End of Eviction Moratorium

Andy Carter Excerpts

Wednesday 23rd September 2020 Commons Chamber

[Christopher Pincher]

We have invested a great deal of money in local authorities throughout this crisis, as the hon. Lady knows. I have described to her the accommodation programme, which invests £263 million in 3,000 units to house the long-term homeless. We have just announced an affordable homes programme, which will result in something like 180,000 affordable homes being built over the next cycle, about half of which will be for a discounted rent. I encourage her to take up her concerns with the Mayor of London to ensure that he is building out the right number of homes, which he has pledged—and has thus far failed—to do.

[Andy Carter (Warrington South) (Con)]

As the Minister will know, a number of new restrictions were introduced in my constituency earlier this week to try to bring down the spread of covid. I have received a number of emails from constituents concerned that they may be at risk of eviction. Can my right hon. Friend give assurances that no evictions will take place in areas such as Warrington where local restrictions are in force?

[Christopher Pincher]

I commend my hon. Friend for campaigning on behalf of his constituents in Warrington, and I can give him that assurance. Where there is a local lockdown—where movement restrictions are in place—no evictions will take place.

Housing, Communities and Local Government: Departmental Spending

Andy Carter Excerpts

Thursday 9th July 2020 Commons Chamber

[Andy Carter (Warrington South) (Con)]

I am very aware that this is an estimates day debate, and I just want to briefly pick up the point made by my hon. Friend the Member for Eastleigh (Paul Holmes) about borrowing and councils. I only wish we had £400,000-worth of borrowing: we are at £1.4 billion in Warrington, one of the highest levels in the UK. I hope we can come back and debate that further, because it is a real problem for local councils and local council tax payers that we have to address.

I wish to spend some time paying tribute to those in Warrington who have selflessly contributed to the local efforts to defeat covid-19. This is, after all, a debate on communities, and people make communities. It is a tremendously broad group of people who have stepped up and stepped out to help us. I met Paul and Helen from Bewsey at the weekend, who were out shopping for their 83-year-old neighbour: it was the first time they had spent time talking to him, having lived next door for three years. I am incredibly grateful for the work that people are doing in their communities to support one another.

Support workers at Warrington youth club have found new ways to engage with young people online during the lockdown. I also want to mention one particular young lady, an 11-year-old called Macy Owen from Grappenhall, ably assisted by her mum Lindsay and her dad Don, who has used her time off school to make bead rainbows. They have sold them on social media to raise funds to support the staff at Warrington Hospital. I looked just before I coming in to the Chamber and saw that they have now raised more than £7,000 for staff—a fantastic example of doing good in our community.

The message for us to stay at home has meant that we have been able to re-engage with those communities, with our local shops and services, and I thank those who have worked on the high street and those who continue to provide local services through parish and borough councils. MHLCG is at the heart of post-covid recovery. This three-month lockdown has slammed the brakes on economic activity on our high streets, and it is the high street in towns such as Warrington that needs more investment and regeneration than ever before. Reforming the planning regime, which makes it difficult for businesses to change the use of premises quickly, is urgently needed. I know that that is something the Minister and Secretary of State are looking at very closely.

There are also areas that we need to maintain in terms of planning reform. I want to send a special message to the Minister to ensure that we protect the green belt, which is fundamental in places such as Warrington to ensure that urban sprawl does not extend beyond the boundaries of the borough.

The Government, to their credit, have made incredible efforts in Warrington—in excess of £47 million to support local businesses and emergency funding for the local authority. We are incredibly grateful for the work that the Minister, Secretary of State and the team at MHCLG have done.

Planning for the Future

Andy Carter Excerpts

Thursday 12th March 2020 Commons Chamber

[Robert Jenrick]

That is already a requirement and we are going to do work to see whether further action can be taken. The future homes standard, the final details of which we will announce shortly, will mean that from 2025 no new home is built in this country unless it has very high levels of energy efficiency and sustainability—at least a 75% reduction in CO₂ emissions. If a council is in the process of making a plan, or will be soon, it will need to plan for all homes to be meeting that standard, or higher, in the years ahead.

