Social Housing Bill [Lords]

Sarah Russell Excerpts

2nd reading
Thursday 10th September 2026 Commons Chamber

[Matthew Pennycook]

I will make some progress.

I am immensely grateful to my noble Friend, Baroness Taylor of Stevenage, for the customary skill with which she oversaw the passage of the Bill through the other place and for the extensive engagement she undertook with peers throughout the initial Lords stages. A number of important issues were raised during the debates in the other place and, as a result, my Department is undertaking rapid policy work to determine whether there is a case for strengthening the Bill further in a series of areas.

For example, in response to concerns raised by my hon. Friend the Member for Dulwich and West Norwood (Helen Hayes) and the noble Lord Best, we are giving serious consideration to what more might be done to provide greater security of tenure for social tenants who are fleeing violence, including serious youth violence. We are also considering what more can be done to bolster public control of social housing to ensure that it serves and supports those who need it most.

[Sarah Russell (Congleton) (Lab)]

Will the Minister give way?

[Matthew Pennycook]

I will not; I am just about to conclude—apologies to my hon. Friend.

I look forward to engaging with hon. Members on both sides of the Chamber in relation to these and other matters as we look to improve the Bill further, and I commend it to the House.

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[Gareth Bacon]

Sorry—I missed that comment from a sedentary position. This Bill does not contribute to building a single extra social home. I agree that people who are victims of domestic abuse should be rehoused—I said that in my remarks. We do not agree, however, that this Bill is the way to do it.

Let us come to the main thrust of the Government’s policy: the effective end of right to buy as we know it. In 1980, Margaret Thatcher’s Government offered millions of people a hand up on to the property ladder by extending the opportunity to own property to hard-working, aspirational people living in social housing.

[Sarah Russell]

Will the hon. Member give way?

[Gareth Bacon]

I will make some progress.

Ever since and right up to the present day, Labour MPs have called for restrictions on the scheme. They have essentially called for an end to the opportunity to exercise the right to own one’s own home for around 5 million households. When owning one’s own home can bring such pride and such a sense of community, and can offer security and safety, one might wonder why on earth anyone would seek to lock millions of social housing tenants out of doing so. Aside from ideology, which of course is a major part of the problem for Labour Members, the Government seek to do this because they have misdiagnosed the problem. In their mind, it is somehow acceptable to lay the blame at the door of right to buy, as 1.34 million households—children, families, the elderly, the disabled and others—wait for a social home, while every year approximately 33,000 new social tenancies, funded by British taxpayers, go to households where the lead tenant is not a British national.

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[Darren Paffey (Southampton Itchen) (Lab)]

I congratulate my right hon. Friend the Minister on bringing the Bill forward. It is a manifesto commitment, and one that will matter enormously to communities such as mine in Southampton by prioritising the building of social homes and better protecting the stocks we already have. Although we are talking a lot about bricks and mortar, these measures speak directly to whether children have a stable place to grow up, whether survivors of abuse can live their lives in safety, and whether places such as Southampton can offer residents decent, affordable housing as a reality, not a pipe dream.

Our city council manages about 18,000 homes, and there are another 2,500 leasehold and shared ownership properties. It is a huge and valuable asset, but it is an asset under strain, with more than 8,000 people on the waiting list. In that time, families live in overcrowded flats and temporary accommodation, and workers who come and contribute enormously to our city cannot afford a home that is genuinely affordable or secure. Those are the kinds of situations that come up in my surgeries and, I am sure, in those of other Members.

[Sarah Russell]

Does my hon. Friend find, as I do in my patch, that those who are on the social housing waiting list for the longest are often those with a disability who need a fully adaptable home? Does he agree that it is vital, when we spend public money on building new homes, that they should be built to an accessible and adaptable standard from the off?

[Darren Paffey]

I thank my hon. Friend for making that very salient point. That is true in my patch as well, where tenants need homes with adaptations either for themselves or for disabled children, so I hope the Minister is able to speak to that.

Those are all reasons why one of the most important and welcome aspects of the Bill is its central measure to protect existing social housing stock by reforming the right to buy. Since 1980, this country has sold more than 2 million social homes through right to buy and replaced only a fraction of them. I remember growing up in three council homes as a child with my family. I have great memories of the secure home that we had, but I often wonder whether they have been lost to the system.

