Non-Domestic Rating (Rates Retention and Levy and Safety Net) (Amendment) and (Levy Account Basis of Distribution) Regulations 2019

Lord Beecham Excerpts

Monday 18th March 2019 Lords Chamber

[Lord Shipley (LD)]

The Minister will be grateful for paragraph 8.1 in the Explanatory Memorandum, which states:

“This instrument does not relate to withdrawal from the European Union”.


It is the first statutory instrument today that does not have that status. However, as the Minister said, it is technical but important.

I remind the House that I am a vice-president of the Local Government Association.

I understand that this statutory instrument has to be brought forward every year to enable the rolling 75% business rates retention pilots to take place, which are now being extended to new areas for 2019-20. In that respect the SI is fine. As the Minister stated, it also allows for the new authorities being created out of reorganisation, such as Dorset, to levy business rates. Obviously that is essential. It allows for the return to councils of money which had previously been levied by central government through the business rates account. The total sum amounts to £180 million, which means that the Government will make themselves popular with those receiving it.

Although this is a technical SI, we should reflect that the basis of business rates is under question and under stress, not least because of the pressures on the retail sector. No doubt we shall have opportunities in the future to discuss that issue in greater depth. However, as the Minister said, this is a technical but important statutory instrument and it has our support.

[Lord Beecham (Lab)]

My Lords, I declare my local government interests as vice-president of the LGA and as a councillor in Newcastle.

The noble Lord, Lord Shipley, referred to the present situation in respect of business rates. There is a bland assumption by the Government that there is a uniform approach to what can be raised locally, either by domestic rates or business rates, but that is not the position. The amounts that can be generated vary considerably between authorities and the Government have paid little attention to that disparity, in terms of either council tax or business rates.

The Government are making much of the £180 million they are going to restore to authorities. That is £100 million less than the loss that Newcastle City Council alone has sustained in grants from central government since 2010. It is a pitifully small amount and will make little difference to the efforts of local councils—of all political characters—to maintain local services. This is not a substantial change in favour of local government and the Government have to look again at the wider issues of funding a sector of the economy which has been substantially underfunded for the last eight years.

[Lord Kennedy of Southwark (Lab Co-op)]

My Lords, as the Minister said, the regulations are technical and in that sense I am happy to support them as they stand. I concur with the comments of the noble Lord, Lord Shipley, and my noble friend Lord Beecham and I am sure the Minister will respond to the points raised.

The only issue I want to raise concerns Northamptonshire being in the list of council areas that are involved in this scheme. I know the county council is the precept authority, or the collecting authority, but equally it is a council in crisis. The local government reorganisation is happening because the county council has effectively almost gone broke. Is the Minister confident that we should be doing this in this area, in view of the problems that have been widely reported over the past year? That said, I am very happy to support the regulations.

Social Housing

Lord Beecham Excerpts

Thursday 31st January 2019 Lords Chamber

[Lord Beecham (Lab)]

My Lords, I refer to my local government interests and join others in congratulating my noble friend on her maiden speech. The housing problem is not just a question of numbers, although that looms large. It is also a question of what we build, especially in the private sector, where space and energy standards lag badly behind those in much of Europe. It is also a question of tenure. Of course it is right to promote owner-occupation, but there is something terribly wrong with a system in which councils are compelled to sell council houses to tenants at knockdown prices—40% of which end up in the hands of private landlords, who then charge significantly higher rents. Latterly, councils have been unable even to retain the proceeds of sale and use them to build new houses, while delivering £3.5 billion in discounts to tenants purchasing their homes.

Moreover, the Government’s interpretation of affordability in their promotion of new building is unrealistic, pitched at 80% of the values prevailing in a market inflated by the lack of new building. In addition, there is the problem of the bedroom tax, which forces up the rents payable by council tenants occupying properties larger than they are deemed to need. How many of us would wish to see elderly friends or relatives, or ourselves, induced in this way to move to smaller accommodation, possibly in a different area, or pay higher rents for the privilege of remaining in the home that one has occupied for many years, with all its accumulated memories? Three thousand and fifty-six Newcastle households were affected by this last year.

