Gideon Amos
MP for Taunton and Wellington · Liberal Democrat · United Kingdom
“(2) A report under this section must assess the merits of a social housing levy scheme that would— (a) enable local authorities either to disapply small business rates relief or apply a local levy with respect to properties that are— (i) used wholly or mainly as self-catering holiday accommodation, and (ii) suitable for occupation as a pe…”
House of Commons29 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“It is gracious of the Opposition spokesperson to consent to those nurses staying in their homes, but apparently when we invite nurses in future to come to Taunton and Wellington and elsewhere in the country, we will tell them, “You must work for the NHS and you must pay your taxes, but if you need affordable housing, you cannot have it.”
House of Commons29 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“If the Government are serious about the housing crisis, they should have no objection to setting a target of this kind. In our manifesto, we set an allocation of £6 billion a year towards that achievement. I appreciate that it would take a number of years to reach 150,000.”
House of Commons29 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I appreciate the Minister’s correct analysis that there is a balance to be struck with individual sites, and I accept that. There is a direct link between the standard method and the loss of social housing.”
House of Commons29 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The hon. Lady makes some excellent points about measures that we have supported; Awaab’s law is one of them, as is the Renters’ Rights Act 2025. We certainly welcome the new standards to which tenants will have access.”
House of Commons29 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“(4) For the purposes of this section, a ‘not-for-profit community-led housing organisation’ means— (a) a Community Land Trust; (b) a Community Benefit Society established for the purpose of providing housing; (c) a housing co-operative; (d) a charitable housing trust; or (e) any other body prescribed by regulations which— (i) operates on…”
House of Commons29 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
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“The hedges and habitats that James maintained for years under previous schemes will likely have to be ripped up just for his farm to remain viable and profitable. Tom Pope of Staple Farm said: “With no replacement scheme we will be forced to consider ploughing up some of our environmental areas…to return them to arable production. Some of these areas have a huge variety of wild flowers and provide a brilliant habitat for insects and birds. It will break our hearts”. Somerset is one of the hardest hit areas for bluetongue, with 156 confirmed cases.”
House of Commons21 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The first case is that of James Hebditch of Lillesdon Court. He is not a last-minute farmer—his fields have been registered with the Rural Payments Agency for years—yet on 22 September, a glitch on the Government portal suddenly rejected one of his fields. He was faced with an impossible choice: apply without it or try to amend and resubmit his application. By the time that he could navigate the error that the portal had made, the whole thing had closed and his entire application was lost. He was caught out by the Government’s own system on land that the RPA already had on its books. When farmers are fighting a failing portal, they do not have time to sit on hold for hours. The consequences of that failure are devastating.”
House of Commons21 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Farmers in Taunton and Wellington have been hit incredibly hard by this debacle. For residents, farmers and visitors to my part of Somerset alike, the hedges, field margins and wildflower meadows funded by the sustainable farming incentive are the very fabric of the countryside that we know and love, from the Quantocks to the Blackdown hills and across my constituency. Yet all of that has been put under threat simply because of a badly mismanaged system that this Government could and should fix. I met local farmers out on the levels in my constituency the week before last. I want to thank them for the work that they do 365 days a year, putting food on our tables, caring for our countryside and bringing employment to our rural areas. Let me relate just two of the cases that they raised.”
House of Commons21 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Does the hon. Gentleman agree that colleges need more support to develop those engineering courses? At present, they receive no funding at all to develop a new course, as university colleges in Somerset have found when catering for the new Agratas factory. They have to find their own investment to develop courses and they receive no funding until those courses have actually started. Surely that hampers innovation, new training and new skills being developed.”
House of Commons20 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I welcome and congratulate the Government on their backing the Agratas factory with £380 million. They now need to grab the opportunity with both hands, and provide the support and certainty on skills to turn it into a real success.”
