High Streets (Designation, Review and Improvement Plan) Bill

Jane Hunt Excerpts

Committee stage
Wednesday 13th March 2024 Public Bill Committees

[Mrs Paulette Hamilton (Birmingham, Erdington) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Charles. I rise to agree with much of what has already been said. I truly appreciate and support the aims of this Bill and in particular clause 2 and the duty on local authorities to create high street improvement plans. I thank the hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent South for bringing the Bill forward.

I have been an MP for two years now, and our high street in Erdington is one of the main concerns of my local residents. High streets are the beating heart of our communities, linking people to every part of their lives, whether that is walking to school, buying their shopping, going to church, visiting a friend, going to the pub or going out for a cup of coffee. But up and down the country, high streets are frankly in a sorry state. That is why I strongly support clause 2(1)(b), which places a duty on local authorities to create a plan that preserves and enhances our streets.

I have lived in Erdington for 36 years. I remember raising my family in a town where everything we needed and everyone we wanted to see could be found on the high street. I have received a number of comments from constituents who have contacted me since the beginning of the year.

“After seeing details on the Next-door app regarding an 87 year old man being badly beaten up and personal items taken from him outside Erdington library, I’m really really scared to get myself out. I would not be able to protect myself like this gentleman did.”

Another comment said:

“As a constituent and a person who works in the area it’s concerning to see the frequency of anti-social behaviour increasing in Erdington high street. Most recently, we’ve had the window smashed in Costa, physical assault and robbery near the library and physical assault outside WHSmith.”

Another said:

“I know Erdington missed out on the levelling up grant twice and I know there was a very ambitious regeneration plan drawn up and Erdington is not alone with this decline in the issues of the high street, but surely something can be done to regenerate it and stop the decline.”

It is a real shame that Erdington has twice been rejected from the levelling-up fund, despite two great bids that would have transformed our area.

It would be remiss of me not to highlight how worrying it is that the Bill is needed in the first place. Local people need to see improvements in their high streets, but, with eight local authorities having issued a section 114 notice since 2018, and the £4 billion hole in council funding arrangements for the next year, I worry that by designating this power and responsibility to local authorities, we are letting the Government off on failing to properly fund the regeneration of our high streets.

I recognise that the Bill comes with a money resolution, but I want to place on record my view that the money to preserve and enhance the high streets that are at the heart of our communities should not have come from a private Member’s Bill, but from the Government themselves. Let me end on a positive and bipartisan note by sincerely thanking the hon. Member for Stoke-on-Trent South for bringing forward this Bill. I hope it will serve to improve our high streets for generations to come.

[Jane Hunt (Loughborough) (Con)]

It is an absolute delight to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Charles. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Stoke-on-Trent South (Jack Brereton) for bringing forward this excellent Bill. The key word in the title of the Bill is “improvement” and, in my view, that is something we need on all levels. I see this more as a matrix that would bring forward all sorts of improvements to a town centre.

I will talk about Loughborough and Shepshed, because I have two towns in my constituency. Shepshed has recently received a large amount of section 106 funding, which has helped to improve the centre of the town, where there is new paving. That took a while to deliver, but it has lifted the town centre enormously, and Brook Street looks absolutely beautiful now.

Local Government Finance

Jane Hunt Excerpts

Wednesday 7th February 2024 Commons Chamber

[Jane Hunt (Loughborough) (Con)]

Let me first declare an interest. Although I am no longer a borough councillor, I was until last May, and I understand that I still have to register that until 12 months have passed.

I want to thank the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities and Ministers past and present, because the £600 million is a significant increase and is very welcome. I also thank Leicestershire County Council, Charnwood Borough Council, my parish and town councils, and others throughout the county. My colleagues there do wonderful work, as do the officials, and I greatly appreciate what they do.

I will not go into too much detail about the issue of fairer funding, because it has been well rehearsed. Since 2019 and, I understand, before I entered the House, all the Leicestershire MPs have lobbied Ministers continuously, including many a Secretary of State and many a Chancellor. I will say, however, that if we are talking about a fairer funding formula, the operative word is “fairer”, and that standard is not being met at present. If something could be done about this in the very near future, I would be most grateful.

The arguments about rural areas have also been well rehearsed. I thoroughly support what was said by my hon. Friend the Member for West Dorset (Chris Loder), and it is always worth listening to my hon. Friend the Member for Ruislip, Northwood and Pinner (David Simmonds). Many of his points were exactly the points that I was intending to make. I do not like to moan—I prefer to come up with a solution if I possibly can—so I want to suggest something along the lines of what my hon. Friend the Member for St Austell and Newquay (Steve Double) said in the police debate earlier this afternoon. He talked about the use of police resources by other Departments, such as the Department of Health and Social Care, and I think that the same applies to the use of council resources by the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities.

