Affordable and Safe Housing for All

Damien Moore Excerpts

Tuesday 18th May 2021 Commons Chamber

[Damien Moore (Southport) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to follow the hon. Member for Makerfield (Yvonne Fovargue).

I want to start by commending my hon. Friend the Member for South Ribble (Katherine Fletcher), who seconded the Loyal Address last week. She gave an impassioned speech on the levelling-up agenda, on improving opportunities and life outcomes for people across the north of England and on more devolution. It was a speech that many of my constituents in Southport, her neighbouring constituency, would agree with, and it was a speech that should make us all redouble our efforts to support the Government in working for everyone irrespective of where they were born.

It is in that context that I welcome the important steps taken by this Parliament to begin levelling up this country while also tackling the covid pandemic, delivering on the will of the British people and leaving the European Union, increasing the size of our police force, tackling inequality, introducing tougher sentences for those desecrating our war memorials and statues, and establishing a £4 billion levelling-up fund and of course the fantastic town deal programme, from which my constituents greatly appreciate having been given £38.5 million to improve our town.

I want to make just three points on safe and affordable homes. First, the planning system is archaic and chaotic and has not really been touched since 1947. It requires reform and that can be achieved through this Queen’s Speech’s legislative programme. If we are serious about levelling up we must reform the planning system. We need to continue to focus on delivering for local people, facilitating a culture of fairness, decency and affordability that will apply equally to renters and homeowners. The Prime Minister and this Government have already started to put our planning system on a much better path, with plans to move to a digital service and for cutting red tape, changing local plans and establishing new frameworks for funding infrastructure, but there is still more work to do to allay Members’ fears that any reform could pave the way to allow controversial developments against the wishes of local people.

Secondly, any reform should welcome conversions above shops. That is happening in my town and I am immensely supportive of it, but if we are to revitalise towns and get this step more prominently on the agenda the Government must step in and ask local councils to develop plans for it. One big problem in my town is that many people would move into these converted homes but there is nowhere to park their car, so facilities should be made available through local councils so people who want to live in one of the flats in town where they would support all the local shops and businesses can park their cars near where they live, not miles away.

Thirdly, we must do more to encourage the right type of housing. Not for the first time, certainly from me and occasionally from the Prime Minister, Members will now hear a championing of Lord Street in my constituency as the basis of the Champs Élysées, but like many great high streets in our country it has seen better days. We want to encourage more people back into town centres, and not just living in flats but in houses as well, so we must empower local authorities to step in and change plans if needed, where they are not in keeping with their surroundings. My town is a grand Victorian town with Victorian houses. That is the type of housing people want in our town centres, and, again, the people moving back into town centres would help to support the local economy, which they would also be passionate about because it is right on their doorstep.

I welcome the Queen’s Speech as a first step in levelling up our country; my right hon. Friend the Prime Minister began last week to point the way down that path, and I look forward to working with him and colleagues on the Conservative Benches in delivering for my constituents and the British people.