Asked by: Alberto Costa (Conservative - South Leicestershire)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, whether she has made an assessment of the potential merits of making water companies statutory consultees in planning applications.
Answered by Matthew Pennycook - Minister of State (Housing, Communities and Local Government)
The government encourage water companies and other infrastructure providers to work proactively with local planning authorities to identify where supporting infrastructure will be required to meet the demands of new development.
On 23 October, the government announced an independent commission to review the water sector regulatory system and make recommendations to reform the water sector regulatory framework in England and Wales. The review is expected to report next year, and we will carefully consider its findings.
Asked by: Alberto Costa (Conservative - South Leicestershire)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, what steps his Department are taking to support local authorities with tackling homelessness.
Answered by Felicity Buchan
I refer my Hon. Friend to the answer I gave to Question UIN 158774 on 9 March 2023.
The Government is spending £2 billion to tackle homelessness and rough sleeping over the next three years and the vast majority of this funding is being provided to local authorities.
This includes £366 million in funding in 2022/23 through the Homelessness Prevention Grant to help local authorities prevent homelessness and provide temporary accommodation.
Asked by: Alberto Costa (Conservative - South Leicestershire)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, whether his Department has taken steps to help increase the diversity of local high streets to encourage more people to shop locally.
Answered by Dehenna Davison
This Government is fully committed to supporting our town centres and high streets to adapt and evolve. We are enabling places to transform their high streets and town centres into thriving commercial, social and cultural hubs. We also strongly support people shopping locally.
To do so, we have reformed the use classes order to enable more flexible use of existing buildings. The use class reform creates a new 'commercial, business and service' use class which encompasses a wide range of uses which attract people to high streets and town centres. This includes offices and other business uses, shops, cafes, gyms and other uses for visiting members of the public which are suitable in a high street. Premises can move between such uses without the need for a planning application. This builds on longer-term structural interventions and funding by Government to support high streets and town centres, including the £3.6bn Towns Fund, £4.8bn Levelling Up Fund and the work of the High Street Task Force which has now supported around 115 local authorities in areas such as placemaking, planning and design.
My Rt. Hon. Friend the Secretary of State was pleased to visit the New Lubbesthorpe community on 24 February 2023 and to see first-hand how such long-term structural interventions can benefit communities.
Asked by: Alberto Costa (Conservative - South Leicestershire)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, what steps his Department is taking to help ensure that (a) local councils and (b) housing associations develop plans for more Rural Exception Sites.
Answered by Rachel Maclean
The National Planning Policy Framework already makes clear that planning policies and decisions should be responsive to local circumstances in rural areas. Our Rural Exception Sites policy allows for the development of small affordable housing sites in rural areas, with the majority of housing on these sites being available to local people in perpetuity, and we published planning practice guidance in 2020 to help local authorities and developers bring more of these sites forward.
Our proposals for the National Planning Policy Framework launched for consultation on 22 December 2022 and we would encourage engagement with the consultation. As part of this consultation we are seeking views on how we can strengthen the role of community groups in delivering affordable housing, particularly in rural areas.
Asked by: Alberto Costa (Conservative - South Leicestershire)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, what assessment he has made of the potential merits of taking steps to ensure social housing providers adopt priority registers that ensure the most vulnerable people are prioritised when raising housing concerns.
Answered by Dehenna Davison
Local authorities have the freedom to tailor their allocation priorities to meet the needs of their local communities, including the most vulnerable people. In framing their social housing allocation scheme, they must ensure that reasonable preference (priority) is given to people who are homeless, in overcrowded housing or who need to move for medical or welfare reasons. This is to ensure that the priority for social housing goes to those who need it most.
Furthermore, as outlined in separate allocations guidance, local authorities have the power to frame their allocation scheme to give additional preference to particular descriptions of people who fall within the statutory reasonable preference categories and have urgent housing needs.
Asked by: Alberto Costa (Conservative - South Leicestershire)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, whether his Department plans to enact the recommendation from the Law Commission's report on Leasehold Enfranchisement that the remit of the Leasehold Tribunal should be expanded to cover issues in respect of leaseholder's concerns that are not currently able to heard by that tribunal.
Answered by Eddie Hughes
The Government recognises the importance of promoting better access to redress and dispute resolution for leaseholders. It is working through the Law Commission's recommendations to reform enfranchisement, including those that reform how disputes are resolved, and we will respond in due course.
Asked by: Alberto Costa (Conservative - South Leicestershire)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, what assessment his Department has made of the potential merits of allowing parish council meetings to be conducted virtually during the ongoing covid-19 outbreak.
Answered by Kemi Badenoch - Leader of HM Official Opposition
We launched a call for evidence on 25 March to gather views and inform a longer-term decision about whether to make express provision for councils to meet remotely on a permanent basis. The call for evidence closed on 17 June.
The Department has considered the responses to the consultation and the Government will respond shortly.
Asked by: Alberto Costa (Conservative - South Leicestershire)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, what assessment he has made of the potential merits of including the construction of low-level tree houses within permitted development rights.
Answered by Christopher Pincher
In determining whether planning permission would be required for a particular treehouse the first consideration for the local planning authority would be to determine whether it constituted ‘development’ as defined under the 1990 Town and Country Planning Act. If the proposed treehouse did not constitute such development, no planning permission would be required.
The householder permitted development rights enable homeowners to extend their homes and erect outbuildings without the need to apply for specific planning permission. To protect the privacy of neighbours the rights do not enable the construction of verandas, balconies or raised platforms over 0.3 metres without planning permission.
Asked by: Alberto Costa (Conservative - South Leicestershire)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, what steps his Department is taking to tackle the increase in hate crimes committed against people of the Jewish faith.
Answered by Kemi Badenoch - Leader of HM Official Opposition
Antisemitism has absolutely no place in our society, which is why we are taking a strong lead in tackling it in all its forms. We are clear that victims should be supported and the individuals who carry out these heinous attacks must be brought to justice. The Government is providing £14 million this year for the Protective Security Grant to protect Jewish schools and community buildings and we have encouraged the adoption of the IHRA definition of antisemitism across universities and local authorities.
Asked by: Alberto Costa (Conservative - South Leicestershire)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, what recent assessment his Department has made of the potential merits of requiring new commercial warehousing to be fitted with solar panels.
Answered by Luke Hall
Mandating a particular renewable technology, such as solar panels, may not be appropriate for all commercial warehousing in all areas. This for reasons such as building orientation and other reasons such as structural strength of the roof. National planning policy encourages the use of renewables without requiring any particular technology. In the case of the Building Regulations, the Government sets minimum energy performance standards for non-domestic buildings and new homes. These are expressed in performance terms and do not prescribe the technologies, materials or fuels to be used This allows builders and warehouse owners the flexibility to innovate and select the most practical and cost-effective solutions appropriate in a development. A new permitted development right was introduced in April 2015 to encourage solar panel take-up on non-domestic buildings. This right allows solar PV developments of up to 1 megawatt. This replaces a previous right and provides for a 20-fold increase in the amount of solar technology that can go onto the roofs of buildings such as warehouses without having to submit a full planning application, subject to strict safeguards to protect local amenity.