28 March 2007
GLA Bill 2nd reading: City urges changes to Mayor's planning
powers
- Support for a strategic role
- But current proposals too unresponsive for fast-moving business
environment
Proposals to give the London Mayor more planning powers in the
Capital need to be changed says the City of London Corporation.
Speaking ahead of Second Reading of the Bill in the House of
Lords this afternoon, the City of London Corporation’s Policy
Committee Chairman Michael Snyder, said:
"The City has supported a strategic role for the London Mayor
but the current proposals, as drafted, are in danger of damaging
the international competitiveness of the City by making the whole
process more complicated and less responsive.
"The global financial firms that make London the international
marketplace of choice need a system that works well – and this
looks like it won’t.
"We are in favour of a system that is genuinely strategic and
delivers benefits to Londoners but the proposed powers are
insufficiently targeted. The draft needs to include bigger
thresholds for height and size and needs to drop its current
catch-all provision.
"The principle should be that the genuinely strategic issues are
dealt with strategically – but that local democracy is left to do
its proper job in the many other cases that don’t need this extra
level of supervision. An added layer of bureaucracy can be costly
to all parties – and to jobs – so it really needs to be confined to
the genuinely strategic."
"This view is not only the City of London’s – but is shared by
London Councils, too."
Ends
For more information, contact Greg Williams, 020 7332 1455,
07889 167 205
City of London Corporation:
The City of London Corporation is committed to maintaining and
enhancing the status of the wealth and tax-generating business of
the City as the world's leading international financial and
business centre through its policies and services. Examples are the
extensive overseas business missions on behalf of UK-based
financial services and the wide-ranging economic development,
research and regeneration effort the City of London Corporation
undertakes across London. It also runs the City Office in Brussels
on behalf of the City and City Representations in Beijing, Shenzhen
and Shanghai – and a City Office in Mumbai. Although the City of
London Corporation provides local government services for the City,
the financial and commercial heart of Britain, its responsibilities
also extend far beyond the City boundaries and include management
of the Barbican Centre, Central Criminal Court at the Old Bailey,
Epping Forest, Hampstead Heath, three wholesale food markets, as
well as acting as the London Port Health Authority – and running
the Animal Reception Centre at Heathrow.