Planning: South Somerset

Kit Malthouse Excerpts

Wednesday 28th November 2018 Commons Chamber

[The Minister for Housing (Kit Malthouse)]

It is a great pleasure to respond to this debate, not least because the A303 is a golden thread that runs from my constituency to that of my hon. Friend the Member for Yeovil (Mr Fysh). I know that we both treasure it as a road that features large in our postbag. Somebody once said that if we want to keep something secret, we should make a speech about it in the House of Commons. Given the contents of my hon. Friend’s speech, I doubt very much it will remain a secret for long, at least in his constituency.

I should first point out to my hon. Friend, as many hon. Members will know, that the Secretary of State has a quasi-judicial role in the planning system. I am sure that people will therefore understand that it would not be appropriate for me to comment on the detail of individual cases. However, I can talk about the issues raised more broadly. My hon. Friend quite rightly raises the ability of the community to influence the planning system, and we are very keen that our planning system should be one that puts local communities front and centre. Planning must be done with local people, not to them.

If we are to ensure that more homes are built in the right places at prices our constituents can afford, we need to make sure that we make the best possible use of the land that is already in the system. The revised national planning policy framework is fundamental to delivering the homes we need in places where people want to live. It sets out a comprehensive approach to ensuring that we get the right homes built of the right quality in the right places. At the same time, it includes policies for leaving our environment in a better condition than when we inherited it, speeding up build-out and providing local areas with more flexibility to make effective use of land. The revised NPPF retains an emphasis on development that is sustainable and plan-led, with local decisions still at the heart of the system.

Local plans are the key vehicle for how this national policy translates locally. I note my hon. Friend’s involvement in his local plan. Local plans must be prepared in consultation with communities and play a key role in delivering the development and infrastructure we need in the right places. They provide clarity to communities and developers about where homes should be built and where not, so that development is planned rather than the result of speculative applications. It is crucial that local authorities have up-to-date local plans, produced in consultation with local people. I urge my hon. Friend and his constituents to make use of the opportunities to participate in developing South Somerset’s local plan, which is currently under review. I applaud the ambition for housing and new settlements in his patch, and I would be more than happy to discuss them with him.

Neighbourhood plans play a key part in communities having a voice in local planning. Over 2,400 communities have begun the process of developing a neighbourhood plan, to shape the future development of their areas. Some 13 million people across England live in a neighbourhood planning area. Seven of those areas are within my hon. Friend’s constituency, and three are now part of the development plan for South Somerset, having passed referendums.

Some neighbourhood plans, however, were being undermined because the local planning authority could not demonstrate a five-year land supply, as my hon. Friend pointed out. The revised NPPF has addressed that issue. Neighbourhood plan areas are provided protections from speculative development in instances where the local planning authority lacks a five-year supply of land, provided that all four of the following criteria are met: first, that the neighbourhood plan became part of the development plan two years or less before the date on which the decision is made; secondly, that the neighbourhood plan contains policies and allocations to meet its identified housing requirement; thirdly, that the local planning authority has at least a three-year supply of deliverable housing sites; and fourthly, that the local planning authority’s housing delivery was at least 45% of that required over the previous three years.

My hon. Friend mentioned decision making. Planning decisions are taken in full view of the public. Local people have a right to look at applications and plans. Local people can also attend council planning committee meetings to see certain decisions being made. Once submitted, planning applications are required to be determined in accordance with the local plan and any neighbourhood plans in place, unless material considerations indicate otherwise. Local planning authorities are required to undertake consultation before making their decisions and must notify neighbours about planning applications.

As the decision maker, the local planning authority must consider all the representations made within the specified period and take into account any relevant issues raised. Local opposition or support is not in itself a ground for refusing or granting planning permission, unless it is founded on valid planning reasons. Where people feel that they lack the knowledge or expertise to make effective representations, which is often the case, they can express themselves through their local councillors. They may also be able to access the services of Planning Aid England, part of the Royal Town Planning Institute, which operates a planning advice service staffed by chartered planners. Happily, it is a free service.

Local authorities typically operate a committee system when determining planning applications, with many decisions delegated to officers under an authority’s scheme of delegation. The operation of committees, including which applications are considered by members, are administrative matters for the local authority. Officers have to abide by their local authority’s code of conduct, requiring them to act in accordance with the seven Nolan principles of standards in public life. They are accountable to the public for their decisions and actions, and they must submit themselves to the scrutiny necessary to ensure that.

The law states that meetings of the council, including committee meetings, must be open to the public unless the matter under discussion would involve the disclosure of confidential information. Copies of the agenda and reports for council and committee meetings must be available for public inspection for at least five clear days before the date of the meeting. Where decisions are made by officers, councils are required to provide a written record as soon as is reasonably practicable, and it must contain the reasons for the decision. The written record and any background papers must also be made available to members of the public and retained for six years.

My hon. Friend mentioned third-party rights of appeal. Interested parties already have statutory rights to contribute their views in the planning process—in the production of the local plan or neighbourhood plan, at the planning application stage, and in response to most appeals by the applicant against a local authority decision. The existing right of appeal recognises that, in practice, the planning system acts as a control on how an individual may use their land. As a result, the Government believe that it is right that an applicant has the option of an impartial appeal against the refusal of planning permission. This existing right of appeal compensates for the removal of the individual’s right to develop.

Decisions on planning permission can be challenged by third parties in the courts only on a point of law, by judicial review, such as whether the correct procedures have been followed. Although there is only a right of appeal for those applying for planning permission, the planning system, as I have outlined, is centred on community involvement at every stage—plan making, neighbourhood planning and decision making.

I once again thank my hon. Friend for securing this valuable debate. I hope that my comments have demonstrated that planning should be done with people, not to them. I would be more than happy to meet him to discuss the issues he has raised. I note that he is going to make a submission for a call-in. We look forward to receiving his letter and will consider it with due process, as we are bound to do. He must recognise that the planning system does take into account the strong and important role that local communities play, with local decisions at the heart of the system. T. S. Eliot once wrote:

“Only those who will risk going too far can possibly find out how far one can go.”

I know that is an aphorism by which my hon. Friend will conduct himself in this matter, as he does in all others.

Question put and agreed to.

Housing Bodies: Accountability

Kit Malthouse Excerpts

Tuesday 20th November 2018 Westminster Hall

[The Minister for Housing (Kit Malthouse)]

It is a pleasure to appear once again before your wise and well-tempered supervision, Mr Hollobone. I congratulate the hon. Member for Coventry South (Mr Cunningham) on securing this important debate on a number of housing issues, which I will seek to address.

First, I thank the hon. Gentleman and other Members for assisting their constituents with numerous housing issues. I know from my own experience that housing can form a large part of an MP’s postbag, and I am grateful for the liaison with landlords and the resolution that is brought about by the actions of Members when something has gone wrong and when a service has not been as expected.

Let me start with complaints. A good complaints process must start with landlords. The regulator of social housing expects all registered providers of social housing to have in place a complaints process that is clear, simple and accessible. Landlords are also expected to publish their performance against those standards through an annual report. The regulator does not proactively enforce standards on complaint handling. The onus is on individual landlords, working with residents, to set their approach and timescales for handling residents’ complaints. However, the regulator considers every referral made to it, signposting those not within its remit to other organisations, including the housing ombudsman service.

I stress that if any hon. Member acting on a constituent’s behalf is unhappy with the response provided by a registered provider of social housing, once the landlord’s complaints process has been exhausted, that hon. Member may take the matter further. Social housing residents can approach the housing ombudsman service at any time to seek advice. However, currently they must pass the democratic filter, either referring a complaint to a designated person—a local councillor, Member of Parliament or tenant panel—or waiting eight weeks after their landlord’s investigation has concluded before a complaint can be formally investigated by the housing ombudsman.

The Government’s social housing Green Paper consultation, “A new deal for social housing”, which closed on 6 November, sought views on how to improve the system for seeking redress for social housing residents. We engaged extensively with residents to inform and shape the Green Paper. We heard that residents want redress quickly when things go wrong, and want processes to be clearer and simpler. We want to ensure that residents receive the help that they need to put things right when they have a housing problem. The Green Paper asked a range of questions on how we could deliver that, including questions about the future of the democratic filter, which can delay the complaints process.

Alongside those questions, the Green Paper set out proposals better to hold landlords to account. We consider that stronger action is required against landlords who consistently fail their residents. Part of the solution is to enable residents to understand and compare the performance of landlords. We have proposed a limited number of key performance indicators to achieve that, including a potential indicator on the effective handling of complaints.

Following publication of the Green Paper, we continued our face-to-face engagement with landlords and residents across the country. We wanted to give them an opportunity to input into and influence the consultation outcome. I assure hon. Members that they had some strong views about the handling of complaints, both positive and negative, which I heard myself, having visited six such events across the country. We are currently analysing the findings of those events alongside the other consultation responses, and we aim to publish our response in the spring.

As Members will know, the General Data Protection Regulation, also known as GDPR, imposes new rules on controlling and processing personally identifiable information. In addition, the regulator of social housing is clear that registered providers of social housing should accept complaints made by advocates, including Members of Parliament authorised to act on behalf of a social housing resident. I am not aware of the specific circumstances that the hon. Member for Coventry South mentioned, but I reassure him and other Members that nothing in GDPR or in the Data Protection Act 2018 prevents us from acting on behalf of our constituents in discussions with a registered provider of social housing.

[Mr Jim Cunningham]

It would be helpful if the Minister circulated that advice on data protection to all concerned, so that the situation is perfectly clear. We often get conflicting views about it.

[Kit Malthouse]

That is a good suggestion. I have to stress that the hon. Gentleman, and other hon. Members who wish to act on their constituents’ behalf, must be instructed by the constituent before they can do so. That is no different from the arrangements that existed before the GDPR was introduced. In requesting assistance from their Member of Parliament, any resident is effectively giving consent for that MP to process their personal data. A housing association should normally accept a Member of Parliament’s word. However, I appreciate that a housing association or local authority landlord might, if the case is particularly sensitive or other individuals are involved, double-check with the tenant. I stress that that should not be used as a delaying or obstructive mechanism; it is merely an extra protection for the tenant in specific circumstances.

Of course, if the constituent or their MP considers that the processing of the concerned resident’s data goes beyond what the resident might have expected, they should be consulted first. Let me make it crystal clear to all landlords that they should co-operate and engage constructively with Members of Parliament when they act as advocates, within the constraints of data protection. I am pleased that the Information Commissioner has issued the following guidance:

“Consent can be implied from a relevant action, in this case the raising of the matter by a constituent with the Member in the expectation that his or her personal data will be further processed by the Member and relevant third party organisations.”

I can circulate the commissioner’s guidance after the debate.

Finally, I will talk about checks on the quality of building and design—an important issue, given the scale of house building that we are experiencing, and hopefully will in increased numbers in the years to come. As a Department, we are focusing on the quality of build and design as a critical issue for the future expansion of house building. I hope that the hon. Member for Coventry South accepts, though, that when it comes to a new building, the person carrying out the building work is responsible for complying with the requirements of the building regulations. That person remains legally liable for non-compliance.

All new buildings are subject to building control supervision, either by the local authority or an approved inspector. Both are required by law to take all reasonable steps to check on the compliance of building work. Where work is found not to comply, the building control body will require it to be put right before giving a compliance certificate. We are sending a clear message that if something goes wrong with a newly built home, house builders and warranty providers, including the National House Building Council, should fulfil their obligations to put things right.

