Lord Kennedy of Southwark
Main Page: Lord Kennedy of Southwark (Labour - Life peer)Housing and Planning Bill
Lord Kennedy of Southwark Excerpts
Lord Campbell-Savours
My Lords, the noble Lord, Lord Best, referred to an authority—I did not know whether it was a mythical authority or a real one that he was not prepared to identify. I can tell him that in the county of Cumbria, there are a number of authorities that would fall within the basic case that he was making: certainly Carlisle District Council; Barrow-in-Furness; probably Copeland, which is in Whitehaven; and, apart from the lakeland part of the districts concerned, certainly Allerdale.
When I asked councillors in Cumbria the other day what the level of rent was in the private sector of houses that had been sold off, I was told that there was very little difference—a marginal difference—maybe a fiver or a tenner on a property. So what are the costs to be incurred? The Bristol brief, which I assume everyone has received, goes into a little more detail. It says that even though very little detail is given in the Housing and Planning Bill, as a minimum the scheme would have to include income verification, data matching, measures to discourage and combat fraud, dealing with inquiries, market rent setting, rent accounting, audit processes for the additional rent raised and processes for internal and external review. That does not include appeals and overpayment recovery. There is an additional factor: investigation. We know that the departments concerned with the benefits system have investigators, which cost money. I am presuming that local authorities, particularly where they have substantial housing stock, if they are to meet the Government’s targets on these matters, will have to employ people to carry out this work. These all add to the administrative costs of implementing the scheme in areas where the differences between the private sector rent of a former local authority property and the local authority rent are only marginal.
That leads me to the view that the Minister should very seriously consider Amendment 75A, because it at least allows local authorities to have in mind what those costs would be and whether they should not proceed to pursue people in the circumstances that will arise.
Lord Kennedy of Southwark
My Lords, this group of amendments, as we have heard, concerns the payment of rental income to the Secretary of State and seeks to deal with issues for both tenants and local authorities that the blanket application of the policy may create. Amendment 75A, which was moved by the noble Lord, Lord Best, and supported by me and the noble Lords, Lord Kerslake and Lord Stoneham of Droxford, seeks to give the Secretary of State the power to disapply the policy if it becomes clear that the costs of assessing the incomes of local authority tenants would be disproportionate to the additional rental income achievable from this provision. From what we have heard already, in many low-wage areas this assessment would be a complete waste of time and money, and achieve next to nothing. This would give the Secretary of State an easy and convenient way out of the mess that has been created.
Amendment 81A in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Kerslake, the noble Baroness, Lady Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville, and my noble friend Lord Beecham, seeks to ensure that the full administrative cost of undertaking this exercise for the Government will be taken into account and deducted from any payment made to the Government. Again, I cannot see how the Government can really resist this; otherwise they are expecting local authorities to do all the work for them, pay them the money and bear all the costs. That does not strike me as very fair at all.
In Clause 84(3), the Government have given themselves in effect a get-out-of-jail-free card by saying that the regulations may provide for deductions to be made to reflect the administrative costs of local authorities. That is just not fair. Amendment 81B proposed by the noble Lord, Lord Kerslake, and myself, would change “may” to “must”. This is an important change which needs to be made.
When I was looking at the Bill, I spotted Clause 84(5), and we tabled Amendment 82. Clause 84(5) says:
“The regulations may provide for assumptions to be made in making a calculation, whether or not those assumptions are, or are likely to be, borne out by events”.
That is utterly ridiculous—a kind of “think of a number and double it” clause. It is absolutely ridiculous that that is in a Bill before your Lordships’ House. If it was not so serious, it would make you laugh. When you think back to Clause 73, no wonder the Government are seeking to keep the money collected, even though they may have taken too much, because they may have made totally ridiculous assumptions in arriving at the figure in the first place and may have collected too little. They are seeking protection through this clause, and it has to go.
I shall draw my remarks to a close but, as this is Committee, I may intervene further during the response from the noble Baroness, Lady Evans of Bowes Park.
Lord Kerslake
I am grateful for the Minister’s assurance on covering the costs. I would have thought, therefore, that putting “must” in rather than “may” would not of itself cause any particular issues, given that that is the Government’s intent here. What would be helpful is if we could, when the Government firms up the taper, have a clear analysis of the potential income that is likely to be raised and the likely costs of collecting that income.