House of Commons20 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The Liberal Democrats have called for apprentices to be paid at least the national minimum wage, and for lifelong skills grants so that adults can retrain for new industries. I have four asks for the Minister. First, when the Government say that they are “supporting” the work of UCS with Agratas, does that support cover the up-front cost of developing innovative courses? Secondly, will the Government make sure that colleges can set up apprenticeships and skills training in advance of factories being built? Thirdly, does the Minister agree that colleges should be able to forward-fund student accommodation to deliver much-needed housing? Finally, will the Minister meet me and UCS College Group to discuss those points? For Taunton and Wellington, and for the whole south-west, the opportunity is right in front of us.”
House of Commons20 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“We cannot expect colleges to shoulder all the risk of investments and initiatives while the Government take credit only for the positive outcomes. This issue is not just about specialist manufacturing skills; building sites such as the Agratas facility requires an enormous amount of construction skills and labour. Figures from Agratas show that in the peak year of activity, the building of the first factory will support more than 3,000 jobs in the south-west, which is equivalent to around a fifth of all construction jobs in Somerset. That comes on top of Hinkley Point C, which is close to my constituency and also needs many workers skilled in the same area. If we are serious about boosting regional growth through specialist manufacturing, we need to be equally serious about training the people who will build and work in such facilities.”
House of Commons20 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“A college that is developing a curriculum and hiring specialist trainers in a completely new industry will receive funding from the Government or other sources only once the course starts, and, as a further education college, it is not allowed to borrow against potential future funding. The current FE model simply does not support the up-front investment that is required, and specialist skills will suffer as a result. Colleges are also no longer allowed to borrow to invest in the student accommodation that they need, even though doing so would generate income, help to regenerate towns and deliver housing—a priority of this Government—in a particular sector to relieve pressure on local family housing.”
House of Commons20 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“In April, they announced a £380 million grant for the factory itself, and UCS was named a clean energy technical excellence college. Last year, I called on Skills England to invest in partnerships that deliver rather than just producing consultation papers that plan and devise. In March—in just three months—it produced a battery manufacturing apprenticeship unit. That is fantastic progress, but there is a great deal still to do. The first pilot course this summer trained nine Agratas staff, but around 1,600 people will be needed just to start battery cell production. In a written answer the Government gave last month, they said that they are “supporting University College Somerset’s work with Agratas.” I welcome that, but I am afraid that the basic problem I raised last year has not gone away.”
House of Commons20 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“In this Chamber last November, I raised the work of University Centre Somerset College Group, which is based at different campuses, not only in my Taunton and Wellington constituency but across Somerset. It is the largest college provider of apprenticeships in England. UCS has had to develop a first-of-its-kind programme to meet demand that barely existed just a couple of years ago, when battery manufacturing was barely a mainstream concept in the UK. It is not an easy task, but it is exactly the kind of innovation required to build a skills base that can support the new specialist manufacturing sectors that we need, such as battery production. To the Government’s credit, some things have moved on since then, and I genuinely welcome them.”
House of Commons20 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“It is a pleasure to serve with you in the Chair, Sir Christopher. I congratulate the hon. Member for Isle of Wight West (Richard Quigley) on securing the debate and shining a light on this really important part of our economy, both locally and nationally. Specialist manufacturing is critical to my constituency, as well as to growth across the United Kingdom. The Agratas factory being constructed just outside my constituency will employ 4,000 people and have a huge impact on the whole south-west economy. Many of my constituents work there already, and many local suppliers are involved in the supply chain, so the regional economy will be very positively affected. That is what specialist manufacturing can do for regional economies, but only if we get the skills right to support the sector.”
House of Commons20 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“My hon. Friend is making a typically excellent and cogent argument for stronger community benefit from these projects. Does he agree that a cousin of pump storage technology is tidal range energy? The west of England has the second highest tidal range in the world, and it will be a missed opportunity if we do not exploit tidal range energy, just as it will be if we do not develop the community benefit programmes that he proposes.”
House of Commons20 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I thank those in Taunton and Wellington who signed the petition. In addition to the review of sentencing guidelines for which my hon. Friend has advocated, and which I very much support, does she agree that, in respect of Paris’s law, which I also support, prevention needs to be tackled through greater perpetrator programmes, so that individuals are targeted and coercive and controlling behaviour can be stopped at its root as much as possible?”
