Baroness Pinnock (LD)

My Lords, I thank the Minister for the careful consideration that she gave to my amendments during the Conference Recess. I have again listened carefully to what she had to say today and it appears that there is agreement across the House that pre-application engagement with affected communities is vital, but we disagree on how it should be achieved. The proposal in the Bill is to remove the statutory requirement for pre-application engagement. That leaves us with the good constructions engaging effectively and the poor constructions avoiding doing it well. The contention on our Benches is that all projects and constructions should engage well. The only way to achieve that is by making it a statutory requirement. The other point about removing a statutory requirement and having a set of principles by which it should be undertaken is that, if the amendment is not accepted, we will be left with engagement that is designed by the developers and often for the developers—not for the community, as it should be. As these issues are important for those of us who care deeply about hearing the voice of people and being able to engage early in a big application, while I shall not press my Amendments 9 to 11, I wish to test the opinion of the House on Amendment 12.