Brandon Lewis
Main Page: Brandon Lewis (Conservative - Great Yarmouth)
Clive Efford (Eltham) (Lab)
3. What assessment he has made of trends in the number of affordable homes available to buy since 2010.
The Minister for Housing and Planning (Brandon Lewis)
I am pleased that we were able to finish the last Parliament with more affordable housing than we started with. We were one of the first Governments in a generation to do that. We actually delivered beyond our target to deliver 276,000 affordable homes, of which 80,000 were for shared ownership.
Clive Efford
Is the Minister aware that home ownership among people under the age of 35 is down by more than a fifth—by 21%? What will a redefinition of affordable housing to homes under £450,000 do to address that problem?
Brandon Lewis
If the hon. Gentleman looks at some of the papers published over the past couple of weeks, he will see that although there was a fall in home ownership since 2003, it has stalled. It is our clear determination and policy to make sure that we increase home ownership, and that is what starter homes are about. I hope that he will support us in delivering those homes for first-time buyers under 40, at a discount of at least 20%, so that we can help them to be able to afford to get into that ownership model again.
Kit Malthouse (North West Hampshire) (Con)
One of the key planks of the Government’s policy on delivering affordable housing is neighbourhood planning, so the Minister will be pleased to hear that in Oakley, in my constituency, the neighbourhood plan went to a referendum last Thursday and received 95% approval. Given that, does he agree that it is an outrage that just seven days before the referendum, the planning inspector allowed an appeal in that village that largely renders the plan pointless after two years of work? What is he going to do about the Planning Inspectorate effectively bulldozing Government policy in my constituency?
Brandon Lewis
I think it is important that neighbourhood plans play their part in delivering affordable homes. When an area such as the one that my hon. Friend has mentioned has worked out a neighbourhood plan to deliver affordable homes, I would expect the Planning Inspectorate to respect that neighbourhood plan.
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
Some 22,000 households in Northern Ireland are in acute housing need. Between 2011 and 2015, we had 4,000 first-time buyers using co-ownership and 6,000 association homes. We need to build 11,000 homes a year. What assistance can the Minister provide when it comes to co-ownership to help people who wish to purchase even more?
Brandon Lewis
The hon. Gentleman raises a good point. We are clear that as part of delivering 400,000 affordable homes by 2021, we want at least 135,000 to involve co-ownership and shared ownership. This is another fantastic model that improves the affordability of the home ownership model and enables more people to access it.
Scott Mann (North Cornwall) (Con)
Will my hon. Friend outline what a couple under the age of 40 living in Cornwall can expect to borrow under the new starter homes initiative that the Government have implemented for a family home worth, say, £200,000?
Brandon Lewis
My hon. Friend makes a good point about how starter homes can help people to get on to the housing ownership ladder. I would not presume to tell lenders what their position should be, but when we apply the starter home discount of at least 20% to that £200,000 home, which brings it down to £160,000, with a 5% deposit, we give access to home ownership to a whole range of people who have been trapped out of it since Labour’s great recession.
Bill Esterson (Sefton Central) (Lab)
5. What recent assessment he has made of trends in the level of demand for social care services.
The Minister for Housing and Planning (Brandon Lewis)
The number of housing starts is up 6% over the last year and the number of completions is up 21%. Both are now at their highest level since 2007.
Graham Evans
Since 2010, there have been more than 4,000 new housing starts in Cheshire West and Chester, including 2,500 in Weaver Vale alone, and the number of housing starts is up 91% compared to 2009. Will my hon. Friend remind the House who was Housing Minister when the figures were so low?
Brandon Lewis
My hon. Friend makes a good point. As we have discussed on the Floor of the House before, the right hon. Member for Wentworth and Dearne (John Healey), the shadow Housing Minister, was the Minister who oversaw the lowest level of house building since, I think, about 1923.
