Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)

My Lords, I will speak to Amendment 104, tabled by my noble friend Lord Banner, and to government Amendment 261. We are grateful for the Government’s engagement with my noble friend on this issue. These amendments would prevent planning permission from timing out as a result of protracted legal challenge and remove the perverse incentive for meritless claims designed simply to run down the clock. At present, judicial reviews, as we have heard, often outlast the three-year planning deadline, leaving permissions to time out, wasting money on repeat or dummy applications and discouraging serious investment. Stopping the clock during a judicial review would protect legitimate permissions, reduce waste and deter vexatious claims. It carries no real downside for the Government. The Government say that they agree with the policy intention. We welcome the Government’s move to address the concerns held on these Benches and their work with my noble friend Lord Banner on these issues. This is a question of proportionality and fairness in the planning system. If time is lost to litigation, that time should not count against the permission. Properly granted permissions should not be undone by process; it should be done by merit. Far from slowing down planning, this change would help to speed it up by reducing wasteful repeat applications, giving confidence to investors and allowing us to get on with building in the right places. Finally, I speak to the amendments tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Hunt. The ideas, the intentions and the thoughts processed behind these amendments are good ones, built on a sound principle. However, we do not believe that these amendments are practical. The proposed process would involve going straight to a hearing. In our view, the court would simply not have the necessary bandwidth. Nevertheless, we are sympathetic to the purpose of his amendments.