In addition, on 1 October, the Government announced a new homes ombudsman to champion the rights of homebuyers and to hold developers to account. Once a building is occupied, social housing landlords are required to comply with the regulator’s home standard, which sets two clear outcomes. First, homes must be of good quality through meeting the decent homes standard. Secondly, landlords must provide a cost-effective service to homes and communal areas that responds to the needs of, and offers choice to tenants, and aims to complete repairs and improvements first time.

Once again, I thank the hon. Gentleman for securing this valuable debate. I hope that he and other Members will continue to support all residents, including those living in social housing, in dealing with housing complaints. We are committed to ensuring that social housing residents can seek timely and effective solutions when they have a housing problem. I also hope that in future all landlords ensure that issues such as those raised today do not hinder or delay their residents’ seeking effective and efficient redress.

Question put and agreed to.

Oral Answers to Questions

Kit Malthouse Excerpts

Monday 5th November 2018 Commons Chamber

[Mr Mark Prisk (Hertford and Stortford) (Con)]

6. What progress he has made on improving standards in the management of residential property in the (a) private rented and (b) social housing sectors. [R]

[The Minister for Housing (Kit Malthouse)]

All tenants deserve a safe and decent place to live. In respect of the private rented sector, Lord Best is chairing a new working group on property agent regulation, and we have extended mandatory licensing. The social housing Green Paper contains proposals to drive up the performance of social landlords in delivering a good service.

[Mr Prisk]

I welcome the reforms, especially the requirement for all residential managers to be trained and qualified. That is the way to raise standards. However, there are concerns about how the requirement may be introduced. Will the Minister agree to a meeting to discuss how existing qualifications will be accredited by the proposed mandatory qualifications, so that we do not end up worsening the current shortage of competent managers?

[Kit Malthouse]

With his usual accuracy, my hon. Friend identifies an issue critical to getting this matter right. As he knows, the working group will be looking at the entire property agent sector to ensure that any new regulatory framework is joined up across letting, property management and estate agents. One of the key issues in making that new regulatory framework land will be the transition from the old to new, and I will be more than happy—indeed it would be foolish of me not to agree—to meet a former Housing Minister of such standing.

[Emma Reynolds (Wolverhampton North East) (Lab)]

According to the Government’s own figures, there are more than 10,000 rogue landlords operating in England. Will the Minister therefore explain to tenants who are suffering from damp and often unsafe conditions why none of these landlords appears on the Government’s new rogue landlord database?

[Kit Malthouse]

As the hon. Lady knows, the database was introduced earlier this year and it will take time to populate in order for landlords to appear on it. There will obviously have to be investigations, prosecutions, and penalties levied so that they can properly be entered on to the database. She will know that the introduction of banning orders and a rogue landlord database will have an enormous impact in future. We just have to make sure that we get the right names on it.

[Mr Marcus Jones (Nuneaton) (Con)]

Having man’s best friend by one’s side can make a massive difference to somebody who is suffering from loneliness, social isolation or mental health issues. I am aware of at least one local authority that has taken the retrograde step of banning its tenants from keeping a pet. Will my hon. Friend please look at the guidance given to local councils, because, to many people, having a pet is their lifeline?

[Kit Malthouse]

As part of a family who regard their pet cat as an intrinsic and important member of our household—[Interruption.] Well, hon. Members may well be amused by that, but it is true what my hon. Friend says: a number of people, particularly those who live alone or those who have children, rely on their pets for comfort and calm and for companionship. I would hope that all local authorities operated a humane and compassionate letting policy where this is concerned, and I would be more than happy to look at the rules around that.

[Mr Speaker]

I empathise very strongly with the Minister, and there should be no levity over this important matter. Our own household cat is very fundamental to our way of life and is suitably named Order.

[Alison Thewliss (Glasgow Central) (SNP)]

I have no pets to declare to the House.

On behalf of my party, I offer our condolences on the passing of Sir Jeremy Heywood and our thanks for his service in public life.

It was encouraging to hear that the UK Government are to follow the example set in 2015 by the Scottish Government and introduce mandatory five-year electrical safety checks on rental homes. Will the Minister confirm a start date for those checks?

[Kit Malthouse]

I am afraid that I will have to write to the hon. Lady with that answer as I do not have it to hand at the moment, but she is quite right that we have been reviewing standards generally in the private rented sector and considering what more we can do to make sure that private rented homes are as safe as they can possibly be.

[Alison Thewliss]

That is a disappointing response, particularly considering how important safety is to people renting accommodation. Citizens Advice found that renters in England who complain about issues with their home are statistically more likely to get evicted. The Scottish Government abolished no-fault evictions recently. Will the Minister consider doing likewise so that tenants in England do not fear reporting faults with their homes?

[Kit Malthouse]

We certainly want to make sure that the phenomenon of revenge evictions is stamped out and that there is an equality of power between tenants and landlords in both the social and the private rented sectors.

[Robert Courts (Witney) (Con)]

7. What steps his Department is taking to ensure the equitable allocation of funding to local authorities.

--- Later in debate ---

[Ian Austin (Dudley North) (Lab)]

9. What assessment he has made of trends in the level of new homes provided for social rent since 2010.

[The Minister for Housing (Kit Malthouse)]

Since 2010, we have delivered over 378,000 new affordable homes, including 129,000 for social rent. We are investing over £9 billion in the affordable homes programme to deliver more than 250,000 new affordable homes, including at least 12,500 for social rent.

[Ian Austin]

There are thousands of households languishing on Dudley’s waiting lists. I meet families every single week who are desperate for a home of their own. Funding for new affordable homes has fallen from over £4 billion in 2009-10 to less than £500 million last year, and the amount of social housing built for rent is actually falling to its lowest level since the war. In that context, what hope do my constituents have of the decent, secure and affordable home that they dream of?

[Kit Malthouse]

As the hon. Gentleman will know, we are throwing literally everything we have got at the housing market at the moment in the hope that we can build the homes that everybody in the country needs. In particular, in the social sector, we have increased the size of the affordable homes programme. We have reintroduced the idea of social rent; removed the housing revenue account borrowing cap for local authorities; and are setting long-term rent deals for councils and housing associations, enabling them to plan. We have also committed funding beyond 2022 for housing deals and partnerships with housing associations, which we think will deliver significant numbers of houses. It must be remembered that the Labour Government the hon. Gentleman supported induced local authorities to get out of house building. I was a councillor at the time. We were offered large amounts of money to get rid of our housing stock. That has to end. We want councils to start building to address exactly the needs he raises.

[Vicky Ford (Chelmsford) (Con)]

In Chelmsford, we are building a new garden community of 10,000 homes, more than one in four of which will be affordable, but the council wants to do more. What measures will there be to allow councils that do not have a housing revenue account also to take advantage of the new schemes that will enable them to borrow and build their own properties?

[Kit Malthouse]

My hon. Friend is right. Quite a number of local authorities, having been induced, as I say, to get out of the house building industry and home-owning function, do not have housing revenue accounts. At the moment, if they construct, build or own more than about 200 council homes they have to open a housing revenue account. We hope that the new freedom we have introduced will enable councils to create innovative partnerships with other social housing providers to build the next generation of council houses.

[Wera Hobhouse (Bath) (LD)]

The net number of social homes for rent built in the last financial year was 7,000, so we are losing a large number of these homes. We all agree that we need a lot more social homes for rent. In order to build more, will the Minister consider local authorities being given first right of refusal when public land comes up for sale, with a sale price based on current use rather than a speculative development price?

[Kit Malthouse]

I am engaged in an intensive amount of activity on the subject of public land with my ministerial colleagues and those elsewhere. Hon. Members will have seen that we have recently changed the rules so that local authorities can dispose of their own public land at less than market value if they deem there is a social need to do so. Whether or not we can give them first refusal on acquiring that land will depend on their ability to deliver the homes that people need. I am very focused on numbers of homes rather than principles of disposal.

[Kevin Hollinrake (Thirsk and Malton) (Con)]

Our policies on affordable homes are almost entirely focused on affordable homes to rent. Does my hon. Friend agree that we should also deliver more affordable homes to purchase?

[Kit Malthouse]

My hon. Friend is one of the most innovative thinkers in housing policy generally, certainly on the Conservative Benches—not that there is much innovation on the Labour Benches, but there we are. He points to an area where there is strong demand. Very large numbers of people who would otherwise be tenants have a strong desire to own, and we would love to see them owning on a discounted basis. Hon. Members will have seen in the Budget the announcement of funding for neighbourhood plans to enable an allocation of discounted homes for sale, particularly in rural areas, and I would be keen to explore the idea further with my hon. Friend.

[Mr Speaker]

I have no reason to think that the hon. Member for Thirsk and Malton (Kevin Hollinrake) is anything other than an innovative thinker on this and other matters, but it might be of interest to people to know that he is also a distinguished estate agent.

[Stephen Pound (Ealing North) (Lab)]

You rather took the wind from my sails there, Mr Speaker.

The Minister refers to housing associations, and it will not have escaped his notice that the chief executives of housing associations earn on average comfortably more than the Prime Minister, with the upper decile trousering salaries in the eye-watering range of £250,000 to £400,000. Is the Minister entirely comfortable with that?

[Kit Malthouse]

One issue that we are considering as part of our work on the social housing Green Paper is whether the tenant voice is heard strongly enough at the highest levels of housing associations. We must remember that some of these organisations are extremely large. The largest ones are huge and complex, looking after many hundreds of thousands of people, and the individuals who run them shoulder enormous responsibility and, indeed, risk. It is for those boards, suitably informed by the tenant body, to make decisions about remuneration.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Minister for Housing (Kit Malthouse)]

In the interests of providing a good service, Mr Speaker, I hope you will indulge me if I refer to my answer to the hon. Lady from north of the border, the hon. Member for Glasgow Central (Alison Thewliss). I just want to say that there is no fixed date at the moment for bringing in the affirmative statutory instrument that will make it mandatory to have five-year electrical checks in the private rented centre, but we are searching for a slot as soon as possible in a crowded and exciting legislative timetable.

In answer to Question 14, the Government are working together to help more people on to the housing ladder. Help to Buy equity loans have helped over 169,000 house- holds to March 2018, 81% were to first-time buyers and 121,500 people have benefited from first-time buyers relief from stamp duty since June 2018.

[Sir Robert Syms (Poole) (Con)]

I am grateful for the cuts in stamp duty for those at the lower end and the help for home ownership, but the higher rates of stamp duty may be having an adverse effect on the housing market. It could cost the Treasury £300 million, so a cut leading to more income, leaving more resources for those at the lower end could be in prospect. Has the Housing Minister raised that with the Treasury?

[Kit Malthouse]

My hon. Friend is a political toxophilite of the highest order and has fired his arrows into a subject that is the cause of constant discussion between us and the Treasury. He knows that we all acknowledge the effect that stamp duty can have on the market; that is why he may have seen changes in the Budget to stamp duty on shared ownership, which we hope will benefit first-time buyers. However, I will keep him apprised of conversations as we have them.

[Mr Speaker]

I hope that the hon. Gentleman will have the tribute framed. It would be very disappointing if he did not.

[David Hanson (Delyn) (Lab)]

What assessment has the Minister made of the number of people who have used Help to Buy who are now in negative equity because of leasehold reform? They cannot sell the properties and the price has fallen, so the taxpayer and the individual are hit.

