Peter Dowd
Main Page: Peter Dowd (Labour - Bootle)
Helen Hayes (Dulwich and West Norwood) (Lab)
I wish to speak briefly about Lords amendment 10B and to urge the Government to support it. The amendment would allow local councils to decide the mix of affordable housing that is delivered in their area, based on their assessment of local need and demand.
The Minister speaks about manifesto pledges, and his point is understood, but I would like to quote the press release that accompanied the Tory manifesto launch:
“After funding replacement affordable housing on a one for one basis, the surplus proceeds will be used to fund the extension of right to buy”.
It is entirely untenable for the Government to include starter homes in the definition of affordable housing. A home to buy that requires a deposit of £90,000 and a salary of £77,000 and that costs up to £450,000 is not affordable to most people in London, and my constituents simply shake their heads in disbelief at the suggestion that it is. It is not the case that starter homes are replacement affordable housing, and it is entirely misleading of the Government to claim they are.
Amendment 10B would allow local authorities—the same local authorities that undertake housing needs assessments, that have statutory housing duties, that are democratically accountable to their communities and that know what is needed in their communities—to determine the type of affordable housing that is appropriate in their area.
Peter Dowd (Bootle) (Lab)
My hon. Friend raises the concept of subsidiarity—the organising principle that decisions are best made at the smallest, lowest and least centralised level. Does she agree that the Bill goes nowhere near that concept?
Helen Hayes
The Bill does not simply go nowhere near that principle—it contravenes it.
Amendment 10B would give local authorities the ability to decide the balance of starter homes and other, more genuinely affordable homes to be delivered in their area. By failing to support the amendment, the Government are breaking the commitment they made in launching their manifesto. More importantly, they are failing communities in London and across the country that need affordable housing.
It is important to point out what links an affordable, secure home and the aspiration of many people in this country to own a home: the ability to save. Someone who is spending too high a proportion of their income on private rents and on deposits for landlords every year because they have no security of tenure does not have the ability to save. The Bill does nothing about the private rented sector; it reduces the supply of genuinely affordable homes and, in doing so, it denies the aspiration of an entire generation to have an affordable, secure home and, ultimately, to own a home of their own. That is an ideological position, and it will deepen the housing crisis and be the shame of this Government.