House of Commons19 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Other than that, we stand in support of the regulations.”
House of Commons19 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“In regard to the social housing regulations, has consideration been given to extending the hazards to encompass overcrowding? I was pleased to campaign over a number of years in different roles to restore minimum space standards in housing; when I trained as an architect many decades ago, those were a requirement, until the Thatcher Government swept them away and we ended up with the second smallest homes in Europe. I was delighted that we campaigned for that cross party and that Liberal Democrat Minister Don Foster brought in nationally prescribed space standards. However, there is not much point in having space standards if the homes themselves are completely overcrowded. We are therefore interested to hear from the Minister whether consideration has been given to including overcrowding in the hazards in these or future regulations.”
House of Commons19 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“It is a pleasure to serve on the Committee with you in the Chair, Sir Desmond. I draw the Committee’s attention to my entry in the Register of Member’s Financial Interests—I am a social landlord. The Liberal Democrats support and recognise the work that has been done on Awaab’s law and its passing in the Renters’ Rights Act 2025, which we supported as a major step forward. We therefore welcome the draft regulations to extend the hazards in the definition. I agree entirely with the hon. Member for North West Cambridgeshire, who made a good speech on the efficacy of Awaab’s law. My constituents have also found it useful in securing action on matters such as damp and mould and so forth. The electrical regulations appear to be a tidying-up exercise. I do not have any further comments, and we are happy to support them.”
House of Commons19 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“A dozen farmers I was with out on the levels last week from North Curry, Stoke St Gregory and the surrounding areas were visibly shaken by the economic impacts that they are facing and the price of diesel. This latest debacle has been disastrous for farmers. They are considering ripping out the trees and margins that were planted under previous funding initiatives because they simply will not be able to continue without funding being provided under this initiative, which seems to have only gone to around 10% to 12% of farms in the country. Can the Minister tell me what he would have me say to those farmers about the loss of the wildlife that they have already put in?”
House of Commons15 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I am extremely grateful to my hon. Friend for being generous with his time. Will he join me in congratulating the veterans of the Taunton and Wellington branches of the Royal British Legion, who have been campaigning on this issue with me and have secured a commitment from my colleagues on Somerset council to review benefits so that all military service compensation is disregarded as income?”
House of Commons14 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“I am extremely grateful to the Minister for throwing the kitchen sink at the problem, including court repairs. We wish to see those repairs make progress at Taunton Crown court. The Minister was good enough to write to me at the beginning of the summer to explain that the court, which has been closed since 2023, will be closed for longer. Will she contact me to give us an update on when Taunton Crown court will finally be reopened?”
House of Commons13 October 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Finally, will the Government confirm that the remediation Bill will provide for cladding manufacturers to be pursued for their share of the costs of remediation, which they have at least partly caused? We welcomed the legally enforceable duty to remediate on pain of criminal sanction, and we still do, but a duty to remediate is only as good as the standard against which it is measured. Commercial interest should have no place in policing commercial projects for safety and building regulations. Residents in Taunton and Wellington, in London and across the country deserve nothing less. Above all, the victims of the terrible and avoidable disaster at Grenfell deserve justice.”
House of Commons15 September 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Will she make it clear that a building that has been found to fail the building regulations that were in force when it was built must be remediated back to the building regulations standard, and that the work needed to reach a low-risk outcome should be done once, not deferred to some future refurbishment? Will leaseholder protections be extended to every leaseholder in every defective building, including the hundreds of thousands excluded from the building safety regime? Will the Government commit to driving profit-making commercial interest out of every part of building control inspections and official product testing certifications, and to making physical inspections the norm once again in every development? What more will the Government do to end delays at the Building Safety Regulator?”
