David Simmonds MP: speeches

Speeches

• 13 May 2025 · Planning and Infrastructure Bill (Sixth sitting) · Hansard source

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  May I press the Minister a little further? That is a really helpful answer in illuminating the Government’s thinking, but could he explain to the Committee how that will interact with the existing arrangements for planning performance agreements, which are very common in respect of larger-scale planning applications? Clearly, if a developer required to engage with all this wider statutory-consultee process is already entering into a voluntary agreement with the local authority to fund the process, there is a risk that that will have an impact. It risks either reducing the ability of the local authority, because that surcharge is effectively being taken by the Secretary of State, or increasing the cost base and therefore opening up the question whether the planning fees are reasonable in the first place.

• 13 May 2025 · Planning and Infrastructure Bill (Sixth sitting) · Hansard source

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  I know that my hon. Friend the Member for Hamble Valley wants to raise some points, but I want to ask a couple of slightly technical questions. The first relates to clause 44(6), on directions in relation to planning fees. The publication of a schedule of planning fees is part of the statutory council tax-fixing process, which every local authority is required to undertake. As we hear from our residents, that generally takes place in February and comes into effect at the start of the following financial year. If a local authority publishes its proposals, as the Minister described in respect of cost recovery, it needs to be confident that any change—in the form of a direction from the Secretary of State—will come in a timely manner that enables further consultation so that the lawful council tax fixing can occur. What provisions will be in place to ensure that any objection from the Secretary of State will come in a timely manner? My second slightly technical question is this. My experience of planning authorities is that there is huge variation in their cost bases. That partly reflects a shortage of staff, but it also reflects different local arrangements. An authority with large numbers of householder applications may use an outsourced service to process them at a relatively low cost. However, if senior, experienced, in-house planning officers are responsible for managing all planning applications, that will significantly increase the cost. Neither of those things is illegitimate; each is a manifestation of the democratic decision making of elected politicians about what is appropriate for their community. It would be helpful to understand what process the Secretary of State will go through in determining what a reasonable level of planning fees is. For example, will she consider the requirement for specialist input at a technical level because there is a significant amount of radon gas, which is found in certain challenging sites because of their topographical nature? Whether there is a requirement for remediation and specialist consultancy will be critical to a proper assessment of that planning application. Other local authorities may have development opportunities of a different nature. Will the Minister set out his thinking on that? That would be enormously helpful.

• 13 May 2025 · Planning and Infrastructure Bill (Sixth sitting) · Hansard source

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  I gently say to the Minister, who I look up to in many ways, that it is a challenge for the Committee to rely upon, on the one hand, an argument that this is not a big deal because it would affect hardly any planning applications, and on the other hand, an argument that it is so important we have to push it through via a national scheme of delegation. The concern that Members have is considering the 4% of applications that go to committee as a major problem, when in fact, by general acceptance in today’s debate, they are not really much of an issue. We lose the important element of local democratic accountability without any corresponding benefit in planning delivery.

• 13 May 2025 · Planning and Infrastructure Bill (Sixth sitting) · Hansard source

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  rose —

• 13 May 2025 · Planning and Infrastructure Bill (Sixth sitting) · Hansard source

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  It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Ms Jardine. The Opposition broadly understand the direction of travel that the Minister has set out and the principles underlying it are clearly quite sensible. Will the Minister give us a degree of assurance, particularly about the process for determining the circumstances in which the authorities that are listed and the circumstances that are listed may be set aside? That is significant because significant infrastructure developments are often close to heritage railway buildings and historic sites where there will be a legitimate expectation from both local authorities and residents that a proper consultation will be undertaken. We know that, in the past, the effect of that regime has been that in many cases developers, in places such as Royal Quay in my own constituency in Harefield, have chosen to put historic buildings back into use for a new purpose. For example, formerly industrial buildings connected with Victorian transport networks could be used for residential development, rather than simply demolishing and clearing the sites and losing that heritage asset in the process. It would be helpful to understand how we will ensure, through the regime as set out, that those considerations are fully taken into account. I appreciate that we will debate the green belt later on, but there is significant interaction in the Bill between the different types of regime that apply, and we have already had much debate about the green belt and the grey belt. I am aware that the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government yesterday issued a decision with respect to a site just north of London, and the effect of her determination is that any land on a transport corridor located between, for example, a motorway and a village, even if it is currently in the green belt, will be considered to be grey belt for the purposes of developability. That will clearly have a significant impact in similar situations in locations with a significant heritage element that are close to railways, motorways and other such transport networks that would potentially, from a developer point of view, benefit from swifter development without a consultation being undertaken. However, from the perspective of local residents and the wider community concerned about heritage and land use, they are losing the opportunity to have this.

