Housing: First-time Buyers

Debate between Lord Vinson and Baroness Hanham

Tuesday 3rd July 2012 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Hanham]

My Lords, the construction industry is dependent on land that is available to buy. As I am sure noble Lords know, the Government are releasing their own land as fast as they can. There is a very big programme of land release, most of which is to be designated for housing, both private and public sector, along with the infrastructure to support it. Many schemes across the country have already been identified for these initiatives, and the construction industry itself is all ready to go. We know that builders are ready to take up the land that is available, so I am sure there will be a boost to housing in the near future.

[Lord Vinson]

My Lords, I believe that there is great common cause across the House that everything should be done to stimulate the building industry. It is one of the great motors of the economy and is a perfect contracyclical investment because housing, once built, is there, so the money is not wasted. Will the Government assure us that they are using every opportunity to help to fill the huge gap in the demand for housing by stimulating in every possible way the housing market and the construction industry, thereby creating many lower-paid jobs for people who would not otherwise be employed? It is a great key to our prosperity.

[Baroness Hanham]

My Lords, I thank my noble friend, who I know takes a great interest in these matters. I answered him to some extent in my response to the noble Baroness, Lady Royall. We are hoping and expecting to stimulate the construction industry through our programmes for new housing. It is absolutely essential to the growth of the economy that the construction industry should get going again, because it is in that sector where skills and training will be required for new jobs. I agree completely with my noble friend.

Housing

Debate between Lord Vinson and Baroness Hanham

Tuesday 22nd May 2012 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Hanham]

My Lords, the housing strategy steps up precisely to the challenge. Some of the completions depend, of course, on when the start was and not all the starts were since 2010, so the previous programme had some effect on the programme now. However, the Government are determined that there will be a big boost to housing starts, to affordable housing and to private housing. There will be support for that in the programmes that we have outlined. By the time the spending review is completed there will be, as I said, 170,000 new affordable homes built.

[Lord Vinson]

My Lords, I hope the Minister is aware that the land value of a house in the 1960s was about 25%. The land value of a house today is over 50%. That means that the present generation are paying 25% more for their mortgages than most of us here today did. Most people who have analysed the situation believe that this is due to excessive land rationing through the planning system. I applaud what the Government are trying to do in freeing up the planning system but we really have to get to the heart of this, release more land and bring supply and demand into balance.

[Baroness Hanham]

My Lords, I agree very much with my noble friend. The Government are doing just that. Public sector land is being freed up as we speak. As I am sure the noble Lord knows, there is a plan across all departments to free up any spare land, including Ministry of Defence land. There are also now policies to ensure that, where planning permission has already been given but the plans have not been implemented, there will be greater encouragement to those people to ensure that the land is developed. We all recognise that there is a great demand for housing. We very much appreciate the problems that first-time buyers are suffering, and the delivery of more houses—on which we are determined—should help.

Local Authorities: Redundancies

Debate between Lord Vinson and Baroness Hanham

Wednesday 9th March 2011 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Hanham]

My Lords, capitalisation impacts directly on deficit reduction plans. Capitalisation is capital being used for revenue so there is no doubt, I think, that what my noble friend said in his letter was correct. The permission for capitalisation—which has now been increased from £200 million to £300 million, largely because of representations being made—is not intended to be the full way of meeting redundancy costs. Councils are meant to look to their own resources to make up most of what they need when there is a reduction of staff through either voluntary or compulsory redundancies.

[Lord Vinson]

My Lords, will the Minister agree that no Government can enjoy making cuts? It must be difficult to watch when some cuts are made inappropriately by local authorities, but the fact remains that, without these cuts, council tax would rise exponentially as it has done in the past. Would the Minister make it clear that the alternative to cuts is a rise in council tax? I wonder how popular that would be with the British public.

[Baroness Hanham]

My Lords, I point out immediately that the Government have made it possible for a council tax freeze for the next two years. Indeed you cannot have numbers of personnel rising exponentially every year, which happened under the previous Government, under which there was a widening out in the number of people employed in local government. There have to be, and there will be, rationalisations of services and new ways of doing things. Not all councils are lost in the depths of despair about what is happening, because this is opening up opportunities for them. However, I do not deny that it is a great hardship for people who are losing their jobs without the benefit of having anywhere to go, and none of us would reject that.