Housing: Underoccupancy Charge

Lord Best Excerpts

Tuesday 22nd July 2014 Lords Chamber

[Lord Best (CB)]

My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Baroness for giving way. I thank the Minister for putting this research in hand, as he promised when the ping-ponging on this measure stopped between us and the other place. I am afraid that one cannot take very much comfort from the figures. The Minister said that the figures are pretty bad; they are, in fact, awful: 60% of people getting into arrears with only 4.5% of people making a move as a result of the measure. He said that there are some more recent figures that are better; I fear that they are not very much so. Five hundred thousand families are affected by the measure and the position remains dire, with a third of landlords—

[Noble Lords]

Question!

[Lord Best]

Will the Minister confirm that when the space standards were introduced in the private sector, the measure was not retrospective and did not apply to all people already occupying the properties? Does he accept that it is quite different in this case, where it was applied to the lettings of existing tenants, which is why it has been so harmful and so hurtful?

[Lord Freud]

My Lords, I have told the House on previous occasions that the difference here is that there is very little changeover or moving within this particular group, so there is no way in which one could introduce this kind of policy on that kind of basis. It therefore has to apply to stock. I remind noble Lords that the impact assessment for this measure envisaged moving or downsizing on the part of about 50,000 people. Nineteen thousand people have moved during the first eight months, which is on the trajectory of our expectations.