• 13 May 2025 · Planning and Infrastructure Bill (Sixth sitting) · Hansard source

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  The Minister’s response has been excellent. Clearly, there will be a number of different arrangements at a local level. That should encourage us, as a Committee considering the legislation, to reflect a little further. In the example that the Minister talked about—the behaviour of local authorities—it may not be about those who have ill intentions. Some local authorities may have a planning and building control department—although the two regimes are separate, there is great commonality of skills—while others may have outsourced one or both those functions, or have them in-house but entirely separate. As part of the published council tax fixing, there is a requirement to set out a schedule of fees for building control. Some local authorities may choose to bundle that together, so when people put in a planning application, they pay for both; but others may do that separately. Some developers, including householders, may choose to purchase the building control privately, even though they could purchase it from the local authority. A lot of factors will determine what a reasonable cost base is. It would help if the Minister shared with the Committee some further thinking on how the Government might seek to establish a baseline, in particular in the light of potential challenges in the future by developers who feel that the level of cost at a particular spot is other than reasonable. I press the Minister a little on how that interacts with two further points that he made. Government new clause 39 refers to the power of the Secretary of State to implement a surcharge as a percentage of a planning fee that has been set. From what I understand of what the Minister said in his commentary, that will principally be to fund the work of the statutory consultees. Clearly, the imposition of a surcharge will then form part of the planning fees that have to be part of the statutory consultation on the legislatively fixed timetable that the local authority has to follow. How will the Government ensure that that timetable is respected, so that they themselves are not subject to the challenge?

• 13 May 2025 · Planning and Infrastructure Bill (Sixth sitting) · Hansard source

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  If we look at the statistics from the ONS on new household formation and the balance between that and the delivery of new homes, we see that they are reasonably in balance at the moment. We know that many people would like a bigger home or a different type of home, and that is why we have consistently argued that we need to focus on the nature of the homes we are delivering, not just on the units being delivered through the planning system. Members have consistently made the point about centralisation. The UK is already an exceptionally centralised country: we have fewer democratically elected politicians per head of population than most other developed democracies in the world. Our concern with these measures is that they further reduce the voice of a local resident through their democratic representative about a decision that may be the most significant thing affecting their home or their neighbourhood in their entire life. By creating a national scheme of delegations, we go beyond a point of saying that all local authorities must ensure, in the delivery of a quasi-judicial process, that they are following the law. We begin to say that this is no longer a delegation: it is compulsory. We are taking away the democratic power of the local authority, under which it delegates those decisions to planning committees and to officers, and we are deciding in Whitehall who will make those decisions. While I absolutely respect what the Minister is saying about expert planning officers, having served in the last Parliament as the chair of the all-party parliamentary group on housing and planning and worked very closely with the RTPI, I think we need to be realistic. In many cases, when the Minister says “expert planning officers”, we are talking about newly minted graduates who do not live in—and have no experience of—the local area. They arrive and undertake a desk-based exercise to make these decisions. They are not highly experienced people with a level of local insight who understand why particular aspects of design, materials, or the nature of a development will have a real impact on a neighbourhood. There are specific examples; one is applications by elected members themselves. I know from my time as a councillor in Hillingdon that a standard rule to ensure transparency is that any application by an elected councillor must be heard by a committee. If someone wishes to change the windows in their home, or build a loft extension, it has to go through a planning committee, even when those things are covered by permitted development rights. That was to ensure that level of transparency. It is not clear how such issues are dealt with through this proposed scheme of delegation. Matters of detail can be critical: ensuring the acceptance of a proposed development at a neighbourhood level may often come down to issues like overlooking or how it respects the privacy of neighbours. Does it have tree planting, to screen developments that people are unhappy to see? Will there be mitigations around noise? Those are not trivial matters; they have a huge impact on people’s quality of life. The ability of elected representatives to say, “This decision made, entirely in accordance with planning law, needs to be taken transparently in public so that these representations can be heard” is critical.

• 13 May 2025 · Planning and Infrastructure Bill (Sixth sitting) · Hansard source

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  Actually, the answer is both. We will all know of people’s experience with local authorities: they meet a planning officer to discuss a delegated planning decision and they receive advice, but when it is submitted, it is considered by a different planning officer who takes a completely different view. Given that that is how the vast bulk of planning applications are dealt with, if the Government’s aim is to bring consistency and certainty to the process—it is a laudable aim—it will be necessary to focus on the more than 90% of decisions that are already made under delegated powers, as well as this measure, which is for that small number considered by the planning committee.

