Localism Bill

Baroness Thornton Excerpts

Thursday 7th July 2011 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Thornton]

Does the noble Lord accept that these provisions are not primarily directed at post offices and pubs? They cover wasteland in cities, disused bank buildings, disused offices, railway arches, warehouses, mills and allotments. Might not the noble Lord be undermining his own case if he is trying to tell the House that this is just about pubs and post offices?

[Lord Cameron of Dillington]

I accept that there are other community assets. As I said, I think that the open-space community assets could be dealt with in other legislation. However, the provisions are ultimately about a change of use rather than the disposal of what is a community asset. I accept that I speak for rural communities, but I think that one of the main purposes of these clauses is to protect, alongside urban community assets, rural community assets such as the village shop and the village pub. In any case, I think that my comments here apply equally to urban properties.

I urge the Government to rethink this whole chapter. I look forward to hearing the views of others.

[Lord Reay]

My Lords, as this is the first time that I have spoken at the Committee stage of the Bill, I would like to declare my interest as a landlord and landowner.

I have put my name down to remove all the clauses in Chapter 4, so I would like to speak to all those clauses collectively, but in fact I would not want there to be nothing in the Bill on this subject. The Government have made too big a political commitment for that. Nevertheless, I have always understood that the original political interest and intention was to make sure that local communities are given a chance to intervene to try to keep going a village pub or post office or shop or public library that has been threatened with closure. Despite what the noble Baroness said, the intention goes slightly further but not much further than that. When Ministers talk about the proposals, those are the examples that they generally give—my noble friend the Minister did the same on Tuesday.

However, the Bill goes vastly wider than that. In the first place, everything would have to be listed, as the noble Lords, Lord Greaves and Lord Cameron of Dillington, have emphasised. The Government have completely glossed over the implications of that. As the noble Earl, Lord Lytton, explained on Tuesday, this would be an extremely time-consuming operation. Every local authority would have to take on someone to list all assets of community value. My noble friend Lord True, sitting beside me, on Tuesday said that he thought that his council would need two extra staff. A cheer must have gone up in the Guardian newspaper’s advertising department upon seeing this provision in the Bill.

Secondly, almost any sort of asset could, by a creative council employee, without even being mischievous, be considered to have community value. Any sort of business which employed people who lived in the locality could be argued to promote or improve the economic well-being of the local community. Any cherished landmark, any listed building—although not, as the Minister tells us, if it is a residence, as regulations will prevent that—and any popular view, even, could be argued to promote the environmental well-being of the local community.

Thirdly, I should like to ask the Minister about the degree to which the provision is limited to assets of which the community has already enjoyed the use. Could a piece of ground that in someone's eyes might make a nice football pitch, cricketing pitch or playground be listed? Could it not be argued that the prospect of enjoying the use of a certain building or piece of land had contributed to the well-being of a local community?

Fourthly, the point of sale—here, I take up the point emphasised by the noble Lord, Lord Cameron of Dillington—is not the point at which local interest and local involvement should be triggered; it should be change of use or the threat of change of use. A pub can change hands and still remain a pub, but if an owner wants to redevelop it, then the community should have the right to bid. Change of use should trigger the right to bid—ditto with post offices and village shops. Could not this be done in a way that tied in with existing planning powers?

As it is, we have a snooper’s charter which could lend itself to all sorts of inventive arguments and practices, and which would surely result in landlords and landowners who have willingly made facilities available in the past less likely to do so in future for fear of having such a restriction placed on their property. They would want to avoid a situation where, whenever they might want to sell or transfer their property, this blocking mechanism could arise to impede and, in practice, prevent the transaction. On Tuesday my noble friend Lord Moynihan explained in detail how this could have massive adverse consequences for the provision of land and buildings for recreational and sporting use by private landlords in private agreements with local communities throughout the country.

Many amendments have been put down that deal with one or other part of the objections which I have mentioned, but none deals with all of them. I liked the amendment proposed on Tuesday by the noble Lords, Lord Greaves and Lord Tope, which would have required assets to be businesses. Unfortunately, when she wound up the debate, my noble friend the Minister said that she did not like the amendment and wanted to include more than just businesses. I am not sure what specific assets she had in mind but the examples that she and her colleagues tend to give are of businesses.

I also liked the amendment of my noble friend Lord Jenkin of Roding, which would have required that land to be listed needed the consent of the owner. Again, my noble friend the Minister did not like that; she said that no private owners would sign up. That in itself is a bit of a giveaway. She and her officials know that they are imposing on landowners something that they will not like.

Unless landowners see a way of providing facilities of whatever sort on their land to local communities without incurring the risk of the land or building being listed as of community value, with all the nuisance that that could bring, I foresee that supply drying up. That would be a huge tragedy. It would be a great folly, if the outcome were likely to be so counterproductive, to allow the Bill to be enacted with this part of it unamended.

Ministers have so far not come up with anything that remotely measures up to the numerous and serious objections to this part of the Bill. However, they have certainly listened to us, and I hope that something can be achieved during the Recess if not before. Meanwhile, I shall follow carefully other amendments which we are about to come to. I certainly liked what I hope may be an amendment that the noble Lord, Lord Cameron of Dillington, mentioned towards the end of his remarks.

[Baroness Thornton]

My Lords, we need to recognise this for what it is—a full-frontal attack on this part of the Bill. I am sure that I do not need to say that to the Minister.

I need to amplify the remarks that I made to the noble Lord, Lord Cameron of Dillington. I am an urban person—I live in Bradford and in London—and I have been involved in community activities, projects and the acquisition of land and property for community benefit in both places. For example, my title is Baroness Thornton of Manningham. I am the patron of the community centre in Manningham Mills—the wool mill in Manningham which was acquired as part of an arrangement to provide a community centre in a very deprived urban area. That is what we are talking about. It was acquired through the imagination and drive of local community organisations and is replicated in thousands of initiatives, both rural and urban, across the country.

