Clause 7 - Energy requirements of buildings
Sustainable and Secure Buildings Bill
9:30 am
Mr Brian White (North East Milton Keynes, Labour)
The Minister has gone some way towards alleviating my fears by clarifying, in his letter, the legal doubt, but one of my concerns is that the requirement in the letter to stick closely to the wording in the Merton plan may be unduly restrictive. I want to ask some questions, because we are in danger of missing another opportunity and having to return in two or three years' time to ask why we did not use it. The Government would be in difficulty because they had not used the opportunity. The Minister should reflect on the danger that removing the clause will mean another missed opportunity.
The Government will, through the sustainable communities plan, be doing an awful lot of work on housing development in the next few years. The Minister will know, representing a constituency in the same sub-region as mine, about the Milton Keynes and south midlands study. Shortly there will be an examination in public. Are the inspectors and regional planning guidance authorities being advised that taking into account the energy requirements of the new buildings is a valid way forward?
It is important, particularly in light of the number of local plans that are undergoing examination at the moment, and the examination in public of regional plans, that a message should come from the ODPM, to the inquiries and the people who are doing the work, that it is not only permissible but desirable to deal with the energy requirements. It is particularly important that that message should go to inspectors, because they sometimes take time to catch up with advances in Government policy.
Including the requirement in local plans is probably the cheapest way for the Government to achieve their objectives on fuel poverty, energy efficiency and matters such as the CHP target. All those could be achieved much more easily through the mechanism of local plans than by the interventionist model and going to the Treasury for money. The Government are in danger of costing themselves money later by not taking the present opportunity. Recently, in another Department, the head of a section who was talking about CHP did not know that it was a manifesto commitment, or that it was in the energy White Paper, and even asked, ''What is CHP going to do for energy efficiency?'' When that kind of comment is made by a civil servant, it makes for an ambience that affects people further down the line.
I agree with the hon. Member for Hazel Grove (Mr. Stunell) about the message that is going to local authorities. If local planners do not believe that something is a key requirement, they will not do it. It is important that the Minister not only states, in his letter, that the matter will be in PPS 22, but explains that the Government want to make progress with it.
We know that the approach works. In development corporations that have used it—and I cite Milton Keynes development corporation, which had its own energy rating system—it advanced tremendously the cause of energy efficiency in building new houses. The requirement in the local plan was very simple; there would be certain energy requirements. If that could happen in Milton Keynes 30 years ago, why can it not happen now? Local authorities should be encouraged to take that route.
The Minister's letter uses the words ''no undue burden'', but something else is important—a level playing field. What builders fear most, and a reason why things do not happen, is that those who want to do the right thing fear being undercut by the unscrupulous. The requirement that there be ''no undue burden'' is actually the Minister saying, ''We will go to the lowest level.'' That is what happens in reality. I ask the Minister to reflect on that, and to make it clear that the idea that there should be ''no undue burden'' is intended to mean not going to the lowest level, but aiming for the highest.