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Alex Sobel (Leeds Central and Headingley) (Lab/Co-op)
I beg to move,
That this House has considered the matter of cold and damp homes.
Thank you for calling me to speak, Mr Western; this is the first time that I have served under your chairship. I rise to speak about a crisis that continues to affect millions of people across the UK and goes to the very heart of the inequality, inefficiency and injustice embedded in our housing and energy systems.
I welcome the Government’s new warm homes plan, which includes the warm homes social housing fund and the warm homes local grant, through which social housing residents, lower-income householders and renters will receive funded energy efficiency upgrades, including insulation and low-carbon heating. However, there are a number of opportunities to truly protect all from living in cold or damp homes.
As part of its United for Warm Homes campaign, Friends of the Earth published a joint report in 2024 with the Institute of Health Equity, “Left Out in the Cold”, which is one of the most comprehensive documents on the issue. It reveals that 9.6 million households in this country—nearly one in three homes—are at risk of living in cold, damp and energy inefficient homes. Many of them are in constituencies like mine.
Leeds is home to a vibrant mix of residents: young professionals, students, families and retirees. It has a range of housing, much of it Victorian and Edwardian stock that is woefully under-insulated. In my constituency, Leeds Central and Headingley, 44.8% of constituents live in private rentals, compared with a national average of 19.4%. Citizens Advice found that one in three private renters could not heat their homes to a comfortable temperature over winter 2024, with millions living in damp and mouldy conditions. Last summer, 40% of renters—4.3 million people, including 1.16 million children —were living in a home with mould or damp. That is very concerning, given the impact that cold and mould can have on people’s physical and mental health, as well as the high energy bills that people face when they need to heat draughty homes.
This crisis does not start and end in winter. Cold, damp and poorly ventilated homes cause year-round problems, from exacerbating asthma and bronchitis to increasing anxiety, depression and other mental health conditions. My office frequently receives damp and mould cases and works closely with the private rented sector team at the council to resolve them. All too often, constituents are told that the issue is their fault. They are typically blamed for drying laundry indoors or for not opening windows.
The problems usually worsen over time and become much harder to fix. My constituent Angela reported damp last year, but the issue persisted into this year. By then, water was dripping from the living room and kitchen ceilings. She had been diagnosed with a lung infection, which the GP linked directly to the damp conditions in her home. She was eventually forced to live exclusively in her bedroom, which was the only room that was less affected.
My constituency is home to the highest population of students in England and Wales. Student accommodation is often rife with damp. Large house shares are often the only economical option for full-time students. Student houses of seven or more struggle to balance keeping the house warm with ventilating it from drying laundry, cooking and bathing. I have heard from students in my constituency who are not even given autonomy over their heating, which their landlord controls remotely.
Students are living with year-round cold symptoms that are due to the quality of their housing. As their tenancies run year to year, damp issues are often painted over, both physically and metaphorically, by landlords who know that a fresh cohort of tenants will be in within 12 months. Ongoing respiratory issues, possessions ruined by damp and cold, the feeling of insignificance and being disregarded by the landlord—these are not the standards that we should be setting for students’ quality of life in this country.
Indoor air quality is a large part of the problem. Breathe Easy Homes, which is delivered by Care and Repair in partnership with Leeds city council and the integrated care board, works to address issues with indoor air quality that can trigger attacks in children with a diagnosis of asthma or other respiratory conditions. The team is working hard to ensure that all families have safe living conditions, but the battle with damp is relentless.
It is not a new statement that cold and/or damp homes exacerbate existing health inequalities. However, too many people are forced to survive in day-to-day, all-consuming living conditions. Today’s debate is an opportunity to focus on how the warm homes plan can go further to ensure that all barriers are removed to securing warm homes for all. That includes the 9.6 million homes that are at risk of being cold, damp and energy-inefficient.
The Government’s warm homes plan will be a vital step to delivering home upgrades for millions of people, to make their homes warmer and healthier, and reduce their bills. We also welcome the Government’s plans to extend Awaab’s law to the private rented sector through the Renters’ Rights Bill and to update minimum energy efficiency standards to energy performance certificate rating C in the private rented sector.
A researcher at the University of Leeds, Rebecca Sale, is examining the impacts of poor indoor air quality. Her research shows how we spend up to 90% of our time indoors. Indoor air pollution can be hard to manage; the pollutants are invisible and are produced from everyday products and practices. The quality of the air is important for atmospheric services in the home, which includes the provision of suitable air for respiration, the regulation of heating and cooling, and the state of the air for comfortable living.
Indoor air quality is much less recognised than outdoor air quality. Damp and mould may be particularly prevalent in UK households due to draughty and leaky buildings. That partly relates to the legacy of coal burning in homes, which necessitated high levels of ventilation. Rebecca’s research explains how it can be hard to achieve a balance between insulating homes to improve energy efficiency while also allowing ventilation to maintain good indoor air quality. New building standards and regulations have meant that buildings are highly insulated and airtight. Although that makes homes warmer in winter, in hotter periods there is an increased requirement for ventilation. Insulating a home or making it more airtight can increase the incidence of mould if moisture is not being ventilated out of the home.
Older people, pregnant women, children and babies are especially vulnerable to the health impacts of indoor air pollution. A well-known and extremely important example is that of Awaab Ishak, the two-year-old boy from Rochdale who tragically died in 2020 as a result of respiratory arrest caused by the damp and mould in his family home. We know how important indoor air quality issues are, so I thank the Government again for extending Awaab’s law to the private rented sector, in which many children live.