Homelessness is another product of the lack of a serious housing policy. It has increased nationally by 400% due to the loss of private rented tenancies since 2010, with rough sleeping up by 169%. Yet the National Audit Office reports a reduction of 21% in housing services and of 59% in Supporting People funding, while there has been a 60% increase in the number of households in temporary accommodation, with all the problems that causes, especially to children and the elderly. In Newcastle, these figures translate to the following facts: 40,000 residents affected by welfare reforms could risk homelessness, 18% of debt advice clients last year had unsustainable budgets and council house rent arrears last March stood at £3.6 million. The council helped 19,000 people last year to secure £30 million of unclaimed benefits and 6,500 received debt advice. Sadly, 254 people were found sleeping rough in Newcastle in 2017-18; 80% of them had drug addiction issues, 55% had mental health problems, 25% had learning disabilities and 25% had been in care.

This is not just a housing problem, although housing is clearly an issue. Like many others, the council has a goal of being a homelessness-free city. That requires support from central government, its agencies and the NHS. We need action and funding to achieve this goal in housing provision and other services.

Building Regulations and Fire Safety: Government Response

Lord Beecham Excerpts

Thursday 17th May 2018 Lords Chamber

[Lord Beecham (Lab)]

My Lords, it is customary to thank Ministers for repeating in this House Statements made in another place. There is no one in your Lordships’ House, or indeed in the House of Commons, who is not saddened by the necessity for this Statement to be made. The tragedy of Grenfell, the dreadful loss of life, and the shock and terror generated by the events that have led to Dame Judith’s report will resonate for years.

Nobody who has read this week’s Guardian with its moving description of so many of those who perished in the conflagration will fail to welcome—indeed, to insist upon—stringent measures being taken to avoid any repetition of this catastrophe.

Noble Lords will welcome many of the proposals in the report, based, as it is, upon its clear findings of failings in the present system of building control and the need to secure more effective regulation and enforcement. It also stresses the need for clarity as to where responsibility will lie. It is, however, disappointing that the report does not appear to accept the need to ban the use of combustible material in cladding systems on high-rise residential buildings. The Government are to consult on this issue. I believe that most Members of this House would join the plea by survivors of the disaster, the RIBA and others in calling for a ban on combustible construction materials, certainly in high-rise developments but perhaps more generally.

The Secretary of State agrees that,

“residents must be empowered with relevant information. They must be able to act to make their homes safer”.

With due respect to the Secretary of State, I find that a curious formulation. What, beyond expressing concerns, can residents do about issues such as those which led to the disaster?

There are some issues not mentioned in the Statement which I would like to raise. The first is to ask the Minister for an update on the progress of rehousing the survivors of this tragedy in housing which meets their needs. Too many tenants and their families continue to live in accommodation which fails to meet their needs.

The second is to ask for clarification in relation to the funding of the essential work necessary to ensure the safety, and alleviate the fear, of residents of high-rise accommodation. Will this be met by the Government?

The third is to ask about the position of residents in blocks of flats where the freeholder is not the local authority. Some will be leaseholders; others will be renting. In the former case, do the Government expect the leaseholder to finance the necessarily expensive work? If not, what steps will they take to ensure that the freeholder does so and that the cost is not borne by the resident? Will local authorities have a role in enforcing any requirements in such cases and, if so, will the cost be treated as being within the new burdens doctrine, under which they can look to the Government for the necessary funding?

Finally, the Statement, perfectly properly, deals with high-rise housing. What consideration is being given to other high-rise buildings—offices, shopping centres, hotels, hospitals and the like—which may also present problems, in relation to both existing buildings and those which might be built in future? The tragedy of Grenfell must never be repeated.

[Lord Stunell (LD)]

My Lords, I associate myself with the remarks of both the Minister and the noble Lord, Lord Beecham, in relation to this terrible tragedy and the need to make sure that it never occurs again.

I should start by declaring that between 2010 and 2012 I was the Minister with responsibility for building regulations.

I very much welcome the report and I welcome the Government’s endorsement of its recommendations. We share the Secretary of State’s commitment to making sure that they are brought into force as quickly as possible. In that respect, my first point is to raise with the Minister the following phrase in the Statement:

“Changing the law will take time”.


When will the primary legislation that the Secretary of State has promised be introduced? We know that there is a legislative logjam further in the system. Can the Minister give us an assurance that this legislation will vault over that logjam and reach this House and the other place in good time for an early introduction and passage through the parliamentary system?

