Heidi Alexander
Main Page: Heidi Alexander (Labour - Lewisham East)
Brandon Lewis
I have met various local authorities through the consultation on this year’s settlement, and I will meet them again next year. The DWP has also spoken to local authorities. We must ensure that we do not replicate the previous, poorly targeted system. There is a whole range of support out there, and local authorities are doing very well in pulling together that support to ensure that the most vulnerable have the right care for them.
Heidi Alexander (Lewisham East) (Lab)
2. What plans he has to increase the supply of social rented housing.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government (Stephen Williams)
We will deliver 165,000 new affordable homes in the three years from 2015. That will be the fastest rate of delivery of affordable homes for at least 20 years. This is on top of the 170,000 new affordable homes that we are on target to deliver by the end of this Parliament.
Heidi Alexander
I asked the Minister about social rented housing, not just affordable housing. The truth is that this Government do not want to build social housing; they want to decimate it. Will he tell me why the number of social rented homes being built in London last year was roughly one tenth of the number being built in the capital in 2009?
Stephen Williams
I am afraid that the hon. Lady is completely wrong. The last Government allowed the stock of social housing in both categories to dwindle completely. We will be the first Government to leave office at the end of a Parliament with a greater stock of affordable homes, including council houses, than there was at the start, including in the borough of Lewisham and many other boroughs around the country. Today the Secretary of State and my right hon. Friend the Chief Secretary to the Treasury have published the prospectus allowing for £300 million of extra borrowing capacity for local government to build new homes.