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Standing Committee G
Thursday 23 January 2003
(Morning)
[Mr. David Amess in the Chair]
8.55 am
The Chairman: Before we begin I should inform members that due to an error at the press, new clauses 18, 19, 20 and 21 appear on the marshalled list of amendments as new clauses relating to part 5. They should in fact appear with the remaining new clauses on page 275. Clause 41
applications for planning permission and certain consents
Mr. Geoffrey Clifton-Brown (Cotswold): I beg to move amendment No. 356, in
clause 41, page 25, line 16, after 'think', insert 'reasonably'.
The Chairman: With this it will be convenient to discuss the following:
Amendment No. 357, in
clause 41, page 25, line 18, after 'think', insert 'reasonably'.
Amendment No. 377, in
clause 41, page 25, line 19, after '(3)', insert 'must be reasonable and'.
Mr. Clifton-Brown: On a point of order, Mr. Amess. If we are to meet at this uncivilised hour, the rest of the House's functions have to be compatible. I have just come from Portcullis House, and through the glass door, which is locked, I could see the amendment paper for today and all the other documents that we may or may not need in Committee. We cannot do our job properly if the other offices of the House are not operating at a similar earlier hour now that we have moved Committees forward. Could you look into this matter urgently with the Serjeant at Arms and see what can be done?
The Chairman: This is not a matter for my consideration, but obviously it has been heard by noises off. I know that it is a nuisance, but the hon. Gentleman can obtain all the necessary documents from the Vote Office in the Members Lobby. I will find out what the arrangements are at Portcullis House.
Mr. Clifton-Brown: Further to that point of order, Mr. Amess. I have received a helpful letter from Hansard, which states:
''I regret to inform you that, because of the heavy work load in Committees, the Official Report for the afternoon sitting of Tuesday 21 January will not be available until tomorrow morning. I apologise for any inconvenience that this may cause you or the Committee''.
I am not in any way blaming any of the officials of Hansard; it is not their fault, it is the system. I do not see how we can do our job properly in these Committees if we do not have a proper record of what has happened, particularly in the previous sitting. We might be in the middle of a clause, subsection or group of amendments when we adjourn. If we cannot look back and see what happened in the previous
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sitting, I do not see how we can do our job properly. If it is not going to be possible regularly to have Hansard reports from previous sittings, the Government will have to schedule these Committees on a weekly rather than twice-weekly basis.
The Chairman: Again, that is not a matter for me, but I understand the hon. Gentleman's point. There are undoubtedly teething problems with the new arrangements.
Mr. Clifton-Brown: Further to that point of order, Mr. Amess. What it amounts to is that the Government are over-scheduling the Committees. There are too many going on at the same time. It means that everyone in this place is in Committee—which is exactly what the Government want—and no one is down in the main Chamber paying attention to the really important debates.
The Chairman: Order. I have heard enough on this point.
Mr. David Wilshire (Spelthorne): On a point of order, Mr. Amess. Have you been given any documents by the Minister that are relevant to this morning's debates? On Tuesday, I obtained documents relevant to matters I had been discussing in the morning after the sitting ended. I was told subsequently that they had been popped on the table. I do not consider that adequate. Are there any Government documents that we have not been given which we need to have before this morning's debate?
The Chairman: Government documents are not a matter for the Chair. I have the impression that the Minister does not want to respond.
Mr. Clifton-Brown: After that little canter on points of order, which were important—some of them, anyway—[Interruption.] I did not say which. We now move to clause 41 and amendment No. 356. Would the Committee kindly turn to clause 41 on page 25, and look at subsection (3) of the proposed new section 62 of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990? That subsection reads:
''The local planning authority may require that an application for planning permission must include—
(a) such particulars as they think necessary;
(b) such evidence in support of anything in or relating to the application as they think necessary.''
My hon. Friend the Member for Spelthorne (Mr. Wilshire) has devised an amendment to paragraph (a) so that it would read:
''such particulars as they think reasonably necessary.''
I believe that to be a useful amendment. Otherwise, the planning authority could ask for all sorts of extraneous information, which might be vaguely related to the application, but which could not reasonably be considered necessary. I hope that the Minister will accede to that simple amendment.
