Homelessness

John Redwood Excerpts

Wednesday 29th January 2020 Commons Chamber

[John Healey]

My hon. Friend is right. I believe that Members on both sides of the House will tell this afternoon of some of the local and individual tragedies behind the national statistics. He is quite right that every one is a tragedy and every one is a travesty. Many are preventable. It cannot be acceptable for any of us in this House, in this day and age, that over 700 people died homeless in our country.

[John Redwood (Wokingham) (Con)]

I entirely agree with the right hon. Gentleman. Conservatives have every wish to see the end of homelessness, just as his party does, and Ministers are now making more money available. What advice would he give Ministers on how best to spend that money to achieve our shared objective?

--- Later in debate ---

[Robert Jenrick]

I will make some progress, as I think Madam Deputy Speaker asked me to.

The question of funding seems to have been at the heart of the debate so far. We are backing our commitment to this agenda with very substantial funding. Yesterday, I announced that we will take the total sum being invested in this challenge next year to £437 million. That is on top of the £1.2 billion that has already been committed, marking a £69 million increase in funding from the current financial year, and £15 million more than we committed at the spending round a few months ago.

However, we are not stopping there. The Government have already made good on their promise to end the benefits freeze, with benefits due to rise in line with inflation from April. The majority of people in receipt of housing support in the private rented sector will see their housing support increase. In our 2019 manifesto, the Government committed to introducing a new stamp duty land tax surcharge on non-UK residents buying residential property in England and Northern Ireland, with that revenue going to support rough sleepers. No one should sleep rough on our streets. That is why we are focused on helping those living on the streets now, as well as ensuring that we consign rough sleeping to history once and for all.

[John Redwood]

Does my right hon. Friend agree that people sleeping rough quite often have drink or drug addiction problems, for example, and that we need to persuade them to get help? Are there not generous programmes to deal with those kinds of issues? [Interruption.]

[Robert Jenrick]

My right hon. Friend is absolutely right and I do not understand the chatter from Opposition Members. The street homelessness challenge that this country faces is not simply a housing issue but an issue of addiction and mental health, and this Government intend to bring those together for the first time in a properly co-ordinated approach between our Departments.