Many older people still struggle to heat their home during winter, particularly those who are just above the pension credit limit and so no longer receive the winter fuel payment; I have met many people in that situation on the doorstep. It is therefore clear that we need an all-round, holistic and comprehensive approach to overcoming the problem of cold and damp homes.
Upgrading homes is one of the key ways in which the Government can put money back into people’s pockets while improving living standards. For the warm homes plan to be successful, it must ensure that upgrades are affordable for low-income households by providing grants tapered by household income and introducing Government-backed low interest rate loans for households that cannot afford to borrow money to carry out the work that is needed.
We also need to overhaul the consumer protections landscape to ensure that people are confident in the process and can easily put things right if they go wrong. We are encouraged by the announcement from the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero that it will address the current patchwork of protections that allow rogue traders to operate in this area. The Government need to provide access to free, independent and personalised advice throughout the home upgrade journey, including additional case-handling support for vulnerable households, which may need more support. Additionally, energy-inefficient homes are responsible for some 14% of the UK’s carbon emissions. Meeting our net zero targets will be impossible without tackling them.
I urge the Minister and colleagues across the House to join me in calling for a fully funded nationwide warm homes plan; a legal commitment to bring all homes to EPC rating C by 2035; fair support for renters and the most vulnerable, particularly our youngest and our eldest; and recognition that this is not just a housing issue, but a public health issue, an economic issue and a moral issue.
Wera Hobhouse (Bath) (LD)
It is a pleasure to see you in the Chair, Mr Western. I congratulate the hon. Member for Leeds Central and Headingley (Alex Sobel) on bringing this important subject to Westminster Hall. The state of our private rental properties is an appalling open secret. One in four private renters live in fuel poverty; 1.6 million children are living in privately rented homes that are damp or mouldy. That is a shocking situation.
As we know, the UK has some of the oldest and coldest houses in Europe. More than half of tenants had issues with damp or mould last year. In my constituency of Bath, 31% had problems with hot water or heating, and 21% of privately rented homes do not meet the decent homes standard. These numbers are simply not acceptable. We need tougher inspections and much higher standards.
As the hon. Member for Leeds Central and Headingley has pointed out, serious health risks can arise from mouldy and damp conditions. It was not long ago that a toddler in Rochdale died from prolonged exposure to black mould, yet MPs still hear every winter from constituents who are dealing with terrible cases of damp and mould. A constituent in Bath recently wrote to me that their walls are black with mould. Now, after months of relentless coughing, they have been referred for asthma testing. Another constituent described fungi growing up from the floor. Damp and decay have already damaged their belongings, and now they fear that the place they call home is no longer fit to live in.
Such cases are prevalent across the country. One in four of the complaints that Citizens Advice receives is about disrepair, damp, mould or excessive cold. Is it any wonder that the NHS spends £1.5 billion every year treating respiratory illnesses? There have been small-scale trials in which heating vouchers were given to at-risk households as a preventive measure, helping to avoid illness and reduce pressure on health services. Why not roll it out nationally?
It is not just privately rented properties with unaccountable landlords that have these issues. Many of the cases that I hear about come from tenants in social housing. My largest social housing association, Curo, has made it clear that housing providers face soaring costs. Repairs, decarbonisation, regeneration and new home delivery must all be funded from increasingly stretched social rents. Social rents are set by the Government using a “consumer prices index plus 1%” formula, but successive Governments have capped, cut and changed this model. In 2003, for example, there was a 7% rent cap, despite the CPI reaching 11% that year; meanwhile, the average operating cost per household unit rose by 11%.
The Government have ambitious house building targets, but that mismatch leaves providers struggling to maintain existing homes, let alone build new ones. Because funding is overstretched, increasing numbers of social tenants are not getting the repairs and upgrades that their properties need to prevent damp and mould in the first place. I ask the Government to look at this closely. A fundamental review of the rent and capital subsidy regime will make sure that providers can provide homes that are well maintained and managed, while also meeting their requirements to improve, regenerate and build new social housing.
At the heart of this regeneration must be a programme of home insulation, which is something that Liberal Democrats have been asking about for a long time. Well-insulated homes stay warmer, so insulation is key to reducing energy bills. Much of the housing stock in Bath is Georgian and grade II-listed. These homes are in dire need of insulation, but listed buildings are more expensive to insulate because of the specific regulatory requirements. For many of my constituents, the cost of insulating their homes is just too high.
The Government have announced the warm homes local grant, aimed at improving the efficiency of low-income, low energy-performance homes. However, in the recent funding award, Bath and North East Somerset council will receive a fraction of the amount that it requested: just 26% of what was felt to be needed to carry out the work following consultation with the warm homes team. The existing consortium was awarded approximately £11 million over two years under the home upgrade grant phase 2. The programme has improved 80 homes in Bath, helping fuel-poor residents to save money on energy bills and benefit from a more comfortable and climate-friendly home, but it has been cut under the warm homes grant. The council is now receiving a reduced budget of just £4.5 million a year over three years.
Thousands of homes in Bath are eligible for the warm homes grant, but a very small fraction will receive it. The programme is likely to be oversubscribed; I understand that there is a waiting list from the previous scheme that will account for the first year of upgrades. The ability to carry out funded work on homes helps to alleviate fuel poverty, improve health and reduce carbon emissions. Reducing the budget will have knock-on effects on all those areas.
