Building Safety

Tim Farron Excerpts

Tuesday 29th June 2021 Commons Chamber

[Tim Farron (Westmorland and Lonsdale) (LD)]

The deadline for applications to the building safety fund is tomorrow, but it is very clear to me and to many other people I have been speaking to—people who are leaseholders in affected properties—that there is a lack of information about the scheme and the deadline. Surely we should therefore be asking the Minister to look at flexibility regarding applications for those people who may be eligible but are not aware that they are.

The crucial issue is that the building safety fund has had £5.1 billion committed to it, but we recognise that the cost of making safe all the buildings that are unsafe because of their cladding is in the region of £15 billion. Of course, that means that nobody in a building smaller than 11 metres would get any support whatever. I point out that nobody in my constituency lives in any building as high as 11 metres, and that is also the case in many much more urban areas than mine. But when we think that there may be up to 1 million people living in affected properties and that a few tens of thousands may get something out of that scheme, we realise that this is surely a despicable state of affairs.

Leaseholders who have done what Governments of different colours, but especially of the blue colour, have encouraged them to do over the last few decades—become homeowners and specifically those homeowners—find themselves stuck in unsafe homes that they cannot afford to make safe, and which they have no chance of selling because of that. They are utterly stuck and, in many cases, as good as ruined. There has been lots of talk about whether things might get better through the Building Safety Bill, and there have been lots of hopeful remarks from colleagues, particularly those on the Government Benches, but do they realise the impact that waiting for any news, good or bad, is having on people in that situation—people who are stuck and cannot move, people facing ruin, people afraid that the place they live in is unsafe and unsaleable?

The Government could agree to the principle of the matter today by agreeing to underwrite the cost of making safe all those buildings and ensuring that those leaseholders are not punished for something that was not their fault, particularly given that we know whose fault it was. In the first instance, the fault lies with the developers that built unsafe properties and Governments of all colours who neglected to ensure that the regulations were good enough in the first place and that they were kept to. Governments of various colours neglected the people and did not stand up for their safety, so it is right that the Government should underwrite the cost of dealing with the cladding scandal and recoup the money from the developers thereafter.

I want to refer to another matter relating to building safety that is of enormous and growing importance in my constituency in particular—the issue of Airbnb. I do not want to denigrate that whole model, the company or the people who make use of it, but it is clear that the standards that apply to people who use their homes for Airbnb are not the same as those that apply to people who are offering a holiday let. As I said last week—this is so important that I will keep repeating it until the Government do something about it—there has been a 32% increase in the number of holiday lets in the Lake district over the past few months. As hon. Members can imagine, my constituency was pretty full of them to start with. Perhaps 80% of all houses bought in my community during the pandemic have gone into the second-home market, so there is an issue with the safety of houses and properties. We must ensure that those that easily get into the letting market are held to the same level of safety as those that were historically within it.

The Government need to get a grip of this growing crisis, because it is about not just the safety of the houses but the sustainability of communities. Villages and towns throughout Cumbria are becoming ghost towns. People who were paying an affordable private rent of £600 or £700 a month are being turfed out of their flats in Grange-over-Sands, Ambleside, Kendal or Sedbergh, which then go on the market for £1,000 a week. I referred to it last week as the lakeland clearances: the clearing out of our communities, because there are ways of making more money from them, rather than having a resident population.

I ask the Minister to take note of what I have said about the building safety fund. His Government must take immediate action to change planning use for rental and second-home properties. They should become a separate category of planning use so that local authorities and national parks can do something to save their communities before it is too late.

Planning Decisions: Local Involvement

Tim Farron Excerpts

Monday 21st June 2021 Commons Chamber

[Tim Farron (Westmorland and Lonsdale) (LD)]

Probably the most bogus claim made for the Government’s planning reforms is that they will lead to more homes. Exactly the opposite is true. Their reforms will incentivise the building of fewer, unaffordable, expensive properties rather than the more affordable homes we want. That was the message I heard when I was knocking on doors in Chesham and Amersham and in my communities in Cumbria over the past few days.

[James Cartlidge]

To be clear, is it the hon. Gentleman’s view that the Government should build more homes?

[Tim Farron]

Yes, and the Government’s plan is to do exactly the opposite. Their plan is to allow developers to build a smaller number of executive homes that we do not need, rather than the larger number of affordable homes that we do need. That is against the will and wishes of many people who live in communities around London, in Cumbria and elsewhere in the country. Today, my hon. Friend the Member for Chesham and Amersham (Sarah Green), my Liberal Democrat colleagues and I will—along with, clearly, many on the Opposition Benches—vote with the courage of our convictions to defend our communities, and we will vote for more affordable housing. My challenge to Conservative Members is: “Do you care for your communities? Are you listening to yours? If so, you should have the courage of your convictions and vote with us in the Lobby tonight.”

Let me say more about the planning reforms. It is about not just what is wrong with them but what is not in them. Yes, they will lead to fewer affordable homes and cut local communities out of the planning process—it is an insult to the electorate not to listen to them and allow them to have their say—but the reforms are also a colossal missed opportunity.

Let me share with the House something that is and has been happening in my community during the pandemic. Over many years in places such as the lakes and the Yorkshire dales, there has been a steady erosion of local affordable homes for our communities. We see our communities become ghost towns as a large number and growing proportion of homes in those communities become second homes and holiday lets, leaving us without a vibrant permanent population.

