Housing: Overcrowding

Lord Young of Cookham Excerpts

Tuesday 25th April 2023 Lords Chamber

[Lord Young of Cookham (Con)]

My Lords, the research to which my noble friend referred showed that the families most likely to suffer from overcrowding are families already in the social housing sector, but they cannot move because there are no larger homes to move to and they cannot afford to rent. In the medium term, should the social housing sector not be building more, larger houses? In the short term, should housing associations and local authorities consider leasing larger homes from the private sector in order to mitigate the problems to which my noble friend referred?

[Baroness Scott of Bybrook (Con)]

My noble friend is absolutely right. If you have anything to do with local housing, you will realise that there seem to be many more one-bedroom and two-bedroom properties than there are family homes. We recognise the challenge faced by the sector, and that is why we encourage local authorities to continue to consider innovative ways in which they can best use their stock. For example, supporting underoccupiers to transfer to other, smaller properties is one way that they can then relet family homes. Landlords are focused on providing high-quality services to all their tenants. Introducing a new requirement for local authorities to lease larger homes in the open market may also be considered a new burden, for which funding would be unlikely to be provided.