The other national awards reflect a similarly bleak picture. Once again, we had a winter in which our constituents suffered in cold and damp homes. I am not aware of any public acknowledgment from the Government that funding for home energy upgrades has been cut. I ask the Minister whether that represents a rowing back on the targets in the warm homes plan, or whether it is a reallocation of resources in the warm homes plan. The Liberal Democrats propose a 10-year insulation programme, starting with free insulation for the most vulnerable homes. If we want to reduce household energy bills, insulating homes is the place to start, so I hope that the Government will sincerely consider that.
The state of our rental housing, both private and social, is simply not good enough. It is one of the many failures of the previous Conservative Government, so the new Government must now step up and deal with the problem. The stories from my constituents in Bath are echoed across the country: damp walls, black mould and cold, unliveable homes. We know the solution—higher standards, proper funding for repairs and investment in insulation—but we continue to see piecemeal action and shrinking budgets. I urge the Government to act fast so all our constituents can live in safe, warm and secure housing.
Matt Western (in the Chair)
I call the Chair of the Housing, Communities and Local Government Committee.
Florence Eshalomi (Vauxhall and Camberwell Green) (Lab/Co-op)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Mr Western. I apologise for my one-minute lateness. I pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Leeds Central and Headingley (Alex Sobel) for his excellent opening speech. I recognised a number of the points that he outlined, because the issue comes up in my inbox from my constituents across Vauxhall and Camberwell Green.
Like the Leeds Central and Headingley constituency, Vauxhall and Camberwell Green is home to a large number of students and young people who are just starting out in work. As we all know, many of them end up at the cheaper end of the housing market, often in smaller, older properties that may be more susceptible to damp and expensive to heat. We must not think, just because a person is young, that such homes are not extremely damaging to their health. Imagine a young person trying to revise for their final exams in a cramped room where damp crawls up the wall. Some will be trying to save for a deposit and get a foothold in a career, all the while knowing that every day after work, they return to a home that will make them physically and mentally ill. That is the reality for so many people across the country.
Many want to tackle the situation directly with their landlords, but they are afraid of being evicted into a housing market where they can barely find somewhere else to live and barely afford somewhere else. That is unacceptable at any age. It is critical that the Renters’ Rights Bill is successful not only in addressing the misbalance between landlords and tenants, but in helping councils to ensure that every home is safe and properly fit for habitation.
We must also tackle the stigma around social housing. An attitude is developing that people in social housing are lucky to have a home. It is not a privilege to have a home, or to have a home that is not covered in damp and mould. That is the bare minimum that any of us should expect, yet many tenants have been told that the cold and damp in their homes is their fault. They have been told to open the windows, even in the cold months, to avoid mould. Why should people be expected to freeze because their home is not fit for purpose? Yet that is what we are asking many people to do up and down the country.
We all know there is a housing crisis. That means we have people who simply cannot say no, even when the property they are viewing is filled with damp and mould. There is no excuse for properties to be in that condition.
Wera Hobhouse
Does the hon. Lady agree with my social housing provider, Curo, that it is impossible for social housing providers to both build the new social and affordable homes that are required and maintain homes to a decent standard?
Florence Eshalomi
I thank the hon. Member for making that important point, which many registered social landlords and local authorities have raised with the Select Committee in various evidence sessions. They are struggling. Many housing associations are saying that they are spending more on repairs and maintenance than actually building. They all want to contribute and support the Government in their agenda to build 1.5 million new homes, but, frankly, they are struggling. That is why I welcome the Government’s commitment to increase rental properties’ energy efficiency, so that no tenants end up paying extortionate energy bills in inefficient homes.
What steps has the Minister taken to work with councils to give them not just extra powers, but the real ability to enforce standards in cold and damp homes across the housing sector, as the hon. Member for Bath (Wera Hobhouse) has just highlighted? What support is the Minister providing so that they can maintain their own stock and not leave social housing tenants facing unacceptable conditions?
We are coming into the summer months, when a number of tenants will be able to enjoy their homes, but winter is just around the corner. It is important that the Government lay out the additional work they will do with private rented and social landlords to tackle this important issue.
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
It is real pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Western. Like the hon. Member for Vauxhall and Camberwell Green (Florence Eshalomi), I apologise for being approximately 55 seconds late, but we were rushing. Thank you for helping us and for letting us take part in the debate.
I thank the hon. Member for Leeds Central and Headingley (Alex Sobel) for leading today’s debate on this important issue. He set the scene admirably. All the detail that he gave helps all of us to focus on what we need to do. This is one of those issues that arise in all parts of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. We all hear of these issues from our constituents. The hon. Member for Bath (Wera Hobhouse) referred to her constituents and the information she gets from them; we all can say the same. Cold and damp are among the biggest problems when it comes to housing in my constituency.
As chair of the healthy homes and buildings all-party parliamentary group, I am fully aware of the problems of cold and damp in domestic homes and commercial buildings. I hear about it from my constituents regularly. Some 60% of the housing cases my staff deal with are transfers, and 40% of those are about damp and mould. Some of the pictures that they have seen are extraordinary, so it is good to be here to discuss the issue and see what we can do.
I am very pleased to see the Minister in his place. He responds to the questions we ask with honesty and clarity. We look forward to the answers that we will get today.
