Samantha Dixon

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Dr Murrison. I thank the hon. Member for South Leicestershire (Alberto Costa) for securing the debate, his constituents for attending, and all hon. Members who have spoken. A number of hon. Members have raised concerns about the development of quarries and referred to specific planning applications in their constituencies. They will understand that I am unable to comment on specific cases, but I hope that the position I am about to set out will provide some reassurance. I recognise that proposals for new or extended quarries are often controversial and unpopular locally. Once permitted, minerals extraction at individual sites can often take place over very many years, so if it is not planned for and managed in an appropriate manner, communities living nearby can be faced with the impacts associated with the development for a long time. However, I want to reassure hon. Members that the planning system provides a robust framework to make sure that the impacts of minerals development are appropriately considered and addressed through both the plan-making and decision-making processes. Chapter 17 of the current NPPF sets out policies on facilitating the sustainable use of minerals to support that. In relation to plan making, the framework is clear that planning policy should “set out criteria or requirements to ensure that permitted and proposed operations do not have unacceptable adverse impacts on the natural and historic environment or human health, taking into account the cumulative effects of multiple impacts from individual sites and/or a number of sites in a locality.”