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19 Mar 2008 : Column 1211W—continued
Non-domestic Rates: Churches
Harry Cohen: To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government what her estimate is of the rateable value of all churches and other places of worship in England which are exempt from business rates. [194394]
John Healey: Valuation officers do not value properties that are exempt from rates.
Non-Domestic Rates: Crossrail
Mr. Stewart Jackson: To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government for how many years the supplementary business rate for Crossrail on London businesses will last. [194343]
John Healey: “Business rate supplements: a White Paper” makes clear that it will be for individual authorities, including the GLA, to decide how long their business rate supplements would last. The proposed duration will be one of the matters the GLA will need to cover in its plans which will be the basis for statutory consultation. The Mayor wrote to my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Transport setting out his thinking and I refer the hon. Member to the written statement made by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Transport on 26 November 2007, Official Report, columns 133-4WS.
Mr. Stewart Jackson: To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government which public authorities will bear the liability of any cost over-runs on the Crossrail scheme; and what liability London firms paying the supplementary business rate will have. [194345]
John Healey:
General questions on funding of Crossrail are a matter for my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Transport, and I refer the hon. Member to the written statement made by my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Transport on 26
November 2007, Official Report, columns 133-34WS, and the answer given by her to the hon. Member for Woking (Mr. Malins) on 30 October 2007, Official Report, column 1294W.
The liability of any businesses paying a business rate supplement, including businesses in London paying a supplement as part of the funding package for Crossrail, would not be able to exceed the national upper limit of 2p per pound of rateable value specified in “Business rate supplements: a White Paper”. The GLA and any other authority that wishes to levy a supplement, would, as the White Paper sets out, be required to set out the way in which it would deal with differences between planned and outrun expenditure as part of its statutory consultation on a proposed supplement.
Non-domestic Rates: Valuation
Mr. Pickles: To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government what her timetable is for the publication of valuation information arising from the revaluation undertaken for non-domestic rates calculation in 2010. [193961]
John Healey: Draft 2010 rateable values will be published in the autumn of 2009, with final valuations being published on 1 April 2010.
Ordnance Survey
Mr. Prisk: To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government (1) whether private companies were consulted on Ordnance Survey’s draft revised Public Task before it was approved; [193729]
(2) whether the (a) GI Panel and (b) Association for Geographic Information were consulted on Ordnance Survey’s draft revised Public Task before it was approved. [Official Report, 26 March 2008, Vol. 474, c. 2MC.] [193730]
Mr. Iain Wright: In April 2007, Ministers from the Department asked Ordnance Survey and the Shareholder Executive to work together to prepare a more precise articulation of Ordnance Survey’s Public Task, as set out in the Ordnance Survey Framework Document 2004. This work was undertaken between April and June 2007 in preparation for the publication of a revised Framework Document for Ordnance Survey.
As has been the case with the preparation of previous versions of the Ordnance Survey Framework Document, there were no external consultations on the Public Task, which fundamentally articulates that defined in such successive Ordnance Survey Framework Document since 1990, but in a more precise and comprehensive way.
Planning
Mr. Pickles: To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government what plans her Department has for independent assessment of national policy statements on planning. [194021]
John Healey:
The Government are committed to ensuring that national policy statements are subject to public consultation and parliamentary scrutiny before they are designated. It is for Parliament to determine the nature of the scrutiny process, however, we have
encouraged the House to set up arrangements which draw on the expertise of the four relevant departmental Select Committees for the purpose.
I am discussing this issue with the Leader of the House and the Chairs of the four Select Committees, with a view to developing recommendations which can be put to House in due course.
Planning Inspectorate
Mr. Andrew Smith: To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government if she will review the scope and powers of the Planning Inspectorate. [194805]
Mr. Iain Wright: The Planning Inspectorate was subject to an end to end review in 2003; the published report is available in the Library of the House. Since then, both the Barker and Eddington reviews have looked at the effectiveness of the planning system as a whole of which PINS forms an integral part. The Planning Bill currently progressing through Parliament draws on all of those earlier reviews in proposing enabling legislation to make the appeals system more proportionate, efficient and customer based.
Planning: EU Law
Mr. David Anderson: To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government whether national policy statements under the provision of the Planning Bill will be required to be assessed under the (a) EU Strategic Environmental Assessment Directive and (b) EU Habitats Directive; and if she will make a statement. [191872]
John Healey: All national policy statements will be subject to appraisal of the sustainability of the policies they contain. Some will also be required to be assessed under the regulations which transpose the EU Strategic Environmental Assessment Directive and the EU Habitats Directive. The Government will carry out assessments in all cases where they are required by the regulations, as part of the appraisal of sustainability.
Public Lavatories: Closures
Mr. Pickles: To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government how many municipal public conveniences have (a) closed and (b) commenced charging for use since 1997. [194026]
John Healey: The provision and maintenance of toilets in public places is at the discretion of local authorities who have, under section 87 of the Public Health Act 1936, a power to provide public conveniences, but no duty to do so. For this reason, the information requested is not centrally held by Communities and Local Government.
Recreation Spaces
Tom Levitt: To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government what proportion of town green applications remained undecided after (a) two and (b) five years on the latest date for which figures are available. [194854]
Jonathan Shaw: I have been asked to reply.