According to National Energy Action, approximately 40% of households in Northern Ireland are classified as being in fuel poverty, meaning that they spend more than 10% of their income on energy costs. That, I think, highlights the issue for many, especially at a time when money is tight and people are not able to stretch it as far as they would like. In addition, social housing stock in Northern Ireland is notably energy inefficient. Many homes lack adequate insulation, leading to higher housing costs and more vulnerability to cold and damp conditions.
A little while back, a constituent who was residing in a Housing Executive property that had excessive damp and mould in both bedrooms came into my office. A little girl of the age of four slept in one of those rooms, and her mother was increasingly concerned about the health issues that can come with cold and damp. That is often forgotten. We tend to focus on the physicality —how it looks and the smell that may come from mould. It is no secret that damp and mould can lead to respiratory issues and exacerbate the symptoms of asthma and cardiovascular disease. I am also chair of the APPG for respiratory health, and we have worked closely on those issues. With a double chair hat on, as chair of both the healthy homes and buildings APPG and the APPG for respiratory health, those issues have combined to put the focus on these things today.
I want to be respectful to Government, as I always try to be, but 10 million pensioners across the United Kingdom have lost their winter fuel payment, and it is projected that those cuts will push an additional 50,000 pensioners into relative poverty each year from 2024 to 2029. In some years, as many as 100,000 people will be affected. Often, those with chronic illnesses or disabilities face higher energy bills and so are disproportionately affected by the cuts, which ultimately will plunge more people into poverty this winter and make it harder for them to heat their homes. That means more cold homes, more damp and more mould, which the Government will single-handedly allow by removing this payment.
There has been some indication in the past few days that the Labour Government are reconsidering this policy. I hope that they are. It would be a positive step forward. I hope that the final decision will be that winter fuel payments will be reinstated. Elderly people who suffer with health issues like the ones I mentioned are much more likely to become ill as a result of a cold home. I cannot stress enough how important it is that the Government commit to reversing this brash and wrong decision.
NEA has estimated that, across the United Kingdom, on average more than 10,000 people die each year due to living in a cold home. It is important to put the problem into figures, because, unfortunately, such a death toll gives us a better idea of what is happening. In England and Wales, excess winter deaths rose by nearly 20% last winter. That is another indication of where we are going. Those figures are shocking. The Government must work more closely with social housing associations and landlords to ensure that people can afford to heat their homes adequately, and are not forced to decide between eating a meal or putting the heating on.
This is a UK-wide issue that must be given the attention it deserves and tackled alongside the devolved Administrations —back home, the Department for Communities. More must be done to support pensioners who are struggling after the loss of their winter fuel payment, and to help tenants, many of whom are families in social housing, whose housing is not habitable or up to scratch. It is time for change. I think that the Minister is committed to it. I look forward to hearing what he has to say.
David Chadwick (Brecon, Radnor and Cwm Tawe) (LD)
It is an honour to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Western. I thank the hon. Member for Leeds Central and Headingley (Alex Sobel) for securing this important debate. As he rightly set out, many of our issues stem from the fact that so much of our housing stock dates to the Georgian and Victorian periods. I draw attention to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests.
My hon. Friend the Member for Bath (Wera Hobhouse) rightly pointed out that the UK has some of the oldest and coldest homes in Europe, and that the NHS is spending £1.5 billion a year on treating respiratory illnesses. Hopefully, investing in warmer homes would bring down that cost. In Wales alone, over 600,000 households—nearly half of all Welsh homes—are estimated to be in fuel poverty, with more than 100,000 in extreme fuel poverty. The crisis is not just about rising energy bills or cold weather; it is rooted in the very buildings we live in. The UK and Wales especially, as we have heard, have some of the oldest housing stock in Europe. Many of the homes in Wales were built before 1919, long before insulation or energy efficiency were even considered. As a result, a huge number of houses are cold, damp and impossible to heat efficiently. Many still rely on outdated boilers, lack double glazing or have walls that leak heat faster than we can generate it.
The consequences are not just physical discomfort or financial strain; cold homes are making people sick. They are contributing to the incidence of respiratory disease, heart conditions, mental health issues and, tragically, avoidable deaths in winter. This is costing every single one of us. The NHS in England alone spends around £1.5 billion a year treating conditions linked to cold and damp homes. In Wales, the annual cost is estimated to be £67 million. That money could be spent on frontline care, rather than on treating problems that could have been prevented by better housing.
The costs go even further. Fuel poverty means lost workdays and reduced productivity due to illness; children underperforming at school because they are too cold or too sick to learn; increased national energy use and demand from homes that haemorrhage heat; growing household debt from people falling behind on unaffordable energy bills; and less money in the economy as a whole as incomes get swallowed up by ballooning heating bills.
We are stuck in a vicious cycle that affects not just the poorest but all of us through higher public spending and lost economic potential. Unfortunately, Government responses have been far too slow. In Wales, the flagship warm homes programme is woefully inadequate. At the current pace, it could take more than 130 years to insulate every fuel-poor household in Wales—a staggering statistic that shows just how far behind Labour in Wales is on this issue.
It does not have to be this way. The Welsh Liberal Democrats have proposed a bold but realistic solution, providing £1.75 billion over five years to retrofit homes, prioritising those in or near fuel poverty. This plan could create 10,000 jobs, generate £2.2 billion for the economy and, most importantly, transform lives. For rural areas and farmers, there are huge opportunities here too, with insulation using Welsh wool now playing a major part in existing insulation programs.
