Cost of Living
Debate between Meg Hillier and Justin Tomlinson
Meg Hillier
Absolutely. Without the supply, none of those issues will be solved. One man who came to see me was a kitchen porter struggling to support his family—he had two children. The jobcentre asked him to go for jobs further afield, but the combined cost of extra travel and child care meant that he could not afford to travel a couple of boroughs away. That is the reality of the cost of living and life in constituencies such as mine. This Government’s Queen’s Speech was detached from the lives of people who want to work hard but who often cannot get the extra hours and of private renters who cannot ever hope to earn in the required bracket.
Justin Tomlinson (North Swindon) (Con)
I would add to the hon. Lady’s list of housing costs the practices of some leasehold management companies, which trap tenants with ever increasing service charges while not allowing them the access they should to the right to manage.
Meg Hillier
Absolutely. Although there has been good cross-party work in the House to reform leasehold management, there is much more to be done. It is no wonder that there is a demand for home ownership in this country, because it gives people greater control. However, that is now out of the reach of so many people that reforming the rights of tenants is long overdue across all sectors, but particularly in the private rented sector, including leaseholders.
I call on the Government to look seriously at rents and at the growing housing benefit bill. The £45 billion a year that is spent on housing benefit could, if capitalised, provide a huge opportunity for bodies such as local authorities, housing associations and perhaps others to invest in building new homes at affordable and intermediate rents, which would provide homes for the very people in my constituency who are being driven out by high costs.
Finally, I want to touch on the Government’s policy of providing new social housing at 80% of local private rents. I will give the private rents in my constituency to give the House a flavour. A two-bedroom flat in my constituency in the lower quartile costs £300 a week. One in the upper quartile costs £400 a week. For a three-bedroom, family-sized property, the average rent in the lowest quartile is £388. Even if only 80% of those rents is paid, how affordable are they?
We need to tackle what affordability means if we are serious about helping people into work and getting the economy moving. If people are in work and have disposable income, they will spend. At the moment, they are struggling to survive and the Queen’s Speech does nothing to help them.