Housing: Under-occupancy

Lord Stoneham of Droxford Excerpts

Monday 17th October 2016 Lords Chamber

[Lord Freud]

The policy is clearly directed at people who have a spare room. These tend not to be people with families; in many cases, they are empty nesters. They would be a typical group—people who have had a larger place but some of the people living in it have then moved on and they now have spare rooms. There is a point in time at which one should address the issue to get the downsizing. This policy looks to make sure that that time is during working age and not later.

[Lord Stoneham of Droxford (LD)]

My Lords, I declare my interest as chair of Housing & Care 21. As the Minister will be aware, there is a major problem coming down the road on retirement housing, particularly the imposition of a cap on housing benefit, which will impose itself on people in retirement housing where rents and the cost of housing are higher—often higher than the proposed cap on housing benefit. How are the Government going to address, beyond just using discretionary funds, the needs of these retired people who will be disadvantaged and also stop the undermining of future development of retirement housing in this country?

[Lord Freud]

We put out a Ministerial Statement in September outlining our approach to supported housing, including sheltered housing, which looks to divide the support into two, with one element coming out of the housing benefit bill up to the limit of the LHA amount in each area, which is then topped up by local authorities through a fund. This will help them drive the commissioning of the appropriate level of housing, and supported housing, for the people in their area.