On a recent visit, I saw at first hand the installation of protective loft insulation in Brecon by Loft Boarding South Wales, a local, family-run, green growth business. It was very clear to me that insulation programmes offer economic benefits not only for consumers, but through the skilled jobs that such programmes provide.
Across the UK, the Liberal Democrats are calling for urgent action, including a 10-year emergency home insulation programme to upgrade Britain’s cold, inefficient housing stock, and the introduction of an energy social tariff—a targeted pricing structure that would lower heating bills for the most vulnerable. We will of course continue to press the Government to reverse their disastrous cuts to the winter fuel allowance—although current briefings to the media from different Ministers make it very difficult for us all to decipher where the Government are at on that issue.
These measures are not just ambitious; they are necessary, and must be in place before the next winter bites. Fuel poverty is a national disgrace, but it is also a national opportunity. By investing in energy-efficient homes, we can cut carbon emissions, reduce health inequalities, lower NHS costs, boost the economy and improve national security all at once.
The best time to introduce an emergency insulation programme was before Putin launched his brutal invasion of Ukraine. The second best time would be now. Let us start thinking of insulation not as a luxury, but as a public good. Let us stop managing the symptoms of cold homes and start curing the cause. In one of the richest nations on earth, no one should have to choose between heating and eating.
Paul Holmes (Hamble Valley) (Con)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Western. I welcome the Minister to his place and congratulate the hon. Member for Leeds Central and Headingley (Alex Sobel) on securing this debate.
It was the English Army officer and playwright Guy du Maurier who wrote that every Englishman’s home is his castle. In that phrase, he summed up the immense feelings of pride and belonging that people should feel about their home. Whether they are homeowners or renters, it should always be the case that everyone in this country—every child, every parent, every pensioner—can live in a home that is warm, dry and safe. I know that all colleagues in this House will agree that that should be the bare minimum.
The hon. Member’s timing in calling this debate is, as usual, perfect—it is almost as good as his timing in arriving at the debate with 30 seconds to spare. Maybe he should think about entering a marathon with sprinting like that—
Paul Holmes
Good luck to him—I hope he sends his sponsorship details to every Member in the House. He outlined a very important case. Whatever party and constituency we represent, we will all have received the bog-standard response from a housing association or council saying that residents who have damp and mould have had their mould wash put in, and they need to keep their windows open and they need to stop using the tumble dryer indoors.
It is not good enough. All Members in this House need to push harder on the sector, and we need to push harder in raising the concerns of our constituents who have those problems. We must all do better, and there is much more to do.
In that spirit, I refer to the fantastic speech of the hon. Member for Bath (Wera Hobhouse). She set out the clear conflict in the social sector between building more homes and ensuring investment to keep standards up in the housing stock. Those concerns have been raised by the sector with me, as shadow Housing Minister. I would not go as far as to say that I agree with the hon. Lady that it is impossible, but it is certainly a lot harder. I myself used to work for the largest housing association in the United Kingdom. We consistently had a line back to the previous Government; we wanted to be ambitious, and we absolutely wanted to commit to making sure that we had decent homes. The issue is that, with homebuilding targets relying on the old profit model, not-for-profit companies get stuck trying to deliver those targets. We need to do better at making sure that the sector is supported.
I am a great fan of the Chair of the Housing, Communities and Local Government Committee, the hon. Member for Vauxhall and Camberwell Green (Florence Eshalomi). She said that there is still a taboo around social housing. She is absolutely correct. I am proud to have grown up on council estates in New Cross, Bermondsey and then Lewisham. My parents still live in their council house. In all parties, we should express our support for people who live in council housing. For many, it is a great step up and a security blanket. I would be the first to admit that the last Government did not go far enough in supporting the housing and social sector. I am determined to change that, because I was created and grew up in the sector myself.
Every home should be a place of pride, safety and stability. That sense of pride is shattered when people are handed keys to a new home built with shoddy workmanship, incomplete fittings or insufficient insulation, or when people’s homes are not looked after properly, with poor repairs and maintenance regimes of housing associations or private landlords. They need to be supported more. On new builds, the last Government did important work to make new homes fit for the future, including by improving insulation standards, but where insulation is still lacking, we need urgent action. I welcome the new responsibilities given to Ofgem to oversee repairs and remediation in this area.
This debate is not just about building new homes to a suitable standard; it is also vital to legislate for the proper and safe maintenance of the existing and ageing stock. I am pleased that in the last Government we passed the Social Housing (Regulation) Act 2024, a landmark piece of legislation that strengthens the powers of the regulator of social housing. The Act introduced Awaab’s law, setting strict limits for social landlords to deal with hazards like damp and mould. The tragic death of two-year-old Awaab Ishak—I used to share an office with his MP, before he left this place, so I saw the tragic case borne out in real time—was caused by prolonged exposure to mould in his home and is a heartbreaking reminder of what can go wrong when we fail to act.
Such a tragedy should never have happened, and we must ensure it never happens again. There must be nowhere for rogue landlords to hide—either private landlords or social landlords. While of course holding this Minister and Government to account, I will continue to work with them to build on the progress we have made in protecting tenants from dangerous living conditions.
