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Planning Bill

I will take advantage of the noble Lord’s courtesy and give the Government’s arguments for withdrawing Clauses 177 to 180. The clauses all relate to provisions for established local member review bodies, which were intended to determine certain planning appeals, instead of the Secretary of State as now. They make provision for local planning authorities to have mandatory schemes of delegation for certain types of planning application. They have attracted much debate, which I will bypass by outlining the Government’s position. As I signalled at Second Reading, we have listened carefully to stakeholders’ views on this proposal. Many professional bodies, including the RTPI, RICS and RIBA, were particularly concerned about the implications of the proposal and are delighted that we have listened to their views and to those of others. On that basis, we concluded that although local member review bodies may bring some benefit through devolving power to local councillors to decide appeals on planning proposals with only local impacts, they risk distracting local authorities, particularly when, as I am sure we all agree, there is an urgent need for them to focus on strategic plans and issues. I therefore propose that Clauses 177 to 180 do not stand part of the Bill.