[Kit Malthouse]

At this stage, there is no indication from the early returns on Help to Buy that the situation that the right hon. Gentleman raises is occurring. Indeed, early numbers show a higher level of successful redemption than we expected and we hope that that will continue.

[Peter Aldous (Waveney) (Con)]

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

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[Julian Knight (Solihull) (Con)]

T7. I am delighted to say that Solihull has one of the highest proportions of home ownership in the country. However, there is still real pent-up demand, particularly among the young. Will the Minister tell me what progress the Department has made on the midlands voluntary right-to-buy pilot?

[The Minister for Housing (Kit Malthouse)]

My hon. Friend is a doughty champion for his constituents, including those who are tenants. He is right. We have had an enthusiastic response to the midlands right-to-buy pilot, with over 9,000 people applying for a code in the ballot. Over 6,000 of them have been given a code, and we hope that a significant number will come forward to seek the ownership they desire, funded by the £200 million being put towards the pilot.

[John Spellar (Warley) (Lab)]

T5. As Brexit approaches, what is the Secretary of State’s Department doing to ensure that, when buying food, vehicles, furniture or any other goods and services, local councils follow Government guidelines to take local value into account and back British business and British workers by buying British first?

[Mr Simon Clarke (Middlesbrough South and East Cleveland) (Con)]

T8. Has my hon. Friend reviewed the better streets proposal from YIMBY and the Adam Smith Institute, which would allow residents of a single street to vote on giving themselves permitted development rights to build upwards to a maximum of six storeys and thereby address the housing crisis?

[Kit Malthouse]

I have done better than that—I have met them. I did so just two weeks ago to discuss their fascinating ideas, not least on how we can make the principle of neighbourhood planning work in urban areas, an issue that I know is of great importance to my hon. Friend.

[Ian Austin (Dudley North) (Lab)]

T9. Does the Secretary of State agree that the establishment of the new all-party group on the national holocaust memorial, which is chaired by the hon. Member for Harrow East (Bob Blackman) and me, is very much to be welcomed? Is it not fantastic that so many Members from both sides of the House came together, at a time when antisemitism is on the increase, to establish this group and that we want to commemorate here in Parliament history’s greatest crime and support the establishment of this memorial, right here in Westminster, at the centre of not just our political life but our national life?

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[Mr William Wragg (Hazel Grove) (Con)]

Following the Office for National Statistics household projection figures being revised downwards by nearly a quarter, will my hon. Friend the Minister ensure that regional housing targets reflect the easing of pressure to build on the green belt, with particular reference to the Greater Manchester spatial framework?

[Kit Malthouse]

My hon. Friend may know that we have already issued a technical consultation on the latest household projection numbers and the impact on projected housing need in local authority areas. We really do not want local authorities to take their foot of the accelerator, however, not least because we believe that there is pent-up demand for housing in this country. We are working with authorities across the country to get the formula right in the longer term, while we seek a short-term fix to keep numbers up, but I would be more than happy to meet him and his colleagues to discuss the Manchester spatial framework further.

[Mr Stephen Hepburn (Jarrow) (Lab)]

Tyne and Wear fire service is facing £3 million of cuts, which could mean the closure of my local fire station. Will the Secretary of State look at the special problems with funding fire services that are facing local government in the north-east?

Shale Gas Development

Kit Malthouse Excerpts

Wednesday 31st October 2018 Westminster Hall

[The Minister for Housing (Kit Malthouse)]

It is a pleasure, as always, to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Hollobone. I, too, thank my hon. Friend the Member for Fylde (Mark Menzies) for securing the debate. It is obvious that he and many Members have strong constituency interests in the topic and want to ensure, as I do, that local voices are heard as we consider the development of the shale gas industry in the UK.

[Chris Green (Bolton West) (Con)]

Will the Minister give way?

[Kit Malthouse]

No, because I want to leave time at the end for my hon. Friend the Member for Fylde.

It is clear from my hon. Friend’s speech that the recent consultations are important and have excited a strong reaction from his constituents, from him and from other hon. Members. I emphasise that no decision has been made whether to bring the proposals forward. The consultations have now closed: the Government are considering the representations made and will issue a response in due course.

The consultations are part of a range of measures to make planning decisions faster and fairer for all those affected by new shale gas development and ensure that local communities are fully involved in the planning decisions that affect them. Hon. Members will know that the Secretary of State has a quasi-judicial role in the planning system, so they will understand that it would not be appropriate for me to comment today on the detail of individual planning applications, on decisions on those applications, or on local plans. Hon. Members will also know that my remit as Housing Minister in relation to shale gas development is focused on planning policy and on delivering related manifesto commitments. However, given that many matters have been raised that are beyond my remit, I undertake to refer them to the appropriate Ministers, not least the Minister for Energy and Clean Growth.

[Sir Greg Knight]

Will the Minister give way?

[Kit Malthouse]

I am afraid that I do not have time.

My hon. Friend the Member for Fylde highlighted the importance of community engagement in the planning process. I reassure him that we remain fully committed to ensuring that local communities are fully involved in planning decisions that affect them, and to making planning decisions faster and fairer. Those are long-standing principles and I am adamant that we should stick to them. However, we understand that communities feel that they are often not consulted closely enough before planning applications are submitted to the local planning authority by developers. As my hon. Friend highlighted, that can lead to opposition to developments and a longer application process.

Engagement with communities at the pre-application stage gives local people a say earlier in the planning process and makes developers aware of issues of importance to the community that may need to be resolved. The planning system in the UK already provides an extensive legislative framework for community involvement, but I believe there is scope to do more. We have therefore published a consultation on whether applicants should be required to conduct a pre-application consultation with the local community prior to submitting a planning application for shale gas development. We believe that that could further strengthen the role that local people play in the process, and we are keen to hear the voices of industry and of communities. The consultation also seeks views on the process of community consultation that should be required and on the stages of shale gas development that should be covered. It closes on 7 January, and I urge everybody to contribute to it.

Let me move on to the potential changes to permitted development rights. Over the summer, we consulted on whether permitted development rights should be expanded to include shale gas exploration development, and on the circumstances in which those proposals might be appropriate. I make it clear that any potential permitted development right granted for shale gas exploration would not apply to hydraulic fracturing operations or to the production stage of shale gas extraction. I also emphasise that any permitted development right covers only the planning aspects of the development; it does not remove requirements under the regulatory regimes of the Environment Agency, the Health and Safety Executive and the Oil and Gas Authority.

It is important to note that all permitted development rights contain specific exemptions, conditions and restrictions to control and mitigate the impact of the development and protect local amenity. Any potential permitted development right for shale gas exploration would be no exception; for example, it could specify limits on the height of any structure, areas where a permitted development right would not apply, or noise and operation controls. The consultation has sought views on that issue.

In relation to the role that local communities and mineral planning authorities can play within the permitted development rights regime, our consultation also sought views on whether MPAs should be able to conduct a prior approval process to consider specific elements of a development before works can proceed. Such a process can include a requirement for public consultation. It would also enable local consideration of key matters.

There is currently no commercial production from any hydraulically fractured shale gas resources in the UK. However, we believe that it is vital to look ahead and understand how best to manage planning permissions for a future state in which shale gas is produced. We therefore also consulted over the summer on whether the production phase of shale gas developments should be brought within the nationally significant infrastructure projects, which many hon. Members have referred to. The consultation particularly sought to understand what the appropriate triggers and criteria could be for including production projects in the NSIP regime.

I emphasise that community engagement is fundamental to the NSIP regime’s operation. Pre-application consultation with the local community and with local authorities is a statutory requirement. Developers are required to consult extensively before an application is submitted and considered, and where the consultation has not been carried out in line with the statutory requirements, the Planning Inspectorate can refuse to accept an application. Local authorities and communities also have the right to be involved during the examination of a project; they can set out their views in written representations, which will then be taken into account in decision making.

Both consultations ran for 14 weeks and closed on 25 October. The Government are analysing the representations made and will publish a response in due course. Should we take forward the proposals, we have committed to conducting further consultations on the detail of the proposed changes. No doubt this debate will provide valuable feedback into that process.

I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Fylde again for securing this valuable debate. We remain fully committed to ensuring that local communities are properly involved in planning decisions that affect them, and to making planning decisions faster and fairer. As part of that, as I said, we have launched a further consultation today on whether applicants should be required to conduct pre-application consultation with the local community. We have also delivered on our manifesto promises to consult on how best to develop our planning processes for exploration and production of shale gas development while ensuring that communities remain fully involved. We are considering the responses from the consultations and will respond in due course.

Beauty and the Built Environment

Kit Malthouse Excerpts

Tuesday 30th October 2018 Westminster Hall

[The Minister for Housing (Kit Malthouse)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship for the first time, Ms Dorries. You and I were both brought up in a city punctuated by architectural superlatives, but also scarred by some of the worst examples of architectural vandalism over the last three or four decades, so this debate is of interest to us both. I congratulate my right hon. Friend the Member for South Holland and The Deepings (Mr Hayes) on his fantastic speech. It will sit in his canon, alongside his groundbreaking and remarkable speech, “The journey to beauty”, which I have read several times now. He gave it as Transport Minister and it caused quite a stir in the industry at the time. He is without doubt an aesthete and a patriot, and I salute his indefatigability in the face of the ugliness that he rightly calls out. I am tempted to say “I agree” and sit down. He knows however that the issue of beauty in the built environment is close to my heart, so I shall continue.

One of the advantages of having a poet on your speechwriting team in the Department is that they quite often recall to us some of the poetry of our youth. In preparing for this speech, we considered Larkin’s “An Arundel Tomb”—a wonderful poem—which reminds us, with his image of the earl and countess captured in stone, that the things we build today could last for centuries, and that we have a duty to future generations to ornament their lives as ours have been ornamented by the generations that preceded us.

When the Prime Minister asked me to take this job, she was clear about my task: she wanted more, better, and faster homes. Those are the three indivisible words by which I live. We are talking in particular today about the “better” bit; building more beautifully, because in the words of the architect Frank Lloyd-Wright:

“If you foolishly ignore beauty, you will soon find yourself without it.”

Back in 2010, just 134,000 net additional homes were added to the country’s housing stock, but today, the Government are in delivery mode. The number of additional homes is up 55% to 217,000 per annum, and we are well on our way to reaching our target of 300,000 per year. We have always been clear that building more does not mean that we cannot build better. As my right hon. Friend said, we have to quash the myth that quality and quantity cannot go together. In fact, the more we build, the more important it is that we get it right. While I accept his challenge that beauty is not a relative term, when it comes to our built environment it is often in the eye of the beholder, so no matter what we do, some people will be unhappy.

We all know what beauty should feel like. Beautiful places not only make us happy but keep us well, and move us from fear and anxiety to hope and happiness. They welcome us, inspire us and elevate the mundanity of human existence. Great housing developments do not have to be billion-pound projects—the overall winner of last year’s Housing Design Award was a mixed-tenure regeneration scheme in Camden—and critically, beautiful places to live and work should not be the preserve of the wealthy, as my right hon. Friend also pointed out. No matter where one stands on design, our first obligation is to ensure that communities get what they need in a form that they appreciate.

The Government are leading on that by putting beauty at the heart of our housing and communities policy. In both the housing White Paper and the social housing Green Paper, we are focused on creating great places and on design quality. Homes England, our new and more assertive national housing agency—I launched its strategic plan this morning with an exhortation to beauty in all that it does—is promoting design quality through its programmes. In July, our revised national planning policy framework put another stake in the ground. It states that

“permission should be refused for poor design”

especially when it

“fails to take opportunities to improve the character and quality of an area.”

