Affordable Housing: London

Debate between Barry Gardiner and Eilidh Whiteford

Tuesday 14th June 2016 Westminster Hall

[Dr Eilidh Whiteford (Banff and Buchan) (SNP)]

It is a pleasure to follow such a comprehensive commentary on London housing policy. The critique from the hon. Member for Westminster North (Ms Buck) was well put together.

The long-term failure of successive Governments to address the underlying problems in the housing market is undoubtedly more evident in London than elsewhere in the UK. I agree with Members that certain aspects are unique to London, but for the most part this city is just the epicentre of problems affecting the whole UK to a greater or lesser extent. The crisis here in London reverberates to the other nations and regions of the UK.

I warmly congratulate the hon. Member for Brentford and Isleworth (Ruth Cadbury) on securing this debate on a set of issues that have an acute impact on her constituents. I assure her that there is a shared interest in addressing the problems in London, because they affect all of us. Every time the Library updates its briefings on London’s housing crisis, the statistics get more and more shocking. It is clear from today’s debate that the key structural issues are not new. There is a chronic under-supply of new homes, an absolute shortage of property in London and—just as problematic—an ever widening gulf between earnings and house prices, which is the affordability problem that has been the focus this morning. Add to the mix a private rental sector that is out of control and we have a recipe for the housing crisis currently faced by the people who live and work in this city.

Like other MPs whose constituencies are many miles from here, I am not a disinterested observer. I have to live in London for more than half the week during parliamentary Sessions, so I have first-hand experience of London’s housing and rental market, although I am aware that MPs have a much easier time than most prospective tenants. I have repeatedly seen the problems faced by staff members and others who live here permanently, and I recognise the issues that colleagues have highlighted today that affect their constituents. Those issues all relate to affordability. They include short-term and insecure lets, but also landlords who do not fix things, deposits that do not get returned for months after a tenancy ends, if at all—in spite of the deposit protection scheme that is supposed to stop that—people having to sleep on their friends’ sofas and floors and, above all, soaring rents. Every year, or every time a rent has to be renegotiated, the rent goes up.

Of course wages—certainly those in the public sector—have stayed static for some years now, and in many cases they have fallen in real terms. There is an ever greater squeeze on the incomes of tenants, who are left in a difficult position, having to work out whether the costs and hassles of moving and the extra commuting costs outweigh the disadvantages of staying put. That causes people enormous stress, upheaval and insecurity and it destabilises communities. As other Members have mentioned, it puts untold pressures on families with children. We have not got anywhere near measuring the cost of uprooting children in terms of their future prospects.

It goes without saying that many private sector tenants have no medium-term prospect of their owning a home anywhere near where they work, and even having a stable home is challenging for them. Even people in London with well-paid jobs—those with well above average wages and, as we have heard today, some of the City’s highest-paid professionals—find themselves in the invidious position of spending so much of their take-home pay on exorbitant private sector rents that saving for a deposit at the level now required is all but impossible. People have to eat, too. The cost of living is already high in this city, regardless of housing costs.

If the average home in London now costs more than half a million pounds—16 times the average London salary—what hope is there for young people trying to get on the housing ladder, many of whom are already carrying a mortgage in student debt? In what universe is that achievable or even desirable? Who wants to be saddled with a debt of that level in the current climate of economic uncertainty? Every time the Chancellor stands up in the Chamber, he talks about bringing down the debt. I am not the first to observe that meeting his own debt reduction targets is something that he has conspicuously failed to do. The levels of personal debt that individuals now need to carry in order to own a home or even buy a starter home, not only in London but in other hotspot areas too, are frankly crippling and completely unsustainable.

The Government’s obsession with home ownership is undermining the affordable rented sector, where, in my view, there is tremendous progress to be made in London for anyone willing to make the tough policy decisions. Points were well made earlier by the hon. Members for Hackney South and Shoreditch (Meg Hillier) and for Hammersmith (Andy Slaughter) about the use of public land and the need to measure the outcomes of house building programmes.

In the 2015 Queen’s Speech, the Government confirmed that they plan to force councils to sell off their low-rent homes in high-value areas, mostly as a means of financing the extension of the right to buy to housing association tenants, and—in theory at least—to incentivise councils to build more homes. However, doing that will not achieve either of those things. Its main outcome will simply be to reduce the number of homes for social rent in areas where low-cost housing is most needed and to force those on lower and average incomes to move further away from the communities where they live and work.

