Public Services

Lord McFall of Alcluith Excerpts

Tuesday 26th October 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Greenhalgh (Con)]

As the Fire Minister, I certainly recognise the importance of the delivery of the vast majority of our fire and rescue services through people who are currently employed by local government. As a former council leader, I know there is a whole host of statutory areas where you would seek to deliver services through people who are directly employed. But increasingly there are areas where you can drive down costs through competitive tendering. That also gives in-house services the opportunity to compete with the market to see whether they can deliver those services more effectively. Competition does drive down costs and increases the quality of the services provided.

[The Lord Speaker (Lord McFall of Alcluith)]

The noble Lord, Lord Flight, is not present, so I call the noble Baroness, Lady Blake of Leeds.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Greenhalgh (Con)]

My Lords, a significant amount of the councils’ budget is already ring-fenced, including adult social care. It is for local councils to determine how they spend their resources to ensure that they meet local needs. The core spending power in the most recent local government settlement increased from £49 billion to £51.3 billion in this financial year. The ring-fencing of budgets can have the deleterious effect of forcing councils to do something that is not necessarily in the immediate interests of their local residents.

[The Lord Speaker (Lord McFall of Alcluith)]

My Lords, all supplementary questions have been asked, and we now move to the next Question.

Regulation of Property Agents Working Group

Lord McFall of Alcluith Excerpts

Wednesday 20th October 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Greenhalgh (Con)]

I take this opportunity to pay tribute to the work undertaken by the noble Lord on the wide-ranging recommendations contained in the final report from his working group. I am grateful to him and to all those who contributed. However, he will appreciate that this is a complex area with many interdependencies. Having paused work on it at the height of the Covid-19 pandemic, we continue to consider the recommendations in the noble Lord’s report.

[The Lord Speaker (Lord McFall of Alcluith)]

The noble Lord, Lord Adonis, is not here.

[Lord Palmer of Childs Hill (LD)]

My Lords, I declare my interest as chair of the advisory board of the Property Redress Scheme. The noble Lord, Lord Best, put it very clearly: this report was two years ago, and still nothing concrete has happened. Some things can be done quite simply. The first recommendation is the appointment of a new independent regulator to lead matters in this instance. May I specifically ask the Minister when he expects such a regulator to be appointed?

Prime Minister: Meeting with First Ministers

Lord McFall of Alcluith Excerpts

Wednesday 20th October 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Greenhalgh (Con)]

There is a clear political point there, but also a practical point. We must spend money for its intended purposes, which is why we have bodies such as the National Audit Office to ensure that taxpayers’ money is properly spent. We need to look into how we can have a similar regime for devolved Governments.

[The Lord Speaker (Lord McFall of Alcluith)]

My Lords, all supplementary questions have now been asked.

Minister for Intergovernmental Relations

Lord McFall of Alcluith Excerpts

Monday 18th October 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Greenhalgh (Con)]

I thank the noble Lord for raising this issue. It is quite clear that you need to have the competence to spend taxpayers’ money. The best way in which to rein them in is, of course, to win at the ballot box.

[The Lord Speaker (Lord McFall of Alcluith)]

My Lords, all supplementary questions have been asked, and we now move to the next Question.

Building Safety Defects: Costs

Lord McFall of Alcluith Excerpts

Monday 18th October 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Greenhalgh (Con)]

It is quite clear that the building owner and freeholder have responsibility for keeping the building safe. Whether the costs are passed on to leaseholders is a matter for the individual lease, but we are doing all we can to step in to help recoup the money that should rightly be paid by the developers and have also put forward taxpayer funding to the tune of over £5 billion at this point.

[The Lord Speaker (Lord McFall of Alcluith)]

My Lords, all supplementary questions have been asked and we now move to the next Question.

Leasehold: Building and Fire Safety

Lord McFall of Alcluith Excerpts

Thursday 16th September 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Greenhalgh (Con)]

We recognise that many people are responsible and that the standard of construction products has not been at the level we expect. That is why we have brought in a construction products regulator, situated in the Office for Product Safety and Standards, to oversee that within BEIS. Obviously, we are looking at how best to ensure that this does not happen in future and that those responsible make a contribution.

