Housing and Planning Bill

Lord Best Excerpts

Wednesday 13th April 2016 Lords Chamber

For this reason, I signal my intention to accept the Government’s welcome offer and will not press my amendment. In doing that, I emphasise the importance of what comes forward at Third Reading, particularly the need for it to address both the one-for-one and the like-for-like issues—both must be part of the response. I look forward to working with the Minister on this matter between now and Third Reading.

[Lord Best (CB)]

My Lords, I rise to support, briefly, the double-headed Amendment 64A and to comment on the late news delivered by the Minister, of which more may follow, to the effect that the Government have broadly accepted the amendment in the name of the noble Lords, Lord Kerslake and Lord Kennedy, and the noble Baroness, Lady Bakewell.

The key underlying theme of the Bill has been the desire to build more homes and to see a reversal in the decline of owner-occupation, to be accomplished, principally, by building starter homes sold at discounted prices and by enabling housing association tenants to exercise a new right to buy under this part of the Bill. The key underlying objection to both these measures has been that the very substantial cost involved—some £8.6 billion for discounts for those buying starter homes and probably a rather higher sum over the next five years for the discounts to housing association tenants who buy—is all to come through taking away resources from social housing for poorer households, including by selling the most valuable council houses. This cunning plan to spend billions promoting home ownership without the Government needing to find any new money sadly has unfortunate consequences: ultimately, someone has to bear the cost and that someone is the family in overcrowded accommodation, the elderly person, the household in desperate circumstances who would have got an affordable home to rent but will not now do.

However, damage limitation is possible. This amendment seeks to ensure that where vacant council houses must be sold, before the proceeds are dispatched to central government to pay for discounts elsewhere, funds from the sold homes are used to replace those lost on a one-for-one basis—one new home for every old one sold. The amendment adds that, where appropriate, the replacement should be like for like—a rented family home replaced by a rented family home, not a one-bed starter home. The Minister, thanks to the Secretary of State approaching this issue in a very open and helpful manner, has I think been able, first, to accept that one-for-one replacement should be in the Bill and, secondly, to go a long way to accepting that like-for-like replacement can be agreed wherever the local authority makes a convincing case for it. We need to see the actual wording of the Government’s alternative amendment but I hope that, if not tonight then at Third Reading, we will all be sufficiently satisfied with this. If so, I am grateful to the Minister and to Greg Clark, the Secretary of State, for listening to your Lordships and—I think and I hope—for acting accordingly.

[Lord Kennedy of Southwark]

My Lords, the amendments in this group are concerned with the payments to the Secretary of State and the deductions from those payments of sums of money to build replacement properties on a one-for-one basis. I am supportive of both the amendments in this group. As I said in Committee, the clauses concerning the high-value levy and the sale of high-value council properties are a very damaging mechanism to deliver government policy. They make local councils foot the bill and risk having a devastating effect on council housing stocks. Both these amendments seek to put in the Bill that the payments to government must be made after the deduction of the costs of replacement on a one-for-one basis.

Amendment 64A, in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Kerslake, to which I and the noble Baroness, Lady Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville, signed up, would add a further clause giving the local authority the ability to set out to government what specific types of local housing are needed in their area. Again, this seems to be within the principle of localism and should not really cause the Government any problems at all. I understand we will hear from the Minister that they understand the issue and are sympathetic to the points raised by the amendments. I am very pleased to hear that: it is very positive news and very welcome. I will not say much more than that, but I am delighted that the Minister and other colleagues have listened. Until we see the text of the amendment concerned, we of course reserve our position, and may bring our amendment back at Third Reading, but from what I have heard I am very pleased and I thank her very much.

--- Later in debate ---

As I have said before, we have so few affordable houses in rural England and such overwhelming need that it is only right that there should be an exemption for rural communities. I am pleased that, in our discussions, the Government have recognised our case. Although we will obviously be carefully scrutinising the exact wording of their amendment before Third Reading, I am very grateful to and thank the Minister and, in particular, the Secretary of State, for their willingness to negotiate on this and for their recognition of the exceptional case we have made. I beg to move.

[Lord Best]

My Lords, my name is attached to both Amendment 62, in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Cameron of Dillington, which is concerned with the sale of vacant council houses in rural areas and Amendment 63 in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Kennedy of Southwark, which is concerned with the sale of vacant council houses where a tenant transfers from one social housing tenancy to another.