Florence Eshalomi
I thank the shadow Minister for his open and honest speech. I know that he cares passionately about this area. Does he agree that the previous Government could have helped on the really important issue of no-fault evictions? So many tenants were in properties where there was too much damp and mould, did not say anything through fear of being evicted, but then lo and behold, found themselves being evicted through no fault of their own.
Paul Holmes
The hon. Lady is correct to say that there are areas in which we could have gone further. Some of that could have been met by actions we brought forward, such as a new housing ombudsman and making sure that regulation was better, but I do not think we worked at pace to do that as fast as we could. We need to learn from that, as I said openly to the Minister. I congratulate him on his position, as there is no one in the House who knows more about the housing sector than him, having prepared the manifesto. We may disagree vehemently about it at times, but I cannot knock his talent and expertise. That is where we will offer to work with the Government on making those great strides.
It is utterly unacceptable in 21st-century Britain that any family should be put in danger because of where they live. Everyone, regardless of background, income or postcode, deserves to live in a decent, safe and secure home. The last Government’s consultation on Awaab’s law proposed sensible timelines. Landlords must investigate hazards within 14 days, act within a further seven, and complete emergency repairs within 24 hours. I welcome this Government’s commitment to implementing the law from October. That implementation must be timely, thorough and enforced, and they will have our support in doing so.
It is important to highlight that providers across the sector continue to invest in their existing stock to drive up standards. The previous Government oversaw the halving of the number of non-decent homes in the social housing sector since 2010, but the cost associated with these new requirements will likely require a rise in rents and service charges, which present their own associated challenges to an overburdened sector. As L&Q Group—not the housing association I worked for, but its rival—noted
“providers across the sector invested £37 billion in bringing homes up to a decent standard, at an average cost of £10,000 per home.”
But without additional Government support, this pace will slow, adding more pressure on renters. As the hon. Member for Bath outlined, it will also slow house building in this sector for the people who most need it, and it will harm the Government’s 1.5 million housing target.
On that topic, I must turn to the issue of winter fuel support, as the hon. Member for Leeds Central and Headingley did. The Minister knows our views on winter fuel support, which I will not rehash, but it is a lifeline for many, and especially for our pensioners. I know I speak for many colleagues across the House when I say that I am deeply concerned about this Government’s decision to scrap the winter fuel allowance, which will impact 10 million pensioners nationwide. Age UK research shows that, in the north-west alone, 1.2 million pensioners are losing support and 300,000 of them are already living in or close to poverty. That is not just a policy failure but a moral failure that we all must bear. Our pensioners have worked in, contributed to and built this country, and we cannot and must not leave them out in the cold.
Energy bills are still going up, and there is the double whammy of removing the winter fuel payment and the energy inefficiency of housing, particularly for pensioners. The Government’s promises to freeze energy bills have not been met, which is not only harming those who are vulnerable but stopping them heating their homes when they need to.
I hope that the Minister takes my criticisms, suggestions and support in the spirit in which they are intended. The Government have a lot to reconsider: a settlement for pensioners that exacerbates their strained living conditions; a housing algorithm that abdicates responsibility for the issue to overburdened local authorities; and a faltering ambition to build a record number of homes.
We all want to see more houses built—I have repeatedly said that—and for those houses to be of high quality, but we also want to have a decent standard of homes across the private rented sector, too. There is much more work to be done, and the Government must rethink their approach to benefits for pensioners and vulnerable people while they still have a chance to correct their course, or it will be the general public who suffer the consequences of the Government’s mismanagement. I stand ready to offer support to the Minister in a genuine, open and constructive way, and I look forward to his response.
The Minister for Housing and Planning (Matthew Pennycook)
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship for the first time, Mr Western.
I begin by congratulating my hon. Friend the Member for Leeds Central and Headingley (Alex Sobel) on securing this important debate. As hon. Members will be aware, he has long championed housing issues on behalf of both renters and homeowners in his constituency and across the country. He made a powerful case in his opening remarks for action to tackle the blight of cold and damp homes.
I also thank all the other hon. Members who have contributed this afternoon. I thank the shadow Minister, the hon. Member for Hamble Valley (Paul Holmes), for his kind remarks, which I very much appreciate. I also thank the Lib Dem spokesperson, the hon. Member for Brecon, Radnor and Cwm Tawe (David Chadwick); the hon. Members for Bath (Wera Hobhouse) and for Strangford (Jim Shannon); and of course the Chair of the Housing, Communities and Local Government Committee, my hon. Friend the Member for Vauxhall and Camberwell Green (Florence Eshalomi).
I will attempt to respond to all the points that have been raised in this debate, but I hope that colleagues who represent seats in Wales and Northern Ireland will understand that, as it is a devolved matter, I am not responsible for housing policy in their areas. However, I will ensure that comments are passed on to my colleagues in the Scotland Office and the Wales Office.
Everyone, regardless of whether they are a homeowner, a leaseholder or a tenant, has a basic right to a safe, secure, affordable and decent home. Yet, as we have heard from the many cases that have been shared this afternoon, and as I am acutely aware from my south-east London constituency, far too many families live in homes that are cold, damp and often mouldy.
My hon. Friend the Member for Leeds Central and Headingley is absolutely right to argue that non-decent housing is not simply a housing issue, and the Government recognise that it is also a matter of public health and can exacerbate existing inequalities. It is imperative that we act decisively to improve the quality of housing in all tenures, and that is precisely what this Labour Government are doing. I welcome the opportunity to respond to the points that have been raised in this debate and to provide the House with more detail on the steps that we are taking.