In decades to come, we want to look back on this golden age of housebuilding not through the windscreen of a bulldozer, but with a view to treasure, preserve and invest in what lies before us.

We must learn the lessons of the 1960s and 1970s. My right hon. Friend referred to the Birmingham central library, which has now been demolished. The same is true of Robin Hood Gardens, as well as Pimlico school—a brutalist concrete school in a ward where I served as a councillor—which I played a part in having demolished. They are temporary buildings.

[Mr John Hayes]

While the Minister still has 10 minutes left, let me ask him if he will agree to three things: first, to draw up a blacklist of blight, which would allow us to demolish many more buildings of that kind; secondly, to put in place obligatory local design guides so that local authorities have to build in a style that is suitable and appropriate; and, thirdly, to back the Mail on Sunday campaign to protect urban green spaces. The hon. Member for City of Durham (Dr Blackman-Woods) spoke about level playing fields, but any playing field will do. Playing fields are places where people dance, play, meet friends and enjoy the open space. We need to protect them. Will my hon. Friend do those three things?

[Kit Malthouse]

My right hon. Friend raises some interesting issues. As he knows, I am in the process of producing the guidance to the NPPF, and I shall certainly take his advice as I do so. He might be interested to know that when I was at City Hall, I suggested a competition for Londoners to vote each year for a building that should be demolished, and that we should provide grant support to assist in the demolition of that building, if required. However, let us see where we get to with the guidance.

My right hon. Friend mentioned local materials and the vernacular, and we want to draw from the history of any area the use of materials that mature and age gracefully. Critically, we want to build the conservation areas of the future. That is a challenge I have put to the housing development community in a number of forums over the past three or four months that I have been in this job. That does not mean that all new homes and public buildings need to be a replica of the local style, but they do need to fit in, in the broadest sense of the term.

We are therefore supporting high-quality, high-density housing such as mansion blocks, mews houses and terraced streets, typical of the English urban townscape and rural context with which we are all familiar. In particular, I am keen to see the re-emergence of that great British gift to the world of architecture, the garden square. It is possible for modern, efficient and technology-driven design to echo our history and to reflect the local area without becoming pastiche. That is something we have sought to achieve with our garden communities programme.

More than a century ago, Sir Ebenezer Howard first outlined his idea of a garden city. He had a vision of places where people could work, raise families, travel easily and enjoy green spaces. We are renewing that idea for the 21st century, and we have set out clear expectations for high-quality place making across our country. That is a chance to aspire beyond identikit housing, which my right hon. Friend identified, and town centres that look like everywhere and nowhere. We are championing ambitious councils, which see garden communities as a central part of their plans for housing and growth. Our programme supports 23 places to deliver more than 200,000 new homes by the middle of the century. I hope that we might be able to rise to his challenge to produce 100 new parks, if each of those places has four.

We are not only building homes; we recognise that we are building neighbourhoods. Developments of 500 units or more are bigger than most villages, so we have to think in terms of neighbourhoods that function, as my right hon. Friend pointed out. To achieve that, however, we know that local planning authorities need design capacity, so we have directed almost £5 million to 26 local authorities through our planning delivery fund, to support them in developing innovative ways to increase design skills throughout the country.

We are also running workshops for councillors, to help them to understand and to support their role in ensuring beauty in the built environment. The workshops will offer them the opportunity to discuss the challenges that they face and, importantly, to share their own experience of promoting design quality. We are bringing in people from across the sector—from local authorities to developers, housing associations and architects—to share their ideas about beauty and great design.

[Mr John Hayes]

Will the Minister—we are lucky to have him, by the way, and the shadow Minister—agree to meet me and the Prince of Wales’s organisations to discuss how to learn from the work he has done and is now doing?

[Kit Malthouse]

I am more than happy to meet. In the past, I have worked closely with the Prince’s Foundation for Building Community—I knew Hank Dittmar quite well before he sadly passed away—and I would be delighted to become reacquainted with the prince’s work, not least because earlier this year we held a design quality conference, the first of its kind, which was attended by 380 people from across the sector, and we want to do more of that kind of work, because the responsibility to build more beautifully rests with all of us.

Where the Government are leading, I encourage the private sector to follow. When I bring that message of “more, better, faster” to the sector, I always stress how design matters at every level, from planning to community acceptability: build beautifully and get permission, build beautifully and sell more houses, and build beautifully and communities will actually welcome developers, rather than drive them out of town at the tip of a pitchfork.

[Mr Vaizey]

First, I echo what my right hon. Friend the Member for South Holland and The Deepings (Mr Hayes) said: we have had far too many Housing Ministers, and I call upon the Prime Minister to keep this wonderful man in office until the 2022 election and many years beyond. Secondly, I caution against this debate tipping over into an attack on modern architecture. Robin Hood Gardens may not be lamented, but Park Hill in Sheffield—a similar design—has been restored and is much loved. As the Minister who listed Preston bus station to much anger, I am delighted that it is now treasured by the local community.

[Kit Malthouse]

I acknowledge what my right hon. Friend says, but as my right hon. Friend the Member for South Holland and The Deepings said, that is often an accident of ergonomics, form and beauty coming together, just as it did for the roof at the British Museum—an extraordinary structure in which, exactly right, ergonomics and form come together.

Some of the best examples of beautiful buildings are delivered by small and medium-sized enterprises, from self-build to the refurbishment of historic buildings. Sadly, the 2007-08 economic crash killed a number of such growing developers, and we are yet to see a new talent pool emerge. I believe, however, that SMEs are part of the key to the challenge. That is why we are directing our home building fund towards SMEs—to give them the confidence to grow and build, and to raise the bar on design quality. By having more players in the market, we shall get them to compete on innovation and quality.

Ultimately, it comes down to delivering houses that people want to live in, buildings where people want to work and places that people want to call home. More than that, we must build things that elevate and entertain. That is what the Government are hoping to and will deliver in the future. I look forward to working with many hon. Members on that most important of missions. I close by—

[Mr Vaizey]

London views?

[Kit Malthouse]

Sorry, yes. I asked my team to update me on the London views. Apparently, there is a campaign by London First and other developers to relax the protections, but so far they remain in the draft London plan. We shall see where that plan lands.

I shall finish my speech by returning to that Larkin poem. Members may remember—I am sure that my right hon. Friend the Member for South Holland and The Deepings does—that the most affecting part of that poem is in the second stanza, when Larkin reveals that the couple he has been looking at are actually holding hands. They have been holding hands for the centuries for which they have been lying there. At the end of the poem he ends with that famous line:

“What will survive of us is love.”

In 200 or 300 years’ time, what will future generations see as a symbol of our love for them, projected forward in time? All that will survive of us is those things that we build today. We are joined in our ambition to ornament their lives and to create the beauty that will enhance their existence for centuries to come, as ours has been enhanced by the generations who came before us.

Housing and Home Ownership

Kit Malthouse Excerpts

Tuesday 16th October 2018 Westminster Hall

[The Minister for Housing (Kit Malthouse)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your guiding hand, Mr Pritchard. It is a great pleasure to respond to this very important debate secured by my hon. Friend the Member for Harborough (Neil O’Brien). In his report, “Green, pleasant and affordable,” he has presented a smorgasbord—a veritable cornucopia—of radical and interesting ideas. In the time I have available, I want to go through a number of the areas that the report covers, in particular supply and home ownership.

The first issue he quite rightly raises is that of getting the most out of land. In order to increase housing supply, we understand that local authorities need to be empowered to make the most effective use of the land that is present across all our towns and cities.

In its recent report on land value capture, the Housing, Communities and Local Government Committee made several recommendations for reform of compulsory purchase compensation. Its recommendations included restricting compensation by removing hope value from the assessment of the market value of land. The Government will publish their response to the Committee’s report shortly. As I explained when I gave evidence to the Committee, we have very recently introduced wide-ranging reforms to make the compulsory purchase process clearer, fairer and faster for all. That includes changes to the Land Compensation Act 1961. We are keen to let those important reforms bed in. The revised national planning policy framework, to which my hon. Friend referred, encourages local authorities to make more proactive use of their extensive land assembly powers. We will keep the operation of the system under review.

We also recognise that the availability of sustainable infrastructure is important to support new housing. That is why we have introduced changes to the NPPF that will ensure that developers know what contributions they are expected to make towards affordable housing and essential infrastructure, that local communities are clear about the infrastructure and affordable housing, and that local authorities can hold them to account. The revised NPPF requires local authorities to set clearer policy requirements for infrastructure and affordable housing through plans, informed by more transparent viability assessments. It will also support local authorities to ensure that development meets the policy requirements set out in the local plan.

Fundamentally, what we are trying to do in the NPPF is to give clarity up front to developers and local communities about what will be expected, which will allow them to factor that into land value over time. My hon. Friend quite rightly expressed dissatisfaction with the amount of value that is captured from land. He is correct that often in a viability assessment, it is the community infrastructure component—the section 106 component—that gets squeezed. That is largely because the negotiation takes place after planning permission has been granted. We are trying to give more clarity up front through the planning system, so that developers know what the requirements are going to be, whether that is infrastructure or affordable housing, and can factor that into the value that they pay for the land, so that fundamentally it is the land value that will get squeezed.

We have consulted on further reforms to developer contributions, including removing existing restrictions in certain circumstances that prevent local planning authorities pooling more than five section 106 planning obligations towards a single piece of infrastructure. We will be responding to that consultation in the near future as well.

Local authorities are also able to use the community infrastructure levy to help to fund the supporting infrastructure that is needed to address the cumulative impact of development. Where authorities have introduced CIL, 15% is specifically allocated to meet local priorities, and that is increased to 25% in areas with a neighbourhood plan in place. In an area that has a parish council, the money is passed directly to it. That neighbourhood allocation from CIL gives communities real power in deciding and delivering their infrastructure priorities for their area and will hopefully encourage the spread of neighbourhood planning.

In his report, my hon. Friend also considered the creation of new communities. We believe strongly that the creation of new garden communities can play a vital role in helping to meet this country’s housing need well into the future. Our current programme supports 23 locally-led garden communities that have the potential to deliver more than 200,000 homes by 2050. They range in size from 1,500 to more than 40,000 new homes in one place. We have just launched a new garden communities prospectus, inviting ambitious proposals for new garden communities at scale. This is not just about getting the numbers up; it is about building quality, innovative places that people are happy to call home.

[Priti Patel]

The Minister has lit the blue touch paper in mentioning garden communities. He will know from my correspondence with his Department that one of those garden community proposals covers my constituency, and the Braintree district and Colchester borough. Can he provide any clarity on the conditional requirements that the Department is putting in place for the development of those schemes—where public funds are being used—to support the concept of garden communities?

[Kit Malthouse]

The primary requirement we have for garden communities is that they have strong local support and are supported by local democratically elected politicians. We would, for example, not countenance a proposal for a garden community that came forward against the wishes of the local authority or local authorities concerned. My right hon. Friend may have noticed—this points to an issue that my hon. Friend the Member for Harborough raised about capacity and capability—that we recently changed the regulations so that we can have locally-led development corporations. They are brought together and approved by the Secretary of State, but under local initiatives and with local control, to try to deliver some of those communities more effectively. Local control, consent and engagement are key, in terms of both acceptability and development.

