Planning-gain Supplement (Preparations) Bill

Part of the debate – in a Public Bill Committee at 10:30 am on 30 January 2007.

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Photo of John Healey John Healey The Financial Secretary to the Treasury 10:30, 30 January 2007

It has been a useful preliminary discussion. As the hon. Member for Twickenham quite rightly observes, the big arguments are about the principle of the planning gain supplement, rather than on the Bill, which is he rightly described as extremely narrow.

I did indeed meet my hon. Friend the Member for Linlithgow and East Falkirk, together with a delegation that was led very ably by Willie Dunn, West Lothian Council’s lead cabinet member on economic development. They clearly have interests in the wider design and principle of the planning gain supplement, rather than in the provisions of this narrow paving Bill. I can assure my hon. Friend that, if the Government decide to go ahead with a planning gain supplement, we will announce that decision and then move towards legislating for it, and there will be ample opportunity, as there has been to date, for all those interested in and concerned about its precise provisions to have their say, to consult and influence the final decisions that we take.

I hope that we will not repeat the experience of interminable discussions that my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent, North had 20 years ago on the paving Bill for water privatisation. She makes an important point about Select Committee recommendations that are relevant to the concerns of a Public Bill Committee. I have not served with her on the Environmental Audit Committee, but I feel that I am familiar with its work and expertise, having appeared before it many times, and I look forward to doing so again tomorrow. The important point that she makes is one for the House to consider, as we move towards bedding down the new Public Bill process.

The hon. Member for Rayleigh and all the other members of the Committee should understand that the interest in a planning gain supplement is precisely as the hon. Member for Twickenham asserted: much less in the provisions of this paving Bill and much more in the feasibility, workability and desirability of a planning gain supplement.

Since Kate Barker first recommended that the Government look at a planning gain supplement in her report in March 2004, we have issued four consultation papers, published a summary of the responses to the main consultation, placed more than 700 responses to that consultation in the Library for public record. I have given evidence, together with my hon. Friend the Minister for Housing and Planning, to the Select Committee on Communities and Local Government,  and the Government have responded to the Select Committee’s very important and incisive inquiry into the planning gain supplement.

I think that hon. Members and others are much more interested in the substance of the proposal for a planning gain supplement than in this paving Bill. I hope that, as a Committee, we will be able to make that clear distinction in our deliberations and scrutiny of this one-page, three-clause Bill.