Clause 76 - Loss payments: exclusions
Planning and Compulsory Purchase Bill
3:45 pm
Mrs Barbara Roche (Minister of State, Office of the Deputy Prime Minister; Hornsey and Wood Green, Labour)
May I go on towards that? We have listed the notices in the clause. On the amendments tabled by the Opposition, the problem with serving a notice on the grounds that a property should be brought into residential use is that, however frustrating it may be to those of us who are anxious to provide decent homes for everyone, the law does not forbid people to own property that they choose to keep vacant. There are several perfectly legitimate reasons why they may choose to do that. I am sure that the hon. Member for Ludlow would agree. I shall give a few examples. Owners may plan to use the property themselves some time in future, the property may be entailed in some way, or there may be other problems such as probate or attempting to obtain planning permission for a change of use.