• 13 May 2025 · Planning and Infrastructure Bill (Sixth sitting) · Hansard source

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• 13 May 2025 · Planning and Infrastructure Bill (Sixth sitting) · Hansard source

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  I am struck by the Minister’s point about the need for consistency. We will all be conscious of the level of inconsistency in delegated planning decisions, which make up around 95% of decisions on planning applications. Does he have a programme in mind to achieve the level of consistency for those decisions that this measure will bring to decisions made by democratically elected members?

• 13 May 2025 · Planning and Infrastructure Bill (Sixth sitting) · Hansard source

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  I will start where the hon. Member for Barking finished. We know that the planning system has delivered consents for 1.5 million new homes in England, where the development sector has failed to step up. One of the things much debated among political parties is the fact that that seems to suggest that, although there are undoubtedly issues, the planning system has been good at producing the opportunity for those new homes—the challenge has been the inability of the development sector to step up to the plate. That should be the priority to address. My hon. Friend the Member for Hamble Valley mentioned the Mayor of London’s recent decision about going into the green belt. That is in the context of a capital city that already has 300,000 unbuilt planning permissions for new homes. The Opposition’s argument is that the priority should not be increasing the stock of unbuilt planning permissions but delivering the homes that our country needs.

• 13 May 2025 · Planning and Infrastructure Bill (Fifth sitting) · Hansard source

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  Just to pick up the point made by my hon. Friend the shadow Minister—again, at the risk of placing officials in need of writing a letter—we can consider London, where we have Transport for London, Highways England and various other agencies or companies that manage the miles and stretches of those motorways. Very close to my constituency we have the M40/A4 motorway, which is literally the same road but transfers from being a Highways England road to a TfL road at the boundary of Greater London. There could be significant issues where, for example, local authorities that are responsible for neighbouring roads would need to be consulted, so I would be grateful if the Minister could clarify, particularly in respect of where we have TfL, red routes and things like that, all of which I think would be within the scope of the clause, that that has been fully considered so that we can ensure that we do not see unnecessary friction as a result.

• 13 May 2025 · Planning and Infrastructure Bill (Fifth sitting) · Hansard source

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  We are zeroing in on the issue that I seek to highlight. The statement in subsection (3) says that the clause does “not apply in relation to an application in respect of which a notice” has been made “before this section comes into force.” Early on in his remarks, the Minister referred to sections of the Neighbourhood Planning Act 2017 that have not come into force, eight years after they underwent scrutiny in a Committee like this one and Parliament passed them. This clause may not come into force for some considerable time after we debate it in Committee and the Bill becomes law—indeed, it may never come into force. If the previous legislation remains the relevant legislation for an extended period, or if a developer sees advantage in securing a permission now, under the previous legislation, before the new measures take its place, do we have an appropriate process for dealing with that?

• 13 May 2025 · Planning and Infrastructure Bill (Fifth sitting) · Hansard source

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  Broadly speaking, the Opposition support the intention set out in the clause. Improving the efficiency of such works is clearly a very logical step. Could the Minister say a little more about how the power will interact with the powers and duties that apply to statutory undertakers? I am thinking, for example, of where it is necessary to divert a gas main or water main, or other significant infrastructure, where there are already legal rights in place that can be used for that purpose. An issue we are all familiar with is the disruption caused to transport networks when major works are being undertaken. Will there be a process for ensuring a degree of co-ordination? Will there be a requirement or expectation for consultation so that, where a highways body wishes to undertake that work, it can possibly be co-ordinated with the work of other statutory undertakers involved in the same project, to minimise the disruption? Will there be an assurance that that process will provide for an appropriate level of compensation for the landowner whose land is being taken temporarily, as that often seems to be a source of dispute? This should not become a back-door way by which a highways agency, as the lead body, says, “We are going to take that at no recompense,” rather than going through a process of negotiation to achieve an agreed sum in respect of the loss of amenity to the owner of the land.

• 13 May 2025 · Planning and Infrastructure Bill (Fifth sitting) · Hansard source

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  I am just reflecting on my experience as a councillor in local government. There are often disputes. For example, the creation or designation of a red route clearway as a trunk road removes all parking along the length of that route and also affects things like bus services along it, so there are situations in which there may be a difference of opinion between a local authority, which is the current manager or administrator of the route, and a trunk road manager, who wishes to designate it as such for the benefit of an infrastructure project but clearly will not be subject to the consequences that that would have for bus routes, parking and other issues under the ambit of the local authority. I am just looking for clarity that there is a process by which those issues will be resolved and that there will be a relevant level of consultation, so that the kind of tensions that we saw around low traffic neighbourhoods with a dispute between Transport for London and a local authority about what was going on in a local area are not replicated.

