Oral Answers to Questions

Lee Rowley Excerpts

Monday 23rd July 2018 Commons Chamber

[Nigel Adams]

That was why I mentioned the issue of transparency. It is very important that leaseholders get as much information as is practically possible. We are currently working with the Law Commission on how best to support current leaseholders because we want to make buying a freehold easier for people going forward, but we also want to ensure that those with leases are helped out.

[Lee Rowley (North East Derbyshire) (Con)]

10. What steps his Department is taking to reduce the time taken to build new homes.

[Mary Robinson (Cheadle) (Con)]

18. What steps his Department is taking to reduce the time taken to build new homes.

[The Minister for Housing (Kit Malthouse)]

New homes should be built out as soon as possible once planning permission is granted, and under this Government net additional dwellings are at their highest since 2007-08. We are building on progress made so far by revising the national planning policy framework and diversifying the market to increase the pace of development, and I have commissioned my right hon. Friend the Member for West Dorset (Sir Oliver Letwin) to lead a review of build-out rates.

[Lee Rowley]

One of the councils in my area has been without a local plan since 2005 and is currently consulting on a draft plan that over-inflates housing need and unnecessarily builds on the green belt. Does my hon. Friend agree that one way to speed up house building is to put in place local plans that have the confidence of local people?

[Kit Malthouse]

My hon. Friend fights hard for his constituents’ interests, as he does at all times. He is right to say that a local plan is vital not only to progress housing in an area but to protect residents from the predations of speculative developers. I find it astonishing that authorities can be so dilatory in producing such plans.