The hon. Member for York Central (Rachael Maskell) alluded to this, in the context of education, health and care plans. Last Friday evening two of the eight slots in my constituency surgery were about EHCPs, and on the previous Friday three of them were. The county council has a statutory responsibility to deliver EHCPs, but the Department of Health and Social Care can say what it wants about the “H” element without having to deliver the resources. The county council feels that it has to deliver them itself, and that puts additional cost and time pressures on the 20-week window within which it must finalise an EHCP. I should like something to be done about that, so that the Department that asks for something actually pays for it.

Exactly the same happens in my borough council in respect of supported housing benefit. Because some charities in my constituency are not registered social landlords, the council cannot claim the whole of the benefit back from the Department for Work and Pensions, and is therefore out of pocket by about £1.5 million, which is simply unsustainable on a budget of about £16 million a year. Instead of the customers of Departments such as the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities—the councils—paying for those things, the Department that wants them to be done should pay.

In his opening speech, my hon. Friend the Minister for Housing, Planning and Building Safety talked about spending on frontline services. I agree entirely with what he said, but I also believe that if councils spend money on things that they want to do, they should not necessarily be unable to get money back from Departments.

Oral Answers to Questions

Jane Hunt Excerpts

Monday 27th June 2022 Commons Chamber

[Michael Gove]

The Foreign Secretary will open the Second Reading debate, and I hope people will listen to everything that she and indeed the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland say, in order to make sure Northern Ireland can fully participate in all the benefits of being part of the UK.

[Jane Hunt (Loughborough) (Con)]

I refer the House to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests.

There are two villages in my local area that will essentially become one due to a development that was granted approval on appeal. How is the Secretary of State addressing the current problem of the lack of a five-year land supply circumventing local planning decisions?

[Michael Gove]

The Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill and our forthcoming national planning policy prospectus will address precisely that question.

UK Shared Prosperity Fund: Rural Areas

Jane Hunt Excerpts

Wednesday 11th May 2022 Commons Chamber

[Alicia Kearns (Rutland and Melton) (Con)]

When people think of levelling up, what often comes to mind is cities that have been left behind, areas of the north whose industries have changed and towns where inequalities are often blatant and impossible to miss, but how often are the needs of rural communities considered within that discussion? I know that they are largely absent from the media debate on this issue and I suspect that they rarely get a look-in in Whitehall. This is the crux of why I stand here this evening: rural communities can be forgotten no more. Too many of them have been left behind, and they deserve to be levelled up too.

One fifth of the UK’s population live in rural areas, so this debate is of great consequence to very many. We too need support to access the opportunities our communities need to succeed. I recognise that this is not straightforward, because in rural areas poverty is often hidden. Barriers to social mobility can be more difficult to observe in rural areas, and it costs more to deliver services in those areas. Another issue is that deprivation is used as a key determinant of funding, but with no recognition of the fact that rural poverty should be considered within this because of the added cost of accessing services in rural areas, which deprives many of access. A focus in policy making on urban and industrial growth has come at the expense of those who do not live in large cities, and this has been made worse by underinvestment in critical infrastructure and local government funding, particularly in areas of the east midlands.

[Jane Hunt (Loughborough) (Con)]

My hon. Friend is making an excellent speech. The national figure for this year’s funding settlement is £128 per person, but Leicestershire County Council gets only £85 per person.

[Alicia Kearns]

My beloved hon. Friend is absolutely right. If Leicestershire were funded the same as Surrey, it would get something like £104 million more, which I will address in more detail shortly.

General Practice: Large Housing Developments

Jane Hunt Excerpts

Tuesday 29th March 2022 Westminster Hall

[Jane Hunt (Loughborough) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Dowd. I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for South West Bedfordshire (Andrew Selous) on securing a very popular debate. I declare that I am still a borough councillor for Charnwood Borough Council, which I will refer to. I am also the chair of the all-party parliamentary group for district councils.

As the Minister can see, he has many friends on the Government Benches, but we suffer some frustrations, and I look to him for advice and assistance. We have two main frustrations: one he can clearly do something about, and the other we need his help with in tackling it with the Department for Health and Social Care. We have GP contracts and the related health profile, and we have planning law—and never the twain shall meet, it would seem. I would like to do something about that.

