Asked by: Holly Lynch (Labour - Halifax)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, on how many occasions he has used the powers in section 21(1)(a) of the Planning and Compulsory Purchase Act 2004 to direct development on individual sites.
Answered by Lord Sharma
The Secretary of State has never used his powers to intervene in the preparation of local plans under Section 21(1)(a) of the Planning and Compulsory Purchase Act 2004.
Asked by: Holly Lynch (Labour - Halifax)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, what support his Department has provided to people affected by recent flooding events.
Answered by Jake Berry
The Government provided communities and business grants, business rate relief and council tax discount recovery payments to help support the recovery of local areas in the face of the impacts of unprecedented rainfall as a result of Storm Desmond and Eva in 2015, but this was an exceptional case.
The Government has so far awarded £45.848 million of Communities and Business Recovery Scheme funding to local authorities affected by flooding as a result of Storms Desmond and Eva. To date, those authorities have awarded grants totalling £56,270,271 to eligible households and businesses. The Government will reimburse the difference in due course.
For events of the scale as seen recently, local areas are expected to provide support form within their own resources. The Government therefore has no plans to activate a wider cross government recovery programme.
Asked by: Holly Lynch (Labour - Halifax)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, whether his Department has plans to allocate additional funding from the public purse for the development of an assistance scheme to support people affected by recent flooding events.
Answered by Jake Berry
The Government provided communities and business grants, business rate relief and council tax discount recovery payments to help support the recovery of local areas in the face of the impacts of unprecedented rainfall as a result of Storm Desmond and Eva in 2015, but this was an exceptional case.
The Government has so far awarded £45.848 million of Communities and Business Recovery Scheme funding to local authorities affected by flooding as a result of Storms Desmond and Eva. To date, those authorities have awarded grants totalling £56,270,271 to eligible households and businesses. The Government will reimburse the difference in due course.
For events of the scale as seen recently, local areas are expected to provide support form within their own resources. The Government therefore has no plans to activate a wider cross government recovery programme.
Asked by: Holly Lynch (Labour - Halifax)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, what support his Department has provided to people affected by recent flooding events.
Answered by Jake Berry
The Government provided communities and business grants, business rate relief and council tax discount recovery payments to help support the recovery of local areas in the face of the impacts of unprecedented rainfall as a result of Storm Desmond and Eva in 2015, but this was an exceptional case.
The Government has so far awarded £45.848 million of Communities and Business Recovery Scheme funding to local authorities affected by flooding as a result of Storms Desmond and Eva. To date, those authorities have awarded grants totalling £56,270,271 to eligible households and businesses. The Government will reimburse the difference in due course.
For events of the scale as seen recently, local areas are expected to provide support form within their own resources. The Government therefore has no plans to activate a wider cross government recovery programme.
Asked by: Holly Lynch (Labour - Halifax)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, whether his Department has plans to allocate funding from the public purse for an assistance scheme to support people affected by flooding events.
Answered by Jake Berry
The Government provided communities and business grants, business rate relief and council tax discount recovery payments to help support the recovery of local areas in the face of the impacts of unprecedented rainfall as a result of Storm Desmond and Eva in 2015, but this was an exceptional case.
The Government has so far awarded £45.848 million of Communities and Business Recovery Scheme funding to local authorities affected by flooding as a result of Storms Desmond and Eva. To date, those authorities have awarded grants totalling £56,270,271 to eligible households and businesses. The Government will reimburse the difference in due course.
For events of the scale as seen recently, local areas are expected to provide support form within their own resources. The Government therefore has no plans to activate a wider cross government recovery programme.
Asked by: Holly Lynch (Labour - Halifax)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, what estimate his Department has made of the amount of funding that was (a) allocated and (b) paid out under the Communities and Business Recovery Scheme to people affected by flooding in 2015-16.
Answered by Jake Berry
The Government provided communities and business grants, business rate relief and council tax discount recovery payments to help support the recovery of local areas in the face of the impacts of unprecedented rainfall as a result of Storm Desmond and Eva in 2015, but this was an exceptional case.
