Housing and Planning Bill (Fourth sitting)

Grahame Morris Excerpts

Thursday 19th November 2015 Public Bill Committees

That is why we seek in the amendment to change the primary purpose of the Bill, so that it does not just concentrate on the delivery of starter homes—useful though that is—but looks at much wider housing supply issues, including the question of having enough rented properties. The interesting figures that we got from Crisis show not only that the number of affordable rented properties in England fell from 43,000 homes in 2010-11 to 31,000 in 2013-14, but that because of the lack of churn in the sector, there are fewer tenancies available. That is an interesting point, which I do not think was raised by any of the people who gave evidence to the Committee. New tenancies by councils and housing associations fell from 231,000 in 2010-11 to 218,000 in 2013-14. Obviously, more people have been moved into the private sector, but we need to look at the fact that that is partly because tenancies from housing associations and local authorities simply have not been available.

[Grahame M. Morris (Easington) (Lab)]

We all want to see more social housing and affordable homes. Does my hon. Friend agree that part of the problem may be that the definition of starter homes is too narrow? There are many examples in our region of the north of England—Gentoo, for example—of rent-to-buy options, which could considerably improve the prospect of increasing the number of affordable homes.

[Dr Blackman-Woods]

My hon. Friend makes an excellent point. It struck me yesterday, as I went through the evidence to the Committee, how many people commented on their concern that such an emphasis on starter homes risks crowding out other sorts of low-cost home ownership. They suggested that perhaps the Government should have looked at other ways of supporting people into home ownership, rather than concentrating on starter homes as much as they have done.

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[Dr Blackman-Woods]

The difficulty is that I have tried to separate out the number of homes built for social housing and at genuinely affordable rents, rather than including, as the tables do, figures on housing built at 80% of market rents, which I think a lot of us would accept are unaffordable for many.

[Grahame M. Morris]

My hon. Friend is making a completely sensible point. I think that most of the Committee would agree that there is a consensus that we need some 250,000 houses a year. In our scrutiny of the Bill, the question is whether we are doing everything that we can to encourage not just the private sector but the public sector to build their share. Our contention, and the point that she is making well, is that we could do rather more in passing the Bill to encourage that.

[Dr Blackman-Woods]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for making that intervention, and for bringing us back to the real focus of the amendment, which is why the Government are not doing more to produce greater output in terms of housing delivery across all tenures. Most people would think that a reasonable question to ask, given the severity of the housing crisis that we face.

We must also question whether measures in the Bill are making an increase in housing units more difficult from the key sectors: local authorities and housing associations’ homes for social rent. We know, and a number of people have commented, that measures in this Bill and the Welfare Reform and Work Bill could make it more difficult for local authorities and housing associations to build homes, due to the combined impact of loss of rental income.

We are not criticising the reduction in rents; that is not the point. The point about the rent reduction is that less money will be available for local authorities and housing associations to build homes. That is simply the point that they are making. If the Government want to reduce rents—we think it a laudable objective to reduce the rents of people in social housing—it should be done in a way that does not impact negatively on the ability of housing associations and local authorities to build more homes. Unfortunately—we have seen this in some of the detailed evidence given by housing associations and local authorities—reducing rents reduces the amount of money available to them for short-term and longer-term investment in their current stock and building for the future. That does not seem to be a sensible approach.