Asked by: Virginia Crosbie (Conservative - Ynys Môn)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, what plans his Department has to support industrial maritime projects in coastal communities.
Answered by Dehenna Davison
My department is committed to supporting coastal communities flourish, strengthening their appeal as places to live, work and visit.
Through our Coastal Communities Fund, which ran until this year, we supported a huge number of projects in communities across the country, with a total investment of £187 million. We recently published the evaluation which showed how it stimulated job growth and prosperity in those areas.
Coastal communities continue to receive investment from our funding programmes, including 22 places that are receiving Town Deals collectively worth over £673 million. The Levelling Up Fund offers investment opportunities for coastal communities to promote regeneration and build vital infrastructure. The £2.6 billion UK Shared Prosperity Fund - where growing the private sector in localities is a core objective - is being delivered through an allocative process that reaches every part of the UK.
Asked by: Virginia Crosbie (Conservative - Ynys Môn)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, what steps he is taking to update planning laws to support an increase in the contribution of wind, solar and other renewable energy sources to the energy security of the UK.
Answered by Stuart Andrew - Shadow Secretary of State for Health and Social Care
National planning policy is clear local authorities should support transition to a low-carbon future, including having a positive strategy in place to promote energy from renewable and low carbon sources.
As set out in Net Zero Strategy, we intend to review the National Planning Policy Framework to make sure it contributes to climate change mitigation as fully as possible, and help bring greenhouse gas emissions to net zero by 2050.
Asked by: Virginia Crosbie (Conservative - Ynys Môn)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, whether he plans to take steps to protect Grade 1 land from housing and solar developments to preserve land for the production of food; and what discussions he has had with relevant stakeholders on that matter.
Answered by Stuart Andrew - Shadow Secretary of State for Health and Social Care
The National Planning Policy Framework makes clear that planning policies and decisions should recognise the benefits of the best and most versatile agricultural land and that where significant development is demonstrated to be necessary, areas of poorer quality land should be preferred to those of higher quality. This requirement would apply to both housing and solar developments. The Framework is also clear that local authorities should encourage efficient use of land and acknowledges the importance of undeveloped land for food production.
In the case of solar, guidance sets an expectation that large-scale solar farms are sites on previously developed and non-agricultural land, provided it is not of high environmental value. Where projects are proposed on greenfield sites, our guidance seeks to minimise the impacts and requires developers to justify the use of any such land. Our guidance also requires that projects are designed to avoid, mitigate and, where necessary, compensate for impacts on the best and most versatile agricultural land.
These aspects of planning policy are devolved in Wales.
Asked by: Virginia Crosbie (Conservative - Ynys Môn)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, what steps he is taking to help ensure that affected homeowners are not charged unaffordable remedial costs for historic fire safety defects.
Answered by Christopher Pincher
Building owners and developers should make buildings safe to live in and it should not fall to leaseholders to pay the price when they have failed to do so. The Government is focused on protecting leaseholders, who bought their flats in good faith, and now face unaffordable costs.
The Government is investing an unprecedented £5.1 billion to fund the cost of replacing unsafe cladding for leaseholders in residential buildings 18 metres and over in England. This will make homes safer and support those who, through no fault of their own, have been unable to sell their property. Fire risk is lower in buildings under 18 metres and costly remediation work is usually not needed.