As any geologist will tell us, erosion can take aeons and aeons, and then sometimes a whole cliff will fall into the sea in one go. That is what has happened in the past 15 months: there has been a 32% increase in the number of holiday lets in the Lake district. Up to 80% of all houses sold in Cumbria during the pandemic went into the second-home market. Those are the figures. The anecdotal, person-by-person reality includes the woman I spoke to recently in Ambleside who pays £700 a month for her small flat in Ambleside but has been kicked out so that her landlord can charge £1,000 a week on Airbnb. That is what is happening: a kind of lakeland clearances whereby people are being moved out of Cumbria because people can make more money without there being a local resident population.

I plead with the Government and the Secretary of State; it is great to see him in his place now: when drastic things such as a pandemic happen out of the blue, drastic action needs to happen, and it needs to happen right now, this side of the summer. I suggest that the Secretary of State amends planning law to make holiday lets and second homes separate categories of planning use, so that local authorities and national parks can say, “Enough is enough: if we do not make changes, Ambleside’s community is potentially dying out, and Kirkby Lonsdale’s, Windermere’s and even Kendal’s will, too.”

I am determined that our communities should move out of this pandemic stronger and more vibrant. They should not find a situation in which there just is not a local community anymore. Rather than introducing planning reforms that undermine local communities, the Secretary of State has the opportunity to change planning law to protect them, to stop these lakeland clearances and to make our communities last well into the future.

Affordable and Safe Housing for All

Tim Farron Excerpts

Tuesday 18th May 2021 Commons Chamber

[Robert Jenrick]

I will come to that point in a moment, if I may, because the good news is that the planning reform Bill does that as well. We are not divided on this issue; we are united. We want a better planning system, and we want planning applications that are granted to be built out as quickly as possible. The Bill will achieve both of those objectives.

But again, just as no reasonable person could contest the fact that we need to build more homes, no reasonable person could argue that we are going to achieve those aspirations through the demand-side interventions that this Government have been pursuing alone. However significant those are—even though we have now given the keys to the 300,000th property purchased under Help to Buy—and however beneficial those schemes are to people across the country, we also need to tackle the supply side of this challenge, and we are doing that.

Last year alone, more homes were delivered—244,000—than in any year in my lifetime. Were it not for the pandemic, more would have been delivered than at any time since Harold Macmillan stood at this Dispatch Box as Housing Secretary. To put these numbers into perspective, under the last Labour Government, in one year work began on just 95,000 homes—the lowest peacetime level since the 1920s. Behind these numbers and targets, the millions of ordinary working people trying to achieve their dream of getting on the property ladder are being frustrated.

[Tim Farron (Westmorland and Lonsdale) (LD)]

The Secretary of State cites some interesting statistics, and I will cite one back at him. In the last 12 months, 80% of house sales in Cumbria have been to the second home market—for people who already have a house and are therefore depriving, in numbers, the communities they bought a home in of a full-time resident population. Does he understand the damage that does to communities such as the lakes and the dales, and what will he do to make sure the houses he builds actually end up in the hands of people who will live in them?

[Robert Jenrick]

I would say two things to the hon Gentleman, who makes an important point. First, my right hon Friend the Chancellor and his predecessors have brought forward tax changes so that there are further costs involved in purchasing second homes or for international buyers to enter the market. That money of course helps to fund our affordable homes programme. Secondly, I hope he will become an enthusiastic advocate of First homes, because not merely does it provide homes for first-time buyers and key workers, but it does so for people in their local area. So his constituents will be able to benefit from those homes, and then they will be locked for perpetuity to first-time buyers and key workers from his area. If he wishes to work with me on that, I would be delighted to ensure that some are brought forward as quickly as possible in his constituency.

--- Later in debate ---

[Tim Farron (Westmorland and Lonsdale) (LD)]

On the planning Bill, the Secretary of State, and the Government, could have listened to those concerned about high land values. He could have tackled the Land Compensation Act 1961 to bring down unrealistically high land values and to make more land available for developing more affordable homes. He could have listened to those who had called for councils to be given the power to do what Macmillan did in the 1950s and to build directly within communities with the support of communities. He could have listened to those observing the situation with the already parlous state of the construction workforce, noting that the Government’s immigration changes have now reduced that workforce by a further 9%.

The Secretary of State could have listened to all those sensible voices. Instead he listened to the voices of a few people saying that all we need to build more homes is to have permissive planning legislation. That is bogus because, as we have heard from other hon. and right hon. Members, nine out of 10 planning permission applications are granted and over 1 million planning permissions were given over the past 10 years and not delivered.

[Jim Shannon]

When it comes to the issue of land that has been banked for development, some 1 million homes are set aside for that purpose. Does the hon. Gentleman feel that there should be a timescale on when that land can be dealt with? Does he also feel that, within the land banked development plan, there should be provision for social housing for people who cannot afford housing by going for a mortgage?

[Tim Farron]

I agree with all those points. It is vitally important that land that can be used for housing is made available for affordable housing—for homes for local people that they can afford.

It is worth bearing in mind that there are other problems in the planning system. In my part of the world, south Cumbria, we have three planning authorities—the district council, the Yorkshire Dales national park and the Lake District national park. One problem there is not the overweening power of the planners, but the overweening power of developers to be able to run rings around the community. The viability assessment, for example, allows a developer to get planning permission for developing, let us say, 30 or 40 houses and then, having agreed to build a dozen or so affordable homes, to tell the planners, and indeed the local community, “We’ve changed our mind; we’ve found a few rocks, so we won’t go ahead as we had promised.” The planners’ lack of power to ensure developers do what the community wants them to do undermines local democracy and undermines the ability to deliver affordable homes to local communities.

