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Foe hails Government u-turn on regional policy
17 February 1998
Friends of the Earth has hailed as “a major victory for environmentalists” the Government's decision to withdraw key clauses (24 to 27) in the Regional Development Agencies Bill.
Roger Higman FOE's Senior Planning Campaigner said today:
“We are delighted that the Government has caved in to pressure on this dangerous part of the Regional Development Agencies Bill. The new Agencies were being given sweeping powers to allow building on common land, green belt and even National Parks. They would have been accountable neither to Parliament nor to local people. The withdrawal of these clauses is a major victory for environmentalists and the opposition parties in Parliament. Now we must make sure that the Government does not simply bring back a new version of the same discredited plan at the Report stage of the Bill.”
NOTES FOR EDITORS
Key clauses in the Regional Development Agencies Bill have been attacked for giving sweeping planning powers to new unelected quangos. The Bill sets up nine Regional Development Agencies which will be run by Boards of between 8 and 15 people appointed directly by the Environment Secretary.
Clauses 24 to 27 of the Bill gave the RDAs extensive powers over planning policy in “any part of the area of a regional development agency which, in the opinion of the Secretary of State, is suitable for regeneration or development”. This is despite promises from Planning Minister Richard Caborn (in the DETR paper “Modernising Planning”) that“statutory planning at the regional level will have to await a democratically accountable statutory body to undertake it”. The clauses state explicitly that the purposes of RDAs apply as much to rural as to urban parts of each area.
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Published by Friends of the Earth Trust
Last modified: Jul 2008
