Housing Benefit (Under-occupancy Penalty)

Debate between Liam Byrne and Nick Raynsford

Wednesday 27th February 2013 Commons Chamber

[Mr Byrne]

I am answering the question. The Deputy Prime Minister said:

“If I’m going to be sort of self-critical, there was this reduction in capital spending when we came into the coalition government…But I think we’ve all realised that you actually need, in order to foster a recovery, to try and mobilise as much public and private capital into infrastructure as possible.”

But what has happened in the past couple of years? What has happened even in the past year? For the last year for which records are available, the number of housing starts in this country has fallen by 11%. That is the reality of what this Government have delivered.

This policy is not simply a cruel punishment; it is a cruel and unusual punishment, because it is not normal—it is not usual in a modern, advanced and civilised country—to reward the rich in quite the way this Government are proposing while punishing the poor. It beggars belief that next month—the month in which those on £1 million a year will get a £2,000-a-week tax cut—those with a spare bedroom will face a £14-a-week rent rise. In what world is that fair or normal and usual? It is only in a Tory world, defended by a Liberal Democrat.

[Mr Raynsford]

As some very misleading comments about housing have been made by those on the Government Front Bench, will my right hon. Friend confirm that in 2007, the last year before the recession, the net additions to the housing stock in this country numbered 207,000? The current Government have presided over a collapse, and fewer than 100,000 new homes were started last year. That is their shocking record and they should not pretend otherwise.

[Mr Byrne]

My right hon. Friend is absolutely right about that. Of course, the Labour party is proposing to have a tax on bankers’ bonuses in order to release £1.3 billion for new housing and to spend the 4G licence proceeds on building homes. That is in sharp contrast to the sob story from the Deputy Prime Minister lamenting the fact that the Government cut capital spending too far and too fast.