Another issue that has been raised is increasing density, which we believe is also important. We need to make sure that we make the most effective use of underutilised land. That is a crucial part of our focus. Higher density development and the development of brownfield land can play a significant role in increasing housing supply in urban locations, especially in areas that are well served by public transport and in town and city centre locations. The revised NPPF requires local planning authorities to be more proactive in identifying opportunities to make more effective use of land. That includes planning for higher densities in locations that are well served by public transport, and reallocating underutilised land to serve local development needs better.

I disagree slightly with my hon. Friend the Member for Harborough about the requirement to build towers to achieve density. In central London—a place that I know very well, having served there as a London Assembly member and councillor—some of the densest areas are in fact some of the most desirable, and they are low-rise. It is probably still the case that the densest part of central London is Cadogan Square. Towers do not necessarily deliver density, and they can often be intrusive. Our framework goes further by stating that local authorities should support the use of airspace above existing residential and commercial buildings to provide new homes, as my hon. Friend said. We recognise that there is more to be done, and that is why we have just announced that we will publish proposals for a national permitted development right to permit people to build upwards on existing buildings rather than just to build out.

Important in all of this is the need to diversify the market. We believe that to increase our housing supply we have to be innovative and boost the development sector to allow both large and small builders to flourish and to build the homes that our communities need. The Government fully recognise the important role that small and medium-sized house builders play in delivering much-needed housing in this country, and we are committed to ensuring that this support is in the right place. We have already put in place a number of initiatives to help SME house builders to grow and develop, including the home building fund, the housing growth fund and the housing delivery fund, as well as proposals to make it easier for SMEs to identify land.

We believe that that is a critical way to encourage innovation. The market has agglomerated into a small number of large players, which are perhaps not as innovative as they could be. If we can create a more vigorous market of people competing to build houses and competing for our custom, they are likely to be much more innovative in their method, supply and typography of housing, and they may well cater to different parts of the market and look at sites that larger builders might not.

[Scott Mann]

My hon. Friend is doing a cracking job, especially with his “more, better, faster” campaign on housing delivery. My point is about self-build—he has not mentioned it specifically, but I know that it is part of the Government’s strategy on delivery. Does he agree with the sentiment that there is no better help that we can give to an individual than to allocate them a plot and allow them to build their own home?

[Kit Malthouse]

I wholeheartedly agree on self-build, which I am very keen to encourage. Something like three out of every four houses in Austria are self-built or custom-built. It holds enormous capacity for the future. I recommend that my hon. Friend go and visit a site called Graven Hill just outside Bicester, which is the largest self-build site in Europe and which will deliver about 1,400 self-build homes. It is quite something to see—an amazing array of different houses. There is a house that looks like a stealth bomber sitting next to a Swiss chalet, a Cotswold cottage and a flat-pack house from Poland. As I said on the fringes of conference, I think the site will be a conservation area in the future because of the effervescence of design that is taking place there. We are very keen to encourage self-build.

Finally, one of the big issues—

[Eddie Hughes (Walsall North) (Con)]

Will my hon. Friend give way?

[Kit Malthouse]

Yes, I will give way.

[Eddie Hughes]

I was scared by my hon. Friend’s use of the word “finally” and thought that I might not have the opportunity to intervene before he finished. As an accidental landlord myself—I need to refer to my declaration of interest—I was intrigued by the report on a proposed “help to own” scheme published by the Centre for Policy Studies on Monday. I understand that the Minister has been sent a copy. The idea that landlords might be able to sell a property to a sitting tenant, and that there would be a capital gains tax break for both parties, seemed innovative and interesting. Does he have any thoughts on that?

[Kit Malthouse]

By sheer coincidence, on my accession to the chrysanthemum throne in housing, I raised a similar possibility, should we look at some way of transferring from landlord to tenant in the future. Those issues of tax, stamp duty and ownership are way above my pay grade, but I have no doubt that the report will have winged its way to the Treasury, where our colleagues will be considering its efficacy. I can see why it might be attractive from a landlord transfer to ownership point of view, although we would have to study its fiscal effects to see what the cost might be.

[Priti Patel]

Will my hon. Friend give way?

[Kit Malthouse]

I will make a bit of progress. I want to address the issue of home ownership, because it is fundamental to the report and it is, as my hon. Friend the Member for Harborough quite rightly said, one of the most important challenges of our time. As he mentioned, we must find ways to improve home ownership. Rising demand for housing has increased prices and in many cases pushed down home ownership. The Government believe that people should be free to purchase a second home or invest in a buy-to-let property. However, we are aware that that can make it difficult for other people, particularly first-time buyers, to get on the property ladder. That is why in April 2016 the Government introduced higher rates of stamp duty land tax on purchases of additional properties.

Since the council tax empty homes premium was introduced in April 2013, the number of long-term empty residential properties has fallen. When it is in force, the Rating (Property in Common Occupation) and Council Tax (Empty Dwellings) Bill will allow councils to go further, increasing the premium by up to 300% in some cases. That will allow authorities to encourage better use of the existing housing stock in their area. As the Prime Minister announced, the Government are also taking action on non-resident purchases of residential property, which can make it more difficult for UK residents to purchase a home of their own. The Government will publish a consultation on introducing an increased stamp duty land tax charge on non-residents buying property in England and Northern Ireland. More details will be brought forward through that consultation in due course, following the normal tax policy-making process set out by the Government—the legislation will be in a future Finance Bill.

We must also support our younger generation, who find it increasingly hard to get on to the property ladder. We are supporting people’s aspirations to buy through a range of initiatives, including Help to Buy, right to buy, greater funding for shared ownership, and rent to buy. Since the spring of 2010, Government-backed schemes have helped more than 481,000 households to buy a home. Younger people are also helped directly by our investment in affordable housing. The Government are investing more than £9 billion in the affordable homes programme to deliver a wide range of affordable homes, including shared ownership homes, by 2022. Since 2010, we have delivered more than 60,000 shared ownership properties, helping people to take their first steps into home ownership. Our recent Green Paper, “A new deal for social housing”, announced that we would be exploring innovative, affordable home ownership models to support those who are struggling to raise a deposit.

The Prime Minister has made it clear that this should be a country that works for everyone. That means building more of the right homes in the right places and ensuring that the housing market works for all parts of our community. It is this Government’s mission to reverse the decline in home ownership and to revive the dream of Britain as a property-owning democracy. We must revive that dream for ordinary people—for those striving on low and middle incomes, who find the first rung of the housing ladder beyond their reach. The Government are committed to tackling this challenge to make the housing market work. By the mid-2020s, we aim to have increased house building to an average of 300,000 net new homes a year.

On planning permissions, which my hon. Friend the Member for Filton and Bradley Stoke (Jack Lopresti) mentioned, we are now granting more than 350,000 permissions a year against a building target of 300,000 houses. That is another challenge that I face. In the time that I have in this job, I am always open to ideas. I certainly welcome the radical thinking that my hon. Friend the Member for Harborough and his collaborators on the paper have injected into the debate. I will be studying the paper in some detail and I hope to weave some of his thinking into our policies in the future.

Question put and agreed to.

Gypsies and Travellers

Kit Malthouse Excerpts

Monday 10th September 2018 Commons Chamber

[Andrew Selous]

indicated assent.

[The Minister for Housing (Kit Malthouse)]

indicated assent.

--- Later in debate ---

[The Minister for Housing (Kit Malthouse)]

May I start by congratulating my hon. Friend the Member for South West Bedfordshire (Andrew Selous) on securing this important debate and thanking all those who contributed? I recognise that feelings are strong across the House, and the turnout this evening, as my right hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Rayleigh and Wickford (Mr Francois) pointed out, is an indication of that strength of feeling.

I stress again that the Government take the issue of living conditions and illegal activity on Traveller sites and unauthorised encampments extremely seriously. As a Member who represents a rural constituency that gets its fair share of some of the visitors who cause disruption and difficulty, I ought to add that this subject is of particular interest to me. I have listened carefully to all the accounts of the conditions on some sites, the challenges faced by those living on these sites and the difficulties that communities face as a result of unauthorised encampments, as well as all the constructive recommendations for how we could improve the way in which we deal with the present situation.

I am confident that I speak for everyone in this House when I say that we recognise that the majority of the travelling community are decent, law-abiding people. Like my hon. Friend the Member for South West Bedfordshire, I have a number of settled small-scale travelling communities in my constituency who integrate well and are part of the community. However, we are extremely concerned about the issues raised during the debate regarding the conditions and activities carried out on certain sites, as well as the impact that unauthorised encampments can have on settled communities, especially when they give rise to criminality.

We promote a tolerant society in which people, whatever their background, can live, work, learn and socialise together, based on shared rights, responsibilities and opportunities, but we will not and should not sit by when people are breaking the law. The Government remain committed to ensuring that all communities, regardless of their ethnicity, are treated fairly, with equality under the law a fundamental tenet of our society, as my right hon. and gallant Friend the Member for Rayleigh and Wickford pointed out. Our aim is to ensure fair and equal treatment for Travellers in a way that facilitates their traditional and nomadic way of life while respecting the interests and rights of the settled community.

I will take in order some of the broad themes raised by hon. Members. First, on unauthorised encampments, in the spring we launched a consultation on the effectiveness of powers for dealing with unauthorised development and encampments, alongside colleagues in the Ministry of Justice and the Home Office. The document sought views on a range of issues—from the powers available to local authorities and the police, to the provision of authorised stopping places and the impact that a change in existing powers could have on travelling communities.

The consultation, which closed on 15 June, allowed the Government to hear views from everyone with an interest—settled and nomadic communities, organisations and individuals, and public authorities—on how best to address unauthorised encampments. We have received a substantial response, with over 2,000 representations, which signals how strongly people feel about this issue. We are grateful for the time that people have taken to engage with us, and we remain committed to working with the Home Office and the Ministry of Justice to consider all representations before deciding on the way forward.

Several Members, not least my hon. Friend the Member for South West Bedfordshire, raised the Irish model. It may be of interest to Members that my right hon. Friend the Housing, Communities and Local Government Secretary recently met the Irish Government to discuss their approach to trespass and unauthorised encampments. We will provide a formal response to the consultation in due course.

[James Duddridge (Rochford and Southend East) (Con)]

Was there a case against the Irish option?

[Kit Malthouse]

I have to confess that I was not privy to the meeting, but I understand that the pros and cons of the Irish model were discussed in some detail, and I think there are some cons as well as pros.

The second broad issue that was raised, quite rightly, by my hon. Friend the Member for South West Bedfordshire was the living conditions on sites. He made an important point about the conditions on existing authorised sites, some of which, I hear, are unsuitable for habitation. I agree that they are, frankly, disgraceful. I would remind the House that, under the Caravan Sites and Control of Development Act 1960, private caravan sites in England, which may include owner-occupied and rented Traveller sites, must have planning permission and a site licence issued by the local authority. It is an offence to run a site without a licence. Housing that is not fit for habitation is not acceptable under any circumstances.

[Andrew Selous]

The difficulty is that planning permission tends not to align with the red line of legal land ownership on a map. The difficulty for really good local authority officers, who want to have good enforcement, is that the law is not fit for purpose, however well-intentioned it may have been. I have really good officers who try endlessly to get this right, and it is really hard under current law.

--- Later in debate ---

[Kit Malthouse]

I do recognise the problem that my hon. Friend raises, and I would be more than happy to sit down with him and discuss what specific changes he thinks are required to planning legislation to deal with some of these anomalies. Anything we can do to facilitate correct planning enforcement, particularly on some of these condition issues, would obviously be welcome. I am happy to give him that undertaking.

