Holocaust Memorial Bill

Richard Bacon Excerpts

Committee of the whole House
Wednesday 22nd May 2024 Commons Chamber

[Nickie Aiken]

My hon. Friend makes an excellent point. Having read the Select Committee’s report, it is clear to me that there is a genuine concern about the Bill setting a precedent, which I will talk about slightly later. The London County Council (Improvements) Act 1900 is clear about protecting public spaces. In a constituency such as mine in central London, we do not benefit from huge amounts of neighbourhood green spaces, where a family can just pop out on a Sunday morning after breakfast to give the children a run around. As I have said, thousands of social housing tenants live on Page Street, Regency Street and in the Peabody blocks just behind Great Peter Street, and they do not benefit from having their own gardens and are desperate not to lose their local park.

[Mr Richard Bacon (South Norfolk) (Con)]

Has my hon. Friend had the opportunity to be in Victoria Tower Gardens on a Saturday or Sunday morning and seen at the south end, where there is a developed play space, large numbers of local mums with their toddlers—not always mums, of course, but often they are—playing in exactly the way we would hope in a green space?

[Nickie Aiken]

I have seen that. It goes back to the point that for many of us in this Chamber this is a workplace. I am obviously an exception, because this is my constituency, but for most Members of Parliament this is our workspace and then they go home. But this is my home, and I know from local residents—my neighbours —that Victoria Tower Gardens is a much-loved and much-used park. It is not just a workplace for people to do radio or TV interviews; it is also where people take their children and their dogs for walks. It is much-used and much-loved, and it would be an absolute tragedy if we were to lose an inch of it, in my personal opinion, but I may be in the minority.

Madam Deputy Chairman—sorry, I mean Dame Eleanor. This could be my last speech in this place, so I have to get that right. Let us not forget the array of statues situated in Victoria Tower Gardens. They carry special meaning and make it a unique place, and they include the Buxton memorial fountain, which celebrates and commemorates the emancipation of all slaves in the British empire in 1834. It is in the centre of the gardens and has the most amazing location, for absolutely the right reasons. I note that in the special report from the Select Committee, Mr Richard Buxton, representing the Buxton family and the Thomas Fowell Buxton Society, highlighted concerns that the Holocaust memorial and learning centre should

“not cause any degree of harm either actual or to the setting of any other memorial in Victoria Tower Gardens”.

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[Simon Hoare]

My hon. Friend is being generous with her time. It is not—

[Mr Bacon]

Ha!

[Simon Hoare]

I am not entirely sure what has amused my hon. Friend the Member for South Norfolk (Mr Bacon), but there we are. Some people are easily amused.

Let me just make this point. That is not just a binding statement on behalf of the actions of subsequent Governments, but for local authorities, the royal parks and any speculative developer in the private sector. I do not carve it out as a niche, bespoke protection, but as a general blanket cover.

Draft Combined Authorities (Finance) (Amendment) Regulations 2024

Richard Bacon Excerpts

Monday 29th April 2024 General Committees

[Jacob Young]

I will come back to my right hon. Friend on that point, but I would say that Conservative Mayors charge zero mayoral precept, whether that is Ben Houchen in the Tees Valley or Andy Street in the West Midlands. Contrast that with the Mayor of Greater Manchester, for example.

[Mr Richard Bacon (South Norfolk) (Con)]

I would just like to pursue the point made by my right hon. Friend the Member for North Somerset (Sir Liam Fox). The issue is not what a particularly good Mayor from a good political party would do. These regulations relate to constitutional changes, which I know because the explanatory memorandum says so. It says that the combined county authorities have a slightly different constitutional structure from the combined authority model before, being designed to be better suited to non-urban areas—quite how, it does not say. Surely the issue is, regarding my right hon. Friend’s question, how are limits put upon the power to raise tax? If there are not any, can we be told, now, during this Committee?

[Jacob Young]

I shall make sure that I give my hon. Friend the answer to his question by the end of this Committee. However, to conclude my speech, these regulations will apply the regime, which is already in place for combined authorities, to combined county authorities to support their Mayors to fund their functions through a precept, where they chose to do so. They prescribe a tried-and-tested budget-setting process that allows for effective challenge and robust and transparent scrutiny by the combined county authority. I commend them to the Committee.

[Jim McMahon (Oldham West and Royton) (Lab/Co-op)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship today, Ms Nokes. I will start by confirming that we do not intend to divide the Committee on this statutory instrument. We agree that there is a financial and democratic need for transparency in the funding of combined authorities and in granting equal powers to mayoral combined authorities and combined county authorities in this regard.

The regulations are intended to extend the existing provisions for the funding of mayoral combined authorities to those of county combined authorities. The new model of county combined authorities, we accept, is more appropriate for non-metropolitan areas where two-tier governance is in place, and this model recognises the geographically specific issues that non-urban areas face, and that local governments then must reflect that different identity and accommodate it where possible.

Can the Minister answer, though, why it has taken so long for the Government to address this difference? There has been a great deal of frustration from our counties, which feel very strongly that they have been required—demanded, in fact—to mirror the model in urban areas, when it just did not fit their geography or their political structures. It would be interesting to know why it has taken so long to reconcile that.