Mr Robin Walker (Worcester) (Con)
We have seen record numbers of housing starts in Worcester this year, and the proportion that is affordable housing is larger than we have seen for many years. What more can my hon. Friend do, however, to ensure that this strong housing recovery—it led a constituent to tell me, “I’m voting Conservative because I am a builder and I’ve seen things get better over the last six years”—continues and that we continue to deliver on this strong record?
Brandon Lewis
My hon. Friend gives an example of something I hear time and time again. We are the party and the Government who have got house building moving again from our inheritance in 2010, and I am proud to be the Housing Minister who, thanks to the Chancellor, is seeing the biggest house building programme since the 1970s. It is quite a contrast to what we inherited from the right hon. Member for Wentworth and Dearne.
Kevin Hollinrake
I will do my best.
The number of housing starts relies on a proper assessment of housing need. Gladman recently ran a successful appeal in my constituency on the basis that the local authority could not demonstrate a five-year housing supply. There is now a revised assessment by the local authority showing an eight-year-plus supply. Is it time for a definitive assessment of housing need?
Brandon Lewis
My hon. Friend makes a good point. It is important that local authorities plan for the future housing delivery and housing needs of their areas. That is what the local plans are about, and I would encourage all local authorities still working through their local plan to get on with it and make sure they make that provision. He also makes a very good point about the confidence of having a five-year land supply, and we will respond in due course to the evidence from the expert panel group that looked at local plans and reported just last week.
Kelvin Hopkins (Luton North) (Lab)
15. What steps his Department is taking to encourage the building of homes for social rent.
The Minister for Housing and Planning (Brandon Lewis)
Since 2010 we have delivered 270,000 affordable homes, including about 200,000 rental homes, and the spending review committed £1.6 billion to the delivery of 160,000 further affordable homes.
Rachael Maskell
Let me ask the Minister a specific question about new-build social housing. My local authority and housing associations say that, because they cannot afford to develop social housing on Network Rail and council land—public land—they will develop up to 2,500 high-value units. However, we have a serious social housing crisis. How will the Minister ensure that councils and housing associations can afford to build homes for social rent to match local needs?
Brandon Lewis
If the hon. Lady compares what was done between 1997 and 2010 with our record, she will see that the number of council social homes being built roughly doubled under a Conservative-led Government. We are building social homes at the fastest rate for about 20 years. Housing associations had a £2.4 billion surplus last year, and local authorities have over £3 billion of headroom. We are working with them, and encouraging them to use their money to build the homes that we want to be built so that we can deliver more homes than the last Government left us.
Kelvin Hopkins (Luton North) (Lab)
It has been reported that private developers continue to hold many thousands of acres of building land in land banks, and are refusing to build on it until house prices rise in order to maximise their profits. May I suggest to the Minister that a sensible Government would take such land into public ownership, allocate it to local authorities, and require and enable them to build council homes to house those who are in desperate need of decent homes?
Brandon Lewis
We do want to see developers get on with building more: we want build-out rates to increase. We want local authorities to deal with preconditions so that builders can get on site more quickly and get building more quickly, but we also want to make sure that land agents are not hoicking land around and holding it up in the way that the hon. Gentleman has described.
Fiona Mactaggart (Slough) (Lab)
12. What plans he has to improve conditions for tenants in the private rented sector.
The Minister for Housing and Planning (Brandon Lewis)
Measures in the Housing and Planning Bill will improve conditions. We will be tackling the rogue landlords that give the entire sector a bad name, in particular those who let sub-standard accommodation. Our proposals include a database of rogue landlords and property agents, introducing banning orders for serious or repeat offenders, a tougher fit and proper person test, extending rent repayment orders and introducing higher civil penalties.
Fiona Mactaggart
The majority of families in Slough live in the private rented sector with only six months’ security of tenure and six-monthly rent increases, often facing eviction if they complain about repairs and so on. I understand that that will be dealt with in future legislation, but it will not come into force until 2018. It is no way to bring up a family. What will the Government do to give such families more security?
