Finance Bill

Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle Excerpts

2nd reading & Committee negatived & 3rd reading & 2nd reading (Hansard) & 2nd reading (Hansard): House of Lords & 3rd reading (Hansard) & 3rd reading (Hansard): House of Lords & Committee negatived (Hansard) & Committee negatived (Hansard): House of Lords
Friday 17th July 2020 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP) [V]]

My Lords, many noble Lords have expressed concerns about the impact of the stamp duty holiday. I believe that I have correspondence from the same private renter as the noble Baroness, Lady Andrews—a man about to be turfed out of his home because the landlord wants to cash in. Why are the Government encouraging instability when, as the noble Baroness, Lady Watkins of Tavistock, said, what people need now is stability, security and certainty?

As the noble Lord, Lord Wood of Anfield, said, it is a huge bonus for London and the south-east—the last region in need of subsidy. As the noble Baroness, Lady Wheatcroft, said, it is slightly weird that second-home buyers will benefit. I would put it more strongly than that: it is a disgrace when we know that there is rising inequality. The young and the lower paid have suffered most in the lockdown. They are not thinking about buying second homes because they are struggling to pay the rent.

Behind this is the long-term dependence of the UK economy on house prices and treating houses as primarily a financial asset rather than a secure, genuinely affordable place for people to live. Money from bank loans has gone into pumping up property prices rather than into productive investments in making goods and providing services. Trying to kick-start the economy by more of the same is not building back better.

Many noble Lords who might be said to come from the right of the House have called on the Government to drop essential anti-Covid health measures, to pack the trains and fill the city centres again. But they are ignoring the fact that this is not within the Government’s control. People will leave home, travel on public transport and travel internationally only when they feel safe, so many measures outside the realm of finance are crucial. Also, many people have come to recognise that it is perfect possible to do their work from home. It means a chance to eat dinner with their children, read them a bedtime story or take an evening stroll around their neighbourhoods. Companies can see the huge savings in rent, gains in productivity and improvements in the health and well-being of their workers. We shall not go back to the world of December 2019.

There are many good things about that. We have, on average, twice the commuting time of the rest of Europe, the second-longest working hours and, relatedly, the highest rates of family breakdown and epidemic levels of mental ill-health. The ideal is a 15-minute community—everything you need for daily life within a 15-minute walk of your home. The just re-elected Mayor of Paris set out that vision and it is something we need to adopt in the UK, as my colleague Caroline Russell has been saying on the London Assembly. That is how the world is going: we should not be left behind. When the Government talk about levelling up, strong local economies, where money circulates in a rich ecosystem of small independent businesses, are a great way to ensure prosperity for every community in the land.

But as the noble Lord, Lord Cormack, said, we face the greatest crisis for three centuries. More than that, we have a climate emergency. Behind Covid comes the climate emergency. My noble friend Lady Jones of Moulsecoomb set out what we should be doing for that. Why are we still supporting things such as road building, HS2 and airport expansion, which are taking us in entirely the wrong direction?