Lyn Brown
Main Page: Lyn Brown (Labour - West Ham)Self-build and Custom Housebuilding Bill
Lyn Brown Excerpts
Mr Richard Bacon (South Norfolk) (Con)
I am grateful for the opportunity to speak to the amendment tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Stone (Sir William Cash), which would require statutory consultation before guidance was introduced.
When I originally drafted the Bill, I considered whether there should be consultation before the guidance, and whether it should be statutory. It is worth saying to my hon. Friend that the Bill is quite thin and will work satisfactorily only with guidance—he is right to identify that guidance is an important component. My hon. Friend alluded to the reason for that: the range of authorities that are planning authorities is very wide.
The Bill does two things: it requires planning authorities—the Bill calls them “relevant authorities”—to keep a register; and it requires them to have regard to that register when exercising their statutory functions, whether that is planning, housing, the disposal of land or regeneration. The range of authorities that are planning authorities is wide. For example, an inner-London borough is a planning authority, but so is a national park. In a rural area such as South Norfolk, a rural district council, as we called them in the old days, is a district council and therefore a planning authority. It is not possible to imagine a set of rules or guidance that would be applicable equally to an inner-London borough and a national park. What might be reasonable for us to expect of a planning authority in a mixed rural and urban area with plenty of land to show that it had had regard to its register, might be unreasonable for us to expect of a planning authority in a dense inner-London borough that has much greater land availability problems. For different reasons, it might not be reasonable for us to expect the same thing of a planning authority such as a national park. Any guidance would therefore by its nature be varied, depending on the circumstances.
My hon. Friend mentioned the role of the vanguard councils. He is right that they are crucial. With a small pot of money from the Department for Communities and Local Government, they are experimenting and establishing what works best in terms of establishing and operating a register. The vanguard councils are doing voluntarily and willingly what will in due course become a duty for all councils. The idea is that all councils that are faced with the new duty—the duty to operate a register and to have regard to it—can learn from the vanguard councils about the best way to set up and operate a register, and integrate the running of the register with the council’s planning, housing, land disposal and regeneration functions.
It would be wrong to be over-prescriptive and to place new burdens on councils, especially given that the vanguard councils from which much of the learning will come are at an early stage. I have no doubt that in due course as the Bill is implemented, it will be sensible in most cases for the Department to consult local planning authorities of different types, depending on the nature of the guidance it wishes to issue in different cases. It would particularly be worth consulting vanguard councils, which will have valuable experience to share. That is the point of the vanguards.
My hon. Friend’s proposal to turn the consultation process, which I am sure will happen, into a legal obligation with a statutory three-month consultation period would inevitably create more inertia, which is precisely what the Bill aims to cut through. The aim of the Bill is to start to unblock the logjam of housing supply by allowing customers more say over what they want rather than leaving them little choice but to accept what a big developer tells them they want. The underlying philosophical drive behind the Bill is that if we build more houses as if customers matter, we will end up with more houses, which is what the nation so badly needs. The aim is most definitely not to create yet more process and inevitably more delay, which I fear statutory consultation would do.
I understand my hon. Friend’s concerns, but I hope he will agree that statutory consultation is not necessary and consider withdrawing his amendment.
Lyn Brown (West Ham) (Lab)
I thank the hon. Member for Stone (Sir William Cash) for his interest in the Bill and for his speech.
As hon. Members know, the Opposition support the Bill and see no reason to support the amendment in that form. We are convinced by the points made by the hon. Member for South Norfolk (Mr Bacon) and are content with the Bill.
The Minister of State, Department for Communities and Local Government (Brandon Lewis)
I, too, thank my hon. Friend the Member for Stone (Sir William Cash) for taking an interest in the Bill and for working to ensure that the Bill is as strong as it can be. He suggests that there should be a statutory consultation period of three months before any guidance is issued by the Secretary of State. I thank him for raising the important issue of consultation and guidance, and for giving me the chance to explain the Government’s position, which I hope I can.