Combined county authorities have shown great progress for English devolution, but there are legitimate concerns over the process and the way in which the SI has been handled. Therefore, can the Minister answer how this change would be communicated with the combined authorities, and their component councils, as this is rolled out?

Labour supports devolution and believes that having the right powers in the right places is important, and that precepts are an important way of achieving that. However, the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities made a point in the Chamber, during oral questions only last week, of criticising the use of precepts in some areas. We heard some of that today, where the political argument is used that Labour Mayors choose to exercise their powers of precepts in a way that Conservative ones do not.

I think that we need to accept that there is no free ride on this—a Mayor is not free; the money comes from somewhere. It comes from a subscription that local authorities pay, from a levy that is required of the local authority, or is done via a precept. Surely the most transparent way is that Mayors of county combined authorities say to the public, on their council tax bills, “This is how much this particular function costs.”

[Mr Bacon]

The hon. Gentleman looks at me in a slightly accusatory way, as if I might disagree with anything he is saying. I do not think you get a free Mayor either. I believe that it is good that it is transparent. I believe that it is good that it is broken up on a bill, so we can see what council tax payers are having to pay for this. On these matters, we are in violent agreement. The only question I had—and I think my right hon. Friend had—was, “What is the upper limit, and how is it imposed?” We know that district councils, if they wish to put up council tax above a certain amount, have to go to a referendum. I am asking—and I think my right hon. Friend is—“What, if any, limits are there here?”

[Jim McMahon]

I will avoid answering the Minister’s question for him, but we need to accept that different Mayors have different powers. Some are police and crime commissioners, while some do not have those powers, and some take on the fire authority powers, the powers of the transport authority, and the rest of it. Therefore, their funding models, and their precept and levelling-up funding, are very different.

However, in each of those circumstances, it will be for the Secretary of State to determine, by legislation, what the upper limit for any increase will be, whether that is a percentage applied to the council tax, or even a cash limit —£5, £10 or whatever—applied to mayoral combined authorities. That is in the gift of the Secretary of State. There is no precept increase in England that has been done without the explicit consent of the Secretary of State, and I think that that is an important point to make here.

We know that councils are facing a perfect storm of rocketing demand in adult and children’s services, adult social care and temporary accommodation, and a rise in borrowing costs, but, at the same time, the core grant has decreased alongside neighbourhood services. The sticking-plaster approach to devolution is part of the problem.

Local growth plans will be made in conjunction with businesses and local authorities to ensure that precepts will be adequately funded, planned and supported, therefore maximising economic potential across the whole region under consideration. More needs to be done, however, because local authorities are, in the end, the foundation of combined authorities. Combined authorities do not exist in isolation, and if the foundation on which they rest is not secure or firm, that will have an impact on them.

Labour is the party of devolution: it created the Scottish Parliament, the devolved Parliament in Wales, the Northern Ireland Assembly and the office of the Mayor of London, and it introduced the Localism Act 2011. Labour Mayors and Labour councillors are leading the charge across the country and, together, have made the case for further devolution.

We propose more stable, longer-term, single-pot settlements across all our combined authorities to reward those who make good progress and are good custodians of public money. It is a fact that, under the Government, working people are paying more and more for less and less, so it is time for a fresh start, which can be achieved only with a Labour Government.

Oral Answers to Questions

Richard Bacon Excerpts

Monday 9th January 2023 Commons Chamber

[Lucy Frazer]

I have had a number of conversations with the hon. Gentleman, and he knows that we are taking steps to help improve and build homes in his area. Not only do we have the £11.5 billion fund, but we have taken steps on the issue of second homes that he and other hon. Members on both sides of the House have raised with me, so that we ensure that people who live in particular areas continue to live there and use their services.

[Mr Richard Bacon (South Norfolk) (Con)]

Does the Minister agree that the best way to build high quality homes is to give the greatest choice to the people who live in them as to what is built? Can she think of any ways in which we might encourage that?

Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill

Richard Bacon Excerpts

Report stage
Tuesday 13th December 2022 Commons Chamber

[John Stevenson (Carlisle) (Con)]

I am delighted to have this opportunity to speak to new clause 3 on the compulsory installation of solar panels on all new residential properties. I have long held an interest in this topic, having questioned Ministers, written articles and held a Westminster Hall debate a number of years ago. Needless to say all were to no avail.

I wonder how much better many people’s energy bills would be had compulsory installation been introduced when I first proposed the idea. However, it is to the future we must look. House building and construction will clearly be significant in achieving the goal of a net-zero environment.

We must also be aware of the potential cost of trying to achieve net zero, and any policies therefore need to be innovative, practical and realistic so they do not damage our economy and individual finances. It is for this reason that I tabled my amendment. Quite simply, making solar panels compulsory in all new builds will create an immediate market. Whether 100,000 or 300,000 housing units are built each year, it will create a sizeable market that is, to some extent, guaranteed. With the knowledge of that certainty, businesses will undoubtedly rise to the challenge, set themselves up and invest. We would then see many businesses, up and down the country, installing solar panels. Repair and maintenance businesses would thrive, too.