Lord Kennedy of Southwark
As my noble friend Lady Hollis has said, can the Minister when she responds say why it is reasonable costs and not all the costs that have been incurred? It is totally unfair if local authorities have to bear some of the costs and all the profit—as my noble friend said—goes to the Government.
Can the Minister also comment on Clause 84(5)? It is an absolutely ridiculous clause the way it is written. It needs to be improved, rewritten or taken out.
Baroness Evans of Bowes Park
I thank noble Lords for their questions. As I have said, the Government are committed to helping cover reasonable costs. We will work with local authorities to make sure that their thoughts are fed into this process; that is the position we are taking.
Lord Kennedy of Southwark
Yes, I know that is the position, but can the Minister tell us why it is not full costs? That is the question we are asking.
Baroness Evans of Bowes Park
There are many things to be taken into consideration and, as I have said, we will discuss with local authorities how best to implement this.
Lord Kennedy of Southwark
Okay. We are clearly not going to get an answer from the Government Front Bench on that. I think it is totally unreasonable not to reimburse councils for their costs.
What is the Government’s response on Clause 84(5)? It is a ridiculous clause the way it is written. What is going to happen there?
Baroness Evans of Bowes Park
I will have to take that away and write to the noble Lord.
Lord Bassam of Brighton (Lab)
My Lords, these amendments would require the Secretary of State to give consideration to the issue of community cohesion—something that has come up several times in the debate on pay to stay this evening—and to consider family life when considering the measures in this Bill on rents for so-called high-income tenants and the ending of secure tenancies. They would require consideration to be given at the end of a fixed-term secure tenancy to the effect of not granting another tenancy, and the effect that that would have on family life—for example, whether a child is forced to move school and whether the family has to move away from local amenities they rely on or a family support network. They also require the Government to undertake a review into the effect that the pay to stay and ending of secure tenancies provisions in the Bill will have on community cohesion.
A council home does not simply provide a roof over one’s head. It enables a sense of belonging to a community, particularly a community that is inclusive of people from different and diverse backgrounds. My argument is that the measures in this Bill put this severely at risk. There is a risk of bringing this cohesion to an end. Shelter estimates that 113,000 affordable council homes will be lost as a result of this Bill. The Local Government Association analysis suggests that some 80,000 council homes will be lost by 2020. That in itself could drastically change the make-up of many of our communities. Add to that the number of people who will have to leave their homes as a result of the pay to stay provisions, and we are looking at the serious dismantling of communities across our country.
I think it was the Minister who said earlier that some 46,000 households in London would be affected by pay to stay. My guess is that we need to double that to get an estimate of the impact across the country. Put these figures together and the multiple impact of pay to stay and the ending of secure tenancies, and we will see big changes to the make-up of many of the communities that currently benefit from social housing. It will be particularly apparent in areas—many in London—that have extremely high market rents. In these areas council housing is even more vital to maintaining a mixed and cohesive community, providing housing in the area for people who would otherwise be forced out.
I argue that a community can thrive only if there is housing in the area for those who need to work there—the people who work in local shops, post offices and schools. If people have to live miles away to commute in to provide services for those who can afford to live in the area, we lose all sense of balance in the community and it is hollowed out. It is unsustainable. We can see it happening now in many London boroughs as private rents soar and people cannot afford to stay and live there. Council housing is supposed to even out this imbalance and to help those who cannot afford market rent, but also to allow people to live in mixed communities.
Under the Bill, households that reach the Government’s threshold of just £40,000 in London and £30,000 outside London will be forced to pay market rents or to leave. Market rents in boroughs such as Camden are completely out of reach for most working households, so what will happen to those now classed as “high income”? We will see people having to leave the areas that they have lived in for years and places in which they have built their lives and their children’s lives. The cost will be not just social break-up of communities, but a financial cost to the state, because when people are forced to move away from the social support networks that they have built up—away from families and friends, those who look after children or share caring—it becomes a cost. They will have to rely more heavily on local authority services.
