5. Will the First Minister make a statement regarding planning consent and change of building use? OAQ54189

I thank the Member for that. Planning consent is generally required for the material change of building use except where it is already allowed by the use classes Order and permitted development Order. Any application for planning permission must be determined in accordance with the local development plan, unless material considerations indicate otherwise.

Thank you. The area I'm interested in is pub closures. We were talking earlier about the issue of bank closures in Wales; another problem afflicting the high street is pub closures. We have had a quarter of pubs closing in Wales in the last 20 years. Now, they have taken some legislative measures relating to this in England with the Localism Act 2011. I have asked questions here before about what plans the Welsh Government has in this area, but I don't appear—or we as a Chamber don't appear—to have heard anything since I last raised the issue in February last year. So, I would be grateful for an update on your thinking.  

I thank the Member. I hope I've got some relatively good news for him in relation to his question. As he will know, the Welsh Government commissioned a report from the University of the West of England looking to see whether current use class Orders remain fit for purpose. The report concluded that while in general the Orders continue to discharge the functions for which they have been put in place, there are a number of improvements that could be made to them—in particular, in amending the consolidated use class Order and the permitted development Order. One of the changes that we intend to bring forward next year will be to provide greater protection for pubs.

Now, the proposals will seek to ensure that no public house can change its use or be demolished without first obtaining planning permission. And that is a change, because it will mean that there will be a greater level of scrutiny where development proposals would otherwise result in the permanent loss of a community asset, and many of our pubs are very important community assets in towns and villages in Wales.

There are a number of other proposals that derive from the work carried out by the University of the West of England. We will bring them together as part of a wider consolidation of planning legislation, and intend to come to the floor of the Chamber next year in order to make those changes to the legislation.   

First Minister, we need to take great care with our most precious buildings. You may have heard that plans are now being considered—I don't expect you to comment on these, but plans are being considered for the development of the Howells store. And they're very interesting, in fairness. They deserve good examination. And, if we turn to Newman's great book on the buildings of Glamorgan, he says of the Howells addition by Percy Thomas in 1928, I quote:

'This is a brilliant exposition of American Beaux-Arts classicism.'

And other writers have said it's a slice of Chicago in Cardiff. But a later addition swallowed up the Bethany Baptist chapel, and I note that this may now be released again. But the lesson here is that we need to adapt buildings so that they can be used in each generation, but to do it with great care, because what was done in the 1960s to Bethany chapel was not an example of best practice.

Well, I thank the Member for that and I agree entirely with what he said. And this has been a bit of a theme on the floor of the Assembly over the last few weeks. I had some work set in hand for me following Nick Ramsay's question a couple of weeks ago about Troy House. Now, from that work, I think we already know that, in any planning proposal, there is a statutory requirement to have special regard to the desirability of preserving buildings where those buildings have a particular status of the sort that David Melding has made reference to this afternoon. So, I agree with what the Member says. We are looking to see whether the current planning arrangements support that outcome in the way that we would want it to. The statutory requirement is an important defence that we already have in the way our planning law operates, but I have asked officials to give me advice as to whether there are any other ways in which that could be strengthened to make sure that, when proposals come forward, they pay absolutely proper regard to the historic nature and significance of buildings, but that those buildings need a future as well as a past and that we have to find ways of making sure that there are viable ways in which those buildings can go on having a living purpose.

When, First Minister, will we see the Welsh Government introducing new rules that will make it a requirement to have planning consent to turn a residential home into a holiday home?

Well, I am, naturally, familiar with the argument that lies behind your question. Our officials have looked in detail at the information available in the field to see whether the regulations we have at present are equitable to all or whether a gap has appeared, or a loophole has appeared, in the regulations where we need to return to do something differently. We are dependent on the information that comes in from the local authorities, and we have received some information from Gwynedd, for example, about the impact that they believe they are seeing in their local area. We are not at present certain that that is actually making us come to the conclusion that changing the regulations is the best way of resolving the situation, if there is a problem to resolve, but we are open to all arguments and we are collecting information on this and, if it is proven that there is a case, then we are open to do something else to change the regulations.