Secondly, does the Minister recognise that in fact the Secretary of State already has powers to start the process? The Building Act 1984 was amended by the Sustainable and Secure Buildings Act 2004 to provide a power requiring a nominated person to be appointed for each building project to sign off on building regulation compliance. That power is not yet in force but it would produce what the Hackitt report calls a “dutyholder”. That can be introduced now by statutory instrument and could be in force by October this year. Changing the law does not always have to take time, and I hope that the Minister will undertake to press his colleagues in the department to get on and make sure that this simple, straightforward introduction of a duty holder takes priority and does not get stuck in the legislative logjam.

The Hackitt review rightly outlined the dysfunctional and fragmented nature of the construction industry and identified a culture of cost-cutting and corner-cutting at the expense of good quality, good safety and common sense. I want the Minister to recognise that it is not just fire regulations in high-rise buildings that have been the victim of, or bypassed by, that cost-cutting, corner-cutting approach. Buying a new house in 2018 is like buying a new car was in the 1960s, with complaints very high and quality standards very low. Will the Government learn from this review and make sure not only that compliance with the right fire regulations is automatic in future but compliance with the full range of measures in building regulations, all of which are aimed at saving life, promoting the health and well-being of the buildings’ occupants, and delivering a long-term, sustainable environment?

Finally, I welcome the Government’s £400 million allocation for social housing repairs to cladding. I want to press the Minister on this, as I did the noble Lord, Lord Bourne, last week: is it not time to give a similar “pay now, recover costs later” pledge to tenants and leaseholders living in privately owned high-rise flats? Surely they are just as deserving of living in safe homes as anybody living in social housing.

Hereditary Peers: By-elections

Lord Beecham Excerpts

Tuesday 15th May 2018 Lords Chamber

[Lord Young of Cookham]

I have said that I will not obstruct it, which I think is of some reassurance. On the two-out, one-in policy, since October last year some 15 noble Lords have taken voluntary early retirement: eight from my party, four Cross-Benchers, two from the Labour Party and one from the DUP. The Liberal Democrats have scored nul points. By any reckoning, they are the most overrepresented group in this House and they should be leading the resignation field instead of being stranded at the starting post.

[Lord Beecham (Lab)]

Follow that, my Lords. I beg leave to ask a Question of which I have given private notice.

Digital Forensic Services

Lord Beecham Excerpts

Monday 12th March 2018 Lords Chamber

Asked by

[Lord Beecham]

To ask Her Majesty’s Government whether they propose to take any action in relation to the outsourcing by police forces of digital forensic investigation work to unaccredited private laboratories.

[Lord Young of Cookham (Con)]

My Lords, individual police forces decide which providers they use to carry out digital forensic science services. The Government have been clear that accreditation should be an important factor when procuring these types of services, and continue to support the police to develop and share best practice in this area. The Government welcome the introduction of the Forensic Science Regulator Bill, which will put the regulator on a statutory footing.

[Lord Beecham (Lab)]

My Lords, at least 15 police forces have outsourced digital forensic work to unaccredited private companies, some of which are subject to no regulatory oversight. One with accreditation had it withdrawn law year but continued to perform work for the prosecution, while another serving 30 forces collapsed in January, costing those forces millions of pounds. Only 15 out of 43 forces achieved minimum standards in their in-house laboratories by the deadline of last October. Given the importance of forensic evidence in the justice system, what steps will the Government take to ensure that the quality of the work is improved and that concerns about the failure to disclose key digital evidence cited by the head of the criminal Bar, the Justice Committee and a joint report by the police and the Crown Prosecution Service are met?

[Lord Young of Cookham]

I agree entirely with the noble Lord that police forces should use accredited service providers when they outsource digital forensic services. I mentioned a moment ago that the Forensic Science Regulator Bill, which was introduced last week, will give the forensic science regulator the statutory powers that she needs in order to enforce high standards in this area. In the meantime, I have looked at the report of the forensic service regulator. She referred specifically to some of the problems mentioned by the noble Lord and went on to say:

“Although the impact of these issues has been large, they arose from the actions of a very small number of individuals and should not be taken as a reflection on forensic scientists more widely … the vast majority of forensic science practitioners, whether working within commercial organisations, government-funded organisations (including policing) or elsewhere, are committed to providing high-quality scientific work to support the Criminal Justice System”.


