Oral Answers to Questions — Peak Park Planning Board

– in the House of Commons at 12:00 am on 30 January 1991.

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Photo of Mr David Knox Mr David Knox , Staffordshire Moorlands 12:00, 30 January 1991

To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment whether he has any plans to introduce direct elections to the Peak park planning board.

Photo of Tony Baldry Tony Baldry Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Environment)

My right hon. Friend has no immediate plans to do so. However, the Countryside Commission is at present considering a wide-ranging review of national park policy and we shall consider its recommendations when they have been received.

Photo of Mr David Knox Mr David Knox , Staffordshire Moorlands

How does my hon. Friend justify the fact that the Peak park is one of only two areas in the country where planning decisions are taken by people who are not directly elected? Does he think that this is fair to people who live in the Peak park, as some of my constituents do?

Photo of Tony Baldry Tony Baldry Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department of Environment)

As my hon. Friend will know, in the 40th anniversary year of the legislation that created the national parks, my right hon. Friend the Member for Bath (Mr. Patten), who was then Secretary of State for the Environment, announced a wide-ranging review to consider the future policy and purposes of national parks. Clearly the matters referred to by my hon. Friend are within the terms of reference of that review, the report of which will appear shortly.