Housing Benefit: Temporary Accommodation
Debate between Baroness Eaton and Viscount Younger of Leckie(9 months ago)
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Viscount Younger of Leckie (Con)
The noble Baroness is right that building more houses and finding more houses, including social housing but also in the private rented sector and for homeowners, is incredibly important. We remain committed to our target of delivering 300,000 homes a year in England. We also recognise that the planning system can be complex. The levelling up White Paper marked an important moment, making clear the scale of our ambition to address the inequalities for communities right across the country, which I think was the gist of the noble Baroness’s question.
Baroness Eaton (Con)
My Lords, I also declare my interest as a vice-president of the Local Government Association. Research by the Local Government Association confirms that government could save £780 in housing benefit for every social home that is built. Will my noble friend the Minister explore the option of making the 100% retention of right-to-buy receipts permanent, so that local authorities have the fiscal powers necessary to build the next generation of social housing?
Viscount Younger of Leckie (Con)
Indeed, and my noble friend has much experience in this field from her long experience in local government. I will certainly take that back: I cannot give any guarantees right now at the Dispatch Box.
Abortion Regulations: Northern Ireland
Debate between Baroness Eaton and Viscount Younger of Leckie
Viscount Younger of Leckie [V]
Indeed, the noble Baroness is correct. Although health is devolved, the UK Government are giving every help they can to the health service in Northern Ireland. Once the regulations are passed by this House next Monday, as I hope that they will be, there is a lot of work to do to make sure that there is a full service operational for those women and girls who wish to have abortions.
Baroness Eaton (Con) [V]
My Lords, will my noble friend the Minister say why Regulation 3, unlike the Abortion Act 1967, makes abortion on the basis of sex lawful in the first 12 weeks of pregnancy? Given that it is now possible to know the sex of the foetus between seven and 10 weeks, and that the CEDAW report expressly condemned sex-selective abortion, why does that regulation make it lawful? What meetings have the Government had with the organisation Stop Gendercide in considering how to define these regulations?
Viscount Younger of Leckie [V]
I make it clear to my noble friend that the abortion regulations do not allow abortions on the grounds of sex selection. My noble friend may be aware that the UK Government publish an annual analysis of the male to female birth ratio in England and Wales to check for any evidence—for example, if there are more girls than boys aborted. The last one was in October 2019 and there was no evidence to show.
Vulnerable Children
Debate between Baroness Eaton and Viscount Younger of Leckie
Baroness Eaton
To ask Her Majesty’s Government, in the light of the Children’s Commissioner’s Report on Vulnerability, published on 4 July, which estimates that 670,000 children in England are growing up in high risk families, what further action they are taking to support families.
Viscount Younger of Leckie (Con)
I welcome the Children’s Commissioner’s report, which is a valuable contribution to the growing evidence on vulnerable children and families. Measuring the scale of the challenge is important; so too is action to improve children’s lives through building children’s resilience as well as addressing vulnerability. Across government, we are taking action, whether through reforming children’s social care, prioritising mental health, tackling child sexual exploitation or better protecting victims of domestic violence and abuse.
Baroness Eaton (Con)
I thank my noble friend for that Answer. In the report, the category with the highest number of vulnerable children in it by a long way is children in non-intact families—some 3,043,000. The Early Intervention Foundation and others state that a national strategy is needed to address relationship breakdown in families. This would need to be cross-departmental. What are Her Majesty’s Government doing to develop such a strategy?
Viscount Younger of Leckie
The figure that my noble friend has given gives rise to concern, certainly. Influential evidence from the Early Intervention Foundation and the Centre for Social Justice, among others, has shown the importance of strong family relationships. The evidence is clear that, when conflict between parents is frequent, intense and poorly resolved, it leads to negative outcomes for children. The report builds on cross-party and cross-government recognition of the challenges that need to be addressed and are often entrenched. That is why the Government are developing a new national programme to reduce conflict between parents, led by the Department for Work and Pensions, working closely with the DCLG and the Department of Health.