We have seen in the past that selling off social housing stock cheaply has long-term adverse consequences. The big sell-off in the ’80s and ’90s meant that councils all but stopped building new homes. It made no sense whatsoever to use public money to build new homes and then practically give them away. It has meant that now, right across the UK, there is a chronic shortage of homes for social rent for those on low incomes—those in low-paid jobs, those on zero-hours contracts and those whose ability to work is impaired by health problems. Some of those people will never be eligible for mortgages and will always need affordable homes to rent.

One of the great ironies is that, 20 to 30 years on, many of the same properties that were bought by tenants are once again properties for rent, but this time in the private sector, being let for market-level rents, often to people who would be eligible for social housing, if any was available. As a consequence, we have seen soaring costs for local housing allowance and its predecessor benefit over the last two decades, disproportionately concentrated in London and the south-east, driven by a private rental market that is simply out of control.

As numerous Members have pointed out, the people who have been most badly let down by all this are the younger generation. Even those with good jobs, who have worked hard for qualifications, have no realistic prospect of buying a home in which they can raise a family. We see adults living with their parents, not just through their 20s but well into their mid-30s, desperately trying to save. We see young couples moving so far out of London in order to put a roof over their children’s heads that they severely compromise their family life by enduring hours of commuting each day.

[Barry Gardiner]

I am delighted that the hon. Lady has talked about the plight of young people in London, but does she realise that this is not just about young people? A constituent who had been living in the same property for 14 years came to me recently, having received a section 21 notice. At the age of 72, he and his disabled wife have not been accepted by the council and are sofa-surfing with friends who live in my constituency. It is not just young people but the elderly who are suffering because they are not accepted as priority-need homeless.

[Dr Whiteford]

The hon. Gentleman makes a very important point. Frankly, what people are being put through in this day and age is quite disgusting.

The situation we have created is not good for people, for families, for people’s employers or for communities. It is not good for anyone and is completely unsustainable. The UK Government’s current direction of travel risks compounding the mistakes of the past, fuelling house price and rent increases, and failing to deal with the underlying lack of supply on anything like the scale required. All the fancy help-to-buy schemes in the world will only fuel personal debt, drive house prices higher and continue to inflate rents unless we actually build more homes to meet demand and take action to ensure that we have an affordable housing stock for people on normal salaries.

Common Fisheries Policy

Debate between Barry Gardiner and Eilidh Whiteford

Thursday 15th March 2012 Commons Chamber

[Dr Whiteford]

The hon. Gentleman makes a valid point about what is happening in his constituency, and clearly there are similar stories all along our coastline. That is a prime illustration of the fact that—as I think Members in all parts of the House agree—the present system does not work, and is not fit for purpose.

A deep-seated and long-standing problem is the issue of compliance across the European Union. It is very frustrating for our fishermen to see the rules applied so inconsistently. The fact that quota restrictions are being flouted with impunity in other parts of the EU not only causes great resentment, but undermines confidence in the system and people’s sense of ownership of the system of fisheries management. We know from the experience of recent years that conservation measures that have been developed in co-operation with the fishermen have been the most effective in conserving fish stocks. The current problems are symptomatic of a top-down CFP, and of that lack of a sense of ownership.

[Barry Gardiner (Brent North) (Lab)]

Having pointed the finger elsewhere in Europe, would the hon. Lady care to comment on a recent case in the United Kingdom—indeed, in Scotland? There was a parallel landing industry, and the Government were taking levies from it.

[Dr Whiteford]

I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for giving me the opportunity to take up the comments made by the hon. Member for Aberdeen North (Mr Doran). I know that the hon. Member for Brent North (Barry Gardiner) was not present to hear that speech, but it dealt extensively with such problems.

Obviously I cannot discuss the situation while criminal proceedings are taking place, but the fact that the police launched such a successful investigation into the criminality that was taking place has taught us the lesson that we cannot take our eye off the ball in terms of our own compliance. However, we must ensure that criminality is not also symptomatic of people’s loss of confidence in the system. We should bear in mind that otherwise law-abiding people resort to it because they do not believe that the system is working.

I was glad that the hon. Member for Thirsk and Malton referred to aquaculture. Because of the crisis in the sea fisheries sector, it is often not given the attention that it deserves. I am concerned about by the Commission’s proposal for multiannual national strategic plans, and, buried in there somewhere, the rather bizarre suggestion that there should be a regional advisory council for aquaculture.