With such a large market, and with competition, I anticipate that the cost of solar panels would continue its downward trajectory, ensuring that the cost of new houses does not rise disproportionately. There would also be a benefit to those seeking to install solar panels on their existing homes, as costs would drop and many more businesses would offer that opportunity. Most importantly, innovation would kick in and solar panels would become far more efficient and, I anticipate, more aesthetically pleasing. Why not have solar-panel tiles on every new build?

[Mr Richard Bacon (South Norfolk) (Con)]

I was recently told that there is a five-year waiting list in Norfolk to have a thatched roof replaced—waiting lists may be shorter elsewhere. Of course, there are thatched new builds. Does new clause 3 cover thatched new builds? Would anyone who wanted to commission such a new build have to cover its thatched roof in solar panels?

[John Stevenson]

That is an interesting one, to say the least. I would certainly leave businesses to be innovative in their approach to dealing with that.

I am aware that there is a lot of support for my proposal and I genuinely believe it is sensible and practical. However, I understand the Government’s perspective on a number of issues. I give them credit for their principled policy of moving housing towards zero-carbon-ready homes. As our energy provision changes, homes must be adaptable and ready for the introduction of new technologies and new supplies of energy.

I appreciate, although I do not wholly agree with, the Government’s view that they should remain technology neutral. I am not entirely convinced by that argument, as any housebuilder can do what they want in ensuring a property is zero-carbon-ready, as well as having to include solar panels. However, I acknowledge that the Government have increased the uplift in the energy efficiency standard, which should lead to 30% less CO₂ emissions—something that must be welcomed as a further step forward.

I support the Government in their decision to look at solar permitted development rights, particularly with regard to commercial buildings; that decision has much to commend it and is a sensible development. I am still, of course, disappointed that the Government have still not accepted my amendment. Although I have had a Westminster Hall debate, written articles and asked questions on the topic, I genuinely feel there has not been enough debate and consideration of my amendment and its implications in this House.

I am grateful for the support from Conservative Back Benchers and indeed the support of Ministers, albeit privately. I am a little surprised that there has not been greater support from the Opposition, but that may be because the issues have not been as well publicised and debated as they should. There will, however, be an opportunity for further such debate in the other place when they consider this Bill. I would like to think that their lordships will look clearly and closely at the amendments tabled in this House but not divided on, which will include this amendment—I know there is genuine interest in it in the other place.

I will not push this amendment to a vote today, but should the other place, after further debate, conclude it is worth pursuing, I would certainly want this House to have an opportunity to express its views on the amendment, in whatever form it comes back to the House. I look forward to the Minister’s comments and observations and, very importantly, the debate that will be held by their lordships.

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[John Penrose (Weston-super-Mare) (Con)]

There is much to like and admire in this Bill. Mention has already been made of street votes, and I want to put on the record my thanks to the Government for including them, as that has been a personal crusade of mine and many others outside the House. I am delighted that street votes are firmly and squarely in the Bill.

I am also delighted to see design codes. We have heard about the importance of beauty and of local democracy, local input and local vernacular styles; design codes are an essential way of delivering that and it is very welcome to see them in the Bill.

I also echo the comments of a number of colleagues about what had been new clause 21, which I also signed, and which the Government have responded to positively in dealing with the tyranny of housing targets. The result is to everybody’s credit and very welcome.

However, there is a “but” at the end of that sentence, and it is to do with the concern that a number of Members, including the former Secretary of State, my right hon. Friend the Member for Middlesbrough South and East Cleveland (Mr Clarke), mentioned about supply: our ability to build enough homes in future. Successive Governments of all political stripes have failed to deliver nearly enough homes over decades in this country, and I worry that this Bill fails to fix that fundamental underlying issue of inadequate supply. Street votes will help, but they will not be enough on their own, which is why I tabled new clause 88, and my thanks to the colleagues who have signed it already or spoken in support of it in this debate.

New clause 88 seeks to deal with the problem of under-supply by saying that anybody who owns a home in a town, city or urban area can redevelop it as of right, provided they follow the local design code, which the local council will by then have passed. That will lead to a dramatic increase in the amount of supply. On average, our towns and cities are about two storeys tall, so if the local design code effectively allows a townhouse revolution, which is what most of them will be, that will double the amount of home space available in our towns and cities in one go.

[Mr Richard Bacon]

Does my hon. Friend agree that it is interesting that some of the most beautiful places in the world—Edinburgh, Cornish fishing villages, Paris or Berlin, where I lived—the normal height is four, five or perhaps six storeys without in any way over-dominating the scene?

[John Penrose]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right and that means we end up with gentle densification and beauty in the local style, creating spaces where people really want to live.

We will end up with a huge increase of supply from this townhouse revolution that I have described, and we will also end up with a bump-up in the value of existing homes, because we are creating brownfield sites and every existing home ends up with a small increase in value because of the hope value created. It is greener, because we are allowing people to live nearer where they work, protecting green fields and, as we heard earlier, using brownfield sites. It creates the beauty we have all been looking for. Most importantly, it retains local decision-making sovereignty. I therefore hope the Government will pick this up, take it forward and examine it carefully. It is in the spirit of street votes, but it is street votes on steroids, and I therefore commend it to the Minister and Government.

