Oral Answers to Questions

Debate between Alan Whitehead and Danny Alexander

Tuesday 14th May 2013 Commons Chamber

[Dr Alan Whitehead (Southampton, Test) (Lab)]

Q11. What discussions he has had with the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government on fiscal incentives for the construction of affordable housing.

[The Chief Secretary to the Treasury (Danny Alexander)]

The Government are committed to supporting new housing supply while maximising value for money. The Government committed £4.5 billion to support 170,000 affordable homes over the spending review period, and we have added a further 30,000 to that figure through the guarantee programme that was announced last year and extended in the Budget a few weeks ago.

[Danny Alexander]

The hon. Gentleman should recognise that—while the previous Government presided over a decline of more than 400,000 in the number of affordable properties—the Government’s action to increase the numbers by 200,000 is a welcome support to the construction sector, as is the Help to Buy scheme that we announced in the Budget, which will produce a significant additional demand for properties to help the companies to which he refers.

[Dr Whitehead]

Does the Minister not recognise that the Help to Buy scheme will not produce a single new affordable home? It will simply enable people to buy other people’s homes. In my constituency, it costs eight times the average annual income to purchase a house in the city, so does the Minister not accept that action to improve affordable house building should have been taken in the Budget?

[Danny Alexander]

The Help to Buy shared equity scheme is available for the purchase of new build properties only. It is a multi-billion pound scheme that will help to fund an extra 75,000 or so construction sites in the next couple of years—a welcome boost to the construction sector. In the Budget, we announced funding to extend the guarantee scheme for housing associations to build new affordable properties, doubling its extent to ensure that 30,000 affordable homes are built over and above the 170,000 already announced. The hon. Gentleman is a close observer of these matters, and it will not have escaped his attention that the net number of affordable homes during Labour’s time in office fell by 421,000. That is not a record for him to be proud of.

Finance (No. 3) Bill

Debate between Alan Whitehead and Danny Alexander

Tuesday 26th April 2011 Commons Chamber

[Danny Alexander]

I understand the concern, and I know that it has been expressed by a number of lobby groups, although I have to say that I think it has been grossly exaggerated. The purpose of the carbon price floor is to ensure a stronger, and strengthening, market over future years for investment in low-carbon energy. It will deliver a genuine incentive for green and renewable energies to be developed and invested in. Meeting the carbon reduction targets, which I think all Members support, will require several tens, or even hundreds, of billions of pounds of new investment in renewable and other energy sources, and I think that introducing a carbon price floor is exactly the right mechanism to achieve that.

[Dr Alan Whitehead (Southampton, Test) (Lab)]

Does the right hon. Gentleman not accept that raising the carbon price floor initially to such a level above the EU emissions trading scheme will not actually reduce emissions across Europe because they are fixed on a European basis, will risk investment moving to the other end of the interconnectors, and will move us substantially away from consultation on the issue of £1 above EU ETS, which I think most people would have accepted as a starting point for a longer-term carbon price floor to move towards the 2030s? Does he accept that he has got that price floor wrong, and that he needs to review it so as to make it actually work by genuinely increasing investment and reducing emissions?

[Danny Alexander]

No, I do not accept that we have got this wrong; I think we have got it right. The level of the carbon price floor was set out in the consultation. A range of options were given, and we have taken a mid-point of the various responses we received. I think it is right that this country is the first country to introduce a carbon price floor. That is a very important mechanism to help us deliver on the low-carbon power generation to which I thought those on the hon. Gentleman’s side of the House were as committed as we are on this side. Of course this will have an impact; it is designed to have an impact. It is designed to have the impact of ensuring that companies and industries seeking to invest in low-carbon power generation have a clear sense of certainty about the price they will receive for that energy over future years. As a result of that, our country can ensure that we deliver on our targets for renewable energy and carbon emissions reduction, which are, I hope, very important to every Member of this House.