[Andy Carter (Warrington South) (Con)]

I welcome the Secretary of State’s statement. Town centres such as Warrington’s can thrive again if we focus on regeneration before we use the green belt. What steps is the Secretary of State taking to make sure that that is a reality?

[Robert Jenrick]

With our £3.6 billion towns fund, the Government are setting out to do exactly that: to help local communities to come together and to work with the business community to harness private sector investment, unlock pieces of land and get more homes built in town centres. There are great examples throughout the country of councils planning significant numbers of new homes in the town centre. For example, the other day I was in Loughborough, a relatively small town that now has a plan for 1,000 extra homes to be built, some above shops and some on brownfield sites. That is exactly what needs to happen in every town centre in the country to get footfall and create new, vibrant life in town centres.

Oral Answers to Questions

Andy Carter Excerpts

Monday 24th February 2020 Commons Chamber

[Luke Hall]

The hon. Lady raises a serious point about the effectiveness of some types of spending. We are working with the Treasury to review the Public Works Loan Board rates and flexibilities that local authorities have, and we will ensure that we keep her updated in due course on the progress of that review.

[Andy Carter (Warrington South) (Con)]

16. What steps he is taking to encourage local growth in the North West.

[The Minister of State, Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government (Mr Simon Clarke)]

We are investing £1.5 billion across the north-west through the local growth fund, including £201 million in Cheshire and Warrington. We have also invited 20 north-west towns, including Warrington, to put forward locally led proposals to draw down up to £25 million from the Government’s towns fund.

[Andy Carter]

What steps is the Department taking to ensure that local councils prioritise brownfield development over green-belt development and make use of sites such as Fiddler’s Ferry, a coal-fired power station in my constituency that is about to close?

--- Later in debate ---

[Robert Jenrick]

We hope it will do both. It will increase the supply of new homes by building popular support for new developments, but I completely accept that the housing challenges we face as a country are primarily supply-side. There is only so much that can be done through new demand-side reforms such as First Homes, which is exactly why, as a new Government, we will be taking forward important supply-side reforms such as those in my forthcoming White Paper on the planning system to unlock more land for development and create a simpler, faster and cheaper planning system.

[Andy Carter (Warrington South) (Con)]

T1. If he will make a statement on his departmental responsibilities.

[The Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government (Robert Jenrick)]

I am delighted to welcome my right hon. Friend the Member for Tamworth (Christopher Pincher) and my hon. Friend the Member for Middlesbrough South and East Cleveland (Mr Clarke) to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government team. Alongside the Under-Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, my hon. Friend the Member for Thornbury and Yate (Luke Hall), who has responsibility for local government, we will be working together to get more people on the housing ladder, end rough sleeping, build safer, greener and more beautiful homes, and level up all parts of the country. I wish to place on record my thanks to my right hon. Friends the Members for Rossendale and Darwen (Jake Berry) and for Tatton (Esther McVey) for their service to the Department and to the Government.

During the recess, many of our communities were affected by Storms Dennis and Ciara, and I pay tribute to the men and women of the emergency services, local councils and the many volunteers on the ground for their tireless work to help people affected. My Department is supporting communities to get back on their feet, activating the emergency Bellwin funding, and providing a financial package of support, including council tax and business rate relief for the worst-affected areas.

[Andy Carter]

Does my right hon. Friend agree that private sector building owners need to act more quickly to remediate dangerous aluminium composite material cladding on their buildings?

[Robert Jenrick]

I agree entirely with my hon. Friend on that. Work by building owners in the private sector to ensure the safety of residents living in tower blocks has been unacceptably slow, and I have been consistently clear with them that there is no excuse for their lack of progress. Today I am publishing a list of building owners who do not yet have a clear plan in place to remediate all their buildings. I will not hesitate in future to name others if they fail to demonstrate progress. Today I am asking the relevant local authorities to commence enforcement action against the entities I have named, and I will be supporting those local authorities to do this at pace.