[Mr Richard Bacon]

It is a great pleasure to speak in this debate under your chairmanship, Mr Deputy Speaker, even though you have restricted everyone to three minutes —I understand, of course, that you had no choice in the matter. I am also grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Weston-super-Mare (John Penrose). When I was discussing with him what to do about this problem, obviously I had crafted an immense amount of prose, but he said, “We will remove every alternate page and then deal with what is left,” which is sort of what I have done. I am also grateful to him for drawing new clause 88 to my attention, because I have seen much of the gentle densification he refers to in different cities on the continent. I have visited the Netherlands many times in my campaign for more custom and self-build, and he is right that it does work.

[John Penrose]

Does my hon. Friend agree that his proposals for a greater amount of custom and self-build will be another way of increasing supply, contributing to solving the problem I mentioned in my remarks just now?

[Mr Bacon]

Yes, I do. That is what I have seen in the Netherlands and we should have it here too.

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[Dame Maria Miller]

I rise to support the Bill. I thank the Minister and her colleagues for engaging with Back-Bench colleagues on our concerns, particularly with regard to the way in which housing numbers are calculated.

New homes in my constituency really matter. We have built 150,000 in the past 50 years, at double the rate of the rest of the country, but because we have done the right thing, the formulaic approach ratcheting house building numbers up year on year and the complication of the five-year land supply have left Basingstoke—my constituency and my borough—building 1,400 houses a year, which is probably three times more than the need in our community. That is not sustainable. Councils must be allowed to vary the figure that comes out of the formula to take into account the local needs of the community. I have been making that case ever since I was elected; I am thankful that my council now has a leadership who are on the same page.

I am pleased to support the amendments tabled by my right hon. Friend the Member for Chipping Barnet (Theresa Villiers) and my near neighbour, my hon. Friend the Member for Isle of Wight (Bob Seely). They have led the Government to agree that over-building can be just as much of a restriction on future house building as anything else. I am grateful for that recognition, as are my constituents.

New clause 123, which stands in the name of the hon. Member for Sheffield South East (Mr Betts), has echoes of the past. What got us into this situation in the first place was centrally led house building numbers. We cannot go back to that. I hope that he will decline to press his new clause, for fear that we will regress in that way.

The Government have agreed to make changes, but I urge the Minister to clarify one further thing, which my hon. Friend the Member for Meriden (Saqib Bhatti) has just mentioned: the role of the planning inspector. Planning inspectors are too often overriding local decision making and undermining local democracy. I hope that the Minister will take the time to reassure us that that will change. What guidance will be given to planning inspectors on the changes that have been announced to the calculations with regard to new homes?

[Mr Richard Bacon]

My right hon. Friend mentions planning inspectors and how annoying they can be. Is she minded to suggest that perhaps we could do without planning inspectors? After all, we have local councils, local democracy and a call-in process through the Secretary of State. Why do we actually need an intermediate process?

[Dame Maria Miller]

My hon. Friend makes a very good point, but there needs to be a way of having arbitration when there are points of concern. I can understand that, but it has to be done with the starting point that local people know what is best for their community. I am shocked to hear what my hon. Friend the Member for Meriden has been experiencing with regard to schools.

Draft Combined Authorities (Borrowing) Regulations 2022

Richard Bacon Excerpts

Wednesday 9th March 2022 General Committees

[Mr Richard Bacon (South Norfolk) (Con)]

It is a great pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Pritchard.

Like my hon. Friend the Member for Central Suffolk and North Ipswich, who is my parliamentary neighbour, I was struck by the comments of the shadow Minister, the hon. Member for Weaver Vale. It is now 50 years since Tony Crosland, a Labour Environment Secretary—as it was in those days, but the position covered local government—used the famous words, “the party is over” in relation to local government borrowing.

The regulations provide for an extension of borrowing powers by local government. As has been said, a variety of councils from across the country undertook investments that they thought were sound. In my constituency, a neighbouring council bought a golf club, which it was pleased by and thought was excellent; I was told that it was going to produce a 7.5% return. I may have commented in the local media at the time that councils owning golf clubs was not necessarily what council tax payers expected. I do not think that anybody assumed that a Government of the future would at some point make the playing of golf a criminal act, but that is of course exactly what happened.

Colleagues’ question about what kind of scrutiny is in place is a first order question, and I hope that the Minister will take it to heart and undertake to write to Committee members with more detail than we have heard today about the scrutiny measures that will be in place.

Section 1 of the Localism Act 2011 is entitled,

“Local authority’s general power of competence”,

and subsection (1) states:

“A local authority has power to do anything that individuals generally may do.”

Section 1 (4) reads:

“Where subsection (1) confers power on the authority to do something, it confers power (subject to sections 2 to 4) to do it in any way whatever, including…power to do it anywhere in the United Kingdom or elsewhere…power to do it for a commercial purpose or otherwise for a charge, or without charge, and…power to do it for, or otherwise than for, the benefit of the authority, its area or persons resident or present in its area.”

There are therefore already very wide powers.