Brandon Lewis
The right hon. Lady has her facts slightly wrong, because legislation relating to retaliatory evictions came in in October 2015. She is right that we want tenants to have protection, which is why we are introducing measures in the Housing and Planning Bill that will go further than anything that any Government have done before. We should bear it in mind that the average length of tenancy in this country is getting on towards three years and that most tenants move by choice. However, she is right that people should not face retaliatory evictions, which is why we brought in that legislation in October 2015.
Nigel Mills (Amber Valley) (Con)
13. What assessment he has made of progress on devolution in the east midlands.
The Minister for Housing and Planning (Brandon Lewis)
The Government are investing a further £8.6 billion to enable another 145,000 people to buy their own home by 2020-21. Recent evidence has made it clear that 43% of homes sold would not have been built without the scheme, so it is clearly driving up the housing supply.
Karl MᶜCartney
The great city of Lincoln is one of the most historic and successful cities in our country and more and more people want to live and work there. Ahead of any directly elected mayor of the county, would my hon. Friend like to remind councils such as City of Lincoln Council of the need to support private house building as well as affordable house building to ensure that my city’s residents have a full range of housing choices?
Brandon Lewis
My hon. Friend makes a good point. It is important that local areas consider their housing needs and are able to plan to deliver the housing that local people want. Some 86% of our population want the chance to own their own home, so I encourage local authorities to work actively and enthusiastically with the starter homes programme that provides first-time buyers with a discount of at least 20%.
Andrew Bridgen (North West Leicestershire) (Con)
16. What assessment he has made of trends in the number of planning permissions granted in the last 12 months.
The Minister for Housing and Planning (Brandon Lewis)
In the year to December 2015, the reformed planning system gave planning permission for another 253,000 new homes, which is excellent news. To be clear and to put it into context, that is a 53% increase on the figure for the year to December 2010.
Andrew Bridgen
Merely giving planning permissions does not build any houses. What more can the Government do to ensure that houses for which planning permission has been given are built out, so that we achieve our target of 1 million new homes?
Brandon Lewis
We are doing a range of things, some of which are in the Housing and Planning Bill, such as having planning permission in principle, which will make it easier for small and medium-sized builders as well to get access to finance. My hon. Friend will be aware that, at the Budget last week, we outlined our plans to make sure we deal with some of the issues associated with preconditions and other things that can slow down the movement on to site once the initial planning permission is given. It is important that we speed up the process, getting developers on site and building out more quickly.
Several hon. Members rose—
Maria Caulfield (Lewes) (Con)
T2. Many towns and villages in my constituency have formally adopted their neighbourhood plans. Places such as Newick and Ringmer have had their plans in place for a long time, yet they are constantly challenged by developers who put in applications for sites outside the plan. Will the Minister uphold the status of neighbourhood plans in the planning process and return local democracy to our villages and towns?
The Minister for Housing and Planning (Brandon Lewis)
My hon. Friend makes a good point. We absolutely hold neighbourhood plans as being of prime importance and they have weight in law. I congratulate Newick on its initiative in creating a neighbourhood plan but, as I know she appreciates, I cannot comment on a particular case. I do wish to stress, however, while I have the opportunity to do so, that the national planning policy framework makes it very clear: where a planning application conflicts with a neighbourhood plan that has been brought into force, planning permission should not normally be granted.
John Healey (Wentworth and Dearne) (Lab)
My question is for the Secretary of State, who clearly lacks the clout to argue his Department’s case with the Chancellor, because there was nothing in the Budget on housing—nothing to reverse six years of failure, from rising homelessness to falling home ownership. In Labour’s last year, despite the global banking collapse and deep recession, we saw 120,000 new homes built in this country. Five years later, that total was only 5,000 higher. At this rate, the Secretary of State will not hit his house-building targets until 2079, so why was there so little in the Budget on housing?