Site licence conditions can govern matters such as the permitted number of caravans on the site, the provision of roads, utilities, sewerage and fire equipment, and spacing distances between homes. Local authorities can serve compliance notices on the park owner if they fail to meet the conditions stipulated in the site licence, and can prosecute them if they fail to comply. If the site owner is convicted—if local authorities can identify the site owner—they may face an unlimited fine. Of course, when the health and safety of residents is at risk, a local authority can enter a site and do the necessary works without taking the owner to court. The authority will in any of these cases often seek to recover all its enforcement costs, including for court cases, and charge interest on the expenses claimed from the site’s owner.

[Sandy Martin]

If it is that much more attractive to have Travellers on properly regulated and enforced sites—I think we can all agree that it is—is it not necessary to make sure that there are enough of these sites? At the moment there are very many unregulated and unenforceable sites, and as long as there are not enough planned sites, Gypsies and Travellers will continue to use unplanned and illegal sites.

[Kit Malthouse]

I will move on to planning issues in a moment, so I will address the hon. Gentleman’s question then, if I may.

The third area that my hon. Friend the Member for South West Bedfordshire raised was educational outcomes. He made a very important point. It is shocking when we consider the educational outcomes of Gypsy, Roma and Traveller children. I am concerned by the findings of the Children’s Commissioner for England that he mentioned. Every child has the right to access all the opportunities that modern-day Britain has to offer, including an adequate education. We expect schools to have data and evidence-led approaches to support all their pupils, whatever their background. Parents are responsible for ensuring that children of compulsory school age receive a suitable full-time education. One way they can do that is through home education, rather than regular school attendance, and the Government support the right of parents to home education. However, if it appears that a child is not receiving a suitable education at home, local authorities can enforce school attendance through school attendance orders.

However, as my hon. Friend mentioned, there is more to do. That was why in January this year the Department for Education established the Gypsy, Roma and Traveller stakeholder group to inform policy development. In March we launched a review of exclusions, exploring why certain pupil groups, including Gypsy, Roma and Traveller pupils, are over-represented in exclusion statistics. In January my Department launched a 2018-19 pilot programme to improve the integration of Gypsy, Roma and Traveller communities, including by raising educational outcomes. As part of the Department for Education’s careers strategy, all those groups and their young people were listed as one of three target groups in a £1.7 million call for projects testing ways of providing vulnerable groups with guidance on routes into careers.

[Andrew Selous]

I am delighted to hear that the Minister is engaging with the Gypsy and Traveller community, but does he not accept that there might be adults in the community who quite like the current system because it gives them quite a lot of freedom, and that it is actually the children who are missing out? Children might not stick their hands up and say that they want to be in school full time, but we in this place have a duty to do what is right for all children so that they can fulfil their God-given aspirations and talents and become the scientists and engineers we need for the future.

[Kit Malthouse]

I completely agree with my hon. Friend but, as he knows, the subject of home schooling and the rights of parents over the rights of the state is a matter of debate at the moment, and something that I know the House will want to opine on in future. That is pertinent to this area in particular. I have inquired of Gypsy communities in my constituency whether their children are at school, and they are being home educated, which at the moment is perfectly legal. The question is whether that education is of an acceptable standard, and therefore whether a local authority feels able to enforce.

The fourth area that my hon. Friend raised was planning policy. He described the imbalance between the number of sites in some areas compared with others, particularly in his county. The Government’s planning policy for Traveller sites confirms that our aims include that local planning authorities should make their own assessment of need for the purposes of planning and, working together with neighbouring authorities, identify land for sites. Local planning authorities should consider the production of joint development plans that set targets on a cross-authority basis to provide more flexibility in identifying sites. The policy is clear that local planning authorities should ensure that sites in rural areas respect the scale of, and do not dominate, the nearest settled community. In exceptional cases when a local planning authority is burdened by a large-scale unauthorised site that has significantly increased its need, and where the area is subject to strict and special planning constraints, there is no assumption that the authority has to plan to meet its Traveller site needs in full. With regard to helping to improve outcomes for Travellers, local planning authorities should also ensure that Traveller sites are economically, socially and environmentally sustainable.

[Andrew Selous]

I will try to make this my last intervention. Is it not possible for a local authority to plan for enough houses for everyone in an area so that there is one general housing needs assessment that provides enough accommodation for everyone? Some 76% of Travellers live in houses built from bricks and mortar anyway. There is nothing in their culture that prevents that from happening while respecting absolutely their history and culture, which we all want to celebrate. Does the Minister not think that there is something odd, outdated and failing about this continuing policy of separation and segregation, which has such terrible outcomes for everyone?

--- Later in debate ---

[Kit Malthouse]

I acknowledge the issue my hon. Friend raises with regard to segregation, but notwithstanding the percentage he mentions, a significant percentage of the travelling community still wishes to live a nomadic lifestyle. The question is how we best facilitate that, so that the impact of that lifestyle on existing communities is minimised, while at the same time allowing those who do wish to travel from place to place to live as peacefully and harmoniously as possible, with their children in particular getting the outcomes he desires.

The final area, which was raised by a number of Members, is that of enforcement. Several hon. Members spoke about the difficulties of enforcing the law and gave examples of cases in which the police are unable to act. The consultation underlined that illegal behaviours, such as industrial fly-tipping, can be difficult to address. We have seen that a multi-agency approach is vital in dealing with these incidents successfully. Local authorities, the police and other agencies should work together to find appropriate solutions. In some areas, such as Sandwell, we have seen that that can work. The majority of Gypsies and Travellers are entirely law-abiding, but we take very seriously the significant incidents that we have heard of involving a minority of individuals. We should not allow them to tarnish the reputation of Gypsy, Traveller and travelling show people and communities.

We want to prevent local residents from suffering when a problematic unauthorised encampment occurs and to improve the outcomes of the most vulnerable in British society. We are funding a programme to improve outcomes for Gypsy, Roma and Traveller community groups in educational attainment, health and integration, and we are working closely with the Department of Health and Social Care and the Department for Education to maximise the impact of our projects. I acknowledge—I think both sides of the House agree—that more needs to be done to ensure harmonious relations between our communities. We recognise that the problem is by no means simple. We are giving these issues our urgent attention and we will publish a response to the consultation in due course.

My hon. Friend has expressed his frustration with Government action thus far and calls for significant change. I have no specifics for him tonight, but I fervently hope that, through my actions and the actions of the Department over the months to come, we can obviate the need for a fourth such debate.

Question put and agreed to.

Oral Answers to Questions

Kit Malthouse Excerpts

Monday 23rd July 2018 Commons Chamber

[Fiona Onasanya (Peterborough) (Lab)]

6. What recent assessment he has made of trends in the level of new homes available for social rent since 2010.

[The Minister for Housing (Kit Malthouse)]

Since 2010, we have delivered over 378,000 new affordable homes, including 129,000 for social rent. We are investing over £9 billion in the affordable homes programme to deliver over a quarter of a million new affordable homes, including at least a further 12,500 for social rent.

[Fiona Onasanya]

In the Housing Secretary’s council area of Bexley, 270 social rented homes were built in 2010, but not a single one was built last year. There is a housing crisis in his area, just as there is in Peterborough and across the country, so would it not be better for his constituents and mine if he reversed the huge funding cuts that this Government have made to social housing?

[Kit Malthouse]

I do not know if the hon. Lady heard my initial answer to her question; I pointed out the enormous amounts of money that are being invested in the provision of affordable homes. Pleasingly, the area that she represents has responded with some alacrity, putting in place some significantly ambitious targets—100,000 new homes over the next 20 years, of which 40,000 will be affordable. It is to be congratulated on doing so. She is right, though, that there is some pressure to be brought to bear particularly on councils to bid into the extra borrowing allowance that we have made available to them for the provision of social rent. I will meet them at my earliest opportunity to understand when and why they will do so.

[Rachel Maclean (Redditch) (Con)]

Between 2012 and 2017, Labour-controlled Redditch Borough Council failed to build a single home for social rent. Does the Minister therefore welcome Conservative-controlled Redditch Borough Council’s intention to build more homes for social rent, because we believe that everyone should have a decent home of their own, whatever their income or background?

[Kit Malthouse]

I am sure that there are many in Redditch who breathe a sigh of relief that the Conservatives are in control of that particular part of the country, championed by such a wonderful Member of Parliament. My hon. Friend is absolutely right: it is still the case that more affordable homes have been delivered in the last seven years than were delivered in the last seven years of the previous Labour Government.

[Siobhain McDonagh (Mitcham and Morden) (Lab)]

7. If he will meet the National Trust to discuss the potential effect on levels of housing need in local authority areas of that trust's proposals to increase rents to market levels on all its housing stock; and if he will make a statement.

[The Minister for Housing (Kit Malthouse)]

I will be more than happy—in fact, it would be a pleasure—to meet the National Trust.

[Siobhain McDonagh]

My constituent, Maria Bentley-Dingwall, has lived in her rented National Trust property for the last 12 years. She pays rent of £850. This is now going to increase to £1,450 per calendar month, which will be considerably in excess of the local housing allowance. As she is a disabled person, when she is eventually evicted for rent arrears, she will become the responsibility of the local authority, quite apart from the personal distress that that will cause her. Does the Minister agree that he should intervene with the National Trust to find out what it is doing and that, as a much loved body, it has a greater responsibility than tearing out the maximum amount of rent from its properties?

[Kit Malthouse]

The hon. Lady makes a strong case for her constituent, as we would expect, and as I say, I would be more than happy to meet the National Trust. I know that it is reviewing its property policies generally and has decided to overcome the problems created by the modern ground rent regulations that are affecting many of its tenants. It is, however, a charity and it has to balance its legal obligation to maximise its income against its charitable obligation to those it cares for.

[Sir Hugo Swire (East Devon) (Con)]

Earlier this year I met the Charity Commissioners to discuss the issue of ground rents and the National Trust on the Killerton estate, a National Trust property in my constituency. I am very pleased that the National Trust has agreed not to increase the ground rent of long-standing tenants, but I hear what my hon. Friend says about it. I am a member of the trust, which is, as it has just been described, a much-loved body. Does my hon. Friend—another much-loved body—agree that he should meet its representatives and encourage them to meet Members with National Trust properties in their constituencies to discuss how the trust can be a better neighbour and companion and conform with the Government’s housing agenda in the future?

[Kit Malthouse]

I have absolutely no doubt that the National Trust’s shifting its position on modern ground rent was due to the pressure exerted and the highlighting of the issue by many Members, not least my right hon. Friend himself, on behalf of his constituents. As I have said, I should be more than happy to meet representatives of that august body and discuss its property policies generally.

[Chi Onwurah (Newcastle upon Tyne Central) (Lab)]

8. What assessment he has made of the viability of local authority funding for the maintenance of acceptable levels of public services.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mary Robinson (Cheadle) (Con)]

18. What steps his Department is taking to reduce the time taken to build new homes.

[The Minister for Housing (Kit Malthouse)]

New homes should be built out as soon as possible once planning permission is granted, and under this Government net additional dwellings are at their highest since 2007-08. We are building on progress made so far by revising the national planning policy framework and diversifying the market to increase the pace of development, and I have commissioned my right hon. Friend the Member for West Dorset (Sir Oliver Letwin) to lead a review of build-out rates.