[The Lord Speaker (Lord McFall of Alcluith)]

The noble Baroness, Lady Neville-Rolfe, is not present, so I call the noble Baroness, Lady Pinnock.

[Baroness Pinnock (LD)]

My Lords, the Minister has just said that he is considering a further levy on developers to enable leaseholders not to have to pay huge bills. One leaseholder I know has a bill of £200,000 landing on their doormat to pay now. Why are the Government so willing to protect developers’ profits while throwing leaseholders to the wolves?

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Greenhalgh (Con)]

We continue to have a number of discussions with members of the G15 housing associations, and particularly with local authorities. The hard yards of achieving a situation in which the same cladding as Grenfell—the aluminium composite material—has been got off around 96% of those buildings, much of that during this pandemic, have required work at every level of government. We will continue to engage with them to come up with practical steps to deal with other buildings with unsafe cladding.

[The Lord Speaker (Lord McFall of Alcluith)]

My Lords, all supplementary questions have been asked and we now move to the next Question.

Net-Zero Emissions: Planning and Building Regulations

Lord McFall of Alcluith Excerpts

Thursday 9th September 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Greenhalgh]

My Lords, I point out that our proposed outcomes-based system of integrated assessment will provide the Government with a mechanism to reflect their environmental ambitions, including wider net-zero commitments, in the planning process.

[The Lord Speaker (Lord McFall of Alcluith)]

I call the noble Lord, Lord Berkeley. No? I call the noble Lord, Lord Oates.

[Lord Oates (LD)]

My Lords, does the Minister recognise that the decision in 2016 to scrap the zero-carbon homes scheme was a catastrophic mistake, and can he tell us the amount of carbon that has been emitted from the 1 million substandard homes that have been built since that time?

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Greenhalgh (Con)]

My Lords, I would agree with what the noble Lord said: it is important to join up government and we are making progress in this area. How we intend to do this will be outlined imminently as we respond to the consultation on the Planning for the Future White Paper and set out our legislation in this Session.

[The Lord Speaker (Lord McFall of Alcluith)]

My Lords, all supplementary questions have been asked and we now move to the next Question.

Council Tax

Lord McFall of Alcluith Excerpts

Thursday 22nd July 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Greenhalgh (Con)]

My Lords, I point out that Westminster has a low-tax policy and sets probably the lowest council tax in the country, and it should be commended for being a low-tax authority. Certain authorities know how to squeeze every penny in every pound, and I commend Westminster on being able to do that.

[The Lord Speaker (Lord McFall of Alcluith)]

My Lords, the time allowed for this Question has elapsed. We now come to the fourth Oral Question.

Mortgages: EWS1 Form

Lord McFall of Alcluith Excerpts

Tuesday 29th June 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Greenhalgh (Con)]

My Lords, we recognise that there may still be an outstanding problem. Where the building is outside the scope of the RICS guidelines and lenders are still insisting on the form, we ask that sellers take that up with RICS in the first instance. But I point out that 80% of lenders have adopted the RICS guidance formally, so people who are purchasing properties have a choice in the market to go to lenders that will follow that guidance.

[The Lord Speaker (Lord McFall of Alcluith)]

My Lords, the time allowed for this Question has elapsed. We now come to the third Oral Question.

Homeowners: Cladding-related Costs

Lord McFall of Alcluith Excerpts

Thursday 24th June 2021 Lords Chamber

[Lord Greenhalgh (Con)]

My Lords, there was media coverage of a medium-rise building where leaseholders and shared owners were facing demands of around £100,000. I was struck by that, not least because the building in question did not have unsafe cladding. There we have a medium-rise building without unsafe cladding, but with some building safety defects that refer to compartmentation. Talk about levying bills of £100,000 seems to be disproportionate, so I have met in that case with the housing association and talked it through with my officials, to encourage them to find a more proportionate approach to keep people safe in these sorts of buildings.

[The Lord Speaker (Lord McFall of Alcluith)]

My Lords, the time allowed for this question has elapsed.