Brandon Lewis
I say to the right hon. Gentleman, with great respect, that he might want to have a look at the Budget book, which outlines a range of measures on both housing and planning. It builds on the autumn statement and the spending review, which gave us the biggest building programme since the 1970s—that is quite a contrast to his personal track record. It also outlines the work we did with local government to deliver another 160,000 homes on public sector land—joining central Government’s 160,000. I would have thought that 320,000 new homes in this country, on top of what we are already doing, is good news and highlights just how important this is to the Government.
John Healey
On the contrary, the extra investment that the Chancellor announced in the spending review that is cited by Ministers brings the total to around about half that invested by Labour in building new homes when I was the last Labour Housing Minister. The truth is that there was little in the Budget on housing, and nothing that will deal with the causes of the housing crisis, so six years of failure is set to stretch to 10. Will the Minister now admit that, on housing, as on everything else, the Chancellor’s credibility is in tatters?
Brandon Lewis
I am surprised that the right hon. Gentleman keeps wanting to give me the opportunity to highlight the fact that he was the Minister who oversaw the lowest level of house building since about 1923. I am very proud to work with the Chancellor who has given this country the biggest building programme that we have seen since the 1920s. We have seen the number of first-time buyers double since 2010 and, as we heard earlier, planning permissions have gone up by 53% since 2010. We are delivering affordable housing at the fastest rate in more than 20 years. In the past five years, we have delivered double the number of council houses that Labour did in 13 years. I am proud of our track record. We aim to continue to deliver more and to deliver faster than Labour ever did.
Karen Lumley (Redditch) (Con)
T3. Will my hon. Friend join me in congratulating Wychavon district council on utilising the new homes bonus and investing more than £1 million in local community facilities? Will he take time out of his very busy schedule to visit that outstanding council with me to see some of those schemes?
Brandon Lewis
I will be happy to join my hon. Friend on a visit. On my last visit, it was good to see the ambition and hard work that her planning team and local councils had put in to provide the homes that were needed locally. It is good to see them using that new homes bonus to deliver the infrastructure of those homes. I look forward to visiting again very soon.
Richard Arkless (Dumfries and Galloway) (SNP)
T5. I accept that the final quantum award under any EU solidarity fund has not been decided, but may I nevertheless ask the Minister to ensure that, however it is apportioned, it reaches the communities that were actually affected? A simple population share going to the Scottish Government will not ensure that it reaches my constituency of Dumfries and Galloway.
Clive Efford (Eltham) (Lab)
T6. Rather than cutting support to people with disabilities, would it not be better for the Government to cut the housing benefit bill, which is up by £4.4 billion over the past four years? Is not that due to the Government’s failure to build enough houses, which is driving up rents and heavy reliance on the private rented sector? Is it not a disgrace that the Budget did not put any money into building social housing?
Brandon Lewis
I again say to the hon. Gentleman that he might want to look back at the spending review and the autumn statement that gave us the biggest building programme since the 1970s. I also gently point out that one of the problems that we have had is that, under Labour, for every 170 homes that were sold under right to buy, just one was built. That is why it is important that we build more homes—and we are building more homes. In London, which I know is dear to his heart, we are looking at two for one. That increases housing supply and it is good for delivering new homes.
Kevin Foster (Torbay) (Con)
T8. Last week’s Budget saw welcome news for small businesses and pubs across my constituency in the form of the changes to business rates. What support will my hon. Friend give to Torbay Council to ensure that local businesses in my constituency benefit as soon as possible?
Craig Williams (Cardiff North) (Con)
Welsh community centres, rugby clubs and pubs cannot be registered as assets of community value because the Welsh Labour Government opted out of the relevant Bill. How can the Minister help us to protect our rugby clubs, pubs and community centres in Wales?
Brandon Lewis
As ever, my hon. Friend is fighting hard for his community to have the same protections that we have been able to give people across England. I would be happy to meet him to see how we can work together to convince the Welsh Government that they should protect those vital institutions—something that Labour in Wales seems willingly unwilling to do.