Housing Supply

Debate between Lord Jackson of Peterborough and Robert Buckland

Wednesday 9th July 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Buckland]

The hon. Lady is talking about 1968—the year of my birth. I agree that house building reached its peak at that time, but I also remind her that in the immediate post-war era, between 1945 and 1951, about 700,000 houses were built, which is only just over 100,000 a year, and that Aneurin Bevan’s record on housing does not match that of Harold Macmillan.

It is important to make such points, historic though they may be, because neither of the main parties in this House can claim a moral authority when it comes to house building. It ill behoves the hon. Lady and her party to make intemperate criticism of this Government when the previous Labour Government’s public house-building record speaks for itself as poor. The year 2008-09 saw the lowest level of house building since, I think, 1923, which is hardly a record of which the Labour party can be proud. If Labour’s record was so poor then, why on earth should we believe its pledges now about house building from 2015? Please forgive me, but, to be frank, I am sceptical of those claims, though I am sure they are well-intentioned.

Swindon is a town that continues to grow—it now has in excess of 200,000 people—and we have delivered house growth for much of the past 30 to 40 years: first, in the form of the London overspill estates, such as Park North and Park South, and then through developments in the ’70s and, indeed, the ’80s in west Swindon, which comprise the constituency that I have the honour of representing today.

We are no strangers to, or shy of, house building, and we continue to do it. The Under-Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, my hon. Friend the Member for Grantham and Stamford (Nick Boles), who has responsibility for planning, is familiar with the Wichelstowe development in my constituency. It is one of the biggest developments in the country and it continues to be rolled out. I am very grateful to my hon. Friend and the Government for contributing £800,000—nearly £1 million—to allow a joint venture to be set up, which will enable the local authority, Swindon borough council, together with a private partner, to start developing homes specifically geared towards retired people who wish to downsize and live in homes that, while they do not meet the criteria of sheltered housing, are designed with the needs of older people in mind.

I am talking about homes with fewer bedrooms but larger living accommodation and that are adaptable for the disabilities that sometimes come with old age. That detailed work has been commissioned by the local authority. It has identified a growing ageing population in Swindon who will need that type of housing, and I look forward to the joint venture being set up in the early part of next year and to houses being delivered in Middle Wichel. A new Waitrose supermarket has been opened on the site, which is welcome. We already have shops and infrastructure, which I hope will match the housing to be built there. I am delighted that this week’s announcement of local growth funding has earmarked more than £20 million for the development of infrastructure to facilitate the development of Wichelstowe, which will include the enhancement of junctions 15 and 16 of the M4. That is vital if Swindon is going to be able to sustain the housing expansion expected of it.

In recent years, planning and development have not had the best of reputations. Accusations have been made that developers have land-banked. Until a few years ago, I think there was a case to be made, but the evidence is shifting. My recent experience of the granting of local planning applications is that developers are, in fact, keen to get on site and start developing. I am no longer as convinced as I was about the accusations of land-banking. I have read the detail of the Opposition motion and think that they are a little behind the curve when it comes to the real evidence. They are quite right to be concerned about land-banking—I do not approve of it at all—but I think the evidence is moving against them as the economy picks up and construction development continues.

[Mr Stewart Jackson]

My hon. Friend makes a good point about land banking. Is there not a huge difference between using the fiscal system to encourage developers not to bank land, and the Opposition proposal to appropriate land in an arbitrary way?

[Mr Buckland]

That leads on to my point. I have concerns about proposals that address non-existent problems. The Opposition proposal could make the situation worse—poorly prepared and considered developments could go ahead, but that is not what we want, and certainly not in Swindon.

Development problems concern not only those of us with an interest in housing, but everybody who wants quality of life. I deal regularly with what I call speculative planning applications, which fall outside the line of development as agreed by local plans and do not capture the consent of local people. Although I was delighted that the old top-down regional spatial strategy was abolished—the number of houses being imposed on my area was excessive—we are in a transitional period between the abolition of the old regime and the adoption of a new local plan. There has been an over-reliance on the five-year land supply argument. That causes a problem for growing towns such as Swindon—it is very difficult to argue that we have such a supply.