House of Commons15 September 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The fault was not theirs. Solicitors’ searches would have shown that buildings had not met building regulations. Homeowners were misled, and it was not their fault. They should not have to pay a penny towards that work. That is why my noble Friend Baroness Pinnock’s Leaseholder Remediation (Building Safety) Bill, which had its Second Reading in the other place on Friday, would protect leaseholders in buildings of any height and would put developers, contractors and manufacturers on the hook for the cost. In conclusion, I ask the Minister six things. Will she set out the changes between the consultation draft and the recent version of PAS 9980, which was published the other day?”
House of Commons15 September 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Meanwhile, leaseholders continue to struggle under the cladding crisis, buying properties that they believed met safety standards but that they now realise do not, and are suffering huge increases in premiums and so on. Many developers and building owners have passed on the cost of remediation work to tenants and leaseholders, putting many of them, quite unfairly, in serious financial peril. The Liberal Democrats, following the policy passed by our conference last year on the great property rip-off, are therefore calling for the removal of all such flammable cladding, whether above or below 11 metres, as soon as possible and without tenants or leaseholders, including non-qualifying leaseholders, having to pay. After all, those who bought leases placed their trust in the private companies and regulatory bodies that let them down.”
House of Commons15 September 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Can the Minister confirm whether the newly published standard requires all the work needed to reach a low-risk outcome to be undertaken at the same time? These are not technical quibbles. The Department’s own figures, published in August, show that of the 4,600 buildings being monitored, only 1,800 have completed remediation, and over 2,000 of the 4,600 required remediations have not even been started, meaning. That means that in 46% of buildings with unsafe cladding no work has begun—nine years on from Grenfell, as other Members have pointed out—and the Department estimates that somewhere between 1,100 and 2,600 more buildings are in scope but have not yet been identified.”
House of Commons15 September 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“For too many, it also renders useless the leaseholder protections in the Building Safety Act, as they apply to unsafe cladding, and this cladding is not considered unsafe. If components are found to pose a tolerable risk, are they unsafe? Why should they not be removed to reduce the risk to low? We have heard about the challenge of getting insurance; if buildings were remediated to the standard to which they should have been built in the first place and all flammable materials were removed, residents would not have any problem in getting insurance. Developers cannot be asked to come back to finish the job under those circumstances, because the developer remediation contract only requires a building to be brought up to the “tolerable” standard.”
House of Commons15 September 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Where an appraisal finds a tolerable risk, the draft allows for the work that is needed to bring that risk down to low to be delayed. The commentary on clause 7 suggests “recommending upgrading the performance of external wall components if/when there is any refurbishment of the external walls in future.” If and when is not good enough for families who have to live in unsafe homes and with the knowledge that their external walls contain flammable material, sometimes including materials that are more flammable than that used on Grenfell Tower. The leaseholder pays for that wait in insurance premiums, mortgage difficulties and living in a building that is only partially safe.”
House of Commons15 September 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“After what we have heard from Sir Martin Moore-Bick and the panel in the Grenfell public inquiry report, any notion that the profit motive has a continuing role in building inspection following those tragic events is unacceptable and cannot be sustained. I am disappointed that the building control independent panel has recommended the continuation of private sector, and therefore profit-seeking, roles in building inspection. That is what got us into this mess; it will not get us out of it. The Liberal Democrats are calling for building control services to be in-house in local or regional authorities, or otherwise not for profit. As we have heard, the second deficiency in PAS 9980 is the gap between “tolerable” and “low”.”
House of Commons15 September 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The remediation regime should require the same standard that developers should have met when constructing the building, and that others were, and continue to be, required to meet when constructing buildings. What is remediation for if not to make buildings meet the standards they should always have met? Frankly, what is the point of having building regulations for leaseholders in this position if they are not enforced in such clear circumstances? Can the Minister reassure leaseholders that the newly published standard requires the remediation of failures to comply with the building regulations that were in force at the time of construction? Such questions also point to worrying failures to enforce building regulations more generally, far beyond fire safety, which could lead to an unfolding tide of undiscovered construction failings.”