[Lee Rowley]

One of the councils in my area has been without a local plan since 2005 and is currently consulting on a draft plan that over-inflates housing need and unnecessarily builds on the green belt. Does my hon. Friend agree that one way to speed up house building is to put in place local plans that have the confidence of local people?

[Kit Malthouse]

My hon. Friend fights hard for his constituents’ interests, as he does at all times. He is right to say that a local plan is vital not only to progress housing in an area but to protect residents from the predations of speculative developers. I find it astonishing that authorities can be so dilatory in producing such plans.

[Mary Robinson]

Does my hon. Friend agree that it is essential that we build the homes that the country needs, and that we build the right homes in the right places, which means protecting the green belt and investing in the infrastructure that we need to accommodate those homes?

[Kit Malthouse]

With her usual perspicacity, my hon. Friend has put her finger on the button and enunciated the cocktails required for successful development, with the omission of one, which my right hon. Friend the Member for Mid Sussex (Sir Nicholas Soames) mentioned —namely, design. If we can put all those things together, we will create the houses that people need.

[Mr Speaker]

I think the right hon. Member for Mid Sussex enjoyed the reference to cocktails.

--- Later in debate ---

[Alex Norris (Nottingham North) (Lab/Co-op)]

The building of new homes is being choked off in Nottingham by the refusal of the Department to remove the cap on the housing revenue account. I put this to Ministers on 12 March, and was told that if Nottingham stepped up and made a strong case, it would be looked upon favourably. Such a case has been made, but it has not been looked upon favourably. Why not?

[Kit Malthouse]

As a person who is new in post, I am happy to look at the specifics of that matter, but we have obviously given an extra £1 billion of funding to local authorities to bid into, and we are inviting bids at the moment for housing revenue account expansion. I would also point out that, across the whole piece, local authorities already have about £3.6 billion of headroom, and I am at a loss to understand why they are not using it.

[Clive Efford (Eltham) (Lab)]

The people who come into my surgery are looking for social rented housing, and we need to speed up the building of those homes. This Government inherited a £4 billion social housing building programme, but the Chartered Institute of Housing says that that has now gone down to less than £500 million, which represents a cut of nearly 90%. How does the Minister intend to increase the supply of social housing that people in my constituency so desperately need?

[Kit Malthouse]

We are committed to a vibrant housing market with tenures of all types, and for all types of people. In particular, we have emphasised that housing for social rent should be an area of growth. As was stated in an earlier answer, we are targeting a further 12,500 social rent housing for provision in the next few years, but if the hon. Gentleman has any ideas about where, when and who I need to push, prod or harass in order to build more, I will be more than happy to do that.

[Nigel Mills (Amber Valley) (Con)]

11. What steps his Department is taking to ensure fairness in the allocation of funding to local government.

--- Later in debate ---

[Robert Courts (Witney) (Con)]

17. What assessment he has made of the effect of the Help to Buy scheme and the reduction in stamp duty on the number of homes purchased by first-time buyers.

[The Minister for Housing (Kit Malthouse)]

A total of 128,317 first-time buyer households have purchased a home through a Help to Buy equity loan from its launch in April 2013 to December 2017. Some 69,000 first-time buyers have benefited from stamp duty relief between its introduction in the autumn Budget 2017 and the end of March 2018.

[Robert Courts]

One of the greatest concerns raised by young people in West Oxfordshire is whether they will ever be able to afford a home in their town or village. I welcome the stamp duty cuts, which have helped people across the country. Can the Minister tell us how many have benefited from our changes?

[Kit Malthouse]

My hon. Friend is well known for his championing of young people and their causes, particularly in his constituency, and he is right to point out that this move will benefit young people in particular. The stamp duty relief will help 95% of first-time buyers who pay it—that will be more than 1 million households over the next five years. Between the relief’s introduction and the end of March, 69,000 first-time buyers have already benefited. I would also point out that we are at an 11-year high in the number of first-time buyers, which stands at 363,000.

[Mr Speaker]

Well, I am keen to get through the Order Paper today. I call Nigel Huddleston.

--- Later in debate ---

[Diana Johnson (Kingston upon Hull North) (Lab)]

20. What recent assessment he has made of (a) trends in the level of home ownership since 2010 and (b) the opportunities available for council and social housing tenants who wish to buy their homes.

[The Minister for Housing (Kit Malthouse)]

Home ownership has been stable over the past four years at about 63%. The right to buy has helped more than 86,000 council tenants into home ownership since 2012, under the reinvigorated scheme. This summer we launch a major pilot of the voluntary right to buy for housing association tenants.

[Diana Johnson]

Since 2010, we have seen home ownership levels fall to a 30-year low, while homelessness has doubled. If we want to end this dual failure to meet housing need and aspiration, and put choice in the hands of the many, not the few, should we not invest in building and renovating enough council and affordable homes to rent and buy, without taking away the rights that council tenants’ have had for 38 years under the right to buy scheme?

[Kit Malthouse]

The hon. Lady is definitely right to say that the solution to everybody’s housing problems is to build more homes—as many as we can—across those parts of the country that need it.

[Phil Wilson (Sedgefield) (Lab)]

22. Whether he plans to introduce a regulator of private landlords; and if he will make statement.

[The Minister for Housing (Kit Malthouse)]

We are determined to crack down on the small number of rogue landlords—that includes banning the most serious offenders from letting properties. The database of rogue landlords and property agents supports local authority enforcement action. We have committed to requiring private landlords to join a mandatory redress scheme.

[Phil Wilson]

I have an indirect interest in this question, as my wife is a private landlord. Selective licensing schemes are good as far as they go, but a side effect is that they force bad landlords elsewhere. Therefore, whether we have a regulator or not, the answer, as outlined in my private Member’s Bill, is a national register of private landlords and licensing scheme to ensure that they provide the good-quality homes that people deserve. I know from working with Ron Hogg, Durham’s police and crime commissioner, of the effect that rogue private landlords have on local communities. Will the Secretary of State meet us both to discuss the need for a more robust approach to registration and licensing, both locally and nationally?

[Kit Malthouse]

I am more than happy to meet the hon. Gentleman to discuss the issues he raises, but I carefully suggest to him that this House has to strike a balance between bureaucracy and regulation—the two are often very different.

--- Later in debate ---

[Siobhain McDonagh (Mitcham and Morden) (Lab)]

T6. In tune with the comments by the Housing Minister during these questions that he thinks that the answer to the housing crisis is to build more homes, can he tell the House whether he will be accepting my amendment to the national planning policy framework to build on ungreen green-belt land within 10 minutes of a London train station?

[The Minister for Housing (Kit Malthouse)]

I am hesitant to anticipate the release of the new planning framework that will be released, hopefully, shortly, but the hon. Lady will know that there is significant commitment by this Government to the green belt and, when that plan emerges, I will be more than happy to have a conversation with her about her plans.

[Mr Richard Bacon (South Norfolk) (Con)]

T5. Given that some planning inspectors’ reports are inadvertently undermining opportunities for people who want to build their own homes, despite new statutory obligations under the Self-Build and Custom House-Building Act 2015, will the Secretary of State ensure that inspectors pay sufficient regard to the legislation and enable the right to build taskforce to offer training so that inspectors are more familiar with the law in this new area?

--- Later in debate ---

[Tom Pursglove (Corby) (Con)]

T10. What assessment has the Minister made of the effect of the Help to Buy scheme and stamp duty relief on the number of first-time buyers in Northamptonshire?

[Kit Malthouse]

The Help to Buy equity loan scheme has helped more than 3,000 buyers in Northamptonshire, a part of which my hon. Friend ably represents, to purchase their first home. The action undertaken by this Government has led to an 11-year annual high in the number of first-time buyers across the UK.

[Mohammad Yasin (Bedford) (Lab)]

T8. What assessment has the Minister made of the effect on the long-term financial viability of councils of the use of reserves to fund adult social care?

--- Later in debate ---

[Huw Merriman (Bexhill and Battle) (Con)]

Despite a new road being built between Bexhill and Hastings, in part to house new developments, the developers have failed to build any of the houses. What more can the Government do to incentivise developers, perhaps by charging them council tax from the time that a planning application is delivered, and allowing local authorities to compulsorily purchase land and build on it themselves if developers will not?

[Kit Malthouse]

I commend my hon. Friend for the urgency with which he requires more housing in his constituency, which I know his constituents will appreciate. He is right that one of the issues that this country faces is that the structures that we have put in place have created more of a land speculation industry than a house building industry. We will be looking at a number of solutions to address that problem.

[Ms Karen Buck (Westminster North) (Lab)]

My local authority, Westminster, has indicated that it would rather give up £23 million from mayoral funding than hold a ballot on a scheme in Church Street that involves the demolition of 700 homes. Will the Minister have a word with the council and encourage it to involve and consult its communities on major regeneration schemes?

[Kit Malthouse]

I have already been in communication with the leader of Westminster City Council about this issue, which is alarming. I understand that there is a dispute about whether or when a ballot was held. I understand that, with regard to the Church Street regeneration, a ballot has been held in the past. One has to wonder why the Mayor would seek to withhold £23 million from one of the most deprived areas of the city that requires this regeneration.

[John Howell (Henley) (Con)]

Two recent planning appeals were won in my constituency on the grounds that planning permission should not be given

“where a planning application conflicts with a neighbourhood plan”.

Will the Minister ensure that this is the rule for the future?

[Kit Malthouse]

Like my hon. Friend, I bear the scars of just such a number of decisions. In particular, there was a decision in my constituency—in Oakley, in my patch—where the planning inspector allowed a development seven days prior to the referendum on a neighbourhood plan. I am determined, however long I am given in this job, to make sure that neighbourhood plans are landed extremely well and are adopted by as much of the country as possible, and that local people know they can rely on them to make sure that planning is done with them and not to them.

Green Belt (Penistone and Stocksbridge)

Kit Malthouse Excerpts

Tuesday 17th July 2018 Westminster Hall

[The Minister for Housing (Kit Malthouse)]

It is a great pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Edward. Apologies if I delayed proceedings during the Divisions.

I congratulate the hon. Member for Penistone and Stocksbridge (Angela Smith) on securing this important debate. I am delighted to be able to respond to the points she raised, not least because I, too, represent a beautiful rural constituency and they are close to my heart. It is clear from everything she said that both the green belt and green spaces are important to her and her constituents. I am grateful for the opportunity to speak about those issues and to underline the Government’s commitment to maintaining strong protection.

I should first point out that, as Members know, the Secretary of State has a quasi-judicial role in the planning system. I am sure they understand that it therefore would not be appropriate for me to comment on the detail of individual decisions or plans. However, I can talk about the broader issues raised. I shall set out what more we are doing to protect our natural environment while building the homes we need, as well as our national policy on the green belt and green spaces.

The Government are committed to protecting our precious environment and place great importance on striking a balance between enabling housing and commercial development, and continuing to protect and enhance the natural environment, minimising the impact on biodiversity. In particular, our planning reform package, which includes the revised draft national planning policy framework and reforms to developer contributions, is fundamental to ensuring that we are improving the environment at the same time as delivering the homes we need. The revised NPPF will be published shortly.

One of the key ways we are continuing to protect the environment is through the provision and protection of green spaces, which are part of our natural heritage. They provide balance in urban areas and improve the quality of life for all. Safe and accessible green infrastructure can play an important role in addressing health and wellbeing needs, which is particularly needed in our local communities, and indeed, in modern society generally.

