Housing Costs

Julie Hilling Excerpts

Thursday 3rd April 2014 Commons Chamber

[Dame Anne Begg]

That is why we say in more than one of our recommendations that the Government need to encourage local authorities to collect data on how their housing stock is being used. We call for an analysis across councils of the availability of houses for people affected by the policy to move into.

[Julie Hilling (Bolton West) (Lab)]

I join in the congratulations to the hon. Lady and her Committee on this report. Did the Committee consider the definition of under-occupancy—for example, the expectation that a toddler should share with a teenager or the size of a box room that would be adequate to house two grown children?

[Dame Anne Begg]

We did look at that. We suggested that the use of the term “bedroom” was misleading and that the Government should use the term “bed space” instead, for exactly the reason that my hon. Friend mentions. Two older children may be expected to share a room that has been deemed to be a bedroom, but the room may be so small that only a cot would fit in it. That is also relevant to whether disabled people are properly housed and whether they are deemed to have a spare bedroom. The Government need to be much clearer in their definition of what is acceptable, the size of room that is acceptable and the area that two beds take up in determining whether there is under-occupancy.