I would like to be able to support housing developments where they are appropriate and needed and of the size and type required for the local area. More importantly, I want local communities to be created. Three thousand houses in one place is a village, not a housing estate, and I would like to create communities with proper infrastructure. I would also like to support my GPs and constituents. I have had many meetings with GPs in my constituency over recent months. They have worked incredibly hard, particularly during covid. We talk about going to see “our GP” an awful lot, rather than going to see a medical professional in a medical centre, perhaps run by a GP. There is something that needs to be done there.

In my constituency, I could talk about the village of Sileby, which has grown hugely, or about Loughborough or Mountsorrel, but I will talk about Shepshed and west Loughborough. The town of Shepshed has grown enormously over recent years, with the addition of thousands of houses. In the Garendon estate, right next door in west Loughborough, 3,000 homes are due to be built. There are two GP surgeries in the whole area and so, whatever they try to do, the situation is completely unsustainable.

I have talked to the clinical commissioning group and the local health service. Everybody is keen to do something, but there is a definite reluctance, because of the risk factor. There is less incentive to run a GP surgery than to just work in one or be a locum; there is a lot of risk involved. We need to take that into account; we need to consider the cost and the risk of extending a GP surgery or starting a new one.

My right hon. Friend the Member for Chipping Barnet (Theresa Villiers) spoke about the lack of a five-year housing land supply. That is absolutely crippling my constituency. We need to stop indiscriminate development that has no forward planning. Planning staff in the council work hard on local plans—they are looking forward to 2036—and on delivery, but without a five-year land supply, it is impossible. The intentions are good but in practice we are not delivering in Loughborough.

The Conservative manifesto stated:

“Infrastructure first: We will amend planning rules so that the infrastructure—roads, schools, GP surgeries—comes before people move into new homes.”

We must do that. The housing infrastructure fund has not created the atmosphere and the momentum we were expecting. I would like to see more.

I agree with my hon. Friend the Member for South West Bedfordshire on the recommendation as regards the number of patients per GP. I also ask the Minister to consider age profiles. The people who live in the Shepshed area have an older age profile and, generally speaking, older patients need GP surgeries more.

We need cultural change—a shift towards seeing a nurse or another professional in a medical centre, not necessarily having a face-to-face appointment with a GP. We absolutely must start five-year land supply. I would also like to see feasibility studies and infrastructure funded up front, either by the developer or through the fund, so that feasibility studies of GP surgeries do not require GPs to stump up the money first.

Levelling Up

Jane Hunt Excerpts

Wednesday 2nd February 2022 Commons Chamber

[Michael Gove]

There are clear and objective criteria for funding, but it is also the case that some local authorities may need help with building capacity to make sure that their bids are as effective as possible. I extend the resources of the Department to the hon. Gentleman and his local authority to make sure that they put in the best bids possible.

[Jane Hunt (Loughborough) (Con)]

This is a plan that provides opportunity and growth throughout every part of our country; I am looking particularly at mission 6, on skills training. Does my right hon. Friend agree that it is the Conservatives who really help people to get on in life?

[Michael Gove]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. Of course, she represents a constituency with one of the finest universities in the country and she recognises the vital importance of higher education, further education and schools working together to extend opportunity.

Leasehold Reform (Ground Rent) Bill [Lords]

Jane Hunt Excerpts

2nd reading
Monday 29th November 2021 Commons Chamber

[Jane Hunt (Loughborough) (Con)]

I am delighted to speak in support of this Bill. I have one or two points to raise, but in general this is an excellent Bill.

For too long, many of my constituents who have realised their dream of owning their own home have been trapped in a cycle of cumbersome bureaucracy and additional, unnecessary and, frankly, unfair expenses in the form of both ground rent and service charges. Since becoming an MP, I have supported a number of these constituents, some of whom have told me that they were not clearly informed about the additional costs they were signing up to when buying their house—costs that have caused significant stress and hardship. I had hoped to provide an example, but unfortunately, all the cases are currently undergoing legal action, which only reinforces my point that change is necessary. I therefore welcome the Bill, which seeks to end these unfair practices.

[Matt Western]

I share a lot of the hon. Lady’s concerns about what her constituents are experiencing. Many thousands of new homes are being built, and constituents are frustrated and surprised when they discover that they have just bought a leasehold house. We understand that a third of leasehold properties are typically houses. Does she agree that where houses have been built as leasehold, surely the simplest thing would be to make them all freehold, and to get agreement with all the developers to reduce the cost of transfer?

[Jane Hunt]

I wonder whether that is part of the main course that is coming up. I am not sure; we will see, I suppose.

