Social Housing in London
Debate between Matthew Offord and Baroness Bray of Coln
Mr Offord
I have given way to the hon. Gentleman once, so I am going to continue with my speech.
My experience has been very good. Large elements of the constituency certainly need development—I am thinking of the West Hendon estate and Perryfields, as well as areas of Burnt Oak and, significantly, the Grahame Park estate, of which some hon. Members might be aware. It was the site of the old RAF Hendon base and it is a location that has now changed to allow development from the private sector. That has been a great success and many of my friends live in that area, which is proving to be a real boon to the local economy.
I was pleased a couple of weeks ago to attend the first phase of Choices for Grahame Park, which is a separate phase of development in Colindale, with the mayor of Barnet, Councillor Anthony Finn. When that is completed, it will form a central part of the Colindale area action plan and will create a new community in my constituency, providing greater transport links on the tube, greater community health facilities and a radical rebuilding programme that will transform the estate, which has been a blight for many years. This will happen in the next 15 years and we expect to see about 3,000 new homes as part of this new heart of my constituency.
The regeneration of the area will also provide retail facilities and 25% of the existing homes are built in a traditional layout, instead of like the cardboard boxes and rabbit hutches that some hon. Members have described. In total, we will demolish 1,314 outdated and overused homes and replace them with 2,977 brand-new, purpose-built family homes that will revolutionise life in the Grahame Park area and in my constituency as a whole.
Angie Bray (Ealing Central and Acton) (Con)
Does my hon. Friend agree that too often the special circumstances in London seem to get missed out in policy making? For example, I think we all want to see more family-sized homes built in the affordable sector rather than the small boxes that typified the affordable houses built under the previous Mayor, Ken Livingstone. Many people got very agitated about that because London wants family-sized homes. Here is the problem: a couple of London housing associations came to me and said that they would like to build more family-sized homes but in order to be able to afford to do that under the current circumstances they will have to charge 80% of market value, which many of their tenants will find difficult to afford. Is it not very important that—
Madam Deputy Speaker (Dawn Primarolo)
Order. All afternoon, we have been drifting into longer and longer interventions. Interventions are supposed to be short, not an excuse for a speech, and the hon. Lady has now finished.