I was particularly interested that the Minister said that the extra powers will apply not only to the existing combined authority, but to the bespoke deals available locally. Will he confirm or refute—now or later in writing—whether the regulations go beyond the bespoke powers of the combined authority and extend to the broad powers in section 1 of the Localism Act 2011 to which I referred? Although we all want, at least on paper and in theory, for local government to be accountable to local citizens, we have seen this process go wrong repeatedly in the past, and the framework—the failure regime—that the Government put in place when the extra powers become law will be very important.

Oral Answers to Questions

Richard Bacon Excerpts

Monday 29th November 2021 Commons Chamber

[Eddie Hughes]

I would say that many local authorities are already making considerable progress along these lines. I am delighted to see that the hon. Lady’s local council has joined the ambitious UK100 network—a network of councils committed to achieving net zero as soon as possible—and I understand that it has committed to being carbon neutral by 2030, so it feels to me as though councils are getting the funding that they need.

[Mr Richard Bacon (South Norfolk) (Con)]

There is very clear evidence that people who commission their own houses do so to much higher environmental standards, thus doing their own bit to protect against climate change. What plans do Ministers have to make it easier for ordinary people on normal incomes to get a serviced plot of land so that they can commission their own, much greener houses?

[Eddie Hughes]

My hon. Friend is a frequent champion of his cause in this Chamber, and I think the simple answer to his question is the funding that we are providing through the help to build scheme, but I look forward to further conversations with him in the future to see what else we can do to assist him.

Planning for the Future

Richard Bacon Excerpts

Thursday 12th March 2020 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

Order. I am going to let this run until about 12.10 pm.

[Mr Richard Bacon (South Norfolk) (Con)]

Even if the shadow Secretary of State does not, may I warmly welcome the new money for affordable housing? I ask the Secretary of State to make sure that some of it finds its way to innovators such as the National Community Land Trust Network and the Right to Build Task Force, because the new ideas that will help us to change our whole approach to how we do housing are coming from them.

[Robert Jenrick]

I do support groups such as community housing organisations—I know my hon. Friend has an Adjournment debate later today to which the Minister for Housing, my right hon. Friend the Member for Tamworth (Christopher Pincher) will respond—and we want to ensure that they are properly resourced to take that forward. We want to help smaller communities, particularly in rural areas, to build small numbers of homes—five, 10, 15, whatever might be appropriate for their community—through rural exception sites and the other things he has championed over the years, such as self-building. We will bring forward more measures in the White Paper to help facilitate that.

Community Housing

Richard Bacon Excerpts

Thursday 12th March 2020 Commons Chamber

[Mr Richard Bacon (South Norfolk) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to lead this Adjournment debate, the subject of which is support for community housing—a phrase that comes from the 2019 Conservative manifesto, on which my Conservative colleagues and I fought the recent general election. The manifesto, perhaps for lack of space, conflates two of my life-favourite themes: first, giving people in local communities more real say over the housing that is to be built in their areas; and secondly, self-build housing. On the latter, I declare two interests: first, because what is now known as the Self-build and Custom Housebuilding Act 2015 started life as my private Member’s Bill; and secondly, because I am an ambassador for the Right to Build Task Force.

Under the heading “Community housing and self-build”—which I should emphasise for the sake of clarity are by no means entirely the same thing, although there is often an overlap—the Conservative manifesto helpfully states, on page 31:

“We will support community housing by helping people who want to build their own homes find plots of land and access the Help to Buy scheme.”

I could hold at least three separate Adjournment debates purely based on that one sentence—first, because there is a great deal to say about community housing and the very successful community housing fund; secondly, because there is also a great deal to say about helping people who want to build their own homes, either as individuals or as members of groups; and thirdly, because there is a great deal to say about the fact that the Help to Buy scheme unfairly and inadvertently excluded custom and self-build from its scope. Although that omission was acknowledged and recognised by the Government in 2014, it did not lead to any action being taken until the 2019 manifesto commitment, so in fact there has been an extended period of unfair competition from state-led intervention, subsidised by our tax-paying constituents, which effectively has operated against self-builders and in favour of large house builders, thus limiting supply and choice while reducing overall quality, sustainability and innovation.

However, I do not want to talk about that—first, because my right hon. Friend the Minister knows that I am a “glass half full” kind of guy, and there is much that is positive to talk about; and secondly, because my conversations with Ministers have convinced me that they are seized of that particular problem in relation to Help to Buy, which I hope will in due course be called “Help to Build”, and genuinely want to find a solution that works for self-builders rather than discriminates against them. In the limited time available, I will concentrate just on the first part of the sentence—namely, support for community housing.

[John Howell (Henley) (Con)]

As my hon. Friend knows, I was the person who invented neighbourhood plans. I have a local plan in my home constituency for a town that has some land that it wishes to develop, but it is having enormous problems with the community land trust model in trying to do so. Does my hon. Friend think that that is typical of the problems of the community land trust route, or does he have a solution?