The amendments do not wipe out the Government’s intention that more expensive council homes be sold when they become vacant to pay, principally, for discounts to housing association tenants given the right to buy. Although a large number of us in this Chamber remain unhappy about that approach, the amendments are simply about moderating the effects of this policy.

First, in respect of rural areas, it seems that the Government recognise that the remaining, much-depleted stock of council houses in villages deserves special attention in those many localities where it will simply not be possible to replace properties that are sold. Sales of council housing under the right to buy have been roughly twice as high, proportionately, in rural settings than in urban areas. The trouble is that these rural properties in due course are sold on to commuters and retirees, for second homes and holiday cottages. So although it is harder for local people to buy a home in their village than it is for their urban counterparts, because prices are higher and earnings are lower, the amount of affordable housing for rent from councils or housing associations is roughly half the level in rural communities than the national average. It is really important, therefore, to hang on to the precious resource of the remaining council housing in rural areas. Instead of selling the council house that becomes vacant, it is really important that it can be let to a household with a local claim.

I was very pleased that Ministers agreed, on the first day of this Bill’s Report stage, to exclude rural exception sites—land for developments specifically to help local people—from the requirement to build starter homes, which would so often be much too expensive for local families. I am equally delighted that Ministers are agreeable in principle to enabling councils to hold on to their remaining housing stock in rural areas when this is clearly essential to meet local needs. Of course, we need to study the small print of the Government’s approach to achieving this outcome, but we know—or we believe at any rate, as the noble Lord, Lord Cameron, noted—that housing in national parks and areas of outstanding natural beauty is to be automatically excluded from the pressures to sell council houses, and the Secretary of State will be willing to exclude homes in any rural community when the council can make a case that sold homes cannot be replaced. Accepting these reassurances, I appreciate, involves trusting the Department for Communities and Local Government to use its discretion wisely to act in accordance with this promise. But I guess that we have gone as far as we can reasonably expect in protecting much-needed council housing in our rural communities.

Secondly, on Amendment 63, I think the Minister will be able to put our minds to rest in respect of the requirements on councils to sell vacant homes where tenants are transferring within the stock of council and housing association properties. The problem that we identified earlier was that there are very good reasons to encourage existing tenants to transfer from their current home to another property—for example, for an elderly person to downsize from a family house to a bungalow or sheltered housing flat, making way for a young family; or for a widow to downsize to escape having to pay the dreadful bedroom tax, because she is deemed to have a spare room at present; or for a family to move out of overcrowded premises to somewhere bigger. But since these moves could be said to create a vacancy, it could trigger the requirement to sell a higher-value home to raise funds principally, of course, for the discounts to housing association tenants. What is needed is for vacancies created by transfers to be excluded from the pressures on councils to sell their higher-value vacant homes.

The Minister explained to us in Committee that mutual exchanges will not fall within the scope of the policy. Even though theoretically two vacancies are created when two households swap homes, in reality there are no properties becoming vacant, so this is entirely right. I pressed the Minister, however, also to exclude vacancies created by someone transferring to another home in the social rented sector. I said that I thought that the Minister had indicated that transfers would probably be treated in the same way as exchanges and she responded:

“I think that the noble Lord is right”.—[Official Report, 10/3/16; col. 1518.]

We just need confirmation that this is indeed so or we would have the unfortunate, unintended consequence of greatly inhibiting opportunities for tenants to transfer to more suitable accommodation in future.

[Lord Beecham]

I endorse the noble Lord’s last plea, and I think that it is one that the Minister will feel able to agree—or I hope that she will, because it would certainly make a great deal of sense. I very much welcome the Government’s more flexible approach to these matters, and congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Cameron, who is doing rather better than his namesake in many respects at the moment, on achieving two substantial concessions from the Government. They are not perfect, perhaps, but go a long way towards meeting the particular requirements of communities that are in many ways very hard-pressed and would undoubtedly have suffered significant difficulties if the Government had stuck to their original proposals. In that spirit of collaboration, I look forward to the Minister dotting the last “i” and crossing the last “t” in relation to the transfer from one property to another not requiring a sale.