Affordable and Safe Housing for All

Derek Thomas Excerpts

Tuesday 18th May 2021 Commons Chamber

[Derek Thomas (St Ives) (Con)]

“Build back better” is not just a simple catchy headline. Quite rightly, the Prime Minister and the Government have created the expectation that we will build back better, and in time the great British public will judge whether they believe we have achieved that aim.

Today’s subject for debate is “Affordable and Safe Housing for All”. A significant measure of our commitment to build back better will be how well we have driven down the harmful emissions of the built environment. It was a Conservative Government who set in law the commitment to reach net zero emissions by 2050, and only recently this Conservative Government strengthened that commitment with a pledge to reach a 78% reduction by 2035—just 14 years from now.

Housing accounts for 14% of total UK emissions, so I am glad to make the case in this debate for stepping up our efforts to drive harmful emissions from our homes. We must start by including in the planning White Paper tangible and ambitious measures to deliver environmentally friendly protections and climate change mitigation. They must be part of a legislative framework that determines the quality and efficiency of new homes. We need to strengthen energy efficiency standards and we certainly need to review how energy performance certificates are organised—if you have ever tried to get one, Madam Deputy Speaker, you will know that it is an absolute nightmare.

We need strong assessment of the environmental impacts of the built environment. We need to bolster the national planning policy framework and drive up the requirements for net-gain biodiversity. Basically, in my view, the build back better White Paper must in effect become the green Bill. The Government and the Queen’s Speech have set out a commitment to support growth through significant investment in infrastructure, skills and innovation, and to pursue growth that levels up every part of the UK to enable the transition to net zero. The Committee on Climate Change has already made its message clear, saying that

“the 2020s must be the decisive decade of progress and action on climate change”

including by taking on the significant task of

“renovating and decarbonising the UK’s…homes.”

We must turn to fixing the problem rather than keep building on it. There is no better way to do that than by transforming the house building sector to ensure it has a highly skilled, highly motivated workforce that leads the world in developing and building homes that are great to live in, cheap to run and carbon neutral. To achieve this, a concerted cross-departmental effort must be made to ensure that planning rules accept only the greenest homes; that construction colleges shift towards teaching the latest methods and technologies, harnessing young people’s interest in the environment; and that building companies large and small have every reason to take on and train apprentices to build the homes in which we can be proud to live.