I believe that Scotland is the largest producer of Atlantic salmon in the EU, and the third largest producer in the world. In 2010 we produced 154,000 tonnes of salmon, worth more than half a billion pounds at farm gate prices, which represents more than a third of Scotland’s food exports. We also export substantial amounts of shellfish including mussels, oysters and scallops, and other species such as trout and halibut. The rapid growth of the sector at a time when the rest of the economy has been stagnant has been very encouraging. It is a success story for job creation and for economic growth, including growth in remote rural communities that do not have much else going for them. I see no benefit whatsoever in imposing a new layer of European regulation and bureaucracy on that sector, and I expect a great many risks to be posed to it if we go down that road.

I have a particular constituency interest. Although Banff and Buchan is often thought of as being at the heart of the fishing industry, it is also a major centre for fish processing. The factories in the north-east process large amounts of farmed fish, and at a time when the sea fisheries are so unstable and uncertain and can fluctuate so much, the farmed fish sector has a hugely stabilising effect on the viability of the processing sector. An increase in political interference in the aquaculture sector from Brussels—or from anywhere else—would not be in anyone’s interests. We must not try to mend successful businesses that are not broken.

There is no consensus across the UK about transferable quotas—or individual transferable concessions as they are now being called. I welcome the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee’s remarks about the problems the ITCs cause for the under-10 metre fleet. Those problems are not confined to that fleet, however. Other communities will also be affected, including some in my constituency.

The real issue is that most of the fishing industry in Scotland still involves family-owned vessels that maintain a strong link to a local port. They are at the heart of communities, and I do not want those communities to be bought out by large multinational fishing conglomerates.

Common Agricultural Policy

Debate between Barry Gardiner and Eilidh Whiteford

Thursday 8th March 2012 Westminster Hall

[Dr Whiteford]

Absolutely. That has been an historic problem, and this is an opportunity to address it. The Commission’s proposals to support young farmers are probably a step in the right direction. It has been very difficult in recent decades, as the hon. Gentleman is aware, for new entrants to get a start in farming unless they inherit a family business. I am concerned that the proposed scheme will apply only to those who are already entitled to basic payments. That will not help new entrants aged over 40, or those who enter farming after 2014.

I should like the scheme to be open to all genuine new entrants to farming. I should also like member states to have the option to implement that policy, so that it can be tailored as necessary to address the real issues that we face. Likewise, a simplified scheme for small farmers could be a useful step in Scotland, where 13% of pillar one support is for less than €1,000. Crofters would be prime beneficiaries of such a move, and I hope that we will find a suitable way forward on that proposal.

[Barry Gardiner]

I agree with the hon. Lady on the importance of local understanding in the distribution of funds; they should be managed locally. However, has she considered that perhaps in other parts of the EU—not within the UK—there might be countries that could abuse or rig such a system to ensure more finances for their own farmers? That would not be good for farming in general or for the CAP’s objectives as a whole. Indeed, it would not be good for the environment.

[Dr Whiteford]

The hon. Gentleman makes a valid point, which touches on one of the key struggles that I mentioned at the outset: the problem of regulation and bureaucracy. We need to strike a balance between bureaucracy and regulation, with all the problems of compliance in recent times, and have an effective and workable system. There is no easy solution. Nevertheless, those who comply with the system should not be the ones who are punished by it. I have lost count of the number of farmers in my constituency who have complained about the amount of paperwork that they have to deal with to access CAP funding. Even though that burden of regulation has eased a little in the past few years, the single, biggest complaint that I hear from local farmers is about the very stringent and absolutely bureaucratic compliance rules.

The financial penalties for even a minor infringement or an administrative error can run into thousands of pounds, which is out of all proportion to the seriousness of the infringement. I have raised that with the Minister on more than one occasion, and he is well aware of farmers’ concerns. What prospects are there in this CAP reform round of addressing that serious issue, which has caused more problems than any other?

I hope that the Minister will respond to those concerns and to those that, I am sure, other Members will raise. There is a future for farming. It supports nearly 500,000 jobs in Scotland, either directly through agriculture or indirectly through the food and drink supply chain. Farming is a critical part of our economy and our culture, and the money that we invest in it is repaid many times over through the management of our rural communities.