House of Commons15 September 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The final version of that document has only just been published, but the draft that went out to consultation should worry us and every leaseholder in the country, and we need to know whether its deficiencies have been fixed. First, it says: “Failure of a building to meet the benchmarks given in building regulations...at the time when the building was built, should not be used as the sole basis for determining the outcome of the FRAEW.” That means that a building can still pass the PAS 9980 test even if it is proven not to have complied with the building regulations in force when it was built. The fire safety order manages fire safety in occupied buildings on the assumption that they met the building regulations when they were built.”
House of Commons15 September 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“On building inspectors, it said: “We have concluded that the conflict between the regulatory function of building control and the pressures of commercial interests prevents a system of that kind from effectively serving the public interest.” Similarly, it said that the Building Research Establishment “sacrificed rigorous application of principle to its commercial interests.” I will return to commercial interests shortly. The remediation Bill announced in the King’s Speech is expected to make it a legal requirement that every fire risk appraisal of external walls be carried out according to the publicly available specification, or PAS 9980, standard produced by the British Standards Institution. That document decides whether, by law, a leaseholder’s building requires remediation or is considered safe.”
House of Commons15 September 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Dr Murrison. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Surrey Heath (Dr Pinkerton) on securing today’s important debate and setting out the issue so clearly. I also congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Woking (Mr Forster) on all the hard work he is doing to deal with the Halloween horror of panels falling in the town centre. I pay tribute to the 72 victims of the Grenfell disaster. No debate should pass without recognising how grotesquely they were failed by the systems that were meant to protect them. Let us not forget what the public inquiry panel, chaired by the judge Sir Martin Moore-Bick, said in its epic report on the disaster.”
House of Commons15 September 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“If people are to accept the homes that we need—and we do need them—they must have confidence in the protection for the bits of green space that are most precious to them and most dear to those communities, as our amendment to the Planning and Infrastructure Act 2025 set out. We were promised that the grey belt would turn old petrol stations into homes, but what it is actually delivering is the loss of green field after green field, as decided by the Government’s policy issued in Whitehall. It is time to scrap it and put communities back in charge of their green belt and their green spaces.”
House of Commons15 September 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“First, we should scrap the grey belt and instead release green-belt land through community-led local plans, with the golden rules applying in full and with social homes at their heart. Secondly, we should keep the long-standing exception for previously developed land, and make brownfield-first a legal requirement. Thirdly, we should give communities who review their green belt 20 years’ statutory protection for the green wedges and green belt that they prioritise. That would give them confidence that, instead of a free-for-all, their most precious green spaces will be protected in law for the long term.”
House of Commons15 September 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“That is something that, in my opinion, made it more valuable not less. An application for 125 homes quickly followed, because the council, like most in England, cannot meet its new five-year land supply. Our councillors rightly refused the application. Fortunately, it was under the 150 homes limit, above which councillors must now ask Whitehall’s permission to refuse a development. The appeals public inquiry has just begun showing how thin green wedge protection is. The green belt, green wedges and local green spaces can all be weakened by the next rewriting of the framework, without this House having a vote. In the Liberal Democrats’ view, all communities—not just those in the green belt—should have a stronger and longer-lasting way to protect their most precious green spaces. What should we do instead?”
House of Commons15 September 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Building the kind of homes that villages lack just got harder. We do agree on the golden rules, which rightly require more affordable and social housing where green-belt land is released. That is absolutely right, but it does not mean that valuable green spaces should be up for grabs. Ironically, an area with no green belt can be better protected from some of these policies, but that does not mean that our green spaces in Taunton and Wellington are safe. In Taunton, we have green wedges—countryside running right into the town and doing the job that the green belt does elsewhere—but those spaces have only local policy protection. Earlier this year, consultants recommended releasing Trull green wedge from its green wedge status, ironically because it was the last bit of green remaining in a built-up area.”