One hugely worrying aspect of the Government’s proposals is that developers will be able to build up to 50 homes without any affordable homes among them whatsoever, which will be massively ruinous to a community such as mine where the majority of developments are smaller than 50 houses and where the average wage is less than a 12th of the average house price. I heard the Secretary of State’s offer earlier about first homes and I will take him up on his offer. In the South Lakes we will offer to be a pilot for first homes, on the understanding that it is not a replacement for the existing provision for affordable homes through the planning system. I am all ears because we need to do everything we can to ensure there are local homes for local people.

I mentioned in an intervention a desperately worrying thing. People talk about an increased number of homes being available, but in the past 12 months we have seen a reduction in the number of homes available for local people in south Cumbria, and other parts of the country as well, as second home ownership has rocketed, in part fuelled by the Government failing to think through the impact of the stamp duty holiday. Eighty per cent. of homes purchased in Cumbria in the last 12 months have gone into the second home market. They are not lived in. What does that mean for the local community? It means we are robbing that community of a permanent population.

People can talk about levelling up, but it does not look like levelling up to me when we see a school closing because there are not enough permanent homes locally to send children to that school. Levelling up does not mean very much to us in Cumbria if there is no demand for the bus service, so the old person who wants to attend a GP appointment 10 miles away cannot physically get there; and the post office shuts down because there are not enough homes in the village to sustain the post office all year round. That does not look like levelling up; that looks like the Government deciding to ignore the plight of rural Britain, including my part of Cumbria.

Therefore, I urge the Secretary of State to look at my early-day motion, which has the backing of the Lake District national park and the Yorkshire Dales national park, calling for councils in England to be given the same powers they have in Wales to increase council tax on second homes, but also to intervene to change planning law to protect first homes in communities such as mine, so those places do not become ghost towns. It is deeply troubling that there is nothing in the Queen’s Speech that allows us to tackle the explosion of second home ownership, which is undermining community in places such as mine.

I want to say a few words about the Building Safety Bill. That is an opportunity for those of us who care about those who are the victims of the staggering unfairness of the cladding scandal to seek to address it, but it would be even better if the Government were to do a U-turn now and decide not to lay at the door of those people who are blameless the price incurred by those who are guilty of recklessness and lethal decisions in both the development side and the Government regulation side of the development of properties over years. It is outrageous that we are apparently about to penalise the innocent for the failures of the guilty.

We must protect our environment, create a planning system that listens to local people and protects our landscape, and make sure that we have homes that are available and affordable for local people, so that our communities in the likes of the lakes and the dales remain sustainable. My great fear is that the Secretary of State’s plans are all about listening to the people with the power and ignoring communities such as ours, which are in desperate need of support.

[Several hon. Members rose—]

Fire Safety Bill

Tim Farron Excerpts

Wednesday 28th April 2021 Commons Chamber

[Dr Liam Fox (North Somerset) (Con)]

Again, we all want the same thing. We want the protection of leaseholders from bills that they cannot afford and should not have been given; we want the protection of taxpayers from a burden that they should not have to carry; and we want the application of the “polluter pays” principle, so that the developers, insurers and builders who are responsible for the problems in the first place are the ones who have to pay the costs of remediation. All of that has become perfectly clear during our various debates on the matter.

I welcome what my hon. Friend the Member for Southampton, Itchen (Royston Smith) said yesterday and today about establishing a study on the ground—similar, in some ways, to that which the right hon. Member for Leeds Central (Hilary Benn) just mentioned—that would make it possible to talk to real people about real bills, and about why the huge sum of taxpayers’ money that has been set aside is not getting through to them. What rate-limiting steps, and what problems with bureaucracy and the timescales that have been set, make it impossible for that money to get to the people who need it? I very much welcome that idea. I hope that the timescale will be short and the Minister will be able to share the lessons learned with all Members.

Today, the Minister has edged us towards the necessary compromise. If we are willing to make it clear in the Queen’s Speech that leasehold reform will deal with forfeiture, that will remove one of the biggest fears. As the Father of the House said, what about the potential for forfeiture to occur during the time before the passing of that legislation? That does need to be dealt with. If I may say so, my hon. Friend the Minister was clearer about that today than he was yesterday, and that is hugely to be welcomed. I have always thought that the idea that we could not say what would be in the Queen’s Speech sat a bit oddly with the fact that we can read what will be in the Budget three days before it actually happens.

I also welcome what my hon. Friend the Minister said about the scope of the Building Safety Bill and the ability to set out in it the concept of apportionment, which will be a major element. I hope that if we can take these concepts forward in the other place, we might reach a solution to this problem. It seems to me that the building blocks of a solution are there.

As my hon. Friend and Members from all parts of the House have said, we all want certainty, so that lenders can lend, property values can stabilise and homeowners—the very people my party wants to encourage—can sleep soundly in their beds once again, as they have a right to do.

[Tim Farron (Westmorland and Lonsdale) (LD)]

I, too, rise to support the Lords amendment. The amendment is simple; it protects leaseholders and prevents them from being charged crippling, life-changingly colossal bills to make safe properties that are unsafe only because of the actions of developers and a lack of Government regulation.

Here we are: the Government have played to the final whistle, and they are down by the corner flag keeping ball and feigning cramp in the hope that the final whistle will go and we will all move on. Let me be clear. I assure the Minister—and, more importantly, I encourage anxious and distressed leaseholders—that we will not give up. We will not troop off the field, not to play again, once the 90 minutes are up. We will come back next Session and fight the corner of leaseholders who currently face bills that they can never, ever hope to be able to afford, and that are not theirs to pay in the first place.

As has been mentioned, the Government’s stance on this issue sets out starkly whose side they are on. They are on the side of the wealthy developers, some of whom fund their party. They are on the side of negligent officials who allowed this to happen. They are not on the side of those who are working hard to afford a roof above their heads. This is a Britain, it would appear, where innocent householders have to pay to remove dangerous cladding while somebody else pays for the Prime Minister’s new curtains. We believe in a better Britain where there is justice, not crushing, undeserved debt. If we do not win today, then, for the sake of leaseholders across this country, we will be back.