• 13 May 2025 · Planning and Infrastructure Bill (Fifth sitting) · Hansard source

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  Throughout proceedings on the Bill, we have flagged up the important point that is highlighted by subsection (3), namely the lack of retrospective application. I would like the Minister’s response on a point that is of concern to the Opposition. There is always a risk that powers that are due to expire will be used and exploited in advance of new legislation coming in. What measures does the Minister have in mind to ensure that that does not turn into a problem?

• 13 May 2025 · Planning and Infrastructure Bill (Fifth sitting) · Hansard source

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  I want to press the Minister on the point raised by the hon. Member for Taunton and Wellington. On a visit to the London Fire Brigade I learnt that there is a particular set of risks associated with batteries—essentially, the difficulty of putting the fires out. In the grand scheme of things, batteries are not more serious than, for example, oil storage, but they require different equipment and differently trained and equipped crews to respond. Will the Minister say more about how, as batteries become a more significant part of the energy mix, he will ensure that fire brigades are able to take a view at the planning stage and are made aware of the risks—just in case they have to respond?

• 13 May 2025 · Planning and Infrastructure Bill (Fifth sitting) · Hansard source

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  The Minister has served on a planning Committee, and he will be aware of the challenges that arise where, for example, a historical permission is secured on which a developer subsequently seeks to rely. It is clear that the intention is, quite rightly, to remove those redundant clauses. The concern I am highlighting is that when permission rights have arisen under the clauses that have been made redundant and a developer later relies on them, we must ensure that the process is effectively managed.

• 13 May 2025 · Planning and Infrastructure Bill (Fifth sitting) · Hansard source

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  My great-grandfather spent his entire working life at the pit in Cwmcarn, which is now a forestry commission site. There is evidence of the coal that was dug for centuries on that site, which is now a place that is enjoyed for leisure by all. Broadly, I echo the comments about welcoming the clause. On page 35, line 20, the excluded types of fuel are listed, to determine what may be considered to be renewable. Waste to energy is not included; nor is the sustainable fuel mandate, which is currently focused on aviation fuel, but ultimately involves producing a gasoline product entirely from waste the purpose of which is to create energy. The fuel may go into aircraft, but it could be used for other purposes. The concept of waste to energy means, essentially, building an incinerator on forestry land to burn waste and generate electricity. By implication, that is something that the Government envisage as a result of that subsection. Could the Minister say more about that?

• 7 May 2025 · Havering Borough and Essex Devolution · Hansard source

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  My hon. Friend is making an excellent speech about a subject that is close to my constituents’ hearts as well. Does he agree that other Government institutions should follow the lead of Mr Speaker in flying, for example, the Middlesex flag on Middlesex Day to celebrate the heritage of my constituents, and that the heritage of Essex should be celebrated in a similar way? Will he also join me in encouraging the Prime Minister—or No. 10 Downing Street—to follow the example of his predecessor in flying both the Middlesex flag on Middlesex Day and the flags of the other historic counties on their relevant days in the coming months?

• 30 Apr 2025 · Point of Order · Hansard source

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  On a point of order, Madam Deputy Speaker. May I seek your guidance? My constituent, Ms Safiya Ismail is without an income because her pension credit application, which was made in July 2024, remains outstanding. I seek your guidance as to what further steps I can take to secure a response from the Department for Work and Pensions for my constituent. My diligent caseworker, Fatema Karim, has chased the matter on numerous occasions. We have been advised that it has been escalated to management, but as yet, no response has been received. Can you suggest any further steps I can take to place my concerns on behalf of my constituent on the record?

• 29 Apr 2025 · Planning and Infrastructure Bill (Fourth sitting) · Hansard source