I think I got the same memo as my right hon. Friends the Members for Chipping Barnet (Theresa Villiers), and for New Forest East (Dr Lewis), as I am going to talk about retirement homes for a moment. I draw the Minister’s attention to an issue I have previously raised with him. I have been contacted by a leading developer and manager of retirement communities, which has recently completed Mill Gardens and Farnham House retirement living in my constituency. McCarthy and Stone is concerned about the impact the Bill could have on the retirement sector, following the decision not to provide it with a concession from the ban on ground rents. While it is welcome that the Bill provides for a short transition period, it does not take into account developments that were in the pipeline before the position changed, and the impact that the provisions will have on schemes that will be part-sold when the legislation comes into force.

The proposals are likely to mean that retirement developments on which building started when ground rents were expressly permitted will find themselves split, with two lease structures operating in the same building. That is likely to cause legal complexity and on-site management issues, and to complicate future apartment transactions. It could throw into doubt the financial sustainability of some communities, on the basis that the collective ground rent income on which a development’s funding was predicated will be substantially reduced, even though the development has already been built.

Furthermore, financial contributions to the development costs of communal areas, which were previously shared transparently and equitably, will become complicated, and that risks a sense of unfairness and disunity arising between residents in the same block. I wonder, therefore, whether a modest technical change could be made to the Bill to allow for developments already part-sold to complete sales, so that all apartments operate on the same basis.

I heard the points made by my right hon. Friend the Member for Newark (Robert Jenrick), the previous Secretary of State, on retirement homes and wonder whether a longer transition period for retirement homes would be better than one ending in 2023. That said, it cannot be right for buyers of new properties to face further financial demands for ground rent. House buying must be made fairer and more transparent, and freeholders and landlords must not be able to continue to amass significant profits from ground rent and, indeed, administration charges to the detriment of homeowners. The Bill is therefore an incredibly important piece of legislation that I wholeheartedly support.

Oral Answers to Questions

Jane Hunt Excerpts

Monday 29th November 2021 Commons Chamber

[Michael Gove]

Conspiracy theories are all the rage these days, but I have to say that the hon. Gentleman should be above all that. He has a number of important constituency issues that I long to work with him on. I know that this raillery across the Dispatch Box can entertain others but—I say this in the most generous of spirits—let us concentrate on ensuring that we can work together for the people of Chesterfield, and if we have legitimate disagreements, that is fair enough.

[Jane Hunt (Loughborough) (Con)]

Around 40% of workers who commute from the Charnwood Borough Council area commute into Leicester city. This is due in part to the lack of housing in the city. However, despite there being a derelict doughnut of brownfield land around the city that could be utilised for house building, more and more housing is being built in the Leicestershire countryside. Will my right hon. Friend set out what the Government are doing to encourage development on brownfield land? Will he provide greater incentives to councils to ensure this happens?

[Christopher Pincher]

We are doing exactly that. The brownfield remediation fund is providing significant moneys to ensure that brownfield is remediated. My hon. Friend will be hearing more about that shortly. We also made it clear when we uplifted the local housing need numbers for the largest cities in our country that we expect them to build within their own geographies and not to try to shunt building outside those geographies. That will be made clear to them time and again until they do so.

East Midlands Economy

Jane Hunt Excerpts

Tuesday 7th September 2021 Westminster Hall

[Jane Hunt (Loughborough) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir David.

Despite the east midlands once being one of the most prosperous areas in the UK thanks to its thriving manufacturing base, decades of underinvestment has curtailed productivity, stifled economic growth and held back social mobility. That, coupled with the Leicestershire County Council area receiving the least central Government funding, stifles our development. But that would be to look to our past, and this debate is about the future.

Recently, the region has seen a resurgence of its economic potential, which accounted for 5.9% of UK GDP in 2019, thanks to growth in a number of new and innovative sectors, such as life sciences and hydrogen technology. The latter is of particular national importance, given the push towards green technology.

Alongside the groundbreaking research from our fantastic universities such as Loughborough University, companies such as Intelligent Energy, which is looking to build a new state-of-the-art gigafactory in the region as a centre of hydrogen fuel cell manufacturing in the UK, are leading the way in this area. Such a factory would not only create hundreds of local jobs but would help establish the UK and the east midlands as a world leader in hydrogen fuel cell technology.

The Energy Research Accelerator is also bringing together local research-intensive organisations and a research community of nearly 1,500 researchers to undertake innovative research, develop the next generation of energy leaders and demonstrate low-carbon technologies that will help shape the future of the UK’s energy landscape, but if we are to harness the true potential of those sectors, we must invest further in skills, infrastructure and research and development. The Government have already committed to their levelling-up agenda by directing significant investment towards the region and stimulating business growth, following an incredibly challenging year for businesses.

