Oral Answers to Questions

Chris Williamson Excerpts

Monday 20th January 2014 Commons Chamber

[Mr Pickles]

I congratulate my hon. Friend and the local authority. There is a certain irony in the fact that the two Administrations of the past 40 years who have built the greatest number of council homes are Margaret Thatcher’s Administration and this Administration. In the past few years, we have built more council houses than the Labour party built in 13 years.

[Chris Williamson (Derby North) (Lab)]

The Government give private landlords £9.5 billion every year through housing benefit, and yet they spend only £1.1 billion on building affordable homes. If they spent all that money on affordable homes, they could build 600,000 homes every year. Why does not the Minister stop picking on and vilifying low-income tenants, and call time on profiteering landlords by capping rents and using the savings in housing benefit to build more council houses?

[Kris Hopkins]

This Government have invested some £4.1 million into tackling rogue landlords. We have received a number of thank you letters from people on the Labour side, which is not in line with what the hon. Gentleman is saying. The Government are ensuring that tenants have decent homes. We support tenants and are not afraid of taking on rogue landlords.