[Lord Jenkin of Roding]

What more does the noble Baroness think this part of the Bill will give to what already existed for the acquisition which she has just referred to? She and her group seem to have been very successful in acquiring it; why do they need all this bureaucracy?

[Baroness Thornton]

If I can continue with my remarks I think there will be some agreement across the House. We would all prefer the Secretary of State to have a smaller role in these matters. I agree with the noble Lord, Lord Cameron, that this is a convoluted part of the Bill which may need simplification and to give more reassurance. However, it does not need to be deleted completely. The Government are on the right lines.

In answer to the noble Lord’s question, I would be happy to list for the noble Lord, although perhaps not right now, a host of initiatives that have fallen by the wayside, either because the powers or the time did not exist for community organisations to raise the money—this applies also in rural locations—to enable them to use the asset in question for community benefit. That is what this part of the Bill is about, and I believe that the Government are on the right lines.

During the Second Reading debate I said to the Minister that we needed to discuss this part of the Bill. I have yet to be involved—as have any of my Front-Bench colleagues—in any discussions on this part of the Bill, but we hold ourselves ready. On Tuesday evening several remarks were made about the discussions taking place but, so far, those discussions do not involve us. I hope that that will change. I also hope that organisations that are expert in these issues—the Plunkett Foundation, Locality—will also be involved in those discussions. I am sure and confident that this House can resolve this situation satisfactorily.

[Earl Cathcart]

My Lords, I was in two minds whether to speak on this but I have something here that I prepared earlier.

The whole chapter has been so badly thought through that, as written, it will do more harm than good. I have two points to make. First, we must not forget that the original aim was to allow communities to save their village shops, pubs and post offices from closure. That is an admirable aim, but no mention is made of businesses and services in the Bill. Why not? Why is the wording so broad? I suppose it was thought that there may be other assets of benefit to communities, and so the scattergun approach was adopted. The great danger of using a scattergun is that one often misses the target—and that is exactly what has happened here.

The Bill needs to be drafted so that it hits the nail on the head. As it is currently written, any person, parish or community group can nominate any asset they deem to be of value to the community. As has been said before, this has put the cat amongst the pigeons. Landowners who for purely altruistic reasons have allowed their communities to use part or all of their land for sport and recreational activities are now reconsidering their positions. On Tuesday, my noble friend the Minister said:

“The fact that my noble friend Lord Moynihan spoke about the loss of sports and recreation facilities if this goes ahead, and that other noble Lords commented on the fact that landowners will be advised not to let their land be used for any community facility, is something of which we need to take cognizance. If that is what is being said, and if that is a fear … We need to take note of that”.—[Official Report, 5/7/11; col. 243.]

I assure my noble friend that I know of national firms of land agents that have already advised their clients of the consequences of this Bill as it is currently written. I was talking to my agent the other day, and at the end of the business he asked me what I was up to. When I said that I was involved in the Localism Bill, he said, “Oh, we are watching the progress in the Lords very carefully and we will advise our clients during the summer”. So warnings and advice have already been given to landowners.

--- Later in debate ---

I know that Governments are reluctant to put lists on the face of a Bill, so why not put “businesses and services” in the Bill, as was suggested in Amendment 133D and echoed today by my noble friend Lord Reay? As it is, we have been given the right of appeal, compensation schemes and a whole list of exemptions—inheritance, gifts, transfers between family members, between partners in the same firm, and between trustees of a single trust and homes—all to allay the fears of landowners, who are just doing things for altruistic reasons. I have no doubt that many more exemptions will be given before the Bill is through. It is all getting far too complicated. If my noble friend wants to keep it simple, for goodness’ sake put shops, pubs, post offices and/or businesses and services on the face of the Bill, and then all these bones of contention will disappear overnight. I concede that there may be the odd asset missed off the wish list, but there is no reason why a community group cannot bid for that asset if it comes up for sale, just as any other purchaser does at present.

[Baroness Thornton]

I am bound to ask, what about railway sidings, for example? What about waste land in cities? What about all those places that people want to have access to and cannot? I beg noble Lords to stop thinking about this just in terms of pubs and post offices.

[Earl Cathcart]

The noble Baroness raises a good point—what about them, indeed? If communities do not use them at the moment, they do not form part of this Bill. It is the very question that my noble friend Lord Reay has just raised.

My second point is that the Government seem hell-bent on the trigger point being when an asset is disposed of or sold. Like the noble Lord, Lord Cameron, I do not think that the selling of an asset of community value hits the spot at all. Hundreds of shops and pubs are sold every week up and down the country, with no loss to communities, as the purchasers are another shopkeeper or publican. So the business continues with no loss to the community. The real trigger point is when the facilities are closed down subject to an application for change of use or a demolition order. So I ask my noble friend to listen sympathetically to my noble friend Lord Hodgson of Astley Abbotts when he speaks to his Amendment 144.

To illustrate the point, there is great concern over the loss of so many school sports fields to development over the past 20 or 30 years. I do not believe that the measures in this Bill would do anything to stop this in future. The Minister might say, “But they can be listed as assets of community value”. And so they can. But the local authority can give itself planning permission for development without a sale of the land taking place and without triggering the right to bid provisions. The local authority can receive a shed load of money from the developers and retain ownership of the land for a nominal annual ground rent. The land has not been disposed of or sold, but the playing field has been irretrievably lost. Surely there should be an obligation on local authorities to supply alternative sports facilities.

I know that my noble friend is well aware of the shortcomings of this part of the Bill and is as keen as any of your Lordships to get it right. She recognises that the most valuable asset is the current good will and genuine community well-being that already exists.