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Parish Councils (Planning)

Not for the first time, and certainly not for the last, the hon. Gentleman makes an extremely effective point. In the Morrisons case, one of the two borough councillors for the area was disqualified under the code of conduct from making any comment as a relative had some work connection with the applicant, while the other felt unable to comment because he sat on the relevant planning committee. A major democratic deficit is created when major planning applications affect local communities, but in that case the parish council was able to meet it most effectively. Just down the road from Barton Seagrave is the village of Cranford, in the Buccleuch ward of the borough of Kettering, which I have the privilege to represent. The ward also includes the villages of Grafton Underwood, Warkton, Weekley and Rushton. Cranford and its residents face a serious threat from planning due to the ODPM’s Milton Keynes and south midlands sub-regional spatial strategy, which proposes for Kettering borough the construction of 13,100 houses by 2021. That will increase the number of houses in the borough by about a third in the next 15 years. That is a very serious issue for everyone who lives in the locality, but it is particularly serious for the good residents of Cranford and for Cranford parish council, because it is likely that a very large proportion of those 13,100 houses will be built in Cranford parish, effectively between the built-up area of Kettering and Cranford. Cranford parish council is, sadly, like a minnow in a sea of sharks, given such a major development issue. I am pleased to report that a former hon. Member for Wellingborough, Sir Peter Fry, serves on that parish council. He and his colleagues are doing all that they can to ensure that local views will be represented when the development plans eventually are made official and presented as a planning application to the borough council—of course, I will do my best as well—but the voice of any parish council on any issue that involves a directive ultimately from central Government is likely to be extremely limited. With a major application, such as the supermarket warehouse development that I have spoken about, the voice of a parish council can be effective in co-ordinating local concerns—I am sure that Cranford parish council will do exactly the same—but there is simply no way in which it will be able to stop the development happening in Kettering. At best, the parish council can seek to modify the plans and to ensure that the houses do not absorb Cranford into the whole development and keep it at a distance. I am grateful to the House for the opportunity to speak in the debate, because all hon. Members owe a huge debt of gratitude to parish councillors, who give of their time for free and who often meet in cold and draughty village halls, often in remote locations. As the hon. Member for Stroud said, for many residents they are the first layer of government. I hope that the Minister, in addressing the concerns that have been raised in the debate and in any measure that he introduces, will seek to enhance the role of parish councillors, not diminish it.