Planning and Infrastructure Bill

Baroness Pinnock Excerpts

2nd reading
Wednesday 25th June 2025 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Pinnock (LD)]

My Lords, I am speaker number 60, and this has been a long and wide-ranging debate. I thank all noble Lords who have raised important and pertinent issues for the House to address at the next stage. Some have been new issues, and I look forward to hearing about mediation processes within the planning system. I particularly thank my 10 Liberal Democrat colleagues for their contributions, which have been, as noble Lords have heard, both supportive and challenging in equal measure. Many of us have benefited from the professional groups, charities and individuals who have provided helpful information on which we could base our debate today. I remind the House that I have a relevant interest as a councillor on Kirklees Council in West Yorkshire.

This is a very significant Bill for our nation. It has the potential to fundamentally change the foundation of the Town and Country Planning Act 1947, which established the principle that planning permission is required for land development. It separated land ownership from the automatic right to develop it. Enshrined in that Act is local democratic decision-making, on both what land can be developed and how it can be developed. This democratic principle has gradually and properly expanded over the years to include and involve in the process those affected by potential development.

In the era of instant and easy communication of both factual and inaccurate information, the principle of local communities having their say and elected representatives making the decisions is ever more important. Ensuring the involvement of communities is vital in both hearing local information about a site and demonstrating that those directly affected are important in the process. The erosion of the local democratic process, as proposed in the Bill, is not acceptable and will not lead to swifter planning decisions, as many noble Lords from across the House have referenced. A better balance must be found between the needs of development and of local communities and their elected representatives.

Major infrastructure projects are, as we have heard, beset with delays and eye-watering cost rises—HS2 is just one of the examples that has been referred to in our debate—and change is necessary. Reducing the time taken to reach a decision is critical. Removing the pre-application stage, however, is a false economy, as it is at that stage that interested parties are alerted to the scheme and can have input, which helps the applicant make amendments in response. As there will be increasing numbers of nationally significant infrastructure projects, it is vital that communities are informed and engaged at an early stage, both in the detail of the application and in its prime purpose for the nation. Communities must feel that they can have their say if resentment at change is not to thrive.

Turning to the more specific planning process changes, spatial development strategies will do much to inform economic development, infrastructure investment and local strategies in a mayoral authority. I too remember, and was part of helping to develop, the previous regional development strategies 20-odd years ago. However, any such strategy must have the support of communities and their local elected representatives if it is not to be constantly challenged. The new clauses introduced into the Bill when it was taken through the Commons throw some light on how this will be achieved. What is not clear is whether all constituent authorities will have a place on a joint board and what decision-making powers the board jointly and severally has in relation to the mayor. Perhaps the Minister can provide some details on the membership and powers of the joint boards. She will have thousands of questions to answer when she sums up, so maybe a note would suffice.

On the proposed changes to the local planning system, the starting point for these discussions must be the knowledge that the local authority planning procedures vary greatly according to the type and size of council. Differences reflect the communities that are served, and a one-size approach to local planning definitely does not fit all.

Like other noble Lords who have spoken, I agree with mandatory training for members of local planning committees. I introduced it when I was leader of Kirklees 20 years ago. Members of planning committees then understand the constraints of planning and highways legislation; it is important and it helps the debate on any planning applications to focus on planning issues.

The number of members of a planning committee is also important. Limiting the membership must go alongside the rights of ward councillors to speak to the committee on a pertinent application. That is their elected duty and responsibility. Equally, as other noble Lords have said, local councils should have the right to choose the size of their planning committee so that it suits their local needs. Imposing top-down schemes of national delegation is not the way forward. There is no evidence that planning committees are the blockers—a contemptible accusation. Some 80% of planning applications are already approved, one way or another; some 90% are already delegated to officers’ decision-making. Of those referred to the Planning Inspectorate by developers, less than 3% are overturned on appeal. The planning system works—it just needs more investment.

The real blockers to housing development are the major housebuilders which acquire planning consent and then wait for an upturn in the market or even play the system with constant applications to alter aspects of the original planning permission. The evidence is clear. The Government could easily reach their target of 1.5 million new homes in this Parliament if the 1.2 million currently with planning permission were built. Reform of this part of the process is desperately needed. That is what needs to change.

There are families in every community who are desperate for a home at a social rent. The scandal of the Bill is that this need is not specifically addressed, nor is the urgent need to provide a definition of so-called affordable housing.

Part 3 of the Bill has attracted a very large number of comments and challenges from across the House, and rightly so. The proposal for a nature restoration fund reads like a developers’ charter. It enables developers to disregard the impact on and destruction of nature as a result of their development and salve their consciences by contributing to the fund. That will not do. Developers must be cognisant of the effect of their construction on habitats. The Bill could well result in some localities having their local habitats and green spaces destroyed, and the recompense is miles away. That is no good for them or for the biodiversity of the area. Fundamental changes to this part of the Bill are essential, and no doubt will be proposed.

Finally, the direction of travel envisaged in the Bill is one that we on these Benches support. However, the Bill has absolutely failed in finding the right balance between the competing ambitions of infrastructure provision, housebuilding and economic development on the one hand and community involvement, democratic decision-making and nature protection and enhancement on the other. We on these Benches will do all we can to work with the Government, where this is possible, to tip the scales in support of democracy, nature and communities.