I will begin by addressing the problem of cold and damp homes, which has been the focus of the debate. No tenant should be forced to live in a home that places their health and safety at risk. Although the proportion of homes with the highest energy efficiency ratings has increased over the last 10 years, an unacceptable number of English homes are not well maintained, and the number of homes suffering from damp has grown over the past five years.
A number of hon. Members mentioned several statistics, and I will give my own. In 2023, 5% of all homes in England had damp in them. The situation is worse for tenants, with 9% of privately rented homes and 7% of social homes experiencing damp. As hon. Members will know, one of the main causes of damp is excess cold, and large numbers of owner-occupiers and tenants are living in fuel poverty. Some 7.5% of owner-occupiers, 13.1% of social tenants and a staggering 21.5% of PRS tenants are fuel poor, with all the implications that that has for their physical and mental health and wellbeing.
It is stating the obvious, but it is worth restating that the social and economic benefits of bearing down on the problem are significant. It has been estimated that remedying dangerously hazardous cold in people’s homes would save the NHS over £11 million every year, and that fixing damp and mould would save a further £9.7 million. For those reasons, the Government are taking decisive action to drive up housing standards.
We are clear that when it comes to reducing the number of cold and damp homes, the existing regulatory system is not fit for purpose. Social rented homes must already meet the decent homes standard, but the part that refers to thermal comfort has not been updated since it was developed nearly a quarter of a century ago. Moreover, there is absolutely no obligation for private landlords even to meet that standard, meaning that, as I said, an astonishing 21% of privately rented homes are not decent. That is unacceptable, and it is why we will consult this year on an updated and reformed decent homes standard, which will apply to both the social and private rented sectors. That means that safe, secure housing will be the standard that people can expect in both social and privately rented properties, at no distinction between tenures.
My hon. Friend the Member for Vauxhall and Camberwell Green rightly mentioned enforcement, which is an essential aspect of bringing a new decent homes standard into force. She will be aware—and I give credit to the previous Government for this—that the Social Housing (Regulation) Act 2023 introduced proactive consumer regulations, overseen by the Regulator of Social Housing, which can hold all registered social landlords to account. The regulator has strong enforcement powers, so where there are serious failings it can take effective action, including issuing unlimited fines.
We are also taking immediate action to clamp down on damp, mould and other hazards. Both the shadow Minister and my hon. Friend the Member for Leeds Central and Headingley mentioned the death of two-year-old Awaab Ishak in 2020. As we have heard, Awaab died as a result of prolonged exposure to mould in his social rented home in Greater Manchester. It was an avoidable tragedy, and it shames us as a nation. I say that wherever I go; I think it utterly shames us, and it must never be repeated. That is why we have committed to implementing Awaab’s law, which was commendably legislated for by the previous Government. From October this year, social landlords will be required to address damp and mould within fixed timescales and carry out all emergency repairs as soon as possible, within no more than 24 hours.
Matthew Pennycook
I will just finish this point, because the sequencing is important for hon. Members to understand. We will then expand the law to include other health and safety hazards in 2026 and 2027.
Florence Eshalomi
As the shadow Minister highlighted, the Minister closes his eyes and sees housing; he cares passionately about this area. Additional enforcement areas will rightly help so many social housing tenants, but does the Minister agree that, because of the number of people caught in temporary housing, the Government need to look at regulation in social housing? We are seeing more and more people stuck in frankly unsuitable temporary accommodation for up to five or 10 years, and 74 children have died because of the conditions linked to their temporary accommodation.
Matthew Pennycook
My hon. Friend is absolutely right: the situation for lots of families in temporary accommodation is acute, and we are aware that there are real decency problems in that respect. The Renters’ Rights Bill provides for the extension of the decent homes standard to temporary accommodation, but we are obviously giving very serious consideration to how we improve standards for those in temporary accommodation and how we very rapidly move people out and into, in almost all cases, a decent, safe, secure and affordable social rented home. I am grateful to the shadow Minister for recognising that we have not done enough on that in the past, so we need to do more in the future.
Through the Renters’ Rights Bill, we will extend the requirements of Awaab’s law to private landlords. Beyond Awaab’s law, we are legislating to introduce electrical safety standards in social housing to bring them in line with requirements in the private rented sector. We are working with the housing ombudsman to ensure that tenants can seek redress when things go wrong, and we are committed to ensuring that social landlords have the right skills and qualifications to deliver housing services for their tenants.
As the Chair of the Housing, Communities and Local Government Committee, my hon. Friend the Member for Vauxhall and Camberwell Green, said, we are making tenancies in the private rented sector more secure by finally abolishing section 21 no-fault evictions. That will mean that tenants can have the confidence to complain to their landlords about poor conditions and use their right to take their landlord to court if necessary without fear of eviction.
It is all very well increasing the quality of social housing, but many people struggle to afford to heat their homes. That is not just a health hazard but a direct cause of damp and mould. An energy-efficient home is a warm and dry home, which is why we are already consulting on raising minimum energy efficiency standards in the private rented sector, and have committed to do the same in the social rented sector in the coming months. We have committed an initial £3.4 billion to the warm homes plan funding over the next three years, including £1.8 billion to support fuel poverty schemes. That will reduce annual bills considerably for tenants.
