Clause 77 - Loss payments: supplementary
Planning and Compulsory Purchase Bill
4:00 pm
Mr Geoffrey Clifton-Brown (Cotswold, Conservative)
This is the first time in the Committee that I have been pleased to move off a clause, and it is certainly the last time I shall table amendments, even for friends on a friendly council, about which I have reservations. I shall be having words with them. Had I realised that the amendments would provoke such a debate, I would not have tabled them.
The claimant will have gone through the whole of the compulsory purchase procedure, as detailed in new section 33A(4)(d) and (e). Compensation will have been agreed. The whole process will have been gone through and may have gone to the Lands Tribunal. Anybody who has been involved with such a case knows that that can take a considerable time. The amendment deals with new section 33I. Under subsection (2)(b), another three months would be added to the considerable time, and that happens when there is a shortfall in the advance payment. The matter may have gone through the long procedure of notices, counter-notices and objections, the Secretary of State may have confirmed the compulsory purchase order and the case may have gone to the Lands Tribunal. Under the amendment, once the shortfall in the advance payment has been established it should be paid within 21 days. That is entirely reasonable. Under amendment No. 443, interest should be paid at the end of the month. These are two straightforward amendments, so I hope that the Minister will accept them.