English Devolution and Community Empowerment Bill

Debate between Lord Lucas and Earl of Clancarty

Committee stage
Wednesday 11th February 2026 Grand Committee

[Lord Lucas (Con)]

My Lords, Amendment 222A just picks up the Government on the disappearance of the funds that the last Government made available to support the community right to buy. I very much hope that the Government will in time reverse that decision, because it made a huge difference to the effectiveness of this provision. It was not that the Government paid the whole of it, but it made the base from which the community could raise the money, particularly if the community was not one of the richest in the world. It was a really important initiative and an important part of what to my mind is a really important clause underpinning the relationship between the community and the space that it occupies. I very much hope that in time the Government will come back to the position as we used to have it. I have seen it do an awful lot of good.

I will also speak to Amendments 235 and 235ZA in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Hoey, because she is unable to be here. First, Amendment 235 essentially says that the planning uplift should be ignored. That is a really important part of the relationship here. If you do not ignore the value uplift that comes with hope value, you make it absolutely impossible for the community to purchase the land. A charity, beyond anything else, is not allowed to buy land above its value, and the value to the charity is the land without hope, so that closes off a substantial route for buying assets of community value.

Secondly, the hope value belongs to the community. It is not something that is generated by the owner; it is something that is generated by the community, which might wish to give at some future time permission to do something else on that land. It is not appropriate that that should be appropriated by the owner. We need the value at which these transactions are done to be the value without hope value.

Thirdly, we need to do something to make it possible to deal with sporting fields. I am sure that the noble Baroness is aware of the trials that Udney Park has dealt with over the last 10 years, with a succession of developers blocking the continued use of that space as a sporting facility and its transfer into community ownership. It would be really helpful under those circumstances if it was possible for the local authority to intervene and use its compulsory acquisition powers to ensure transfer. I beg to move.

[The Earl of Clancarty (CB)]

My Lords, I have a number of amendments in this group relating to assets of cultural value and I am grateful for the support of my noble friend Lord Freyberg.

Between them, the amendments do just two things. First, Amendment 233 tells us more precisely what cultural interests are by giving specific examples of assets such as music venues, theatres, rehearsal spaces and so on. I take on board the concerns that the noble Lord, Lord Jamieson, expressed in the previous debate, about the use of “culture” or “cultural”, and indeed the phrase “cultural interest” could on the face of it mean a number of different things. I suggest that there are three ways of addressing this. You can strictly define the term; you can use associated words to help lock down the meaning of the term, such as in the phrase “arts, culture and heritage”; or you can give specific examples, which is what I have done here.