The freeport at East Midlands airport will not only act as a customs hub, boosting international trade, but will create a highly skilled ecosystem, becoming a magnet for inward investment and business expansion and acting as a springboard for opportunity throughout the region, creating tens of thousands of new skilled jobs. The gravitational pull of the freeport will bring jobs and growth from across the world to the only freeport based at an airport. That is great news for the east midlands.

We already have some excellent forward-looking businesses in the Loughborough constituency, such as Morningside Pharmaceuticals, ERGO, Jayplas and JRE Precision Engineering. Each one is a global player, groundbreaking and integral to the future of our region and our country. That is not to mention the life science cluster based at Charnwood Campus—the first life science opportunity zone in the country, with superb businesses already based there and capacity for more; companies are looking to come to the region, with labs and offices ready to go.

The £16.9 million town deal funding for Loughborough will also ensure that local residents have the skills needed to support local businesses. It will fund projects such as the Loughborough College digital skills hub, and the already thriving careers and enterprise hub. With match funding, those town deal projects are worth more than £40 million.

Loughborough College in itself is a driving force for training and skills, adapted and shaped by the jobs market in which it thrives. Last week, we held a jobs market in the centre of Loughborough that offered literally hundreds of jobs. Thorn Baker, for example, had 75 jobs available. The place is really beginning to thrive. That is in addition to the huge £7.8 million investment in Loughborough from the getting building fund, which not only helped to play a role in creating a global sports hub in the town but has gone towards highways infrastructure to improve accessibility to Loughborough and Shepshed at junction 23 of the M1.

The east midlands is transforming and creating an identity for itself as a leader in innovation and cutting-edge technology. It is time to capitalise on not only our geography but our skills. Inward investors are looking for a place where their business can succeed, for the skilled workforce needed to drive their business forward, and for a great place to live, in which case the future is bright for the whole of the east midlands, but it shines like an Olympic gold medal here in Loughborough.

Affordable and Safe Housing for All

Jane Hunt Excerpts

Tuesday 18th May 2021 Commons Chamber

[Jane Hunt (Loughborough) (Con)]

At the heart of the Queen’s Speech was a commitment to our nation’s recovery and to building back better, greener and stronger. Planning reform is fundamental to achieving that, and I welcome the announcement in the Queen’s Speech that reform will focus on ensuring that homes and infrastructure can be delivered more quickly and, crucially, that local plans will now be able to provide more certainty on the type, scale and design of development permitted on different categories of land. Beautiful villages such as Wymeswold, with its concentric circles of development over centuries and little nooks and crannies of growth over time, need to be able to maintain their character while some growth takes place.

Since becoming an MP, I have advocated more power being transferred from developers and officials such as the Planning Inspectorate and put into the hands of local communities, and local plans becoming, in effect, the tender document of local residents, instructing the market on what local people want and what will work for their community. Grown-up conversations need to take place at local level, recognising that we need housing development but equally recognising the needs of local people and the communities in which they live. For too long, developments have been imposed on communities by the lack of a five-year land supply, or by taking surplus housing numbers from adjoining places—from Labour-run Leicester City Council, for example—into Sileby, Barrow and Shepshed. That needs to change. Linked with a 30-month timeframe to produce a local plan, that will transform the current set-up of delay, repetition of action and the inevitable outcome of piecemeal development, which often carries with it local criticism, to the unwarranted detriment of local planners, whose expertise is not currently recognised.

The average house price in Loughborough is nearly £199,000, but median earnings are £31,000—a house price to earnings ratio of 6.4. That is not an easy target for young and first-time buyers and those on low incomes. We need local people to be able to afford to stay in the area where they grew up, so I was delighted that, alongside planning reform, the Government last week reaffirmed their commitment to helping more people own their own home through the affordable homes programme, the new mortgage guarantee scheme and first homes programme. Furthermore, if the focus is put on turning empty floors above shops into affordable homes, we can also help to create a strong customer base for our high streets and town centres and so aid recovery while protecting our essential green spaces and areas of separation between settlements.

On the subject of rental reform, we have a thriving lettings market in my constituency, thanks in part to our large student population. While the vast majority of landlords provide safe accommodation and treat their tenants well, from time to time I hear of tenants who are in distress because they are living in unacceptable conditions, or their tenancy is cut short. I look forward to hearing the Government’s plans on housing and planning in greater detail over the coming months.