To bring it down to individual households, just think of the potential damage that these provisions can do: parents unable to plan for their children’s schooling; friendships broken off every few years; few friendship groups and poorer community support networks, which currently thrive. I wonder whether the Government have given any thought at all to the impact on schools. What if a council decides on setting secure tenancies at three years at a time? Parents with children face the prospect of moving three, perhaps four times during the schooling of a child. It does not take much imagination to see how disruptive that can be for a family. Think, too, how disruptive it will be for the school, with a constantly revolving door of pupils and families, never knowing who or how many will be on the school roll from one year to the next. I ask this simple question: has the DCLG thought to talk to the Department for Education? If it has, what has the department said in response? Was this consideration ever factored into an impact assessment?
The Bill is a series of unintended consequences piled up as a cover for action designed to solve problems caused simply by lack of low-cost housing. The very least we can do is invite the Secretary of State to think about this measure and its impact on community cohesion, in particular on schools and families. The Bill, with its emphasis on reinforcing social housing as a tenure of last resort, runs the risk of taking us back to a world of rigid divisions in society. Worse than that, it would entrench them. Surely we should be encouraging mixed communities, full of people with different talents. Pay to stay, mixed in with short-term tenancies, will lead to social housing for just the very poorest. It will further stigmatise a form of tenure and, combined with short-term tenancies, create perpetually insecure families facing a series of costly moves.
I do not think the Government have thought through the long-term impact of the legislation, nor the multiple impacts of different changes that the Bill will bring in. If we are serious about community cohesion—something that the Prime Minister in particular has laid great store by in the past, with his plans for the big society—the very least we can do is begin to understand the long-term impact and the consequences of divisive and socially damaging legislation of this sort. I beg to move.
Lord Kennedy of Southwark
My Lords, two amendments in the group are proposed by my noble friend Lord Bassam of Brighton. As we heard in his contribution, they concern community cohesion and the effects of the pay-to-stay policies on it. Amendment 82AA would require the Secretary of State to undertake a review into the effect that the ending of secure tenancies and the pay-to-stay policies will have on community cohesion. Amendment 82GAB would require the landlord, at the end of the fixed-term tenancy, to consider the effect that a decision not to grant another tenancy would have on family life and community cohesion.
These seem very sensible amendments and should be of no concern to the Government. In fact, they should be fully in tune with the Government’s thinking. We might all have our own definitions of community cohesion; for me, it is as set out by my noble friend Lord Bassam of Brighton. It is where there is a common vision and a sense of belonging—family life and a role for everybody in the local community. It is where we have rights and responsibilities, a breaking down of barriers, a building of trust and the creation of a community.
Baroness Hollis of Heigham
My Lords, I also support my noble friend’s amendments. Like him and many others in this House, I have been a local authority leader. Many of us have been housing chairs, possibly on the way to becoming local authority leaders. Whenever we went round on what we used to call site visits, we could tell the stable community estates. They were the ones with no graffiti and no litter; in which people had carved out gardens around the base of flats or had put carpeting down on the public stairways. In those flats, there was no petty level of criminality; there were no rent arrears and no yobbing youths setting fire to mattresses in the garages. The community policed itself, and that was because there were people of a wide age range, a wide income span and a wide set of occupations and retirement. Those estates worked, and were the core—the heartbeat—of my city. As Nye Bevan said, they were part of the,
“living tapestry of a mixed community”.
That is what we all want.
I, and perhaps the Minister and other people in this House, have been around the inner-city estates in Detroit, the outskirts of Washington and so on. I saw areas there where, if you get a job, you leave your home; so nobody gets a job except recycling the drugs economy or working on the streets. In these estates, children are in families that are broken and damaged in all sorts of ways; young men go around in groups and gangs, intimidating those who wish to stay. There is a permanent, transient population of the down-and-out, the derelict, the destitute and those with mental health problems. I have been there and seen it: I did not work in it like Obama, but I have spent time there.
If first you have a bedroom tax that forces tenants with larger homes to move because they cannot pay the rent and have to downsize, and disabled people lose their community networks of support; and if secondly you have pay to stay, so that those who could be an aspiration and an inspiration for the young people in the community, who have the knowledge of where jobs may be, and who could help those young people into the labour market, will have moved on; and, if thirdly, on top of that, we are going to have five-year tenancies—and, as my noble friend said, parents who worry would start planning their move with their children in advance, to ensure that their child goes to school—in the process we will strip out the support networks for disabled, older and frail people, and the support networks where people understand the problems that a family with an autistic teenage daughter or son would have. Either they will be sent on their way or they will voluntarily have to move.