The Government are also sponsoring research in order to drive up standards in this area.

Budget: North East of England

Lord Beecham Excerpts

Thursday 14th December 2017 Lords Chamber

[Lord Beecham (Lab)]

My Lords, I should declare my interest as a member of one of the tribes in question. Educational attainment is a key contributor to economic development. In Newcastle—this will be true of the region as a whole—27% of children are living in poverty; that is 50% more than the national average. Will the Government now seek to improve the life chances of these children by replicating in the north-east the very successful London Challenge that transformed education in the capital?

[Lord Young of Cookham]

I have no objection at all to rolling out successful experiments in London, or indeed anywhere else, to other parts of the country that could benefit from them. There is quite a lot in the Budget to help the north-east on housing, health, transport and technology. Under the proposed deal on education, adult education would of course be devolved to the new combined authority. On the noble Lord’s specific question on education, perhaps I could take advice from colleagues in the respective departments and then come back to him.

Universal Credit

Lord Beecham Excerpts

Thursday 16th November 2017 Lords Chamber

[Lord Beecham (Lab)]

My Lords, there is, as exemplified by today’s debate, widespread concern about the way universal credit has developed. I shall outline some of the problems that have emerged in Newcastle, as reported by the city council, of which I am a member, and the citizens advice bureaux.

The system has been implemented locally in stages since May 2016 and the process will be complete by May 2019. There are now in Newcastle 10,826 people on universal credit, and by 2022 working-age benefits will be cut by £123 million. Already there have been serious problems. The controversial six-week wait—this has been referred to many times today—before the first payment is made has led the council to make 327 crisis support scheme awards, totalling just over £29,000, to people awaiting payment or receiving an incorrect amount. As if that was not bad enough, the DWP has been found to be deducting fines from payments, often by as much as 40%, without considering the individual circumstances and hardship that might ensue.

There are also problems around the impact on council tax reduction. Hitherto, housing benefit and council tax reduction were applied for at the same time. Now only those universal credit claimants who indicate an intention to the DWP to claim separately for council tax reduction benefit will have information about their entitlement to universal credit sent to the council. The council has processed 3,723 claims for council tax reduction, which is many fewer than anticipated, and is working with Jobcentre Plus and Your Homes Newcastle to maximise the number of universal credit claimants claiming council tax benefits at the earliest stage. What will the Government do to facilitate this process?

There are particular problems for those residents for whom English is not a first language. Library staff, with the aid of interpreters, have helped over 100 households to obtain their entitlement, but there must be concern about those who have not sought that aid. Currently, Your Homes Newcastle has rent arrears attributable solely to universal credit of nearly £1.4 million.

There are some sad cases among those struggling with the new system. There is the single 25 year-old woman who lost her job, had no income for five weeks and faces eviction from her private rented property. Another woman, suffering from depression and with a baby daughter not yet a year old, was left entirely without income and had to be provided with food and supplies by the council. A 61 year-old man, unable to read or write, was booked into an assisted digital support session at the city library by Jobcentre Plus. The library staff managed to help him through the application, but how is he going to manage his email account in the future?

Newcastle’s citizens advice bureau has helped 357 people since July, and, in the last two years, 11.2% of all households on universal credit in the city. It relates some staggering statistics: 30% of the people it has helped had made 10 or more calls to the helpline and 40% were unaware of the possibility of obtaining an advance payment while waiting the six or seven weeks before the first payment was made. Even the likely reduction to a four-week delay is still going to cause problems.

There are problems with free school meals because of delays in proving the universal credit claim is successful until two days before the first payment. Any money paid for dinners before then is not reimbursed, with parents having to have recourse to the food bank.

There are also problems with people being persuaded to move from jobseeker’s allowance to universal credit. One man lost £100 a month in housing benefit which had included a disabled living allowance and the disability and severe disability premium which came with jobseeker’s allowance, but not with universal credit.

One woman was transferred to universal credit from jobseeker’s allowance where she had a disability and severe disability payment of £728 a month and lost £410 a month, so is left with some £317 a month in total and could lose her home because she cannot keep up her mortgage payments.

