Affordable Housing
Debate between Meg Hillier and Mark Prisk(9 years, 8 months ago)
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Mr Prisk
My hon. Friend is a brilliant campaigner on this issue in Pendle. When I was the Minister for Housing, I had the chance to go and see the work that he does. He is absolutely right: we need the collaborative approach, across the sectors and between the different agencies, if we are to get the building of these homes unlocked.
I have spoken about the need for a long-term rental policy for housing associations. My second point is that we need to match that with a long-term commitment to sustained supply for all housing tenures. I recently had the chance to co-chair—with the right hon. Member for Greenwich and Woolwich (Mr Raynsford), who was himself a very capable construction Minister under the previous Administration—a housing commission sponsored by Lloyds Banking Group. That commission brought together an outstanding group of public and private sector experts, who were crystal clear about the key issue. The report states:
“We believe that only a long-term commitment, across the political parties, will deliver the additional homes needed over the next decade. A realistic target is to complete 2 million to 2.5 million homes by 2025. To achieve this there is no single solution, no silver bullet. Rather what is needed is a larger, more competitive and diverse market in the supply of homes.”
As the report rightly says, we must not only expand the house building and private rented sector, but encourage housing associations and, as my hon. Friend the Member for Truro and Falmouth (Sarah Newton) pointed out, local authorities to contribute more. We need not only the larger contractors, which the hon. Member for Nottingham South mentioned, but more small builders and, indeed, self-building. In addition to more homes for sale, a new professional private rented sector needs to develop. We will need not only to regenerate urban areas but to establish completely new settlements as part of a long-term comprehensive approach.
On that note, I very much welcome the Minister’s statement to the House yesterday on Ebbsfleet. He is making excellent progress on that; I remember the tensions and challenges of dealing with it. That, together with the potential in Bicester and elsewhere, is really good progress. Together—not individually but together—all these different elements can give us a sustained increase in housing supply, an increase not for one year or two years, but over a decade or more.
That brings me to my third and last point, which was a key finding in the housing commission’s report. We need to turn idle public land into affordable family homes. Government, in all its forms, owns a lot of buildings and land that are either underused or, frankly, completely idle.
Meg Hillier (Hackney South and Shoreditch) (Lab/Co-op)
Does the hon. Gentleman therefore agree that it would have behoved the Mayor of London to sell off for that very purpose the fire stations that he has been selling? My local one has been sold for £28 million to an as yet unannounced but no doubt private developer.
Mr Prisk
I am not an expert on the hon. Lady’s constituency, so it would be wiser for me not to wade into that particular parish, but the Mayor is very clear about raising the number of homes built and he has been crystal clear about ensuring that we get land brought into use. The Government have established an effective register within Whitehall, but it has always proved difficult to turn that register into actual homes. The prize is great, as we discover if we talk and listen to some of the people who have analysed this. Savills, for example, estimates that up to 2 million homes could be built on publicly owned land. I welcome the recent announcements by Ministers about engaging the Homes and Communities Agency to drive that forward, and I commend Ministers’ efforts in releasing land, which should result in the building of up to 100,000 homes over this Parliament.
I contend that more can be done, however, and I suggest that we need to overhaul Treasury rules that guide public asset sales in this field. The strict application of best value rules works against long-term development partnership, and it means that we fail to use public assets to provide homes that people can afford. Instead, we need to incentivise Government Departments, agencies, NHS trusts and local authorities to become long-term development partners and to use public assets to deliver homes that are affordable to many more people. There are some good signs, and I draw the Chamber’s attention to the fact that the Ministry of Defence, which is often criticised in that regard, has managed to secure a sensible long-term programme in Aldershot.
More can be done, however. I encourage the Minister, although I suspect that he does not need much encouragement, to be ambitious in this field and to encourage his colleagues across Whitehall to do likewise. Alongside that, I would like other long-term owners of land—such as our universities, which are substantial landowners, many of the large private landowners and many of our large pension funds—to be able to work in a new legal and tax framework that actively encourages them to develop communities for all and, more importantly, homes that most people can afford.
Of all the problems that will face the next Government after May, meeting our country’s housing needs will probably be one of the greatest challenges. Many of the concerns that will be raised in this debate and others are symptoms of the wider problem—dysfunctional housing markets, which have meant that for 25 years or more, we have been building roughly half the homes we need, year in, year out. To break that long-term cycle, we need a long-term commitment across the parties to create a larger, more diverse and more competitive market in the supply of homes. There are no quick answers and no easy solutions, but if we create a consistent, long-term policy framework, we can build the homes that our constituents need.
Oral Answers to Questions
Debate between Meg Hillier and Mark Prisk
Meg Hillier (Hackney South and Shoreditch) (Lab/Co-op)
One of this Government’s first acts was to get rid of proposals to have a register of private landlords. In many discussions I have had with residents—including at the Hackney housing summit that I hosted recently—it has become clear that there has been a real need to improve landlords, but without knowing who they are we cannot do that. Will the Minister look again at the issue? Again, I draw the House’s attention to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests.