New Clause 30 - Access for disabled people
Planning and Compulsory Purchase (Re-committed) Bill
11:00 am
Mr Matthew Green (Ludlow, Liberal Democrat)
The new clause and group of amendments would give planning authorities a statutory duty to have special regard to the needs of disabled people when considering planning applications. There is a Government manifesto commitment to revise section 76 of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990 to do exactly that. The new clause and the amendments, many of which are supported by Conservative Members, have been tabled by a coalition consisting of the Disability Rights Commission, Radar, the Royal National Institute of the Blind, and the joint mobility unit at the RNIB and the Town and Country Planning Association, which
has given us the wording, and the briefing behind it. I hope that the Government will leap at the opportunity to meet their own manifesto commitment.
New clause 30 requires developers to submit an access statement with their planning application demonstrating how their scheme will be accessible and exclusive, and gives the planning authorities a statutory duty to have special regard to the needs of disabled people when considering planning applications. Amendment No. 132 requires regional spatial strategies to include details of how they will meet the access needs of disabled people.
Amendment. No. 147 would ensure that the regulations made provision for the steps to be taken by the regional planning body to ensure that the draft provision and appraisal under section 5 furthered the social inclusion and access needs of disabled people. Amendment. No. 173 requires local development plans in Wales to include details of how they will meet the access needs of disabled people. Amendment. No 148 requires local development schemes to specify how they will meet the access needs of disabled people, and amendment No. 172 requires the Welsh spatial plan to include details of the policies of the National Assembly for Wales for meeting the access needs of disabled people.
I could speak at length on this subject, not least because I have been provided with an extensive briefing. I hope that the Minister will accept the thrust of it, and I shall not have to quote the reasons why she should accept it. Not wanting to detain the Committee so that we can move on, and—I hope—get the Government's acceptance, I shall leave it at that.