We also recognise the contribution that more energy-efficient buildings will make to meeting our target of net zero emissions by 2050. Future standards, which will be introduced later this year, will set out how new homes and buildings can move away from reliance on volatile fossil fuels, and ensure they are fit for a net zero future. I look forward to updating the House on what those future standards entail in due course.
We know that most landlords, private and social, want to provide high-quality accommodation and work to fix damp and cold conditions as soon as they can, but we also know that our reforms will come at a cost to some. That is why our new warm homes local grant will help the private rented sector, and the warm homes social housing fund will support social housing providers and tenants.
David Chadwick
Does the Minister see a greater role for Welsh wool in insulating our homes? He may not be aware that many Welsh farmers actually lose money from shearing their sheep. Wool is a natural product that can be used to insulate homes. It is organic, and it would bring more money into the rural economy, unlike synthetic products.
Matthew Pennycook
It has been acknowledged that I have some knowledge of housing, but the hon. Gentleman tempts me into an area about which I do not have particular knowledge, not least because the warm homes plan is the responsibility not of my Department but of the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero. I am sure that Department will have heard all the comments that have been made about the warm homes plan, and I will ensure that the relevant Ministers reflect on them.
There is currently a zero rate of VAT until March 2027 on energy-saving measures such as insulation and low-carbon heating, making it cheaper for landlords to invest in their properties and reduce their energy usage. Other support is available to landlords to improve their properties. An eligibility tool is available on gov.uk to help people find the support available to them via the home upgrade grant and the Great British insulation scheme.
Of course, it is not just rented homes where we need to take action. We are also considering options to ensure a fair, proportionate and affordable approach to improving the energy performance of owner-occupied homes. The warm homes plan will help people find ways to save money on energy bills and will transform our ageing building stock into comfortable, low-carbon homes that are fit for the future. We will upgrade up to 5 million homes across the country by accelerating the installation of efficient new technologies such as heat pumps, solar batteries and insulation.
Before I conclude, I should mention how our efforts to improve standards and quality in homes of all tenures fit in with a wider housing strategy. In many cases, cold and damp homes are a symptom of the wider housing crisis that we inherited. That acute and entrenched crisis will not be solved by raising quality and standards; we need new supply. That is why the Government’s plan for change includes a hugely ambitious milestone of building 1.5 million safe and decent homes in England in this Parliament. We know that is a stretching target, but it is deliverable, in our view, and it is essential.
We have already announced changes to planning policy to support the delivery of affordable homes. We have also provided two immediate one-year cash injections totalling £800 million to the affordable homes programme to deliver an extra 7,800 homes. On 25 March, we injected a further £2 billion into the affordable homes programme from 2026-27 to build up to 18,000 new homes by the end of this Parliament. That funding is a down payment on future long-term investment and will act as a bridge to the future grant programme to be announced in the spending review. In that programme, we want to put particular focus on delivering homes for social rent. These are new homes, built to high standards, that will be warm and dry.
Jim Shannon
The Minister is always assiduous and gives good answers. He has put forward many good ideas to ensure that the issue of cold, damp and mouldy homes is addressed in the United Kingdom, especially in England. The hon. Member for Brecon, Radnor and Cwm Tawe (David Chadwick) and I would be keen to ensure that the Minister shares those ideas with the Governments in Northern Ireland and Wales.
Matthew Pennycook
We speak regularly with our counterparts in the devolved authorities, but I will make a special point of ensuring that the comments that have been made today are passed on to the relevant Ministers within those authorities and, as I said, with colleagues in the Scotland and Wales Offices.
Once again, I commend my hon. Friend the Member for Leeds Central and Headingley on securing this important debate, and thank all those who have contributed to it. We all know the detrimental impact that non-decent housing has on the lives of our constituents, and that more must be done to drive up standards across housing tenures. I hope that this afternoon I have provided hon. Members with reassurance that the Government are working with determination to drive a transformational and lasting change in the safety and quality of housing in this country.
Alex Sobel
Thank you, Mr Western; your chairing this afternoon has been excellent, and I hope to serve under you in many more debates. I thank all Members who have taken part: the Chair of the Select Committee, my hon. Friend the Member for Vauxhall and Camberwell Green (Florence Eshalomi); the hon. Members for Bath (Wera Hobhouse) and for Strangford (Jim Shannon); the Opposition spokespeople, the hon. Members for Brecon, Radnor and Cwm Tawe (David Chadwick) and for Hamble Valley (Paul Holmes); and most of all the Minister. I have contributed to a number of debates in which he has been exceedingly gracious and generous in what he has offered. It is very clear that he recognises the scope and scale of the issue that we face, and I am really pleased with the range of measures that he outlined. It is a league above where the previous Government were, but we need a driving focus on removing the barriers to providing warm and dry homes for those on the lowest incomes. That needs to be our main priority, because they are the ones who are still suffering the most.
Many Members mentioned the fact that many older people who may be just above the pension credit threshold are struggling to pay their fuel bills. We are only in May, and there are many months until the winter, but I hope that the Government, in addition to introducing measures that will result in lower energy bills in the future, might look again at that issue for the group who are just slightly above the threshold. Perhaps the Government could look again at the taper or threshold for winter fuel payments. As the Minister said, the worst tenure overall for cold and damp homes is the private rented sector. We need to go further and faster on action to ensure that landlords provide warm and dry homes, because everyone deserves a decent home.
Question put and agreed to.
Resolved,
That this House has considered the matter of cold and damp homes.