Is this what we want? Behind it, as far as I can tell, the thing that is motivating the Government seems to be that council housing is a scarce resource; it is heavily subsidised by the taxpayer and therefore, if at all possible, we should move people on and out, irrespective of the damage to the communities, to make way for those on the waiting list who might be in even greater need because we are not building enough social housing for those other people to enjoy.
This is the wrong solution to a description of the wrong problem. We need social housing and stable communities. When it suits the Prime Minister he talks about the value of civic society—I congratulate him when he does so—and of communities on our estates. He talks about the value of the knowledge economy of those in work helping people to come into the labour market. As we know, most jobs do not go through the jobcentre at all but through networks of local knowledge. Strip that out and I promise that you will send those estates spiralling down until in a decade or 20 years you will look at our equivalent of Detroit’s inner city. You will wonder how this happened and what we now do about it.
Lord Kennedy of Southwark
My noble friend in the first part of her contribution reminded me of the work done by Lewisham Council. In Crofton Park we have the Ewart Road Housing Co-op. That is just the sort of estate that my noble friend talked about at the start. It is a wonderful place that is well run by the tenants. There are people of different ages living there. People have lived there since they were first moved on, there are new people and there is a long waiting list. It is clean, well run and an absolute pleasure to walk round. It is wonderful—and just the sort of place put at risk by the policy we are debating today.
Lord Campbell-Savours
My Lords, unlike my noble friends Lady Hollis of Heigham and Lord Bassam of Brighton I have not been a housing chairman. The last time I was on a local authority was 40 years ago when I was a mere member of the housing committee. My experience of these matters is more limited than theirs but I want to fix on one word in all this: “review”. What does “review” actually mean here? What will be taken into account by these local authorities? Will they take into account the ability of a tenant to maintain a clean home, their ability to be a good neighbour, ethnic diversity, whether the property is overcrowded, whether there have been complaints by neighbours, or whether they are happy with the employment arrangements for the family involved?
We have some form in this matter. I remember when Lady Porter ran Westminster. She cleared people out of local authority property so that she could sell it off. If I remember rightly, I was one of those who went to the district auditor at the time. The reality is that, exactly as my noble friends said, this will lead to a transient population moving into inner city areas—I have no doubt that in the end they will be crisis areas. At the moment, these areas succeed only because they have a wide social mix. The Government are destroying the social mix that makes these areas work. No doubt the Government will be blamed for that at some stage in the future.
Lord Kennedy of Southwark
My noble friend reminds me of Lady Porter and her activities in Westminster some years ago. Am I correct that her policy was called Building Stable Communities?
Baroness Lister of Burtersett
What amendment is the Minister speaking to? I do not think we have got to these amendments yet. The noble Lord, Lord Bassam, has only had his own amendments.
Baroness Williams of Trafford
Can I check if I am yet again speaking to amendments that we have not got to? Amendment 82GAE is in this group. Would noble Lords like to discuss it or withdraw it?
Lord Shipley
Will the Minister be really clear about guidelines? This is about regulations and guidelines. I am now looking at the policy fact sheet, which the department published. It makes it clear that there is going to be a single set of regulations for these measures, that is, the phasing out of lifetime tenancies. However, the regulations will be subject to the affirmative not the negative procedure. Could the Minister confirm that fact? It then says that the regulations will be developed in discussion with local authorities and the regulations and provisions in the Bill will come into force early next year. That, therefore, is early 2017. It is therefore easy to share the guidelines that will be written because there is from now approximately 10 months for those guidelines to be shared.
Lord Kennedy of Southwark
My Lords, to help noble Lords with this Amendment 82GAE, we are going to speak to it in its place, which obviously will not be tonight.
Lord Kennedy of Southwark
This has never been in previous lists. We just noticed it now. When the Minister stared speaking we thought, “What’s this?”, because we had two amendments by the noble Lord, Lord Bassam, which clearly go together, but I now see from the amendment sheet that it has been put in the list.
