PARLIAMENTARY DEBATES - United Kingdom Parliament

1557 Easter Adjournment
26 MARCH 2013 Easter Adjournment
1558
worst repaired and worst maintained properties and in
the least regulated sector. Not all landlords are bad—some
are very good—but the lack of regulation means that
those who are bad can get away with it. We need
regulation of the letting agencies, registration and regulation
of all private rented accommodation and, in my view,
rent controls.
The housing benefit cap is acting as an agent for the
social cleansing of the poorest people on housing benefit
all over central London. They are being driven out of
their areas and driven out of London. For that reason,
we need not just to control housing benefit expenditure
but to control it by controlling the rent levels instead,
rather than forcing tenants out of their homes—
Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Lindsay Hoyle): Order. I call
John McDonnell.
5.18 pm
John McDonnell (Hayes and Harlington) (Lab): I
want to speak about the protection of the green belt in
Hillingdon. I have lived in my constituency and represented
it in various guises for nearly 40 years. From the earliest
days I shared a dream that we would surround our
largely industrial and urban area, which is encircled
with factory sites, offices, major motorways and airports
to north and south, with country parks and open spaces.
Decades on, we have succeeded, with new country
parks to the south, west and east and the regeneration
of our traditional parks and green-belt open spaces.
That has been a tremendous community achievement. I
have set up friends groups for each park and worked
with organisations such as the London wildlife trust, A
Rocha and Hillingdon natural history society to improve
and open up our open spaces.
One of our greatest achievements is the creation of
the award-winning Lake Farm country park. That land
next to Hayes town centre was owned by EMI, which in
the early 1990s sought to dig gravel from it and turn it
into a rubbish tip. I set up a friends group, mobilised the
local community and persuaded the council on a cross-party
basis not only to reject the planning application but to
buy the land to create a country park.
Ironically, it is the council that is now planning to
build on our country park. It proposes to build a threeform
entry primary school on the park, putting at risk
the natural habitats of the skylarks and other abundant
birdlife and wildlife on the site as well as taking away a
considerable portion of the park from public enjoyment.
That has caused uproar in our community.
The council argues that although the development is
contrary to local and national policies, and those of the
Mayor of London, on protecting the green belt, there
are exceptional circumstances because of the need for
additional school places and because there is no other
site for the new school in the area. The planning process
by which Hillingdon council reached that decision has
plumbed the depths of disgraceful, mendacious and, at
times, farcical local government incompetence.
Stephen Pound: I urge my hon. Friend to resist this
even more strongly that he is already inclined to. Were
he to enter London along the broad, majestic A40, he
would see the three mounds of Northarla fields, which
were achieved by Ealing council and the Northolt and
Greenford countryside park, influenced by, in admiration
of and in tribute to the work of his borough of Hillingdon.
John McDonnell: If this goes ahead, all green-belt
open space in west London will be vulnerable to attack.
On the demand for pupil places, it is only three years
since the council proposed closing and selling off a local
school because it was surplus to requirement. Then,
12 months ago, we were told that the projections for
pupil numbers had rocketed and new schools were
desperately needed. In particular, a three-form entry
school had to be built.
Bizarrely, the council has failed properly to take into
account a new four-form entry school being built, with
the enthusiastic support of the Secretary of State for
Education, at Guru Nanak college, which is in the same
ward. The overwhelming number of pupils applying for
places at the college have come from the local area, thus
freeing up places in local schools. The council has also
refused to take into account the request by a new
two-form entry school in the same wards to expand to
at least three, if not four, forms of entry. That would
obviate the need to build on our local park.
The council failed to search adequately for alternative
sites for the new school. Initially, it refused to release its
search site report to the general public, or to me, on
grounds of commercial confidentiality. When the report
was finally released, we discovered that the council was
rushing to sell off the most obvious alternative site to a
developer for housing. The council’s planning meeting,
where the council gave itself planning permission, descended
into farce, as petitioners were ignored, new figures were
presented to councillors on the night and it was revealed
by a Labour councillor and committee representatives
that the land in question is subject to a section 106
agreement from the 1990s, which the planning chair and
the officer seemed oblivious to.
Nevertheless, the planning application was sent off to
the Mayor, who we hope will adhere to his election
pledges to protect the green belt. I know that he has
stated his concern about school places being used as an
excuse to make incursions into the green belt in London.
Mr Andy Slaughter (Hammersmith) (Lab): I am afraid
that my hon. Friend is telling a familiar story. My local
Conservative-led council is in the process of selling off
a third of a public park in the most deprived part of my
constituency to a private owner, who will then charge
£90 an hour for people to play football there.
John McDonnell: I hope that the Minister and the
Department will monitor this in London. The Mayor
has raised his concerns. A pattern is emerging of excuses
relating to the number of pupil places needed. Alternative
sites that have been discussed, particularly brownfield
sites, are not being examined properly, and then the
issue is used as an excuse for incursions into the green
belt, sometimes for profiteering, as my hon. Friend
suggests.
My concern is that if the council gets permission for
a primary school, it will then roll out to a secondary
school, and then it will argue for housing on the site. We
will then lose the whole park, which is award-winning,
and which we achieved on a cross-party basis. The
planning application has gone to the Mayor, who we
hope will reject it or refer it back. However, this morning
I discovered that the council has withdrawn the application