Rural Economy

My Lords, I challenge the analysis of the noble Lord, Lord Desai, which we have just heard. I want to speak for the people for whom living in a rural community is not a lifestyle choice; they are the people who live there now. I am not concerned about the people who decide to retire to a rural village or people who have made a lot of money elsewhere and wish to buy a house in a rural village. I am talking about the people living there now, whose fathers and grandfathers often lived there. They live in cottages and small houses which, when they come on the market, get snapped up, usually by people who want second homes and who like the country lifestyle, but retreat to urban areas. Nor am I debating whether people in urban areas are poor: that is not the subject of today’s debate. The subject is the people who live in rural areas. My analysis suggests that there are two problems to be confronted. The first is rural housing; we have heard it mentioned by several people. It is absolutely essential, in my view, that each rural district council or housing authority sets aside some area in the locality where they will produce some houses that can be afforded by people on basic wages in that area. I do not use the word affordable, because I am not certain what it means. Those houses should not be subject to any sort of right to buy. I am not advocating a system by which people can make a lot of money out of property development, but a system by which housing will remain available in the locality for people who have some association with the area and contribute to the rural economy, not people seeking second homes or who want somehow both to enjoy country life and live elsewhere. The first thing I ask the Minister is whether he is completely satisfied with the housing policy, as it is promulgated by government to district councils; whether sufficient money is made available to them; and whether the arrangements for the purchase of land for those houses from the agricultural stock around the village are fair and likely to lead to the production of good houses for people who live there. I contrast the policy there with that for the redevelopment of farms. Often, local authorities are very generous in their interpretation of the rules about the redevelopment of farm buildings. Barn conversions are often for, again, the more affluent people, and certainly not targeted at many of the people from rural areas. The noble Lord, Lord Harrison, is not in his place at the moment, but I was in a very rural part of Cheshire and the one new house being built there, in a country lane, was an enormous establishment for a footballer, it is rumoured. I do not begrudge the footballer his money but we seem to have our priorities for housing totally wrong. The man who looks after the cows on the farm where I stay is to retire soon and they need a new cowman. What is needed is premises where he can afford to live, not footballers who commute from Merseyside or Manchester. The second issue I wish to raise is that of rural transport. Obviously, we do not want to see any railway lines closed. I suggest to my noble friend Lady Maddock that the excuses about health and safety as to why a train cannot call at her local station are a lot of nonsense. I hope the Rail Regulator will sort them out, because I fear that health and safety is trotted out as an excuse for not doing something when, in fact, there is no rule or regulation preventing it. So often, an excuse for not doing something is so much more convenient than doing something about it. We are wasting a lot of money in subsidising rural bus services. I am an Oxfordshire county councillor and know how much it costs to subsidise very inadequate rural bus services. I am going to take my text from the noble Lord, Lord Brooke of Sutton Mandeville, and trespass on the enormous good will that exists in a lot of villages. I suggest to the Government that it would be a far better use of money to make a present of a minibus to each village that undertakes to operate that bus, to take people to work and college, bring them back again in the evening and provide a shopping and leisure service. I am not suggesting that any bus of this sort should go all the way to the town or city, but it should at least take people to a railway station, or a point on the main road where the network of bus services that can be sustained is provided. We would give up trying, as I know we have in many areas, to tip good money after bad in providing inadequate and very little-used rural services. What I am suggesting in many ways builds on the work of Wheels to Work, mentioned by the noble Lord, Lord Cameron. The small initiative, which builds on the inventiveness of people living in rural areas, is far more likely to succeed. But whether it is something which can be taken through the bureaucracy and made to work is another question. I hope that the Minister will address this point when he responds to the remarks made by the noble Lord. I want to make one last point concerning aeroplanes, an issue raised by the noble Baroness, Lady McIntosh of Hudnall. Aeroplane noise is the cause of a lot of concern in rural areas. An opportunity to do something about it will arise in the Civil Aviation Bill currently before the House. Could the Government suggest to National Air Traffic Services and the Civil Aviation Authority that a rule should be in force against routing aircraft across national parks and areas of outstanding natural beauty? If not, before long, every part of this land and every person will be subject to the noise inflicted by aircraft.