[Bob Blackman (Harrow East) (Con) [V]]

So, here we are again debating the Fire Safety Bill and the Lords amendments to it. The key issue here is not whether we enshrine in law the requirements on fire safety but who ends up paying for them. The reality is, as the Father of the House mentioned, that the £5.1 billion offered by the Government thus far will be insufficient to cover the remediation and fire safety costs identified not only in tall buildings but in lower buildings as well. The key issue, then, is that it is going to take some five years for the work to be carried out, and that leaseholders are receiving bills now of £50,000 or more in order for the work to be carried out. They can ill afford it.

The Government are committed to producing the Building Safety Bill, but we know that it will be announced in the Queen’s Speech and that it will probably take 18 months to two years before it is live and operational. Leaseholders do not have the luxury of that time. They are being charged the money right now. We still do not know the details of the forced loan scheme that the Government are offering for leaseholders in buildings below six storeys. We have been asking to scrutinise it, so we can see whether it is fit for purpose or whether it will even work.

I have had the honour and privilege of serving on the Housing, Communities and Local Government Committee for the past 11 years. We are publishing a report on cladding and the other issues tomorrow. Obviously I am not allowed to pre-disclose the details, but it is fair to say that we are critical of the way in which the Government are approaching this necessary means. I urge the Minister for Housing, who is a good friend for whom I have every respect, to let us have some commitments from the Front Bench in his answer to this debate, and to tell us what he will do to ensure that leaseholders are prevented from having to bear these unnecessary and unacceptable costs. Let us also have some commitments on when we will see the proposed forced loan scheme. Let us have some commitments on when we can expect to see the Building Safety Bill brought into operation, and some overall commitment to ensure that people living in unmortgageable, unsaleable flats are given appropriate comfort, because, frankly, without that, we will have to support the Lords amendment to ensure that the Government come back with these proposals early in the new Session.

Let us make sure that we send the message to leaseholders out there: you should not have to pay a penny piece to rectify the problems that are not your fault in the first place. I shall be supporting the Lords amendment once again today.

Levelling Up

Tim Farron Excerpts

Tuesday 16th March 2021 Commons Chamber

[Eddie Hughes]

I have been a bit tired of seeing my hon. Friend’s face in my social media feeds over the past weeks and months showing him celebrating the various successes as funding and opportunity flows towards his constituency. I am delighted to say that I am a similar beneficiary in the Black Country, because HCLG has decided to move one of its offices to Wolverhampton. It is great to see that this Government are deploying staff around the country to ensure that we level up right across the country. Under no circumstances is that giving up; we are levelling up everywhere.

[Tim Farron (Westmorland and Lonsdale) (LD) [V]]

During this pandemic South Lakeland has had the biggest increase in unemployment and has the highest proportion of its workforce on furlough of any community in the country, and yet the Government have our community in the bottom priority for levelling-up funding because they are using old pre-pandemic data. The Lake district is Britain’s biggest visitor destination outside London, and so if the Government rethink, using accurate data, and choose to invest in the Lakes line, in rural bus routes, in cycling, and in culture and our visitor economy here, they will not just be preventing hardship in our South Lakeland communities but boosting the whole British economy. So will the Minister rethink?

[Eddie Hughes]

As I said in answer to a previous question, the Government will not be rethinking the data or the methodology that they apply to distributing their funding, but given the circumstances that the hon. Gentleman has set out, I strongly urge that he engages with Ministers in the Department, because, as I have explained, a significant number of funding streams are available, and I would like to think that one of them is a good fit for his constituency.

Rough Sleeping

Tim Farron Excerpts

Thursday 25th February 2021 Commons Chamber

[Robert Jenrick]

I praise my hon. Friend for the work that he has done. It is important that we do not attribute the whole of the success that we are seeing this year to the Everyone In initiative. As I said earlier, its roots lie much deeper than that, in the work that has been done over the last couple of years. His Homelessness Reduction Act played an important part in that. The statistics that we have published today show that the average person sleeping rough is a 26 year-old male, exactly the sort of individual that the Act set out to ensure was given support and that might not have been supported previously by local authorities. He is also right to praise Housing First. The pilots continue with £28 million of Government support, and the £430 million that we are investing in move-on accommodation is very much in the spirit of Housing First that we need to get individuals into a home and then give them wraparound care.

[Tim Farron (Westmorland and Lonsdale) (LD) [V]]

The Secretary of State promised that no one would lose their home due to the pandemic. The moratorium on evictions has helped to keep people off the streets, but it covers only those people with rental debt up to six months, and of course the pandemic has been going on now for something like 12 months. There are 1,500 people in South Lakeland who are both private renters and members of workforce groups that have been excluded from Government support, with no income to pay the rent. How will he keep his promise to them?

[Robert Jenrick]

I am proud of the action that we have taken to support renters throughout the pandemic. The hon. Gentleman is right to draw attention to the moratorium on evictions that I introduced early on with my right hon. and learned Friend the Lord Chancellor. We have chosen to extend that on at least one more occasion to the end of March. That enables people to be safe and secure in the knowledge that they will not be forced out of their homes. There are exceptions to it, but they are the right exceptions. There are exceptions for domestic abuse perpetrators, for those who have committed serious antisocial behaviour which is damaging the lives of their neighbours, and for those who are in egregious rent arrears of six months or more. We have to strike a balance between the interests of the tenant and those of smaller landlords as well, some of whom are in very difficult circumstances. We have also created a six-month notice period for evictions, which means that people have a very long period to adjust to changing circumstances.

