Local Housing Allowance: Freeze

Baroness Stedman-Scott Excerpts

Wednesday 4th November 2026 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Sherlock (Lab)]

We will continue to keep the rate of the local housing allowance under review. To give the House a sense of the cost involved, in April 2024 there was a one-year increase in the local housing allowance; that cost an extra £1.2 billion in 2024–25. Over five years, that one rise will cost over £7 billion. I am extremely sensitive to the points being raised. The Government are investing money through a long-term crisis and resilience fund and through local discretionary support to help meet the shortfalls. But in the end, the Government’s priority is to tackle emergency problems in the short term, tackle emergency accommodation, tackle temporary accommodation, invest extensively in tackling homelessness, and provide extra support while the market is sorted.

[Baroness Stedman-Scott (Con)]

My Lords, if increasing supply is the sustainable way to make housing more affordable, do the Government accept the OBR’s forecast that 190,000 fewer additional homes will be delivered over the forecast period, which will mean higher housing costs as a direct result of this Government’s failed housing policy?

[Baroness Sherlock (Lab)]

My Lords, I am not sure that, if I were on the Benches opposite, I would be talking too much about a failure to build houses over a long period. Since we are on the subject, this Government are providing an extra £1.5 billion to provide 10,000 homes in England for social rent now. We also have a target to build 1.5 million new homes—we know that that is stretching. Our latest statistics suggest that we built 437,900 net additional homes from the start of this Parliament through to 20 September this year. It will take time for the impact of our planning reforms to flow through to the published data, and we know this is a difficult environment; the geopolitical context is not easy. We know it will be challenging and that it will take time to turn the tide and deliver more homes. We expect housebuilding to ramp up further in the later years of this Parliament, but I urge the whole House to get behind an ambitious target. We need Government after Government to keep doing this. This Government are determined to do it.