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  I have a couple of questions. As my hon. Friend the Member for Hamble Valley has set out, we are broadly supportive of the direction of travel around energy in the Bill. One of the things we are all conscious of with the move to renewables being the main source of power in the grid—something that the UK has achieved faster than most other countries, with a bigger drop compared with the 1990 baseline than any other developed economy —is that it makes the grid more complex. Unlike oil, gas and nuclear, which can be delivered in an entirely predictable manner, renewables are generally much less predictable. There are times when the wind does not blow and the sun does not shine, and we cannot therefore put that element into the grid. We need to find alternative methods so we need to be able to shift greater amounts of power around to meet the growing energy needs. As the Minister has outlined, the regime that is envisaged will, for a limited period of time, give greater powers to the Government to determine who gets connected and in which order. First, will the Minister set out how he and the Government intend to feed back to Parliament what we learn from that process, to inform the future shape of our energy grid? Secondly, what recourse will there be for those at a certain point in the queue who anticipate that their development, whatever it may be, will be served by a particular project and connected at a particular point, if the Government decide otherwise because the reordering of the queue is, in the Minister’s view, necessary? We all understand why that may happen, but if someone is about to invest in a major new carbon capture and storage facility—the sort of major infrastructure project that the Bill is designed to support—and they expect it to be powered by a wind farm but are then told they have been moved much further down the queue than they expected, that will affect the delivery of that project. It would be helpful to understand the process whereby those affected by the reordering of the queue are able to challenge the decision, if necessary, and certainly to engage with the Government, or with constituency MPs, who may seek to advocate for them, so that the reordering can be revisited if necessary.

• 29 Apr 2025 · Planning and Infrastructure Bill (Fourth sitting) · Hansard source

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  We broadly support the content of clause 20, but I have one question for the Minister. I am mindful of his comments about the process of EU retained law, and it is absolutely right that we are looking to update that. However, a lot of the new powers set out for Scottish Ministers are the kind of thing that, in England, we would expect to be the subject of a pre-application consultation. One might ask the promoter of a project to come in and discuss those exact things with the local authority, the strategic planning authority if there is one, or the mayoral authority or the combined authority, so that the application process can be streamlined as much as possible. Earlier on, we said that we would amend legislation through the Bill to remove that process in England. Given the intention to effectively introduce a top-quality process for applications to be considered in Scotland, does the Minister agree that there is an element of contradiction in that, in the same piece of legislation, we are seeking to remove many of the equivalent processes in England?

• 29 Apr 2025 · Planning and Infrastructure Bill (Fourth sitting) · Hansard source

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  It is a pleasure to serve with you in the Chair this afternoon, Mr Twigg. We touched on the issue of remedy earlier today. A local authority, for example, may have a statutory obligation placed on it by a piece of legislation, which means that it has an obligation to take an interest in a particular development, including potentially judicially reviewing that application, if the impact runs contrary to its other statutory obligations. We are well aware of issues relating to air quality, but there are also organisations such as ClientEarth, which many of us will have heard of. Essentially, their stock in trade is to look for opportunities to address broader issues around, for example, climate change and environmental impact by using what, in some cases, are arguably loopholes, but in many cases, are essentially contradictions in legislation. The Minister talked earlier about a shift from having statutory pre-application processes to having guidance that would need to be followed. Clearly, one of the issues is that guidance can be challenged, and bodies that have a responsibility to follow the guidance can be challenged as to whether they have fulfilled their obligation to the letter. Opposition Members certainly have concerns about the implications of removing the right to judicial review. We share the view that we need to ensure that those processes—those applications—are not frivolous and that they are not being used simply because the cost of responding to judicial review, and the delay that is involved, is a tool to create delay, impose costs and therefore deter development, which we all agree should take place. Conversely, however, we do not wish to see a situation where a public body or a local resident—a constituent—who has a genuine right to be heard and a genuine concern arising out of law is constrained from bringing the matter forward and seeking a remedy. We also do not want a situation where, for example, a decision by Government, which is then taken through this process and restricted from judicial review, results in a third party, such as a local authority or NHS body, being judicially reviewed for its failure to stop that from proceeding—for its failure to bring a judicial review under other responsibilities that it has. I would be grateful if the Minister could address that. Statutory consultees already have many legal obligations and duties relating to issues such as water quality, air quality and nature. They are obliged to go to the utmost of their powers to fulfil those obligations. Clearly, they may well be held in default if a development proceeds by virtue of the fact that they have not had the opportunity to appropriately challenge it in law. It would be helpful if the Minister set out how that will be fully addressed.

• 29 Apr 2025 · Planning and Infrastructure Bill (Fourth sitting) · Hansard source

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  A general point arises here, which we also debated on the Renters’ Rights Bill Committee. The different systems in Wales, Scotland, Northern Ireland and England—most of the legislation we are dealing with here is for Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland—give rise to a risk of inconsistency. The shadow Minister spoke of the importance of community benefit. That is designed to secure community support. If there is a view that Ministers in Scotland might choose to spend such revenue on other things to the detriment of community benefit, that may also undermine consent. I completely agree with what the Minister is saying about creating the necessary power, but will he commit to further discussions with his colleagues in the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government so that we can ensure—not just in this Bill, but in future legislation—that where we expect a community benefit to derive from something that we decide on, it will be a consistent benefit across the UK?