for the first time in this country to have individual electoral registration, as opposed to household registration. We will remain way behind most other western countries in that respect until that comes into place—hopefully, if the work can be completed in time, for the next general election.

The noble Lord, Lord Tyler, has put out some interesting proposals in an all-party draft Bill on party funding—which, I remind the House, is an unresolved and difficult issue. Again, if I may skirt around an area of controversy without actually entering it, I hope that before too long I will see the day when every vote cast in a general election is of equal value.

That is what I wanted to say on this occasion. I look forward to contributing to other debates on these matters.