The relaxation of planning rules poses 'serious dangers' for disabled people, Lord Holmes has warned.

Speaking at the second reading debate on the Business and Planning Bill 2020, Lord Holmes said the rapid expansion of licences for pavement furniture could exclude people from their local communities.

He warned that the Bill could turn accessible pavements into 'hostile environments' for blind and partially sighted people.

Lord Holmes said: 'It is vital that we get our economy moving again. But this should not in any sense come at the expense of the exclusion of disabled people from our high streets and their local communities, this exclusion utterly avoidable.

'Economic growth and equality are not mutually exclusive, or indeed diametrically opposed, they absolutely walk hand in hand. It makes legal sense, moral sense, it makes great business sense.'