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New threat to property owners forced to sell land 'New powers being given to local authorities are a serious threat to the countryside,' warns Mark Hudson, President of the Country Land and Business Association (CLA) which has been fighting Government plans to make it easier for authorities to force property owners to sell up. Last night saw the Government's compulsory purchase proposals pass through the House of Lords.
'Until now, a local authority that wanted to compulsorily acquire land had to show why the land was 'required'. Now it only has to show that it 'thinks it will facilitate development'. 'As these new powers come into force there will be a surge in local authorities taking privately owned land for whatever purpose happens to be in fashion, whether it is out of town supermarkets or traveller sites, or merely because they find a particular farm unsightly. 'The Government has pushed these major changes through Parliament without giving any justification for why it thinks they are needed. Even its own advisory group could not find anything wrong with the present state of affairs. Our repeated requests for an explanation have been ignored. 'Even as late as the debate last night, Minister Lord Bassam made it clear the Government had not thought its position through. He said he would have to give Baroness Hamwee (Lib Dem) an explanation in writing for why the changes were needed. The alternative, he admitted, would be that he 'would have to make it up as he went along'. This is wholly unsatisfactory. 'The European Convention on Human Rights contains a requirement that a person's property can only be taken by the state if it can show that the acquisition is necessary. We therefore anticipate that it will not be long before the actions of local authorities are challenged in the courts, at considerable expense and inconvenience to all involved. 'It is extremely unfortunate that the Government has chosen to bring this about. If only it had given a little more thought to what it wanted and taken on board the advice of both its own advisers and the property owning organisations, this could all have been avoided.' 26 March 2004 |
Contact Christopher Price
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More articles and documents [News Archive] [13 December 2007] GN45-03: Blight [Guidance notes] [28 November 2003] The Draft Compulsory Purchase (Inquiries Procedure) (Ministers) (Rules) 2006 [Consultation response archive] [13 February 2006] |
Christopher Price is the Director Policy and Advice at the CLA. He has overall responsibility for managing all the CLA's national policy and advisory work. He makes sure that the organisation's policy work is focused on what matters most, and that members' queries are dealt with accurately and efficiently. A planning and environmental lawyer by background, he joined the CLA as public law adviser in 2002. He became Chief Legal Advisor in 2007 and took up his current post a year later. Before coming to the CLA Christopher worked in local government for a number of different authorities.
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