The Government has so far awarded £45.848 million of Communities and Business Recovery Scheme funding to local authorities affected by flooding as a result of Storms Desmond and Eva. To date, those authorities have awarded grants totalling £56,270,271 to eligible households and businesses. The Government will reimburse the difference in due course.
For events of the scale as seen recently, local areas are expected to provide support form within their own resources. The Government therefore has no plans to activate a wider cross government recovery programme.
Asked by: Holly Lynch (Labour - Halifax)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, if he will make it his policy to allow applications for grants from the 2015 Communities and Business Recovery Scheme, for people effected by flooding.
Answered by Jake Berry
The Government provided communities and business grants, business rate relief and council tax discount recovery payments to help support the recovery of local areas in the face of the impacts of unprecedented rainfall as a result of Storm Desmond and Eva in 2015, but this was an exceptional case.
The Government has so far awarded £45.848 million of Communities and Business Recovery Scheme funding to local authorities affected by flooding as a result of Storms Desmond and Eva. To date, those authorities have awarded grants totalling £56,270,271 to eligible households and businesses. The Government will reimburse the difference in due course.
For events of the scale as seen recently, local areas are expected to provide support form within their own resources. The Government therefore has no plans to activate a wider cross government recovery programme.
Asked by: Holly Lynch (Labour - Halifax)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, whether he has the power to redraft the local plan for Calderdale council.
Answered by Lord Sharma
In his Written Statement of 16 November 2017 (HCWS254), the Secretary of State announced his intention to commence the formal intervention process with 15 local authorities who have not adopted a Local Plan since 2004, including Calderdale. These authorities have until 31 January 2018 to explain why they have failed to adopt a plan and what they will put in place to speed up plan production.
Asked by: Holly Lynch (Labour - Halifax)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, what his policy is on the use of greenbelt land in local plans when there are insufficient brownfield sites.
Answered by Lord Sharma
The National Planning Policy Framework encourages local authorities to prioritise re-use of suitable brownfield land for development, and to adopt Local Plan policies that support the take-up of brownfield. Moreover, each local authority is now legally required to publish a register of local brownfield land by 31 December 2017. These new registers will bring many more sites to the attention of house-builders and investors. However, brownfield sites differ, and not all will be available or in the right place for sustainable redevelopment. It is therefore for each local authority, in consultation with local people, to decide what land to allocate for development, as part of the Local Plan process.
The Framework sets out strong protections for Green Belt, stating that inappropriate development should be refused permission except in special circumstances. Green Belt boundary may be altered only in exceptional circumstances, using the Plan process. In the Housing White Paper, Fixing our broken housing market, we proposed that a local authority should be able to alter a Green Belt boundary only when it can show that it has examined all other reasonable options for meeting its development needs. Besides brownfield, the options included under-used land; optimising the density of development; and exploring whether other authorities could help. We will announce our conclusions as soon as possible in 2018.
A local authority can consider any suitable land, but should have regard to all relevant policies in the Framework. For instance, the Framework also asks local authorities to direct development away from the best and most versatile agricultural land, and to recognise the character and beauty of the countryside.
Asked by: Holly Lynch (Labour - Halifax)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, whether he plans to strengthen provisions in planning regulations to make the flood view of land clear, both upstream and downstream, when planning consent is provided to (a) developers and (b) all relevant parties for large-scale developments.
Answered by Lord Sharma
Flood risk is already an important consideration in the planning system and there are strict policy tests to protect people and property from flooding. The National Planning Policy Framework, underpinned by our planning practice guidance, sets out an approach of assessing, avoiding and managing flood risk from all sources. The Framework is clear that inappropriate development in areas at risk of flooding should be avoided by directing development away from areas at highest risk. Where development is necessary, it must be demonstrated that it will be safe without increasing flood risk elsewhere.
Where a developer is proposing a development in a flood risk area, or where the development is of one hectare or more, they will need to submit a site-specific flood risk assessment with their planning application. This should identify all flood risks both to and from a development, and demonstrate how these risks will be managed.
Information about the flood risk status of land is readily available in maps produced by the Environment Agency, which can be viewed at the following link: https://www.gov.uk/check-flood-risk