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Bacon]

I recommend that my hon. Friend talks to the National Community Land Trust Network, because the truth is that there are lots of different solutions that work in different environments. He will have heard, as I did, the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government say earlier that the great idea of neighbourhood plans does not work if it is then overridden by developers who take no account of what local communities have said they want. It undermines the credibility of the whole neighbourhood plan process. In my hon. Friend’s particular case, I suggest that he talks to Tom Chance and Catherine Harrington at the National Community Land Trust Network, to see if there is a way forward, particularly if my right hon. Friend the Minister does what I hope he will do, which is relaunch the community housing fund so that the funding continues to be available, preferably on a long-term basis.

[Danny Kruger (Devizes) (Con)]

Does my hon. Friend agree that community land trusts offer potentially a large part of the answer to the housing shortage in this country —uniquely among new developments, they frequently have considerable support from local communities—and that, although this Budget was overwhelmingly brilliant, it is disappointing that the community housing fund was not extended to meet the enormous demand for community land trusts?

[Mr Bacon]

I agree with everything my hon. Friend says. I draw attention to an utterly apposite quote on the front page of “Community Builders”, a book by the Demos think-tank. I happened to attend the launch several years ago. It says:

“Giving communities more power over local housing developments can help to get more homes built”.

Various arguments are made against community housing and alternative ways of doing things. I want to stress something and make sure that the Minister is aware of it by the end of this debate, so I might as well say it now. We know very well that the Treasury’s infrastructure targets are based on what housing can be delivered. I was in a meeting with the Transport Secretary the other day and, like many of us lobbying for our areas, I have been in various meetings with Ministers over the past few weeks. The clear indication given is that if a proposal brings more housing, it is more likely that a Member’s constituency will get the bypass it needs or that its major road will be dualled, and so on. My point to the Minister is this. If he and his colleagues want extra housing to be accepted, greater density than might otherwise be achieved, a system that is against sprawl and in favour of the most efficient use of land, including brownfield, and if they want something that is more environmentally sustainable and green, rather than just greenwash, all of that, not just some of it, is made easier if we involve the community.

I talked to the Secretary of State earlier today. He mentioned a view that he believes may be held by some in the Treasury—it was not his view—that community housing may not represent good value for money. I will tell you what definitely does not represent value for money, Mr Deputy Speaker, and that is having a parcel of land handed from pillar to post, from one public sector body to another, sometimes for generations.

When he was Mayor of London, my right hon. Friend the Member for Uxbridge and South Ruislip (Boris Johnson) said, “Let’s cut this Gordian knot and make something happen.” The thing that happened was the scheme on the site of old St Clement’s Hospital in Mile End, which he had celebrated and opened as Mayor of London. It was the fact that it was community scheme that helped drive it forward. That is much better value for money. In an environment where we are talking about rewriting the Green Book in a more sensible way, we should be thinking much more laterally and broadly about how different approaches can deliver better, faster and greener outcomes that are in every sense better for the community, our nation and people, and also better value for money. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Devizes (Danny Kruger) for helping me raise that point.

As my hon. Friend alluded to, the Budget did not announce that the community housing fund will continue, although I am sure something will happen in due course. It is worth saying, for the benefit of the House, that the most common form of community-led housing, although it is not the only one, is via a community land trust, which is a legal entity that acquires land through purchase by the community, perhaps though a parish council, another local authority or a gift, and then oversees the development of affordable housing to buy or to rent. The housing remains affordable in perpetuity, while the land value is in effect removed from the equation because the land is held by the community land trust, which is a not-for-profit group that acts as the long-term steward.

Frankly, the community housing fund has been a tremendous success story for this Government. It was originally launched by George Osborne in his March 2016 Budget. The story of what happened next is important, particularly in terms of ensuring value for money. Over that summer, the community housing sector, led by the National Community Land Trust Network, worked up a detailed plan for how the money should be spent, although I regret to say that the Treasury initially decided, at the end of 2016, that the money should be handed to local authorities, which is in effect what happened—in two tranches totalling £148 million. This is a very important point to bear in mind if the Secretary of State or his ministerial colleagues want to discuss the question of value for money with the Treasury, because the Treasury may sometimes suggest that the community housing approach is not necessarily the best value-for-money approach. What actually happened was that the councils, having been given the money in a very non-ring-fenced way, spent it in the way that councils usually do. The Community Land Trust Network then did the obvious thing of talking to the councils about ensuring that the money was spent in the best possible way for community housing projects—and some of it was, which is good news, although, inevitably, not as much as might otherwise have been the case.

In November 2017, our right hon. Friend the present Business Secretary—who was in his place on the Front Bench not a few minutes ago—was Housing Minister, and he addressed the National Community Land Trust Network at its annual conference, announcing a rather more targeted scheme, and it is that scheme that has been such a huge success. In just 18 months, the pipeline in Homes England’s system has grown to more than 10,000 homes; that is actual projects that are good to go. Independent analysis by Sheffield Hallam University has found that 859 communities are bringing projects forward, and that the community housing fund has increased the potential pipeline from just under 6,000 homes—when I and some of my colleagues met the then Prime Minister my right hon. Friend the Member for Maidenhead (Mrs May) in 2017 to push the idea of announcing and getting on with the community housing fund—to over 23,000 homes today. That is staggering growth and it is down to the community housing fund.