House of Commons15 September 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The Government, however, have now told every landowner around villages and elsewhere that their acre could be worth not just £12,000 but anything from £150,000 to £3 million—the price of land with residential permission—because those strict planning policy preventions no longer apply, and because anyone can apply for it to be developed as grey belt anywhere in the green belt. If a landowner is told that their field might be grey belt, why would they sell it for £12,000 for social housing, when they could get £150,000 or more? It would definitely be more in the home counties and near London. Hope value has always been the enemy of exception sites, and the way that the grey belt has been implemented has created hope value around every village and green belt—so goodbye to social housing on such exception sites.”
House of Commons15 September 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Villages are hit hardest, not just because they have lost their green-belt protection but because for many, if not all, the new targets have undermined the one thing that has reliably delivered affordable homes for local people in rural areas: rural exception sites. Last week, I brought to the House an example from an inspector’s decision in Gweek, Cornwall. The Minister told us in July that the framework makes exception sites easier. In reality, exception sites work where agricultural land that is worth, say, £12,000 an acre cannot be sold for a higher price for commercial housing due to strict planning rules, so it might as well be allowed to be sold for agricultural value, or a little more, for social housing that helps the village.”
House of Commons15 September 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The targets are derived from the Government’s new standard method, which has in one fell swoop thrown much of England under the threat of development, as the majority of councils cannot meet such impossible targets under the new standard method. It would take them the two-year local plan process to escape that threat, and millions of pounds to boot. This could be called a developer’s charter but, unfortunately, many of these sites are not being developed, so it is more of a land speculator’s charter. Developers, not the community, end up selecting which part of the green belt is up for grabs.”
House of Commons15 September 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Redeveloping previously developed land in the green belt has been allowed since 2012, if not longer, as long as it does not harm openness more than the development previously there. What grey belt adds is the field next to it, and it is decided at appeal, rather than through the local plan—that is, rather than by the local community. That is another instance where community powers have been stripped away in what the Town and Country Planning Association has called an “unprecedently permissive” planning regime. This policy comes into play where there is unmet need—in practice, where a council cannot show a five-year land supply. In Somerset, the Government are mandating that another 75,000 homes—a 41% increase—should be found in the next local plan. I have not met anyone who believes that is realistic or achievable.”
House of Commons15 September 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“On the same day, the Minister confirmed that the Government do not collect data on how much land councils have identified as grey belt. Will the Minister commit to collecting that? My hon. Friend the Member for Harpenden and Berkhamsted (Victoria Collins) asked for that last October. The new national planning policy framework requires every green-belt council to plan for grey-belt releases, allocated in its local plan. But since the Government’s grey-belt rules allow any developer to apply for grey-belt development on any site, whether or not it has been allocated as grey belt in the local plan, there can be little point in pretending that the local plan approach is the only one, or that grey-belt development is, in any sense, being plan led. Developers do not need a grey-belt policy to redevelop an old petrol station in any event.”
House of Commons15 September 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“It omits to protect two of the green belt’s five purposes—safeguarding the countryside from encroachment and recycling derelict land. Because the purposes that are left do not apply to villages, it has also removed villages from the green-belt protections that they have had for more than a century, so a field on the edge of a green-belt village is very likely to be grey belt. Developers know it and are trying their luck. On 7 September, the Secretary of State told the House that she is “strengthening and clarifying the rules around the release of grey belt”. —[ Official Report , 7 September 2026; Vol. 790, c. 643.] If there is no confusion, what is being clarified? The answer so far has been to take the test for protected landscapes out of the definition altogether. That widens the grey belt rather than tightening it.”
House of Commons15 September 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“It is being abused, giving carte blanche to development pretty much anywhere and, as it is currently set out in the national planning policy framework, it has to go. We were told that “grey belt” meant disused car parks and old petrol stations, but the CPRE has found that, in the first year, 88% of homes approved on the grey belt at appeal were on land that had never been built on, as the right hon. and learned Member for Kenilworth and Southam also pointed out. In this Chamber in July, the Minister told us: “The definition of grey belt is set out in the glossary of the NPPF.” —[ Official Report, 16 July 2026; Vol. 789, c. 466WH.] There is a definition there, but for me it has more holes than a Swiss cheese.”