My hon. Friend the Minister is well aware of those problems, but the message on development and new homes must go out loud and clear. In Swindon alone, 238 new homes have been purchased through Help to Buy, and under the affordable homes scheme, just under 1,000 homes have been delivered. Real progress is being made. The Government are sowing the seeds of a renaissance in housing development. The proposals in the Opposition motion are ill-conceived and do not address the issues properly, and they would cause more problems than they seek to solve.

Children and Families Bill

Debate between Lord Jackson of Peterborough and Robert Buckland

Tuesday 11th June 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Buckland]

I am extremely grateful to my hon. Friend for his kind remarks. He makes an important point about a common entry point for families. That is a good start, but more needs to be done to build on it. To be frank, it may not be necessary to do that through primary legislation and the rules of the tribunals might be used. That would be a matter for Her Majesty’s Courts and Tribunals Service. I know my hon. Friend is liaising with counterparts in the Ministry of Justice on other matters that I shall come on to, and I sure he will also give this issue careful and anxious thought.

At the moment, clause 50(4)(a) allows

“other matters relating to EHC plans against which appeals may be brought;”

to be added to the jurisdiction of the tribunal. To be fair to my hon. Friend, there does seem to be a power within the Bill, but it would be wise to go just one furlong further and make it absolutely clear to the families we represent that simplicity is the order of the day when it comes to people’s rights to challenge decisions that—let us not forget this—will affect the life course of the young people we are dealing with.

Let me move on to a rather interesting—well, I hope so—and important matter. Having to admit to being a lawyer is not popular in this House, but words are important and if we change the meaning of something, once again the lawyers will jump all over it. In that spirit, let us consider amendment 39, which relates to the position of current case law, and the synthesis between health care provision, social care provision and education—a point that returns to the comments made by my hon. Friend the Member for Stroud (Neil Carmichael). The Government’s intention seems clear: they wish to replicate current case law when it comes to how local authorities judge their responsibility to make provision in that area. Clause 21 includes the words

“wholly or mainly for the purposes of education”,

and I share the concern that the words “wholly or mainly” set a different and higher threshold than is currently set out in case law. In the 1999 Bromley case, Lord Justice Sedley spoke about a case-by-case analysis of particular applications, rather than a general principle as seems to be suggested by the clause. We should therefore consider a spectrum or range of provision from purely medical to purely educational need. A large number of cases will fall inside that spectrum, bearing in mind the common and well-understood scenario that with a particular need often comes a co-morbid need—a special educational need will often be accompanied by a health need as well.

[Mr Stewart Jackson (Peterborough) (Con)]

I strongly support the points that my hon. Friend is making eloquently and with his normal charm, especially as they relate to particular groups. I speak from my experience of working with children who have Tourette’s. That is one of the most obvious examples of co-morbidities and, for want of a better expression, people fall through the cracks in current legislation and are often failed by educational or health provision. The amendment seeks to ameliorate that difficult situation.

[Mr Buckland]

I am extremely grateful to my hon. Friend, and I pay tribute to him for the work he does with a very challenging condition. A lot of people think Tourette’s syndrome is a funny thing, but for those who suffer from it, it is a challenging and difficult condition that is often misunderstood by members of the public. Perhaps I should pause for a moment and pay tribute to the families and carers who, day in, day out, have to put up with ill-informed and quite frankly abusive comments from members of the public who should know better, whether those parents are taking their child to use a disabled lavatory in a supermarket or going to the cinema and trying to enjoy a film with their child who may have a special need that means they make a lot of noise or have to move about. We still have a long way to go in society to achieve general understanding among a wider section of the public about what it is like to live with a child who has special needs. It is good that an increasing number of towns offer autism-friendly cinema screenings, for example, that allow people to sit in comfort on a Sunday afternoon without needing to have eyes in the back of their head or worrying about what somebody else will say about their child. I have parenthesised a little, but I am grateful to my hon. Friend for his intervention.

I was talking about “wholly or mainly” and the concern shared by many people that we could end up with a wholly artificial argument about a particular type of provision falling between two stools. Thankfully, it has been made clear on case authority that speech and language therapy would be an educational need, but as my hon. Friend the Member for Peterborough (Mr Jackson) said, in a number of examples there will be less clarity and an ugly argument could break out between the health service and the local authority about who is responsible for what.