Baroness Williams of Trafford
It clearly is a mistake and I really apologise if my noble friend has waited all this time.
Lord True
I was trying to say to my noble friend that I had come into the Chamber. I do not particularly wish to intervene, but we have patiently gone through six days in Committee and we have had many opportunities to look at groupings. I think it is a courtesy to the House if noble Lords who have a problem with the groupings—which are published, they are out there, and we pick them all up—make it clear before that they are not happy with the groupings. Otherwise, I think the House is entitled to expect things that are grouped together will be discussed together.
Lord Kennedy of Southwark
If it helps the Minister, I have a Whips sheet from Thursday and the grouping of that amendment is not on there. It is a typo. Thursday’s sheet has the two amendments down in the name of my noble friend Lord Bassam but this paper has been worked on and has appeared today. I do not produce the Government’s Whips sheet for debates but Thursday’s sheet, which we signed up to, has my noble friend’s two amendments and nothing else.
Baroness Williams of Trafford
Would noble Lords like to hear it tonight or on Thursday? I am not going to waste any more time on this; I will finish my comments where I should have finished them and say to the noble Lord, Lord Shipley, that when I have guidance, I will be happy to share it with him.
Lord Kennedy of Southwark
My Lords, I am opposing the proposition that Clause 113 should stand part of the Bill. Clause 113 introduces Schedule 7 and concerns the phasing out of secure tenancies. The effect of the clause and schedule would be to permit councils to grant tenancies only for a fixed term of between two and five years. Local authorities, of course, have the option to issue fixed-term tenancies already, but for some reason the Government are seeking to go further and want to prevent councils from issuing what they call tenancies for life. I just see them as secure tenancies, where, in order to remain in the property, the tenant has to comply with the requirements in the agreement: pay the rent, keep the property in good order, not be a nuisance neighbour, et cetera.
Why do the Government want to dictate to local authorities what sort of tenancies they can issue? As has been said many times before, it does not seem to apply along with the policy of the big trumpeting of localism only a very short time ago in your Lordships’ House. Of course, that is a whole area of policy that the Government seem to have gone very quiet on in this Parliament.
When the noble Baroness, Lady Evans, responds to the debate, it would be helpful if she could outline how the proposals in this section of the Bill would help people on low or modest incomes—the sort of people who are likely not to be able to afford to buy their own home, not to be a beneficiary of the starter-homes plans, and not even to be able to take up the right to buy. All this does is provide greater insecurity for tenants in these circumstances. How does it help tenants, help their children, or enable people to prosper? How is it in any way beneficial to them? I am struggling to think of one reason. I will be grateful if the noble Baroness could help me out in that respect when she responds.
I have told your Lordships’ House many times before that when I was about eight years old we moved into a council property. I am the oldest of four children. I was lucky enough to get my own bedroom. Both my parents worked. My mum was serving school meals and my dad was running a post room. Both my parents worked hard and paid their bills, but we never had the insecurity or worry as a family that our tenancy might expire at some point in the future. How is this policy beneficial for families in social housing on modest incomes today? The amendments in this group seek to improve the proposals from the Government and provide tenants with different possibilities, all of which are better than what is offered by the Government.
Due to the late hour, I will leave it to other noble Lords to speak to their amendments in this group and comment at a later stage when appropriate. As this is Committee, I will of course intervene on the Minister if necessary. I beg to move.
Baroness Evans of Bowes Park
I am sorry. The noble Baroness asked about the intention behind the provisions that govern a tenant’s rights to make improvements. Landlords will be able to grant such rights and officials would be happy to meet with carers’ groups to explore this matter, as the noble Baroness suggested.
Lord Kennedy of Southwark
Can the noble Baroness comment further on the points made by the noble Lord, Lord Stunell, when he talked about the Localism Act, which he obviously helped get through the other place in the last Parliament? How would the proposals here regarding secure tenancy square with that?
Baroness Evans of Bowes Park
As I said, our aim is to make sure that people have access to social housing. We do not want to see thousands of tenants forced to live in overcrowded conditions, or occupying homes with more bedrooms than they need, or 1.2 million households on council waiting lists waiting for a social home. As noble Lords have said, local authorities have not used the provisions much and we also need to think about all the people who need access to homes.