Council Tax: Government’s Proposed Increase

Tim Farron Excerpts

Monday 25th January 2021 Commons Chamber

[Tim Farron (Westmorland and Lonsdale) (LD)]

To govern is to choose, and the Government have chosen to make local authorities choose between cutting services at this time of all times and imposing a 5% council tax rise.

I have always opposed the council tax since the Conservatives introduced it in a rush in the early ’90s in the poll tax debacle. It was always a wrong form of taxation; it takes more from those who have the least, and it takes less from those who have the most. It is a regressive form of tax, and for the Government to force local authorities—red, yellow and blue—to increase that burden on the families who struggle the most during a pandemic is utterly inexcusable.

It is a choice that the Government have made to increase council tax by 5% and to hit the worst those families who struggle the most, but there are other choices that this Government have made at the same time. The stamp duty holiday has given a boost of tens of thousands of pounds to people who want to buy second homes. Therefore, people who are struggling by on the minimum wage, paying a much higher proportion of their salary in council tax now than those who are wealthier, get a hit, yet those who can afford not just one home but two or more get a benefit worth tens of thousands of pounds from this Government, who have chosen to give it to them.

I suggest to the Minister that there is something better he could do with council tax. In communities such as mine in the lakes and dales, where as many as 85% of the properties are second homes—boltholes for folks who are well-off enough mainly to live somewhere else—the impact is colossal. Every single one of those homes is sending no child to the local school and providing no demand for the post office or the bus service, and so those services and facilities end up closing, as they have done in many communities in my part of the world. Yet there are things the Government could do to ameliorate that. Instead of imposing a huge council tax burden on those who are struggling to pay now, why not increase council tax on those who are well-off enough to have more than one home and recycle that money back into local communities?

Furthermore, why do the Government not deal with their own consultation that closed nearly three years ago on whether to close the loophole that allows second-home owners to pretend that they are a business? They claim business rate relief, and get business rates taken off altogether—so pay no council tax and no business rates. If this Government cared about levelling up, they would not be levelling down Lake district communities by benefiting those wealthy enough to have more than one home while hitting those who are on low incomes to start with.

The Government have chosen to impose this council tax rise, and council tax always hits the less well-off more than those who are better off. This is the opportunity that the Government have to change their mind, to benefit not just the lakes and dales but the whole of the country as it struggles through this terrible crisis.

United Kingdom Internal Market Bill

Tim Farron Excerpts

Consideration of Lords amendments
Tuesday 15th December 2020 Commons Chamber

[Stephen Flynn (Aberdeen South) (SNP)]

I have to start by expressing my deepest sympathies to the shadow Minister, the hon. Member for Manchester Central (Lucy Powell), who has had to come to the House to try to defend the completely and utterly indefensible. [Interruption.] She says that she does not need my sympathy—well, she is getting it anyway. The reality is that the Labour party has once again turned its back on voters in Scotland. Last night Labour had the opportunity to stand up for the Scottish Parliament, to stand up for devolution and to block direct spending by this UK Government on devolved matters, and it sat on its hands. That is why there is a not a single Labour Back Bencher here in the Chamber this afternoon.

But my sympathies do not stop there: they also extend to the Minister himself. He talks about business certainty—business certainty! Four and a half years after the Brexit vote, after three Prime Ministers and two general elections, it is 17 days to the end of the transition period and the Minister could not name, in any way, shape or form, what the trade status of the United Kingdom is going to be. I pity them all. This is why the people of Scotland will choose a different path in the very near future.

Let us look at the Bill as it stands in a little more detail. It remains—it utterly remains—a blatant attack on devolution. For me, that is extremely frustrating, because, like my hon. Friend the Member for Glasgow East (David Linden), I am young enough to have lived almost entirely under the Scottish Parliament. I do not remember a time when there was not a Scottish Parliament. It has been a positive, progressive force for Scotland that we are proud of. I am not going to come to this Chamber and let a party that has not won an election in Scotland since the 1950s dictate to the Scottish Parliament as to what will happen. It is a complete and utter shambles, and the Government should be utterly ashamed of that.

To finish, something that has been asked a lot in this Chamber—I have heard the shadow Scotland Office Minister say it as well—is, “Name a single power that is being grabbed. Name a single one”, but this is much bigger than that; this is a blatant, all-out attack on devolution itself. It seeks to undermine the very premise of devolution. To prove that very fact, The Press and Journal just four days ago said:

“The Secretary of State has been very clear he wants to deal direct with local authorities”—

not just going beyond the Scottish Parliament or the Convention of Scottish Local Authorities, but going straight to the local authorities themselves. That is absurd and a blatant attack on devolution, and we will not stand for it.

[Tim Farron (Westmorland and Lonsdale) (LD)]

I am overwhelmed by a sense of déjà vu, with the Labour Front Bench getting more grief than the Treasury Front Bench, as back in the day. I am also overwhelmed with a sense of déjà vu because I feel a great sense of this Government being in the same place—in my heart, in my mind—as the European Commission once was. Back in the days when we were not little Britain, I remember feeling enormous frustration and anger with the European Commission when it would do stupid things, in particular with agriculture, playing into the hands of separatists who only wanted the end of our relationship with the European Union.

I feel exactly the same about this Government now playing into the hands of my friends and colleagues around me on the SNP Benches—to whom this is music to their ears—by undermining the Union and being cloth-eared in the process. The Minister has had every chance to accept Lords amendments and to do what he can to stand behind the integrity of the Union and of the devolution settlement.