The research estimates the total funding need for projects outside London over the next five years to be about £260 million. That includes £57 million of revenue funding and £172 million in capital funding via Homes England. The Government may ask why so much of the money that was available was underspent when the bids closed in December 2019. The answer is very simple: it was not open for long enough. Eighteen months is too short a time period, even for the very best of housing developers, and in many cases, community groups are, by definition, starting from scratch. They need longer to establish themselves and to develop projects using the revenue component of the fund. Since the fund opened in July 2018, Homes England has received 379 bids, and it is estimated that that would require double the revenue that was in the fund at the point of closure. It is absolutely clear that that part of the fund was a smash hit, but not enough projects, in 18 months, had reached the point where they could bid for the capital element. It makes sense to have a much longer, stable community housing fund over the life of a Parliament.

Communities in every corner of England are playing their part in tackling the housing crisis in this way. We heard the Secretary of State mention First Homes earlier today. Communities are pioneering First Homes. In Cornwall, a community land trust has built 252 homes over 10 years, sold at a discount to make them affordable to local people. Thanks to the community housing fund, there are now plans for another 209. Many colleagues have campaigned to make these schemes happen, including the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, my right hon. Friend the Member for Camborne and Redruth (George Eustice), and my hon. Friends the Members for North Cornwall (Scott Mann), for South East Cornwall (Mrs Murray), for St Austell and Newquay (Steve Double), for St Ives (Derek Thomas) and for Truro and Falmouth (Cherilyn Mackrory). Indeed, the predecessor of my hon. Friend the Member for Truro and Falmouth, Sarah Newton—whose loss to this House is much lamented by many—was one of the campaigners who originally suggested to George Osborne the idea of using the additional tax receipts from higher taxation of second homes to fund more community housing.

Communities are pioneering new approaches to affordability. In York, a group called YorSpace has planning permission to build 19 homes and a common house. It is developing a tenure called mutual home ownership, which lets members build up equity in their homes through monthly payments. It has raised £400,000 through a community share issue—local investment by local people—but it needs the community housing fund to provide capital grants.

Communities are building better and building beautiful. Some of us attended the launch of the Building Better, Building Beautiful Commission, chaired by the excellent Nicholas Boys Smith and the much lamented late Roger Scruton. Marmalade Lane and New Ground are two co-housing communities featured in the new “National Design Guide”, and both have won numerous awards. They were featured in the Building Better, Building Beautiful Commission’s report. Communities are pioneering new methods of construction. In Brighton, a self-build co-operative called Bunker is on site as we speak, building its first two homes for families on modest incomes. It is one of many community groups using off-site manufacturing and other construction innovations that the Government want to encourage.

I could go on—there are many other examples. I will give just one, in particular. Communities are working with landowners on projects that no one else would build. In Taunton, Somerset Co-op community land trust got started by converting a disused building into flats for young homeless people, and then went on to develop eight new affordable homes. It had been developing a bid with Homes England to take forward a new 30-home development in partnership with a local landowner, but the community housing fund closed just at the point when it was ready to apply.

The Minister may be familiar with the Oakfield scheme in Swindon, the headquarters of Nationwide Building Society. I recommend that he visit the scheme when he gets the chance. As he will be aware, Nationwide is a mutual building society, not a profit maximiser, and, like many building societies, it is going back to its roots in thinking about how it can do more to solve the housing crisis. This is an interesting scheme because although it is in some senses conventional—that is, it is not a community land trust scheme—Nationwide held a statutory consultation process where it really, seriously took account of what the community wanted for a development on a derelict brownfield site that no other house builder would touch. It now has a beautiful scheme coming forward that lots of local people are supporting. The total number of statutory objections it had in the consultation phase for the planning was zero.

I urge the Minister to reflect on the fact that one of the big problems that not just this Government but every Government have faced is getting people to accept the idea of more housing. I have been on platforms with people taking part in election debates with their political opponents where they have talked about extra housing being a sad price that has to be paid. We have somehow forgotten that the idea of development is cognate with developing—it is supposed to be a good word. We have managed to turn “development” into a bad word. The only way we turn it into a good word again, and therefore get it to be more widely welcomed, is to have good development. It is not an add-on. It is not a small piece on the side that we can perhaps think about at some point in the future if we have time—it is part of recasting how we do housing in this country.

We should not expect that people will get it right all the time. Upstairs a few moments ago, I was reading David Vise’s book about Google, where he talks about the fact that we treat Google a bit like a university. We try lots of stuff, and some of it is going to fail. I am not advocating failure—I am advocating success, but the way we get success is by experimentation and learning. By having lots of small, early cheap failures, we are more likely to have success. This applies across Government projects, but it is true in housing, as in many other areas. The great thing about housing is that we have learnt a great deal already, so there are fewer opportunities to make mistakes if we bother to learn those lessons and take more opportunities to get it right.

The housing White Paper, “Fixing our broken housing market”, of which I have a copy here, came out three years ago, in February 2017. It has been the Government’s view for three years that we have a broken housing market and that we need to fix it. We have had a lot of position papers, we have had every think-tank under the sun coming out with policy statements, and we have had some movement, but we have not had quick enough movement in changing the way in which we do things.

