Oral Answers to Questions

Claire Coutinho Excerpts

Monday 13th January 2020 Commons Chamber

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government (Luke Hall)]

I thank the right hon. Gentleman for his question; I know how important this issue is in his constituency. I can certainly confirm that the social care grant will continue every year, including the additional £9.2 million for his local authority into the next year. I am very happy to meet him to discuss this further.

[Claire Coutinho (East Surrey) (Con)]

T8. I welcome the fact that house building is at a 30-year high under this Conservative Government, but my constituents and I are concerned by the extremely high local house building target. Will the Secretary of State meet me to discuss how new homes in East Surrey will be supported by much needed investment in road, rail and GP provision?

[Esther McVey]

I welcome another hon. Friend to these Benches. She is quite right: we have to ensure that we have the right infrastructure. We pledged in the manifesto to ensure that infrastructure first, as set out in the Queen’s Speech. We have the £5.5 billion housing infrastructure fund, but we will introduce a bigger, single housing infrastructure fund to provide the infra- structure that she rightly wants for her constituency and that other Members want for theirs.