I have another great concern. I mentioned agriculture a minute ago, and what is critical in the race to the bottom that is built into the Bill when it comes to standards of farming, animal welfare and the environment is something that is not restricted to the Bill alone; it is something that the Government are repeating in other areas of their approach. We have seen the failure of the Government to accept proposals from my party and others that the high standards of British animal welfare and our environmental standards should be written into all new trade deals, but those were refused at every turn—clearly preparing the way to sell out farmers in all corners of the United Kingdom at the first chance the Government get in any trade deal.

At the same time, although most of us in this House agree with the Government’s direction in terms of the English changes to farm payments—from basic payments to the environmental land management scheme—the plan has been to underfund the scheme and to bodge it, getting rid of the basic payments before the new payments are in place, therefore killing off English family farms, which are the unit that allows us to have high-quality animal welfare and environmental standards. All those things together paint a picture of a Government who have lost touch with the countryside and with agriculture, and are prepared to set out a range of policies—almost a manifesto, a catalogue, of attacks on British farming—that undermine our standards, animal welfare and the quality of our produce, and to sell our farmers down the river.

I am proud of the quality of British farming, throughout these islands, and I want the standards that are the highest in any nation to be the highest across all four. I would love the Government to learn from the mistakes of the European Commission—not to play into the hands of separatists, but to make sure that they defend our Union and the devolution settlement.

[Alison Thewliss (Glasgow Central) (SNP)]

We are clear on the SNP Benches that Scotland does not want this Bill and that it overrides powers within the Scotland Act 1998. The explanatory notes state:

“The Bill’s provisions replace the existing limits on the effect of legislation made in exercise of devolved legislative or executive competence”.

The Bill is clear about taking new powers.

We know that divergence will not be tolerated, because it is not tolerated currently. In immigration policy, Scotland has been refused any degree of control. On the control and sale of fireworks, we have been ignored in our request to regulate fireworks. In the treatment of drug law, an area close to my heart and that of my constituents, despite crying out for years in the face of a drugs-death crisis—a crisis which last year saw 1,264 souls lost—the UK Government say that Scotland will not be permitted, not allowed, not trusted to take further action to prevent the deaths of our citizens. Scotland accepts responsibility in the areas where we can act, and we know we must do more, but we do it with our hands tied behind our back. I do not trust this Government to behave any differently when they grasp with grubby hands Scotland’s powers over economic development and infrastructure, such as our water supply, our transport, our health or our education. The only way to protect the powers of our own Parliament is for Scotland to vote for independence.

Dark Skies

Tim Farron Excerpts

Monday 14th December 2020 Commons Chamber

[Andrew Griffith]

I certainly agree with my hon. Friend. Although he did not invite me, I would be very willing to come and see the charms of first light, as it rises in the east off Lowestoft.

For  health, for nature, for the environment and for the economy, there are excellent reasons to protect a dark sky at night. I think all of us in this House can agree on that. If the problem is so clear, what is to be done? Well, the good news is that it really is as simple as flicking off a switch. Unlike acid rain, lead pollution or even carbon emissions, there is no long and complex supply chain or difficult trade-offs to be made. The even better news for the Minister is that the all-party group for dark skies has already done the hard work and brought it together in a simple 10-point plan that I believe he has already seen. We do not even have to go first as a country. There are several models around the world of countries that have legislated for the improved protection of dark skies, such as South Korea and, although I hesitate to say it just at this moment in time, France. Our 10-point plan was produced following a consultation in which over 170 academics, legal professionals, national park associations, astronomers, lighting professionals, engineers and businesses participated.

[Tim Farron (Westmorland and Lonsdale) (LD)]

I am extremely grateful to the hon. Gentleman not only for his generosity in giving way but for his success in bringing this debate, which is massively important, to the Floor of the House. He is the Member of Parliament for Britain’s newest national park, whereas I speak as one who represents two rather old ones: the Lake District and the Yorkshire Dales. I am sure he would agree with me that part of the attraction of places like ours is not just the landscape itself, but the landscape that is silhouetted by the canopy of stars above. In his report and recommendation to Government, will he call on them to toughen up planning powers, in national parks and in other planning authorities as well, to prevent developers encroaching on our areas and adding to light pollution, which removes the appeal and the beauty that we both share in our beautiful parts of the world?

[Andrew Griffith]

The hon. Member makes an excellent point and anticipates one of the points I hope to get on to.

The first of our recommendations concerns the Minister himself. As has been widely reported, we would like to see a designated Minister for the dark skies with cross-cutting responsibility for this issue. Last week, I and others met the Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, my hon. Friend the Member for Taunton Deane (Rebecca Pow). As a DEFRA Minister, she told us about the contributions her Department has made towards assessing the impact of artificial light on wider biodiversity. She also shared with us a fascinating story of her visit to Skomer a few years ago to witness the Manx shearwaters flying at night to find their chicks, making her aware of just how sensitive such creatures are to light pollution, which impacts their flight paths. However, so many of the issues involved lie with the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government that if we had to pick one Department, and I believe we do, it is there that we think the designated Minister should sit.

Secondly, the language in the national planning policy framework on avoiding light pollution should be significantly expanded, allowing local planning authorities to impose specific planning conditions related to external lighting, including curfew hours, standards for brightness, colour temperature, as well as the direction and the density of lighting. The most recent NPPF from 2019 makes very little reference to lighting, with paragraph 180(c) being the only reference, which states:

“limit the impact of light pollution from artificial light on local amenity, intrinsically dark landscapes and nature conservation.”

Although a number of local authorities have adopted policies that seek to do that, in practice most development proposals are simply not assessed against such policies. CPRE’s “Shedding Light” survey found that almost two-thirds of local authorities do not have a lighting policy in their local plan and only a third had proactively adopted one to comply with the NPPF.