Yesterday, like my hon. Friend the Member for Devizes, I was very pleased, in supporting the Budget, to hear the Chancellor say that there was going to be £12.2 billion extra for affordable housing. I thought personally that the shadow Chancellor was a little churlish in calling it “only” £12.2 billion—I would say that it is quite a reasonable start.

The £12.2 billion that the Chancellor announced yesterday is a five-year programme. The community housing fund was originally slated as a £300 million programme over five years—£60 million per year. The point is that if all that money had been spent—and it has not been yet, for the reasons we have discussed—£300 million is still only 12.45% of the £12.2 billion that the Government are planning to spend on affordable housing. The central burden of “Fixing our broken housing market” is that just doing the same again and again will not solve the problem. We have to start doing things differently. We have to start thinking differently. Community housing, supported through the community housing fund, is a very important part of that.

I was addressing a community housing conference in Surrey only a few weeks ago. I like to refresh my presentation, so that I say things that are interesting to me each time, and there is a chance they might be interesting to the audience. I put up a slide that talked about the well-known national organisation Grandmothers Against All Development, with a question mark after it. The audience looked rather blank, and I said, “I made that up actually.” I have yet to meet—and I do not think I ever will—the grandmother whose daughter has just had her second baby and wants her daughter’s family not to have somewhere decent to live. All we have to do is bottle that thought and create the wiring under the bonnet to turn it into reality, and we have gone a long way to solving the problem.

The central problem we face with housing is that most people feel that they have no voice. Most people feel that they have no say over what gets built, where it gets built, what it looks like or how it performs in terms of thermal performance. If the Minister really wants green housing, the best thing he can do is involve local people, because I have yet to meet the person who would not prefer to have a house that costs nothing to heat. We have known for many years how to build a house that costs basically nothing to heat—£100 to £150 a year for heat and hot water—and yet we do not routinely do it.

I heard the Secretary of State say in a statement a few weeks ago that the volume house builders would have to ensure they met the quality standards, otherwise they would no longer be eligible for Help to Buy. I found myself thinking: if they did not meet those standards, how can they have been eligible for all these years, basically producing small, expensive, poor-quality, environmentally-unfriendly dwellings that most people would prefer not to buy?

Believe it or not—I can demonstrate it with evidence, which I am happy to share with the Minister—there are more people in this country who want to build their own homes than people who want to buy new ones. Only 33% of people in this country would prefer to buy a new home. Two thirds of people would prefer not to, and 61% of people in this country would like at some point the chance to build their own home. We have to take the energy that is there and turn it into something real, and we need radical changes in how we do things to make that happen.

Rod Hackney, who was the adviser to the Prince of Wales and is a renowned architect, once said:

“It is a dangerous thing to underestimate human potential and the energy which can be generated when people are given the opportunity to help themselves.”

That is what we have to make happen.

--- Later in debate ---

[Christopher Pincher]

My right hon. Friend is an aficionado of beauty. I know he served with distinction on the Building Better, Building Beautiful Commission, and we look forward to bringing forward many of that commission’s proposals.

As I was saying, we recognise that community-led housing offers a wide range of benefits beyond just meeting housing needs. It supports the SME sector, as my hon. Friend the Member for South Norfolk made clear, and it helps drive up standards of design and energy efficiency, as my right hon. Friend the Member for South Holland and The Deepings (Sir John Hayes) mentioned. It sets a benchmark for high-quality new housing that enhances the built environment and creates a strong sense of place. It embraces modern methods of construction, and it helps sustain local communities and local economies, allowing young people to stay in the areas in which they grew up.

The Government recognise that there is huge potential for growth in community-led housing here in the United Kingdom. That is why we announced the community housing fund, making £60 million per annum available over four years to kickstart and drive the growth of the sector. In 2018, a dedicated grant-funding programme was launched by Homes England, the Government’s housing delivery agency. We have also made available £38 million to the Greater London Authority to support the sector in London. Capital grants have been available to schemes that have reached the point where they can start building.

This growth has been particularly rapid since the community housing fund delivery programme was launched in 2018, with 135 CLTs either being formed or becoming legally incorporated. We have provided a £6 million grant to Community Led Homes, a consortium of the leading stakeholders, to train an England-wide team of advisers who can help guide community groups through the often daunting and complicated process of taking a house building project forward. The advisers will help build and facilitate the market for community-led housing in the years to come.

As my hon. Friend has said, the Homes England programme was closed to new applicants towards the end of last year. That is because, as for most Government programmes, funding for the community housing fund is not available to the Department beyond the end of the current financial year, although different constraints apply to the GLA, where the funding remains available until 2022-23. I completely understand his frustrations, and let me say to him that I am very sympathetic to the points he has made. I look forward to having further conversations with my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State and my right hon. Friend the Chancellor of the Exchequer as we approach the conclusion of the main estimates and, beyond that and for future years, the comprehensive spending review.

[Mr Richard Bacon]

I fully understand the need for the Government to respect the CSR process. Does the Minister think there is an opportunity to provide limited bridge funding, as it were, just for the sake of continuity, between now and July, when the CSR takes effect, so that many of the schemes that are just on the wrong side of the line do not collapse and the enthusiasm does not evaporate?