Similarly, paragraph (b) would be amended to read:
''such evidence in support of anything in or relating to the application as they think reasonably necessary.''
That amendment adds narrowness to the very wide possible requirements.
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Planning authorities require more and more information to be submitted with planning applications. Sustainability reports, environmental impact assessments, traffic impact assessments, and a whole host of supporting documentation will be required for larger applications. That is expensive for the applicants. I believe it to be incumbent on all planning authorities and on the Secretary of State to consider the cost and inconvenience to applicants of having to provide such information, some of which may be necessary and important, but not all of which is important in every case.
The amendments are simple, and I hope that the Minister will consider them.
Mr. Wilshire: May I add some comments, particularly in relation to amendment No. 356, which would amend subsection (1)(3)(b)? That section currently reads:
''such evidence in support of anything in or relating to the application as they think necessary.''
The amendment would alter that to read:
''such evidence in support of anything in or relating to the application as they think reasonably necessary.''
There is a specific point behind this amendment that has concerned me for a long time, from the days when I was a member and then a chairman of a planning committee. It is also an issue that has regularly been raised with me as an MP, and no doubt with other hon. Members. From time to time, human nature being what it is, there will be disputes between neighbours about planning applications. Those disputes often concern who owns what. Arguments will be adduced that something cannot be done, because the person making the application does not own, for example, the hedge or the ditch concerned. I have no doubt that such issues have arisen in your Southend constituency, Mr. Amess.
Such cases may eventually end up with the ombudsman. The complaint will be that it was inappropriate to consider the application either because the papers submitted with the application showing the ownership of the site were wrong, or because the certificate confirming that the notice had been served on everyone who had an interest in the site was wrong. Reasons will be adduced for those complaints. There are occasions when it is almost impossible—sometimes wholly impossible—to give notice to a neighbouring owner, or to someone who might be involved in the site, because no one knows who that person is, or there may be no owner.
This issue exercises councillors, council officials, MPs, and ultimately the ombudsman. I am concerned that if this part of this clause stands without modification, it will now be argued that there is a requirement on the planning authority not to consider anything until every last doubt has been eliminated. This is another opportunity for neighbours who are trying to stop something that is perfectly permissible in planning terms from happening out of bad neighbourliness, or some other reason that has nothing to do with planning.
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A requirement to say that we must have all the evidence without a test of reasonableness makes the problem worse. It will ensure that councillors, officials, MPs et al will get more and more of this complaining—dare I say, whingeing—which has nothing to do with our objective of planning the future of this country. Even if the other amendments do not appeal to the Minister, I ask him to give serious thought to having some form of words that makes it clear that the local authority is entitled to apply a test of reasonableness and to say to these people who make these complaints about land ownership, ''We hear what you say. We understand that you are concerned, but the applicant has done everything that is reasonable to supply us with information.''
To go any further than reasonableness is not a planning consideration and will not make for good processing of applications. Indeed, it gets into the realm of the law on neighbour disputes. That is the context for amendment No. 356. The Minister may not like the way I have gone about it, but I urge him to consider the point. If he does not like these amendments, I ask him to suggest others to meet our legitimate and reasonable concerns, so that the Bill does not bung up the system and achieves the swifter, more efficient planning system that he says he wants.
Sir Paul Beresford (Mole Valley): I rise to support my hon. Friend the Member for Cotswold (Mr. Clifton-Brown) from a slightly different aspect to that raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Spelthorne. Anyone who has been on a planning committee for any length of time and has looked at the tactics of some of the planning officials will recognise the term ''jobsworth''. There is a great temptation for local authority officials to cover themselves by asking for what most of us would consider unreasonable details. They stymie any progress on an application without making a decision or bringing it to the committee or members to make that decision. I am not sure whether the word ''reasonably'' should be in its present position or earlier in the sentence. That would be down to the Minister. The Minister often tells us that he has been on a planning committee for 11 years. I am sure that he will understand the argument, and I hope he will consider these reasonable amendments reasonably.
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