This information is not held centrally. However, a survey of commons registration authorities in England was undertaken in September 2007. Allowing for authorities which did not respond, we estimate that 14 applications made in 2003 and 79 applications made in 2006 had not been determined by the date of the survey.
Tom Levitt: To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government what the average time taken for processing a town green application was in the latest period for which figures are available. [194855]
Jonathan Shaw: I have been asked to reply.
This information is not held centrally. However, according to the findings of a survey of commons registration authorities in England, undertaken in September 2007, the average time for processing town and village green applications made under section 13(b) of the Commons Registration Act 1965 was 16 months.
Regeneration: Coastal Areas
Geraldine Smith: To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government what steps she is taking to encourage economic regeneration in coastal resorts. [194034]
John Healey: The Government’s Review of Sub National Economic Development and Regeneration (SNR) will help empower local authorities in coastal resorts and other areas to drive local prosperity, economic growth and regeneration. My Department will issue a consultation document on the SNR shortly. This will include a proposal for a new statutory duty on local authorities to carry out an economic assessment of their area, in consultation with local partners, and take account of their wider economic area. The assessment will also support the development of new integrated regional strategies.
The Regional Development Agencies (RDAs) have a key role to play in helping coastal areas in their regions to achieve their full economic potential, as part of wider regional strategies to deliver sustainable growth. The Homes and Communities Agency (HCA) through its regional presence will also support the delivery of sustainable regeneration and growth in coastal areas.
My Department is supporting the South East Economic Development Agency (SEEDA) in setting up an RDA-led Coastal Areas Network. This will play an important role in bringing together national, regional and local authority stakeholders to improve co-ordination and sharing best practice in delivering economic growth and regeneration in coastal towns. The first meeting of the Network is scheduled for May.
This Network complements a cross-government working group on coastal towns, led by my Department, which is promoting a co-ordinated approach to addressing issues affecting coastal towns, including economic regeneration.
Geraldine Smith: To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government what steps her Department is taking to encourage economic regeneration in coastal resorts. [194246]
John Healey: I refer my hon. Friend to the answer given today to question 194034.
Sustainable Development: Urban Areas
Mr. Stewart Jackson: To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government pursuant to the Answer to the hon. Member for Leicester East of 18 February 2008, Official Report, column 53W, on sustainable development: urban areas, when the first eco-town will be completed. [194368]
Caroline Flint: I refer the hon. Member to the answer I gave to the hon. Member for Brentwood and Ongar (Mr. Pickles) on 28 January 2008, Official Report, column 120W.
Temporary Accommodation: Tamworth
Mr. Jenkins: To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government how many households were housed in temporary accommodation by Tamworth Borough Council in each year since 1997. [187759]
Mr. Iain Wright: Information about local authorities’ actions under homelessness legislation is collected quarterly at local authority level. This information includes the number of households accepted by local authorities as eligible for assistance, unintentionally homeless and in priority need, and therefore owed a main homelessness duty. The duty owed to an accepted household is to secure suitable accommodation. If a settled home is not immediately available, the authority may secure temporary accommodation until a settled home becomes available.
Tables summarising homelessness figures for each local authority for the past 10 years, including the total number of households in temporary accommodation at the end of each year, have been placed in the House of Commons Library. An extract from the table is provided as follows and gives the number of households in temporary accommodation in Tamworth as at the end of each financial year, from 1997-08 to 2006-07:
| Table B: Number of house holds in temporary accommodation , March 1998 to March 2007 | |
| Tamworth | |
| (1)( )Denotes data not reported | |
The figures include those households who have been accepted as owed the main homelessness duty, those for which inquiries into whether they are owed the duty are pending and those who were found to be intentionally homeless but are being accommodated for a reasonable period by the LA. It excludes households designated as “homeless at home”, that have remained in their existing
accommodation and have the same rights to suitable alternative accommodation as those in accommodation arranged by the authority.
Data are also published in our quarterly statistical release on Statutory Homelessness, which includes a supplementary table showing the breakdown of key data, including temporary accommodation for each local authority. The supplementary tables are published on our website and placed in the Library each quarter. The latest release was published on 10 March 2008 and contains data for the period October to
Thames Gateway Development Corporation Planning Committee: Business Interests
Mr. Stewart Jackson: To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government whether members of the London Thames Gateway Development Corporation Planning Committee are required to (a) submit declarations of interests to a monitoring officer and (b) make a declaration of their political activity on taking up the post. [193364]
Caroline Flint: The London Thames Gateway Development Corporation Planning Committee currently consists of nine members. Seven of those members are members of the corporation board, appointed to the board by the Secretary of State. They were appointed to the planning committee by the chairman of the corporation.
Two members of the planning committee are not members of the board. They were appointed by the chairman of the board with the consent of the Secretary of State, following an appointment process involving advertising the position, shortlisting and interviews.
All members of the planning committee (board and non board) have to complete a corporation declaration of interest form and keep this updated. At each planning committee meeting members have to declare any interests.
All members of the planning committee (board and non board) have to comply with the corporations code of practice, which contains guidance on acceptable political activities. As part of the appointment process for non board members all applicants were required to complete a political activity questionnaire.
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