Southampton has felt that loss directly, and at the same time it is facing rising costs for emergency accommodation for homeless families. The measures in the Bill on extending the qualifying period, on tapering the discount and on exempting new social homes are sensible and proportionate changes. They preserve a genuine route into home ownership for long-standing tenants, while removing the perverse incentive that has, for decades, discouraged councils like mine from building. I welcome the new requirement for private registered providers to give notice before selling a home, so that the council or another provider has a chance to keep it in the social sector. That is a small but practical protection, and one that I will strongly encourage Southampton city council to use.

I particularly welcome the provisions in part 3 relating to survivors of domestic abuse. As other Members have said, a home should be a place of safety, yet for many victims, housing insecurity is what stops them from escaping abuse. That is unforgivable and we must remove that barrier. The measures will make it easier for survivors to remain in safe accommodation. I hope Members across the House are able to unite behind that principle.

Can I ask the Minister to address two questions when winding up? First, how will the Government ensure that the protections translate into a genuine long-term increase in social rented stock in high-demand areas such as Southampton, where waiting lists and temporary accommodation costs are already straining local services? Secondly, what support will be available to local authorities and housing associations to implement the Bill successfully? Legislative reform is essential, but councils need the financial and operational capacity to deliver the outcomes that we are all behind. Will the Department match the ambition of the Bill with the capital investment needed to ensure that authorities such as Southampton, which already carry a decent homes backlog on more than half its stock, can genuinely invest?

As others have said, legislation alone will not solve every aspect of the housing crisis that faces Southampton and the rest of the country, but the Bill takes bold and meaningful steps in the right direction: protecting social housing and stopping the leaks in the bucket; protecting survivors of domestic abuse in their own homes; and giving councils the tools and the confidence to build again. For residents in Southampton and across the country who need a safe, affordable, secure home, that progress matters. That is why I will proudly vote for that progress today.

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[James Naish (Rushcliffe) (Lab)]

I welcome the Bill and the Government’s commitment to a decade of renewal for social and affordable housing. I will use my time to speak on behalf of the villages in my Rushcliffe constituency, and to draw the House’s attention to the work of the Labour Rural Research Group.

Affordable housing is too often discussed as if it is purely an urban and metropolitan problem—it is not, as we have just heard. In villages in my constituency and across rural Britain, families are being priced out of the places they grew up, young people are leaving because they cannot find a home, and the social housing stock that once anchored our rural communities is shrinking, not growing. The LRRG’s March 2026 report, on rural poverty in England, sets that out starkly. In 2024-25, just 17,506 affordable homes were delivered in rural local authorities, compared with 47,256 in urban ones. Rural delivery fell by 2% on the year before, while urban delivery rose. In a significant number of rural councils, only 4% of homes are affordable for someone on an average local income, compared with 10% of homes in urban authorities. That is why I welcome the fact that the Bill already exempts properties in designated rural areas from the right to buy. That principle reflects exactly what the LRRG called for in its report: recognition that rural housing is structurally different and policy needs to treat it accordingly.

However, I will press the Minister to go further in three specific areas. First, on the disposal of rural social housing stock, we would particularly welcome a local replacement guarantee, so that rural communities are not subsidising urban housing waiting lists at the expense of their own when stock is disposed of. Secondly, rural exception sites deliver important housing opportunities in rural areas, but LRRG has called for them to be placed on a statutory footing, alongside the Bill’s right to buy reforms, and for the policy to be strengthened and simplified, so that planning authorities can accelerate delivery. Thirdly, on measurement and targets, as it stands we do not properly track rural affordable housing delivery as a distinct category. The LRRG has called for a dedicated rural affordable housing delivery target, with separate monitoring by tenure type. Without that data, we cannot know whether the policies are working for rural communities.

[Sarah Russell]

Might I suggest that producing social housing that includes flooring as standard is a fourth area in which the Minister could go further? That is delivered by the private market, but it is not a requirement for social housing providers at the moment.

[James Naish]

There are several areas in which we make further interventions to support our rural communities.

The Bill is a good and necessary step. It protects social housing stock, gives greater security to survivors of domestic abuse and reduces unnecessary bureaucracy for providers. However, if we are serious about a decade of renewal that reaches every postcode, rural Britain cannot be an afterthought. I hope that the Minister will look closely at the LRRG’s recommendations as the Bill progresses, so that rural communities are not left behind.