Housing

Lord Knight of Weymouth Excerpts

Thursday 21st October 2010 Lords Chamber

Asked By

[Lord Knight of Weymouth]

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what is their most recent assessment of housing need in England; and what plans they have to meet that need.

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Communities and Local Government (Baroness Hanham)]

My Lords, unlike housing demand, housing need relates to the incidence of particularly poor housing outcomes: overcrowding, affordability problems, homelessness and unsuitability of accommodation. Our focus in addressing housing need will devolve power to local people and stimulate private investment in new housing through measures such as the new homes bonus. In addition, we have protected many important measures for vulnerable people, including grants for supporting people, homelessness and disabled facilities grants, securing £7.6 billion in investment over the next four years.

[Lord Knight of Weymouth]

My Lords, the most basic security wanted by families in this country is a job and a home. Yesterday’s spending review is at the cost of at least 1 million jobs, but how many will also lose their homes? Government plans allow increases in rents to 80 per cent of the market rent, potentially trebling the weekly rent. This, coupled with a cap on household benefits, means families will be priced out of some areas. When will the Government bring forward a plan that we can scrutinise that shows how cutting the housing budget by 60 per cent yesterday will allow many more affordable houses to be built?

[Baroness Hanham]

My Lords, the process for affordable housing in future will be that most of the money for housing has been passed down to local authorities, so that they will then make the decisions for themselves about how much housing is needed and at what rents. The new homes bonus will mean that where they build houses, they will get more money for that on the basis of the matching of the council tax. There will be plenty of housing built in future—probably more than was built under the previous Government. Even Andy Burnham admitted that they had not done enough.