Housing (Built Environment Committee Report)

Baroness Wilcox of Newport Excerpts

Tuesday 8th November 2022 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Wilcox of Newport (Lab)]

My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Moylan, for his detailed introduction of this important report; I also thank the members and former chair of the committee.

What was discovered? A UK housing market in which

“too many people are living in expensive, unsuitable, poor quality homes.”

To meet future housing demand, the report’s recommendations focused on seven areas, many of which have been mentioned time and again in this House in various debates. Planning reform, social housing provision and skills shortages were all deemed failures over the past 12 years of Tory Governments, whoever was in charge.

Government choices over those 12 years have broken our housing system, allowing developers to maximise profits, as noted by the previous speaker, and build housing for investment rather than good-quality, safe, secure and affordable homes. They have broken the link between work and affordable, secure housing for many renters and first-time buyers. The Government built only 5,955 social rent homes in 2020—a 12% decrease on the previous year and an 85% decrease from 11 years ago.

The scale of the housing crisis means that we need a bold new approach that underlines the importance of housing as a human right and the bedrock of stable, secure family life, giving people a stake in their communities and societies and supporting opportunity and aspiration. Indeed, that is the first layer of Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. Labour reforms would allow communities to build the right homes in the right places and at prices that local people can afford. We would rebalance power between developers and communities by reforming arcane purchasing powers to stop speculators reaping all the rewards and closing the loopholes that developers use to wriggle out of affordable housing commitments. We would ensure that local councils have stronger powers to deliver the affordable housing that their communities need, not the housing that will make the most profit for developers.

Labour would give first-time buyers first chances on new homes and stop foreign buyers buying up homes off plan, before local people can get a look-in. We would set out an ambition to re-establish the link between genuinely affordable housing and average earnings, bringing affordable rents and the dream of homeownership closer for those locked out of the system today.

There are nearly 1 million more people in the private rental sector than there were when the Government came to power in 2010. Too many people are stuck in a system with no power to challenge rogue landlords, no savings to get on the housing ladder and housing that falls below acceptable standards. All those renters need a deal that gives them the security and dignity they deserve. Some 800,000 fewer households of people under the age of 45 now own their home.

The Government’s current proposal to extend the right to buy will only worsen the chronic shortage of affordable homes; it does nothing to fix the lack of social housing and is totally lacking in ambition for millions stranded in the private rental sector. In England, 190,000 homes have been lost since the Tories came to power in 2010. That number is equivalent to all the homes in Bristol. Ministers have failed to deliver the promised replacement for homes sold through right to buy. Less than 5% of the stock has been replaced. Now, for the third time in seven years, Ministers are promising expansion of right to buy into housing associations, with no plan to increase the number of new social homes or genuinely affordable homes to buy. This will lead only to more people unable to secure a home.

One major reform in the Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill relates to scrapping Section 106 agreements, which have been talked about several times this evening, and replacing them with a new national infrastructure levy. I assure noble Lords that, during my tenure as leader of Newport City Council—I am sure the Minister also experienced this when she was a council leader—every negotiation on a Section 106 agreement was hard-fought, as developers employed expensive legal experts to deviate from these agreements wherever they can. Doing away with Section 106 would be completely disastrous to ensuring that developers deliver a proportion of affordable and social housing within new developments, because the proposed levy would replace this delivery mechanism, with revenues going to local authorities to build infrastructure as well as housing. Local authorities would therefore take both the financial risk and responsibility. In the current financial and political climate, that is another unaffordable option for local government.

But Labour has a plan. We will build more affordable houses, linking the definition of affordable to local wages for the first time. We will build more social homes and give first-time buyers first chances. We are going to rebuild our social housing stock and bring homes back into the ownership of local councils and communities, with home ownership opened up to millions more. We will tilt the balance of power back to private renters through a powerful new renters’ charter and a new decent homes standard, written into law. The charter will have far-reaching consequences for those in rented accommodation, including by ending Section 21 evictions, reducing eviction powers for landlords whose tenants are in arrears, introducing four-month notice periods, creating a national register of landlords and initiating a legally binding decent homes standard in the private rental sector.

We will close the loopholes developers exploit to avoid building more affordable housing and put an end to the outrageous practice of foreign buyers purchasing swathes of new housing developments off plan, before local people can even see them. We have an ambition to re-establish the link between genuinely affordable housing and average earnings, bringing affordable rents and home ownership closer for those locked out of the system.

I conclude by asking the Minister the following questions, some of which my noble friend Lord Grocott and others addressed earlier. While building more homes is essential to address the housing crisis, supply alone will not fix the affordability crisis, which is as much a part of the housing crisis as pure numbers. Last year, there were fewer than 7,000 social homes built in England. What plans do the Government have to increase social housebuilding? What does the Minister believe is an acceptable number of social homes to build each year, and will the Social Housing (Regulation) Bill deliver this?