Whatever the good intentions, it is apparent that this transformation of welfare provision has been little short of a disaster for far too many people. It is taking much longer than estimated to roll out, leaves too many people struggling to make meagre ends meet and adds to the huge pressure on local councils and advice centres struggling to help those people navigate the uncharted waters of social security reform. It is not so much universal credit as near universal discredit.

Working-age Benefits

Lord Beecham Excerpts

Thursday 16th November 2017 Lords Chamber

[Lord Beecham (Lab)]

My Lords, I congratulate the right reverend Prelate on securing this debate. I am sorry that the congregation—if I may put it that way—is not quite as large as it should be, but we have already had a very interesting debate partially touching on similar issues. But it is as well that the right reverend Prelate draws our attention to particular aspects of the situation facing far too many people in this country. I again refer to my interest as a Newcastle city councillor. As I was happily reselected for the forthcoming elections, I hope to be able to continue saying that after whatever date they are on next year.

As I think I have said previously, I live just 12 minutes’ drive from the ward I have represented for the past 50-plus years. For every minute of that drive, life expectancy falls for people in that ward by a year. In other words, life expectancy is 12 years less in the ward I represent than in the ward in which I live, which says something about the problems faced by far too many people—and not only in the city of Newcastle. That manifests itself in many ways. Fortunately we have a very strong voluntary sector and a very caring community. But it is sad that teachers at the local primary schools bring in food for breakfast clubs for children attending their school because they cannot be certain of having an adequate breakfast and start to their school day. It is a measure of the deprivation that is unfortunately too prevalent. In a way, a more dramatic example of that is the West End Foodbank in Newcastle, run by the Trussell Trust, which has done wonderful work all over the country. The food bank in my ward is the busiest in the entire country. Again, it gives a sense of the deprivation, which is not universal but is certainly far too widespread for us to feel at all comfortable about it.

In an area with these problems and people struggling with them, many issues are making matters worse, reflected in a range of government policies. One of those is the bedroom tax, which has not been mentioned much latterly but which inflicts an average annual loss in the ward I represent of £777 on 243 households, amounting to £189,000 in just this one ward in the city. Across the whole city, the figures are 3,950 households, and the loss of income—and loss to the local economy—is £3,263,000, a formidable amount. On a national basis, I have not done the arithmetic but your Lordships will not find it difficult to acknowledge that we are talking of billions of pounds lost nationally to the local economy by this measure. Those numbers, of course, are expected to rise over the next few years. In general, dependency is likely to rise over the next few years.

The Resolution Foundation projects a total saving, at the expense of the most vulnerable and impoverished, through two more years of the benefit freeze and less in-work support under universal credit—which we have debated at some length already—of £6.8 billion a year by 2021. Money is not going into households and into the local economy, particularly in areas that need it most. We need to recall—although one would not imagine that readers of the Daily Mail and Daily Express would ever get to know—that 60% of benefit payments go to working households. Poverty among those in work is greater than among those without work. That is not to say that we should not be encouraging and facilitating people getting into employment—well-paid employment, we hope—but part of the problem that we have faced over the past decade or so is that earnings have not risen proportionately to the cost of living. In that way, people’s standards have fallen substantially.

In addition, there are government policies that make matters worse. In particular there is the pernicious restriction of benefits to the first two children in a family, mentioned in an earlier debate with reference to the kinship situation—which, I confess, I have not been alerted to, although I should have been—which is uniquely barbarous. However, it is bad enough for those restrictions to be imposed on any family. Some 900,000 are affected by this measure. The Rowntree Foundation, which does enormously valuable work in reviewing the state of our society, predicts that 470,000 more people will experience poverty by 2021, and a two-child family will be £832 a year worse-off than if benefits had kept pace with prices, or £676 for a two-child family with a single parent. Either way, that is a lot of money to support children in a very low-income family.

What is the justification for freezing benefit levels, especially now that the cost of living is rising rapidly? The cost of food, particularly, is rising substantially. The cost of living looks as though it is rising by a smaller amount but, for the people we are talking about, it is the basics—food, fuel and accommodation—that are the most telling calls on their budget. With Brexit, one imagines that food prices will continue to rise, probably at an ever faster rate.

