Planning Bill

I have two amendments in this group but before I come to them perhaps I may say to my noble friend Lord Colwyn that in Grand Committee on the Energy Bill we had a very good debate in the Moses Room on the exact problem that he has raised tonight of the apparent impact of electromagnetic radiation from power lines and the strange association with childhood leukaemia. However, as he rightly said, the problem at present is that there appears to be no scientific evidence of causation. We are waiting for a government report on this, which perhaps the noble Lord, Lord Hunt of Kings Heath, could comment on. I do not intend to return to this matter at the Report stage of the Energy Bill—although of course other people may do so—because there is no point until we have the response to the report setting out the Government’s evidence on it. Nevertheless, it is a strange phenomenon. I turn to the two amendments to which I have put my name. Amendment No. 66 is simply about ensuring that disabled people are able to access any consultation. As I have mentioned before, for 10 years I was on the council of the Guide Dogs for the Blind Association. There is a constant complaint from people who suffer from a sight disability that they are not taken into account on these matters and that they have the greatest difficulty in accessing the information that is necessary for them to have an input. The GDA has drawn my attention to a number of focus groups on the issue of consultations and it has given me some rather poignant quotations from people who were consulted. One blind person said: "““Everything was ‘we are doing this, we are going to do that’. We argued against it—but they took no notice””." Another said: "““I went to one meeting and they didn’t listen to us—they just didn’t listen. It is always statistics and more statistics””." We can all express some sympathy with that. One guide dog owner said: "““It knocks your confidence when you go to meetings and get ignored””," and so on. Therefore, it seems to me that in this day and age there is a clear duty on any public authority engaging in consultation to ensure that the form that the consultation takes is accessible, and can be responded to, by people who suffer from, in this case, a sensory disability, although that applies to some extent to other disabled people as well. Amendment No. 84 is addressed to a somewhat different and rather wider point. It would insert a new clause concerning access for disabled people. We have discussed sustainability and Clause 9 requires the Secretary of State to promote sustainable development in drawing up planning policy statements. The organisations representing disabled people ask whether there should not be the same obligation relating to access for disabled people. The new clause is therefore designed to promote that. However, clearly, if there is to be a major infrastructure development where public access is required, it is much better that that should be firmly built in at the beginning rather than be an add-on later, which is always less satisfactory and more expensive. Therefore, I think that those organisations are asking the Secretary of State to draw up the national policy statement with the objective of contributing to the achievement of an environment accessible to disabled people. I do not think that that is asking a great deal but it would make a considerable difference to the responses that may come forward and, I suspect, to those who will promote projects under the aegis of a national policy statement. It should be as much a core issue as sustainability or design. We have debated both of those issues and this gives us an opportunity to make the same point in relation to disabled people. I hope that the Minister will be able to give a favourable response.