I know from the experience of our right-to-build vanguards that it is important that any national framework for the register is sufficiently flexible to reflect the considerable differences—my hon. Friend the Member for South Norfolk (Mr Bacon) outlined the differences—in the scope for custom build in different parts of the country. It is important that we seek the views of a wide range of interested parties, particularly when we are establishing the detailed framework, but I am not convinced of the need for a statutory consultation period before the issuing of guidance. I am afraid that the Government cannot support the amendment.
Statutory consultation can have a valuable role, but it is not necessary or desirable for every Government action. When used unvaryingly, it can have a detrimental impact on policy and create significant delays. That is not to underplay my understanding of the point that my hon. Friend the Member for Stone makes—I acknowledge his point.
In many instances, the Secretary of State may issue guidance to local government without being required to consult local government and other partners before doing so. For example, we are not statutorily required to consult on national planning policy guidance. In the case of the Bill, we believe that statutory consultation would only delay the implementation of the custom and self-build register that the Bill seeks to establish. The explicit requirement in the amendment for at least a three-month consultation period seems excessive, especially given that our current consultations on planning policy matters are normally around six to eight weeks, which gives local authorities and others sufficient time to respond.
My hon. Friend’s amendment would also mean that the Government must consult for a considerable period on even minor revisions to the guidance, which would clearly add unnecessary bureaucracy. Arguably, it would increase the burden on local authorities. My hon. Friend wants neither of those things and we strongly want to avoid them.
To deal with what my hon. Friend desires, local authorities have been key influences in the development of the policy, as we have demonstrated through the right-to-build vanguards. My hon. Friend the Member for South Norfolk outlined how important they have been in the development of the policy—I will return to that on Third Reading, which will I hope will happen shortly. We fully intend to maintain this close link with local authorities and other partners in implementing this policy, including in drawing up the guidance.
With those few words of explanation, I hope my hon. Friend feels reassured enough to be able and willing to withdraw his amendment.
Lyn Brown
I congratulate the hon. Member for South Norfolk (Mr Bacon) on all the work he has put into the Bill and on getting it this far. I know just how hard that can be, having sat a number of times on private Members’ Bills in the previous Parliament, in particular on the Communities Bill, which took an awful lot of effort and time. I can only imagine the kind of effort he has had to put in to get us to this stage. I also commend him for achieving cross-party consensus. The Opposition are very supportive of the Bill.
If passed into law, the Bill would create an opportunity, for those seeking a plot of land for a new self-build or custom build home, to register their interest with their local authority. The local authority would then have regard to the register in developing its approach to housing and the local plan. We are supportive of this approach, because we think it essential that a range of measures be deployed to tackle the current housing crisis.
We are building half the number of homes we need to keep up with demand, and over the past years we have seen the lowest levels of house building in peacetime since the 1920s. As a result, home ownership continues to decline and is now at its lowest level for 30 years. A record number of young people in their 20s and 30s are living at home with their parents, while 9 million people are living in the private rented sector with little security or stability and facing increasingly unaffordable rents and poor standards.
The Lyons review set out a comprehensive plan for how the next Labour Government will tackle this crisis and get at least 200,000 homes built a year by 2020. A clear conclusion of that review was that we are over- reliant on a small number of builders and we need much more diversity in the housing market. Custom and self-build can be a part of that diversity.
Earlier this year, my hon. Friend the Member for Wolverhampton North East (Emma Reynolds), who apologises to the hon. Member for South Norfolk for not being here today, set out Labour’s plans to boost home building, including measures to support custom and self-build and a register, as proposed in the Bill. Our hope is that as well boosting the level of custom and self-build, we will see an increase in take-up among those on low to middle incomes as a result of having such a register. Custom build should be an option for all those who want their own home—not just for a wealthy few.
In many other countries, the housing market is made up of a much more diverse number of builders, including self and custom builders. This often means the output in house building is much higher, while the homes are also attractive and of good quality—essential if we are to win the support of communities across the country for new homes in their local areas. While the Bill stops short of proposing the fundamental change needed, as set out by Labour, to tackle the housing crisis, it proposes concrete steps that will help boost the self- build and custom house building sector. The Bill is to be welcomed and the hon. Member for South Norfolk is to be congratulated on it. I wish him further luck with it.