This need not be the case. The South Downs national park contains approximately 2,800 local authority streetlights, all of which point downwards and minimise the colour temperature. National planning policy on light pollution should require all proposed developments to conduct a dark sky impact assessment and ensure there is no net impact of a scheme on a dark sky location. Much of this could be overseen and enforced by a new statutory commission for the dark skies to develop standards and regulations, and work with local authorities to enforce them. We should also create a national programme of best practice, dark sky hours, in which categories of lighting can be dimmed or turned off completely in consultation with the community, lighting professionals and the police.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Minister for Housing (Christopher Pincher)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Arundel and South Downs (Andrew Griffith) on securing this debate and on making such eloquent and passionate arguments, as he ever does, in support of dark skies. I am also impressed by his ability to weave into his speech historical references such as “The Lion in Winter”, about King Henry II and his powerful reign. I suspect that although we might see dark skies again, we shall never see the like of Henry II again. I congratulate Chris Cook, my hon. Friend’s researcher, on all the efforts that he has undertaken on my hon. Friend’s behalf.

I am also grateful to the other hon. and right hon. Members who have taken the time and, so to speak, seen the light in coming to this debate to speak on behalf of their constituents, and to the all-party group for the important work it is doing to preserve our dark skies. We share a common goal in wanting to limit the effect of light pollution from artificial light on our dark landscape. I therefore welcome the initiative taken by my hon. Friend and his noble Friend Lord Rees, the Astronomer Royal, in working to reconnect people with the wonder of the dark skies, as well as with a wide range of other benefits to society and the environment that flow from his endeavours.

Of course, when used wisely, artificial light can extend opportunities for sport and recreation, and it can enhance security and safety in and around our homes and on our roads. However, as Members have rightly pointed out, when it is used unwisely, artificial light can be a real nuisance, becoming pollution that undermines our enjoyment of the countryside and especially of our night skies. My hon. Friend the Member for Arundel and South Downs has rightly pointed out that we cannot overlook how much energy is wasted by unnecessary lighting, as we work together on achieving our climate change net zero goals. That point was also made by my hon. Friend the Member for Bracknell (James Sunderland), and I hope that the highways authorities around our country will take note.

I am aware of the effect that poorly located artificial light can have, not just on residents but on wildlife, not least in its capacity to interrupt their nocturnal habits. Any of us who has tried to get a good night’s sleep with a bright street light shining through their bedroom window will understand what I am talking about. In fact, if I may deviate slightly, one of my proudest achievements in my 10 years as the Member of Parliament for Tamworth is not having tried to fix the NHS or improve the schools or the road system of my town; it has been to get a street lamp moved so that a little old lady living next to the Belgrave Lakes could get a decent night’s sleep. She knows what I am talking about, and I think that we in this House also know what I am talking about. The same applies to ecosystems and protected species. There is increasing evidence that lighting can also have far-reaching effects on biodiversity and nature. The Government recognise these issues and are taking action.

I know that my hon. Friend appreciates, as we all do, that there are complexities surrounding the policy and legislation that govern artificial light. Responsibility for its monitoring and regulation crosses several Departments and also falls to local authorities. Our intention has been to utilise the planning system to get the lighting right from the outset. Local planning authorities can require applicants to submit a lighting strategy with their planning application, and they can consider on a case-by-case basis what conditions are appropriate.

I have no doubt that my hon. Friend’s all-party group will make an important and valuable contribution to the current work on our planning reforms, and I am grateful to the group for so ably and clearly setting out its 10 dark sky policies for Government. I believe that planning control can and should be a key determinant in this, with support from organisations such as the all-party group. That is why we have taken action to ensure that light pollution is addressed through the planning system.

[Tim Farron]

The Minister is making a good case, and it is important that we hear what the Government intend to do when it comes to working with the planning guidance. Does he agree that planning authorities—particularly cash-strapped national parks—will always worry about the potential of losing an appeal, at great cost to them and the local community, and that they will need real confidence and support from the Government to allow them to say a flat no to developers who seek to bring about developments that threaten our dark skies?

[Christopher Pincher]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for that intervention. He will know that five of our parks have committed to conserving dark skies. We said in the “Planning for the future” White Paper that we would undertake a comprehensive review of the skills and resources that local planning authorities require to do the work. The consideration of the White Paper is under way, as he will know, and I will say a little more about that in a moment. I am sure such considerations will be given very careful thought as we work through the review process.

The national planning policy framework, which was updated last year and now includes the paragraph to which my hon. Friend the Member for Arundel and South Downs referred, makes it clear that planning policies and decisions should limit the effect of light pollution on local amenity, dark landscapes and nature conservation, including where there may be effects on wildlife and ecosystems. It is supported by guidance; it emphasises the importance of getting the right light in the right place at the right time; and it helps local planners and developers to design in ways of avoiding glare and intrusion.

My department has worked closely with the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs and the Under-Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, my hon. Friend the Member for Taunton Deane (Rebecca Pow), to revise and reinforce the planning practice guidance on light pollution that we published last year. That guidance encourages local planning authorities to engage with all relevant bodies and interested parties, whether statutory or not, who may feel that they are affected by a particular development proposal. It should not just be a case of rounding up the usual suspects, so to speak.

Our guidance emphasises the importance of getting it right from the outset, because lighting schemes can be costly and difficult to change. Fitting things is expensive, but retrofitting them is even more expensive. That approach will help to ensure that lighting design is carefully considered at the outset, to avoid harsh glare and obtrusive effects and to help to safeguard our environment. Our policy remains that organisations that wish to be more engaged in the planning process should liaise directly with local planning authorities on the types of planning application on which they want to comment.