There are also serious implications for the housing sector—both for social housing and for privately rented homes. ALMOs, the arm’s-length management organisations that provide much local council housing and manage it nationally, reveal that 31% of their tenants are in arrears to the extent of £414 per household, which brings a figure of £68.5 million a year in arrears. Of those who are universal credit claimants, 73% are in arrears, more than half of whom—this is telling—were not in arrears before universal credit began to be applied. In the private sector, as we have heard from time to time in your Lordships’ House, a vast number of people—4.7 million—are now in poverty after paying rent, where they can afford to. Where they cannot afford to, all too often they are faced with eviction, and society has to pick up some of the consequences of that through alternative provision.

The benefit cap has mainly affected single parents with multiple children. Indeed, 63% of those with three children or more are more likely to find it difficult to get into work or to be able to make up the difference. Yet against this background, the Government can find money effectively to reduce inheritance tax by increasing the threshold on family homes by an additional £125,000 for each spouse or partner, while their vaunted increase in the level at which income tax becomes payable benefits the higher paid proportionately more than those with very low earnings. There is also the anomaly that national insurance kicks in well below the tax threshold. Is it not time to review the relationship between these two forms of taxation? One of these two aspects of taxation receives attention from time to time, while the other apparently does not.

While we are talking about taxation, what about council tax? With bands unchanged for 25 years, the difference between the lowest band and the highest remains only threefold. In a street near where I live, there is a house on the market in band H where the asking price is just under £4 million, and the council tax will be in the order of £3,000. The smallest, cheapest flat in the ward I represent will be in band A, and the council tax will be £1,000. That is a ludicrously narrow ratio. I should make clear that my own home is in band F, and I estimate that it is probably valued at six to seven times the price of new houses being built in my ward—but my council tax is only twice as much. It is no longer the case that the poorest are protected by what used to be called the rate rebate scheme.

These are issues that need to be addressed if we are to protect people from the hardship that the right reverend Prelate so rightly outlined.

Housing: Rental Market

Lord Beecham Excerpts

Thursday 2nd November 2017 Lords Chamber

[Lord Young of Cookham]

The noble Lord is right to raise the issue of universal credit. It is one of the issues that is now being looked at as we run up to the Budget later this month. We will also have a debate on universal credit later this month, before the Budget, when he can make the point again. However, in certain circumstances the rent can be paid direct to the landlord in order to provide the security of income that the landlord may need.

[Lord Beecham (Lab)]

My Lords, given the depth of the housing crisis, is it not time to review the application of planning laws and the planning system to this and related issues, which simply make it more difficult for people to find a permanent home?

[Lord Young of Cookham]

As I said a moment ago, outside London there is no restriction on what home owners can do with their homes. They can let them on a series of short-term lets. Precisely to protect the stock in London we have a 90-day rule to prevent the leakage of rented accommodation for Londoners wholly into the tourism market. We will look at the issue again, if the noble Lord insists—but, as a former MP for a London seat, I will need some convincing that we have not got the balance about right at the moment.

Housing: Planning Laws

Lord Beecham Excerpts

Wednesday 25th October 2017 Lords Chamber

[Lord Young of Cookham]

I am grateful to my noble friend, and for her contribution to our debate on housing last week. She will be aware that there was a manifesto commitment to safeguard the green belt. The planning policy indicates that the green belt should be developed only where all other opportunities have been explored, such as brownfield sites and building at higher densities in urban areas. However, we go on to say that if at the end of that it is necessary, we will develop in the green belt. Some areas of green belt do not live up to their name; they are sometimes very unattractive pieces of land. We are consulting on local authorities in the White Paper; if it is necessary for them to encroach on the green belt, they should make complementary provision elsewhere to replace the amenity that has been lost.

[Lord Beecham (Lab)]

I refer to my local government interest in the register. Apparently there are currently between 500,000 and 600,000 planning consents for houses, many granted years ago. What action will the Government take to ensure that these are used? Further, while I welcome today’s announcement by the Prime Minister that the Government will not cap housing benefit in the social housing sector, and the recent announcement of £2 billion for all of 25,000 extra homes over the next four years, will they remove the cap on council borrowing for new building, and if not, why not?