Housing (Bradford)

Philip Davies Excerpts

Wednesday 15th June 2011 Westminster Hall

[Mr David Ward (Bradford East) (LD)]

I do not think that our paths have crossed, Mr Streeter, but I am pleased to serve under your chairmanship and to face my colleague the Minister. This is a wonderful opportunity to highlight an important issue, and I hope that I do it justice.

A famous statistic alleges that Bradford once had more Rolls-Royces per head of population than anywhere else in the world. If that were ever true, I am sad to say that it must have been a long time ago. I remember being a young councillor during the recession of the 1980s—that really was a recession—and one council estate I represented had 70% male unemployment. Most of the unemployed men on that estate walked out of school in the ‘50s, ‘60s or even the ‘70s, and went straight into jobs. Sadly, when made redundant, many never worked again. Sadder still, their children went on to have children who have never worked.

Believe it or not, two thirds of the entire Bradford district is rural, and it is one of the most diverse areas in the country. It ranges from the prosperous Ilkley, where house prices are, surprisingly, at their highest ever level at present, to areas such as two wards in my constituency where, in some parts, 68% of children are categorised as living in poverty.

Bradford has gone from being one of the wealthiest cities in the world to being a city with deep economic and social problems. Over 30 years, Bradford has had millions of pounds of regeneration funding from every scheme that was on offer. The schemes were not without success, but the fundamental weakness of the economy has led to deep-rooted problems of poverty, high unemployment, low educational attainment, dire health outcomes in many areas, a decaying housing stock and, at times, as we know, frightening social tensions.

The housing problem stands out as one of the many consequences of economic failure in Bradford. I started this speech on housing by referring to the declining economic history of Bradford because, in addition to the contribution that housing policy can obviously make to meeting housing needs, it can make a contribution as a fundamental element of the regeneration of the community’s economy.

I must admit that there are many concerns about some of the proposals that the Government are considering. Those include changes to the shared room rate and paying the rent element of universal credit directly to tenants. That may have severe consequences: 80% of the tenants of the largest social landlord are on benefits. The changes include flexible tenancies, restricting housing benefit for tenants who are under-occupying and capping local housing allowance at the four-room rate. Many of those changes will potentially have adverse effects on people in Bradford. I will continue to campaign on those issues on other occasions. Today, in the limited time available, I want to focus on the most crucial aspect of housing policy—its contribution to economic regeneration.

The Government’s housing policy as it affects Bradford can at worst impair economic regeneration, or, if delivered with consideration of and adaptation to local circumstances, play an integral part in fulfilling the deep need for economic regeneration. I am sure that the Minister is well briefed and is well aware of the scale of the difficulties that we face. On current projections, Bradford’s population will increase by 150,000 in the next 20 years. To meet the projected growth, we need at least 2,700 homes each year. Currently, we are missing that target by a long way.

[Philip Davies (Shipley) (Con)]

I commend the hon. Gentleman for bringing this debate to the House. As he knows, there are two proposals for big building developments in Micklethwaite and Menston, in my constituency, on beautiful, picturesque green fields. Does he agree that building houses on the outskirts of the district does nothing to alleviate the housing need in the centre of Bradford and that at a time when the council and all of us are trying to regenerate the centre of Bradford, it is rather counter-productive to build houses in that part of the district, the residents of which will shop in Leeds, regenerating Leeds even more, rather than Bradford?

[Mr Ward]

That is a massive issue. I am sure that the hon. Gentleman is well aware of the fact that, as people progress up the housing chain, they move out of the inner-city areas. There is a long history of that happening in Bradford. The simple answer is that the housing must come from somewhere. We are missing the targets on new houses: at the peak of the housing boom in 2008, just over 2,000 houses were completed, but by last year the number had fallen to just 700.

Bradford’s low-wage economy and high unemployment in the areas where housing demand is strongest mean that about half the homes required will have to be in the social rented sector. There, the gap in delivery is even greater. Currently, fewer than 300 affordable homes are built each year—it is little wonder that there are 20,000 people on the social housing waiting list.

Added to the high demand for new homes is the fact that much of Bradford’s private sector accommodation is not fit for people to live in: 40% of Bradford’s private sector accommodation currently fails the Decent Homes standards; 10% is overcrowded; and across the district more than 7,000 properties stand empty and, often, derelict.

How could a national housing policy contribute to the economic regeneration of the Bradford district? Bradford has the youngest, fastest growing population outside London. That could be a great opportunity for Bradford’s economy, but only if there is somewhere for those people to live. Meeting the demand for new housing and stock improvement would provide much needed jobs in the construction industry. The Home Builders Federation has calculated that, for every £1 of public money spent on social housing, a further £3 of private sector investment is generated. Tackling poor-quality housing could change the image of Bradford. Our housing is critical to the way in which we are perceived as a district and to the confidence that investors require to put money into the district. In addition, improving basic housing conditions would remove many of the factors that contribute to the poor health and low educational attainment that perpetuate cycles of deprivation.

