Housing and Planning Bill

Lord Porter of Spalding Excerpts

Monday 11th April 2016 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville (LD)]

My Lords, as this is the first time I have spoken on Report, I draw the attention of the House to my interests as set out in the register as a South Somerset District Council councillor and as a vice-president of the LGA.

I rise to support Amendment 10. As the noble Lord, Lord Best, ably demonstrated, age-restricted housing schemes for older people should, by their very nature, be exempt from the requirement to provide starter homes. The majority of these schemes will have been designed around the needs of older people and will be completely tailored to their needs. The ethos of the Government’s starter homes policy is targeted at younger people between the ages of 23 and 40. It would be inappropriate for starter homes to become part of an elderly people’s complex, and they should therefore be exempt. This should be clear in the Bill.

[Lord Porter of Spalding (Con)]

My Lords, as this is the first time I have spoken on Report, I remind the House of my declaration of interests. It is long and exhaustive, and I do not propose to read it out again. Noble Lords should refer to previous copies of Hansard or to the register, where it is all recorded.

I support my noble friend Lord True on the age restriction. I would not go through the wrong Lobby on this minor issue, which is going to go to the other end of the building and hopefully someone will look at it, but the age restriction based on the arguments that were exercised in this House excludes some people who may well be able to purchase a starter home if they are not university students. To exclude people who are not university students because we are worried about avaricious parents of university students seems perverse. I hope the Government will try to work out a way in which we can get a restriction on people getting into schemes that does not preclude those youngsters—probably in couples, with trades behind them—who could earn enough money, subject to being able to get access to a deposit, for 80% of the value of the scheme where they would not for 100%. That aspect requires a bit more work.

In response to my noble friend Lord Best’s comments about properties for the elderly being excluded from this measure, quite clearly there would be an expectation that we would not be putting starter homes on elderly-unit accommodation. However, that is not to say that a developer, if the financial circumstances warranted it, should not be expected to pay a commuted sum to offset the cost of starter homes on an alternative site. Some more work needs to be done on this to ensure that we are not allowing some developers to get off without it while we are imposing it on others.

[Lord Beecham]

My Lords, the Opposition support the Government’s amendment here. I guess that a line has to be drawn somewhere with regard to age, and the Government are probably right to have drawn it where they have.

I also support the amendment in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Lansley. I hope the Government will take it back in a positive sense because he makes a strong argument for extending the principle to these different forms of ownership—they are quite compatible with the Government’s intentions, after all—and meeting the particular needs that he has so clearly identified. I hope the Minister will feel able to say that she will take that back positively and perhaps return later on Report if she cannot accept it today. It would be ideal if she could accept it today but I guess that she may not have that freedom. Still, a positive response would be very welcome.

I sympathise again with the amendment moved by the noble Lord, Lord Best. I am not sure whether that needs to be in the Bill so long as it is on the record that it is the Government’s intention that the thrust of the amendment would be realised in practice. If the Minister were able to give that assurance, that might avoid the need to amend the legislation. That is a matter for her judgment, but it might be a way forward.