The Government recognise the development pressures that areas such as green spaces face, particularly in the current housing crisis, but we are committed to their continued protection. To do that, the NPPF sets out that planning policies relating to open space, sports and recreation facilities, and opportunities for new provision should be based on robust and up-to-date assessments of need. That means that existing open space, sports and recreational buildings and land should not be built on unless an assessment has been undertaken. The assessment should show that they are surplus to needs, or that there the loss will be mitigated by making equivalent or better provision in a suitable location.

The framework also encourages communities to use their local and neighbourhood plans—an issue that is important to me, too—to identify green areas of particular importance to them. They can then be given special protection by designating them as local green spaces, which means that they cannot be affected by development. Hon. Members will be pleased to know that the draft revised NPPF maintains those protections.

[Angela Smith]

The point I made in my speech is that in one community in my constituency, the Government’s planning inspector attempted to override the provisions made in the neighbourhood plan.

[Kit Malthouse]

The hon. Lady may not know, but as a Back Bencher, I, too, had that experience in a village called Oakley in my constituency. As a result, the Neighbourhood Planning Act 2017 strengthened neighbourhood plans in the considerations of planning inspectors, particularly prior to referendums. One pledge that I can make to her is that in my tenure in this job, however long that may be, I will do my best to promote, enhance and strengthen neighbourhood plans. I agree with her that they enable local communities to feel that planning is done by them, not to them; that very often, they result in more housing, not less; and that we should use them more across the country.

The green belt is another key feature of our natural heritage that fundamentally aims to prevent urban sprawl by keeping land permanently open. It is a national policy, but it is applied locally, with green-belt land defined and protected by local planning authorities. By providing strong protection for the openness of green-belt land, the NPPF prevents inappropriate development. It makes it clear that most new building is not appropriate there, and should be refused planning permission except in very special circumstances. That sets a high bar for developers, and is part of the reason why protection of the green belt has proved so effective over the past half century.

The draft revised framework remains committed to that protection. It states that changing green-belt boundaries is possible only in exceptional circumstances, using the local plan process of consultation and rigorous examination by the Planning Inspectorate. It proposes a clarification of the exceptional circumstances test and sets out that a strategic plan-making authority will be able to alter a green-belt boundary only if it can show that it has examined all other reasonable options for meeting the development needs it identified. That means that an authority’s strategy should take into account several different factors.

For example, planning policies and decisions should give substantial weight to the value of using suitable brownfield land in settlements for homes and other identified needs, and support opportunities to remediate degraded or underused land. Another factor to be considered is the optimisation of the density of development, to ensure that authorities have significantly raised minimum densities in towns and city centres, and in other locations well served by public transport. Furthermore, the authority’s strategy should be informed by discussion with neighbouring authorities to see if they can take some of the necessary development.

Sometimes, exceptional circumstances may require land to be removed from the green belt. However, that does not mean that we are concreting over the beautiful landscapes for which England is known around the world and to which the hon. Lady referred.

[Angela Smith]

The Minister’s words are very welcome. He is being very generous with his time, and is very well-meaning, but the point is that 425,000 new homes are proposed on the green belt in local plans as things stand now. How can that represent exceptional circumstances?

[Kit Malthouse]

Proposed they may be, but the point is whether they will make it through the inspection procedure. It still remains the right of the Secretary of State, of course, to call in proposals where they are of national importance. There are particular safeguards.

I would point to the fact that the decisions are made by local democratically elected politicians. The hon. Lady raised an issue about engagement and the decisions that are made. I urge her to take that up with her confrères and colleagues on the councils concerned. She should be raising her concerns with them as well, as I hope and assume she has.

She asked about local housing need. A further consideration to green-belt policy is the calculation of local housing need. House prices are simply unaffordable in many places, meaning that too many people are unable to get on the housing ladder. Each local authority should assess local housing need and plan to meet it in full where possible. As part of the package of planning reforms, we have introduced a more transparent standard method for calculating housing need, which aims to make sure that we take the crucial first step of planning for the right number of homes. Although green belt acts as a constraint, the draft revised framework sets out that the calculation should be carried out before assessing where the need could be met. That is because constraints such as green belt are relevant when assessing how to meet need, rather than when assessing the scale of need.

Once again, let me thank the hon. Lady for securing this valuable debate. Before I close, I want to raise one issue she talked about. Local wildlife sites are of particular importance to me. The revised national planning policy framework will clarify protections for local wildlife sites. My predecessor as Minister for Housing met with the Wildlife Trusts and wrote to MPs confirming that. We can dig out a copy of that letter for the hon. Lady.

Finally, I emphasise the importance to me personally of neighbourhood plans. In my own constituency, I have been at the forefront of promoting those plans as a way of controlling and directing the right kind of development, in the right place, which suits local people and is responsive to their needs. As I say, I will do my best in this job to try to promote them in the future.

Question put and agreed to.

Draft New Towns Act 1981 (Local Authority Oversight) Regulations 2018

Kit Malthouse Excerpts

Monday 16th July 2018 General Committees

[The Minister for Housing (Kit Malthouse)]

I beg to move,

That the Committee has considered the draft New Towns Act 1981 (Local Authority Oversight) Regulations 2018.

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Sharma. The draft regulations were laid before this House on Monday 4 June 2018. If approved, they will allow for the establishment of new locally led town development corporations to be overseen by the local authorities covering the area designated for the new town. Currently, any newly created town development corporation is overseen by the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government.

The Government are committed to helping fix the broken housing market and close the gap in getting towards building 300,000 homes a year. Garden towns and villages are a key part of that, and we want them to have every lever at their disposal.

Where there are complex delivery and co-ordination challenges, we consider that new town development corporations may be the right vehicles for driving forward high-quality new communities at scale. With a statutory objective to secure the laying out and development of the new town and their own suite of powers, they should have the focus and heft to get things done. In line with our locally led approach to new garden towns and villages, we think it is right to provide the option for new town development corporations to be overseen not by the Secretary of State but by the local authorities covering the area for the new town. Our housing White Paper, “Fixing our broken housing market”, published in February 2017, therefore committed the Government to legislating to allow locally led new town development corporations to be set up. Section 16 of the Neighbourhood Planning Act 2017 enables that to happen by providing a regulation-making power to set out the necessary detail to make it work in practice.

The draft regulations effect a simple principle: the transfer of functions relating to the oversight of a new town development corporation from the Secretary of State to the local authority or authorities covering the area of the new town. As the length of the draft regulations testifies, in practice that process is not as straightforward as replacing the words “Secretary of State” with the words “local authority” in the New Towns Act 1981.

Some functions, such as the confirmation of compulsory purchase orders, will remain with the Secretary of State, and it will, of course, continue to be the Secretary of State who will lay the regulations that designate new towns and establish and dissolve new town development corporations. Some provisions, such as those relating to audit and accounts and planning, have required amendment to make them work in a context where the development corporation answers not to central Government but to local councils.

I emphasise that the draft regulations do not change the powers of new town development corporations; they simply localise oversight of the development corporation. Moreover, although the draft regulations provide the mechanism for a locally led new town development corporation to be set up, they do not enable Government to simply do so at the behest of a local authority or group of local authorities. If, as we hope and expect, local authorities consider a locally led new town development corporation to be the right vehicle, we will need to undertake a public consultation, and only if we consider designating the particular new town to be expedient in the national interest would we lay a statutory instrument to that effect. It is also important to note that Parliament will have an opportunity to scrutinise each proposal for the designation of a new town, because a statutory instrument designating a new town must be debated in both Houses.

In conclusion, if approved, the draft regulations will allow newly established town development corporations to be overseen by local authorities, via further statutory instruments laid under the affirmative procedure. In short, the draft regulations support locally led ambitions for high-quality new development at scale. They provide an important lever for delivering the transformational housing growth we need, while ensuring that surrounding existing communities can also benefit through well-planned infrastructure and community amenities.

--- Later in debate ---

[Kit Malthouse]

It is a great pleasure on my first outing as Minister in a Delegated Legislation Committee to preside over a break-out of cross-party consensus. Obviously, great minds think alike on local control. I am pleased that the hon. Lady has seen the importance of having local control over some of the drivers of new towns and how that it is likely to inject an element of dynamism into the proposals. She has raised a number of questions; if I do not get to them all, I am more than happy to write to her and clarify.

On support, there is a coincidence of interest between the Government and a group of local authorities that promote the new garden town to get the thing off the ground and get it built as quickly as possible. It is certainly the case that we would expect to be part of the ongoing dialogue that will take place beyond the establishment of the development corporation. The hon. Lady has my commitment that that would be the case, and I hope that of my successors whenever they may come—hopefully not for a long time. We have made a significant financial commitment, as she knows, of £22 million, with £7 million available this year. We have other pots of money, in particular for infrastructure. She knows that there is a £5 billion pot is available in the housing infrastructure fund to enable and accelerate development where appropriate.

On appointments, it is worth bearing in mind that we are increasing local democratic oversight. Although we encourage local authorities to ensure that local representation is embedded in the governance structure, the responsibility for that governance will fall to local, democratically elected politicians. An element of improved direct local oversight and local voices in the organisation will come about because of the draft regulations.

On the public inquiry, we want to make sure that the development corporations can be established as quickly and unbureaucratically as possible. There will be an up-front assessment process. The Secretary of State will look carefully at the robustness of the plans, particularly around some of the elements that were mentioned—community involvement, plans for the legacy, ongoing stewardship of the development corporation—and at their financial viability and deliverability before he or she, whoever the Secretary of State is, tables the regulation for the establishment of the development corporation. The House will then get a chance through the affirmative procedure to make known its own views about the likely success of the corporation being established. As far as we can see, that seems a sensible, non-bureaucratic—as lightly bureaucratic as we can get it—process to get these things established.

I am sure the hon. Lady agrees with me that the housing need in this country is extremely pressing. We do not want to see undue delay where there is an accepted view among local democratically elected representatives that this is what they want to do. If a robust plan has been developed, it should proceed.

[Dr Blackman-Woods]

We would like reassurance from the Government that, if they are not going down the public inquiry line, there will be a real opportunity for local voices to be heard on what the new town will encompass. Local people often know best how to achieve the end product. I want to know a little more about what the Government intend to do. The Minister does not have to provide us with the information about how local voices will be included today, but can he at some point?

[Kit Malthouse]

We will look at things on a case-by-case basis, but the whole point of the regulations is to make local voices louder. Local authorities—people who have been elected by local people—are the progenitors of the idea. The hon. Lady raised issues about affordable housing, climate change and all that kind of stuff. We should not forget that the planners will be intrinsically involved. While the development corporation is able to master-plan and make proposals, the local planners will ultimately make decisions about those kinds of issues. The local voice will be very strong in these organisations. They will serve the areas they are designated in much better than they have done thus far. I am happy to elucidate further if the hon. Lady wishes. If she has specific questions, she can drop me a line and I will be happy to respond.

We have debated regulations that will enable local areas to use the New Towns Act 1981—previously the preserve of central Government—to create their own locally led new town development corporations. This will give local authorities a powerful and effective tool for driving forward high quality new garden communities at scale. It is a game-changing move that puts local areas in the driving seat of developing new towns. We are really very excited—certainly I am, having campaigned on these issues in the past—to see how the measure will be picked up and used to deliver exemplary new settlements. I again commend the draft regulations to the Committee.

Question put and agreed to.