Greater Cambridge Development Corporation (Establishment) Order 2026

Lord Jamieson Excerpts

Wednesday 22nd July 2026 Lords Chamber

[Lord Jamieson (Con)]

My Lords, I make the House aware of my potential interest as a councillor in central Bedfordshire, which neighbours this area. I support my noble friend Lord Lansley in his amendment. I was going to say how important Cambridge is to the economy of the UK, but I think the noble Lord, Lord Smith of Finsbury, has done a far better job than I can. It is an absolute critical part if this country is going to be successful and have the growth that it desperately needs. However, Cambridge is hamstrung by a lack of housing, infrastructure and commercial space for biolabs, technology and so forth. You have a town of around 150,000 which every day, according to the 2021 census, has 55,000 commuters coming in—bearing in mind that that was during Covid, the actual number is probably far higher—largely by car.

The Government are right that Cambridge needs to grow. That is why I was pleased that the last Government progressed with east-west rail, the A14 dualling and the A428 Caxton Gibbet to the A1, but there is much more to do. Cambridge, as I said, needs more housing, lab space and commercial space. It also needs to work with other areas of the wider geography. It is not just the Ox-Cam arc; it is the golden triangle, spanning Oxford to Cambridge to London, which is a global powerhouse in technology and biotech among others. It encompasses the Minister’s Stevenage, and it has central Bedfordshire at its geographic heart.

A DCO can be a useful delivery mechanism, but it needs to be one built on local support, functional geography and democratic accountability. It must have clear outcome-based objectives, with resources and powers linked to those outcomes. The Minister mentioned the negative instrument which is to come that will outline those, but I feel that is very much the cart coming before the horse. If you are going to look at the organisation, you need first to know what it will do and what its powers are. Then there is the question of local government reorganisation, as the noble Baroness, Lady Pinnock, mentioned. We may set up a geography here only for it to change completely in a few months’ time.

The issue of geography is very important. Major projects and developments just outside the proposed area could have huge impact. Tempsford new town is potentially almost as large as Cambridge itself. Around junction 13 of the M1, we have the new town in Milton Keynes, we have a large data centre, we have Universal and we have the Marston Vale development, which will have a huge impact, particularly on east-west rail, the M1 and east-west corridor travel. Then we have things such as the A1 realignment. That needs somehow to fit all together as a package.

Several noble Lords talked about planning powers. Clearly we need to know what the geography is when we look at the planning powers. If you are going to have a much bigger strategic overview, you should not have detailed planning powers. If you are going to have detailed planning powers, that raises the question: why can it not just be based on a council-led DCO rather than a centralised national DCO, or even a mayoral DCO?

I talked about resources. We have heard about a lack of water and we have talked about a lack of electricity. I know from my experience that development in Biggleswade could not go ahead until we had additional power, and there is a constant refrain of a lack of water. What powers will this DCO have over things such as Great British Railways, Anglian Water, highways and the electrical and power companies, not to mention east-west rail? Will it have defined outcomes and targets? Will it have a clear division of responsibilities between the DCO organisation, the local councils and others? I want to be clear on this because the Minister talked about strategic sites, and we discussed this during the passage of the planning Bill. Is “strategic” above nine houses? Is it above 500 houses? What size of development is it? I think many people have a different view of what strategic is.

Many have mentioned democratic oversight. How does central planning in government centralised body fit with the new Prime Minister’s promotion of devolution? I believe the answer will be the creation of so-called structured forums for local residents, but what are the details? What will their statutory status be? How will members be selected? What powers will they possess? How will their views influence decision-making? How will Ministers be held accountable if those views are ignored? It is for these reasons that I support my noble friend Lord Lansley in his amendment and look forward to the Minister’s response.