House of Commons15 September 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The Liberal Democrats want to see more homes built, principally the 150,000 council and social rent homes that the country needs, but the right way to deliver those homes is by working with communities and trusting them, and prioritising brownfield sites, the 700,000 empty homes in the country, and the 500,000 homes that could be provided in empty commercial buildings, according to the London School of Economics. When it comes to the green belt, few of us, and certainly not the Liberal Democrats, would object to a community deciding, through its democratic local plan, to release formerly green-belt land for its own reasons, and particularly for social homes. But the Government’s grey-belt policy is not that.”
House of Commons15 September 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“It is a pleasure to serve under you in the Chair, Dame Siobhain. I thank the right hon. and learned Member for Kenilworth and Southam (Sir Jeremy Wright) for bringing to the House an important debate on an issue that affects a lot of our constituencies. I also thank all the Members who contributed today, including my hon. Friend the Member for Woking (Mr Forster)—indeed, I thank him for contributing in this Chamber for the second time today.”
House of Commons15 September 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The Minister is always generous with his time and in responding to interventions, which is appreciated by all of us. If the intention is that this should be a plan-led approach, will he remove the provisions in the NPPF that allow developers to claim that their land is grey belt through an application by reference to the policies that have been put in the NPPF for such grey belt decisions to be made outside of the local plan process through individual planning applications?”
House of Commons15 September 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The Ministry of Justice will be able to deliver its rapid deployment cells building programme more quickly if it completes other programmes. Taunton Crown court has been closed since 2023, and the closure has just been extended. In March, I received a letter saying that the long-promised opening date in July was now cancelled, and that in due course I would receive an update. I have not received any update. Victims and jurors are having to travel extra tens of miles—30 or 40 miles—without public transport, which is a real burden on them. An exacerbating issue is the fact that jury recompense has not been updated since 2010. Will the Minister look into this issue, and also address jury recompense?”
House of Commons15 September 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Few of us, and certainly not the Liberal Democrats, would object to local communities deciding that underused green belt land is degraded and could be released for development. But this policy overrides that local plan process, and disapplies protections against encroachment on the countryside, removing villages from the green-belt protections that they have had for decades and generations.”
House of Commons16 July 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“Friend the Member for Wells and Mendip Hills put across very well, the 75,000 new dwellings will come as a surprise in terms of population growth compared with what has ever been achieved in the past. Urban areas where regeneration is needed have seen their targets reduced. The second element driving development in rural green fields is green belt policy GB7. In short, that means that a developer can secure consent anywhere in the green belt, regardless of what the local plan says, on condition that it is near a town with a railway station. Ironically, an area with no green belt might be better protected because it is not subject to those policies to allow development around railway stations. The third and final part of the policy that leads to this greenfield development is GB2 for the grey belt.”
House of Commons16 July 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The Town and Country Planning Association has called the framework “unprecedentedly permissive” for good reason. Three elements combine to have that effect. First, the standard method, where 0.8% of the existing housing stock is applied as a multiplier and then a further multiplier is applied according to areas of high house prices. By definition, green belts constrain supply; that is their purpose. Therefore, they are areas of higher prices. In short, the standard method takes the consequence of protecting a place as a justification for building more on it. That cannot be logical or acceptable. Rural councils have therefore been subject to much higher housing targets. For example, in Somerset, as my hon.”
House of Commons16 July 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗
“The same instinct runs through proposals on the weight to be given to different policy considerations, giving the same weight to housing, economic development, and heritage and landscape, leaving Historic England to raise concerns about how those will be balanced. It could mean that the historic setting of the Wellington monument on Oldway Road in my constituency, currently subject to appeal, could be another victim of these proposed policies. That approach could also be in contravention of the well-known wording in the Planning (Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas) Act 1990 that “special regard” will be paid to preserving heritage. Nowhere is the centralisation of such decisions in Whitehall’s grasp going further than in the green belt.”
House of Commons16 July 2026Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0Source ↗