Housing and Planning Bill
Debate between Helen Hayes and Peter Dowd
Helen Hayes (Dulwich and West Norwood) (Lab)
I wish to speak briefly about Lords amendment 10B and to urge the Government to support it. The amendment would allow local councils to decide the mix of affordable housing that is delivered in their area, based on their assessment of local need and demand.
The Minister speaks about manifesto pledges, and his point is understood, but I would like to quote the press release that accompanied the Tory manifesto launch:
“After funding replacement affordable housing on a one for one basis, the surplus proceeds will be used to fund the extension of right to buy”.
It is entirely untenable for the Government to include starter homes in the definition of affordable housing. A home to buy that requires a deposit of £90,000 and a salary of £77,000 and that costs up to £450,000 is not affordable to most people in London, and my constituents simply shake their heads in disbelief at the suggestion that it is. It is not the case that starter homes are replacement affordable housing, and it is entirely misleading of the Government to claim they are.
Amendment 10B would allow local authorities—the same local authorities that undertake housing needs assessments, that have statutory housing duties, that are democratically accountable to their communities and that know what is needed in their communities—to determine the type of affordable housing that is appropriate in their area.
Peter Dowd (Bootle) (Lab)
My hon. Friend raises the concept of subsidiarity—the organising principle that decisions are best made at the smallest, lowest and least centralised level. Does she agree that the Bill goes nowhere near that concept?
Helen Hayes
The Bill does not simply go nowhere near that principle—it contravenes it.
Amendment 10B would give local authorities the ability to decide the balance of starter homes and other, more genuinely affordable homes to be delivered in their area. By failing to support the amendment, the Government are breaking the commitment they made in launching their manifesto. More importantly, they are failing communities in London and across the country that need affordable housing.
It is important to point out what links an affordable, secure home and the aspiration of many people in this country to own a home: the ability to save. Someone who is spending too high a proportion of their income on private rents and on deposits for landlords every year because they have no security of tenure does not have the ability to save. The Bill does nothing about the private rented sector; it reduces the supply of genuinely affordable homes and, in doing so, it denies the aspiration of an entire generation to have an affordable, secure home and, ultimately, to own a home of their own. That is an ideological position, and it will deepen the housing crisis and be the shame of this Government.
Housing and Planning Bill (Fourteenth sitting)
Debate between Helen Hayes and Peter Dowd
Peter Dowd (Bootle) (Lab)
Many of us remember the brutalist structures built in the 1960s and planned under Tory Governments in the 1950s, and we recognise how dreadful many of those buildings are. Does my hon. Friend have any fear that proposals such as the Government’s will lead us back to those brutalist buildings?
Helen Hayes
One of the great concerns about the Government’s proposals is that at present they contain no safeguards on quality of design, which our communities all care very much about. Which of us, as elected representatives, has not been asked to represent constituents objecting to a planning application because it is too tall, or too many homes are proposed, or because it is all small flats where the local need is for family-sized homes, or there is insufficient affordable housing?
Housing and Planning Bill (Fifteenth sitting)
Debate between Helen Hayes and Peter Dowd
Helen Hayes
I, too, want to speak briefly in support of the amendment. However the planning system is defined, it embodies a set of values and prioritises a series of outcomes. Garden cities of the past were so successful as communities, function so well and are such popular places to live in precisely because of the high aspirations and strong values on which they were founded and the extensive efforts to secure high-quality design and the long-term sustainability of the resourcing of those communities, in all sorts of different ways. That happened because their founders were thinking about long-term success and the values of the communities that they were developing and because they were established on strong principles.
In contrast, some of the early urban development corporations did not embody those same aspirations. The development that took place was, in many cases, far less attractive as a consequence and far less well served with open spaces and amenities. It was often unsustainable or lacking in things such as local school places and good public transport connections. Some of those lessons from the early urban development corporations have informed the way in which development has taken place in the last 10 years or so. We have seen an emphasis on bringing forward community infrastructure early in the development process, so that communities are not left stranded and ill-provided for.
So far, I have seen nothing in the Bill that will ensure that new development under the Bill will be built to a high quality or high standard of sustainability. That is of significant concern. That is what the amendment is seeking to ensure both for urban development corporations and garden cities, which can and should play a significant role in building the homes we need. We must ensure that those homes are built to the highest standards for the long term, that they become part of the heritage of this country and of communities we can be proud of for the long term. We will do that only if we get right the values and the aspirations on which they are founded. That is why I am pleased to support the amendment.
Peter Dowd
I, too, support the amendment. It is partly because of my experience of being raised in an urban area where, post-war, many houses, and communities, were knocked down. Those communities were not fantastic all the time, but at their heart they had a community spirit. There was a genuine attempt in the post-war environment to expand and continue with that spirit, which was often difficult to do. Part of that was to ensure that when people left the slums—there should be no beating about the bush, because that is what they were; it was slum clearance—they went to an environment where houses were designed as best they could be and for the best reasons. However, there is a danger in the current proposals that there is a push, a push and a push for growth. Although there is nothing wrong with that, the quality of the housing that arises from that push can get lost in the race. This is an attempt to lay out a protocol for building.
In Merseyside, the village of Port Sunlight, which many people may have been to, was built by Lord Lever. It is a perfect example of a garden city that, to this day, looks virtually no different from the way it did 100 years ago. It is a fantastic place. Many other places in Liverpool have smaller versions of that, such as Norris Green, which won awards in the 1920s and 1930s for the design of its buildings. There is nothing to stop us supporting this proposal and to reify—to put into clear, unambiguous terms—what we expect from some of the garden city developments.