Conversely, we encourage local planning authorities to produce and publish locally specific lists of non-statutory consultees, thereby helping applicants to refine their proposals in a way that can balance the needs of the built environment with wider considerations. I suspect that there will be a role for Members of Parliament, including members of the APPG, in that regard. It is important to remember that being a statutory consultee does not give any organisation a right of veto over a planning proposal or decision. This ultimately rests with the local planning authority as the decision maker in the first instance. As we move to our new upfront planning system that places much greater emphasis on holistic and strategic design, I suspect that there will be opportunities for such stakeholders to have and to play an important role.

One of the key proposals in our “Planning for the future” White Paper is bringing forward a quicker and simpler framework for assessing environmental effects—one that does not compromise environmental standards and, indeed, encourages opportunities for environmental enhancements to be identified and pursued early in the development process. We have received a significant number of responses in consulting on our proposals, and we will respond in due course once we have processed them all. We have had over 44,000 consultation responses, so I am sure that the House, and particularly the hon. Member for Westmorland and Lonsdale (Tim Farron) and my hon. Friend the Member for Arundel and South Downs, will understand if it takes us a little time to get through them all.

I should briefly describe some of the other approaches being taken to tackle light pollution, given its potential significant effect not just on rural areas but on our towns and cities too. Street lighting is an important issue and it needs to be considered carefully when balancing the competing priorities of maintaining road safety and avoiding light pollution. The Department for Transport is therefore encouraging all local authorities to replace their street lighting, wherever feasible, with more modern technology such as LED lighting units, as such alternatives can greatly reduce the amount of glare emitted. I am aware that action is being taken by Highways England on replacing poorly performing lighting—I have seen quite a lot of that as I drive up and down the M40—and that these initiatives are supported by those with interest in preserving our dark skies, such as the CPRE and the British Astronomical Society.

We also recognise that wildlife species can have heightened sensitivity to light, being affected by even very low levels in a number of different ways. This is especially important where habitats support nocturnal animals, insects and protected species such as bats. My colleagues at DEFRA have recently published and contributed to assessments of the effect of artificial light on insects, and wider biodiversity work, to ensure that the Government continue to address the key drivers of biodiversity loss. Indeed, an objective of the Environment Bill, which is before the House, is a biodiversity net gain.

I am all too aware that common causes of complaints to local authorities include domestic shop or office exterior security lights, illuminated advertising and floodlighting, so these installations may require particular attention. Similarly, insensitively positioned decorative lighting, particularly in rural areas, can be a cause for concern. It is therefore essential that such situations are prevented from occurring right from the outset, as pursuing remedies through the statutory nuisance regime or other legal avenues can add further stress to individuals and incur heavy costs. Planning committees should look closely at that when considering the strategic design of their town centres and their built environment.

On behalf of the Government, I should like to add my congratulations to those received by both the Yorkshire Dales and the North York Moors on being named international dark sky reserves just last week.

In conclusion, I again thank and congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Arundel and South Downs on all his work and diligence in this area, and I also congratulate fellow Members across the House on speaking with such passion and on the strong arguments that they advanced in support of this new all-party group’s objectives. I look forward to working with the group and with Members of all stripes, from all parts of the House, on this important issue as we advance planning proposals.

Question put and agreed to.

The Future of the High Street

Tim Farron Excerpts

Thursday 10th December 2020 Commons Chamber

[Tim Farron (Westmorland and Lonsdale) (LD)]

The town and village centres in South Lakeland, in the lakes and in the dales and the communities around, them are spectacular places. They are part of our hospitality and tourism offer, as well as serving the communities that are permanently with us, but the impact on hospitality and tourism in the last nine months has been colossal, and the impact on the town and village centres of the south lakes has also been colossal.

The health of the retail, hospitality and tourism sectors in those towns and villages is absolutely essential, and as we move through the next few months towards what is hopefully the conclusion of the covid crisis, I want to urge the Government to be far more generous towards those businesses, because many of them are at risk and many have already gone out of business. I have seen a sixfold increase in unemployment in my constituency. At one stage, we were the furlough capital of the United Kingdom. Those businesses in our town and village centres throughout South Lakeland are healthy and have a future, and I would like the Government to back them so that when the recovery comes, we have not dead businesses that are empty and unable to step up to the plate, but lively, vibrant businesses that are ready to lead the recovery.

I join those who are saying that business rates are crucial. They really are, and the Government should not pat themselves on the back too much over the digital sales tax. Business rates net £25 billion a year. The digital sales tax, according to the Government’s best estimate, will raise £0.5 billion a year. What we need is the full-scale abolition of business rates, their replacement by taxes on revenue and sales, and measures to ensure that the online giants are no longer being subsidised by independent shops in our communities up and down this country. I was talking to a constituent of mine, a business person who owns a number of businesses. He told me that the rateable value of one of his premises, which he is having to close, was £250,000. The rent that he pays on that business is a fifth of that. This distorts the price of operating physically in our town and village centres. That is why business rates must be abolished, and this is the moment to do it.

I also want to make the point that while the independents are crucial—we have loads of them in the south lakes—so are the chains. When Beales closed down in Kendal, it removed footfall from the rest of the community as well, so let us make sure we support our high streets and town and village centres for our independents, but also for our chains.

Finally, in rural communities such as mine, where one in four people work for themselves, the economy is like an ecosystem. The health of the town and village centres—their poor health at times—is made worse by the fact that 4,500 people in my community are being excluded from support by this Government. The Government’s failure to back those people, many of whom who run their own businesses and who should be the backbone of any recovery, is costing them and their families, and it is also costing our town and village centres.