My concern is that the array of housing measures proposed by the Government will fail the test of delivering the quantity and quality of housing that we need to underpin the economic revival. Bradford’s ability to meet its targets for affordable housing will inevitably be hit by the halving of national capital funding. The Government’s much lauded affordable rent model is seen as a way forward in terms of replacing direct Government funding. We are told that it will generate 150,000 new affordable homes. It may well offer a viable replacement for lost grant funding in many parts of the country where market rents are high, but it is unlikely to be the answer in Bradford.

There is very little difference in Bradford between target rents and 80% of the market rent. I know that the Minister is aware of that. Taking into account the fact that the areas with the highest turnovers also have the lowest rents—of course, this measure will apply only to re-lets—Incommunities, the largest social housing provider in the district, which manages two thirds of the social housing, has projected that using affordable rents alone would generate for the whole of the Bradford district only an additional £120,000 a year. That would be almost but not quite enough to build two or three houses.

I am sure that the Minister will be keen to mention the new homes bonus—a key plank in the Government’s housing policy and one that in principle we have to support. The danger is that the policy simply gives more to those who already have, where land values are higher. Because of the distribution of funding being based on council tax bands rather than the grant formula of the Department for Communities and Local Government, which is based on levels of deprivation, Bradford will again lose out.

My fear is that funding will be skewed to areas with healthy housing markets at the expense of more deprived grant-dependent local authorities such as Bradford. Certain areas will gain additional homes because the affordable rents model will work, but on top of that, they will get the new homes bonus. I stress that the new homes bonus and the affordable rent model, as the two key policy levers for increasing housing supply, will not work sufficiently in areas such as Bradford and that broader consideration of other policy mechanisms is needed. It is not enough to say, “It cannot be expected to work everywhere.” We need measures that will work in a place such as Bradford.

It is not as if we are not trying as best we can with the limited resources available. The council has been attempting to tackle poor-quality housing through equity share and home appreciation loans, which in the long term would provide a small but self-sustaining pot of funding. However, the loss of the private sector renewal grant means that when the scheme comes to an end, there will be no provision to help vulnerable people to fund improvements to their properties.

The role of the private sector in realising economic benefits is crucial, and I am sure that the Minister welcomes the good cross-sector work that is going on through initiatives such as the Bradford Together procurement partnership, a public-private sector partnership that links construction contracts with the development of skills and jobs, which will benefit local communities. Over the last five years, Incommunities, the largest registered social landlord in the district, has built 400 homes, which has created jobs and provided 30 apprenticeship places. There are successes—they do exist—but they have to be set against the context of complex and large-scale housing needs.

What am I asking for? I seek a commitment from the Minister that he will speak in Bradford to those engaged in the challenge of increasing the quantity and improving the quality of housing in the district; they know far more about the subject than I ever will. I would welcome a response from the Minister about the possibility of the large surpluses generated in some parts of the country through the affordable rents model being redistributed to areas such as Bradford, that gain so little from the scheme. In a recent case, a registered provider, Affinity Sutton, considered investing in affordable housing in Bradford, using a surplus generated in the south, but it was unable to take that forward because the Homes and Communities Agency was unwilling to allow it to reallocate surpluses between regions.

The Minister may also like to say whether he believes that it would be sensible to take account of the difference in additional revenues generated through the affordable rents model, and to see whether they can be taken into account when calculating the allocation of grants through the HCA. Should not the remaining grants be targeted at those areas that have an acute need for affordable housing but are without the conditions required to benefit from the affordable rents premium?

I welcome the £100 million of additional funding to bring empty homes back into use—I have already mentioned the 7,000 empty properties in our district—but that amounts to only £338 per empty private home in the country. When considering the scale of the problem in places such as Bradford, I question the adequacy of the amount being made available. I ask that it be reconsidered. My plea is that the Government should resist the temptation to micro-manage and centrally control how the money is used—avoiding that is localism at its best. We have creative and innovative people working in the housing sector in Bradford, and I would welcome the Minister’s assurance that the Government will trust them to do what works best in our area.

The challenges that Bradford faces can at times appear daunting, but they are not insurmountable. Housing can be part of the solution to unlocking Bradford’s economic potential, but only if we get the policy levers right. Conversely, if we are not able to tackle housing effectively, Bradford’s problems will be compounded by the growing cost of homelessness, overcrowding and squalid conditions. As these problems escalate, households’ basic needs will not be met, and the search for a job will take a back seat for those affected as they try to deal with their living conditions.

If the Government are to be judged a success, they need to understand places such as Bradford when considering legislation. To take the time to understand places such as Bradford and to respond accordingly would be a much more critical test of the Government, and would be evidence of the extent to which they actually care about them. We await the outcome of that test with desperately keen interest.