Karen Buck
Main Page: Karen Buck (Labour - Westminster North)Urgent Questions are proposed each morning by backbench MPs, and up to two may be selected each day by the Speaker. Chosen Urgent Questions are announced 30 minutes before Parliament sits each day.
Each Urgent Question requires a Government Minister to give a response on the debate topic.
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Brandon Lewis
My hon. Friend makes an excellent point. He has a good example in his local authority area of a housing association that is keen to build, and this scheme will allow it to access its assets to build more and to use that income to make sure it is building more homes to increase supply across our country.
Ms Karen Buck (Westminster North) (Lab)
Listening to the Minister, one would almost think he had not presided over a collapse in homeownership in this country during the past few years. In inner-London areas we face the prospect of losing up to three quarters of our social homes, which has led even the leader of Conservative Westminster Council to say that this is going to lead to the loss of a swathe of social housing. It is all very well for the Minister to say that he is going to replace in London, but people do not just live in a city—they live in communities, they live near their work and they live near their children’s schools. Will all replacement homes be built within the same local authority, where council housing and housing association properties have been sold off?
Brandon Lewis
First, I say to the hon. Lady that the drop in house building that led to the drop in homeownership started under the Labour Government. In fact, the right hon. Member for Wentworth and Dearne (John Healey), who is on the Labour Front Bench, said that he had no problem with a fall in homeownership, but I have a different view. This Government want to make sure that we drive up not only home building but homeownership. We will do anything we can to support that, and this deal that the housing associations have put forward will help to increase the supply of affordable homes right across our country, including in London.