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Localism Bill

My Lords, like all noble Lords who have spoken in this debate today, we support the need for transitional provisions that have clarity as to their meaning as well as a reasonable timescale that reflects the capacity both of local planning authorities and of the inspectorate. Like the noble Lord, Lord Greaves, I believe that this is probably the most serious issue left unresolved from Part 5 of the Bill. We hope that we will get a clear message from the Minister today. We added our name to the original amendment of the noble Lord, Lord Best, which bit the dust by being pre-empted, and we support the thrust of the amendments of the noble Lords, Lord Best and Lord Greaves. It is imperative that we avoid a lacuna, with the prospect of all or most local plans being absent, silent or indeterminate or having policies that are out of date under the current NPPF formulation. Under the presumption in favour of development, this would lead to an emphasis on approving development proposals unless the adverse impacts of development would significantly and demonstrably outweigh the benefits when assessed against the framework policies. I assert that 50-odd pages of framework cannot be an effective substitute for all the local plans and the thousands of pages of guidance that currently exist. The risk was put to us by one planner in the following terms: "““I’m worried about this. I can see a very silly situation emerging, with the Planning Inspectorate massively overloaded as several hundred LAs seek to get their new plans approved in a short space of time, and the rest of us seek confirmation that our existing Core Strategies conform. Also, the Inspectorate will have to look at everyone’s CIL frameworks … the Inspectorate will be under operational pressure … and developers will be seeking to use the vacuum in policy (combined with the presumption in favour of sustainable development) to get consents which they ""can then ‘bank’, rather than actually develop. I’m afraid it’s the oldest trick in the book—get a consent when the market is low, arguing viability to reduce level of affordable housing/other S106, then simply waiting for an upturn in the market!””." This is a very serious issue, so the Bill cannot be left as it is. The minimum that we want to hear from the Government is that they will support effective transitional provisions and, after discussion in which I hope we can all be involved, bring forward amendments at Third Reading. I say to noble Lords who tabled the amendments in this group that they should bring them back at Third Reading if the Government do not. The Government's amendments to Clause 97 that were moved last week hold out the prospect that existing regional spatial strategies and saved structure plan policies will not be revoked until an environmental assessment of the revocation has been undertaken. Perhaps the Minister will explain the position in the interim. Regional spatial strategies and saved structure plan policies could mean that some local authorities will have a core strategy that is effectively complete in the light of those strategies, or intact subject only to the NPPF. Of course, we do not know when the NPPF will be finalised. Will the presumption operate only when that happens? If the presumption is to predate the demise of some or all of the regional spatial strategies, will the NPPF prevail nevertheless? If not, there will be parts of the country where regional spatial strategies will prevail and parts where they will not because they were never completed or because they have been separately revoked. Clearly, there must be a robust transition in place to cover this and myriad other points that noble Lords have raised in the debate. We support the amendments in this group.