Stephen Williams
Main Page: Stephen Williams (Liberal Democrat - Bristol West)
Heidi Alexander (Lewisham East) (Lab)
2. What plans he has to increase the supply of social rented housing.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government (Stephen Williams)
We will deliver 165,000 new affordable homes in the three years from 2015. That will be the fastest rate of delivery of affordable homes for at least 20 years. This is on top of the 170,000 new affordable homes that we are on target to deliver by the end of this Parliament.
Heidi Alexander
I asked the Minister about social rented housing, not just affordable housing. The truth is that this Government do not want to build social housing; they want to decimate it. Will he tell me why the number of social rented homes being built in London last year was roughly one tenth of the number being built in the capital in 2009?
Stephen Williams
I am afraid that the hon. Lady is completely wrong. The last Government allowed the stock of social housing in both categories to dwindle completely. We will be the first Government to leave office at the end of a Parliament with a greater stock of affordable homes, including council houses, than there was at the start, including in the borough of Lewisham and many other boroughs around the country. Today the Secretary of State and my right hon. Friend the Chief Secretary to the Treasury have published the prospectus allowing for £300 million of extra borrowing capacity for local government to build new homes.
Henry Smith (Crawley) (Con)
Will my hon. Friend join me in congratulating Crawley borough council which is building hundreds of social and affordable houses in the new Forge Wood neighbourhood? This is in stark contrast to what happened under the previous Labour administration.
Stephen Williams
I will certainly join my hon. Friend in congratulating Crawley council on its record. I stress yet again that this Government are committed to building new affordable homes, including social homes—[Interruption.] The hon. Member for Lewisham East (Heidi Alexander) shakes her head, but I remind her that the latest statement on housing policy from her own party says that it wants 100,000 new affordable homes, of which half would be shared ownership, 35% would be affordable and only 15% would be social rented homes. She should have a word with those on her own Front Bench.
Emma Reynolds (Wolverhampton North East) (Lab)
This Government’s first decision on taking office was to cut the affordable homes programme by 60%, and they have also watered down section 106 agreements for social homes. Was it a surprise to the Minister that last year they built the lowest number of homes for social rent for more than 20 years, or was that in fact the Government’s plan?
Stephen Williams
I do not recognise those figures. This Government are committed to a very ambitious programme of building affordable homes, including social homes, with 170,000 over the course of this Parliament and 165,000 already planned for the first three years of the next Parliament. That represents the fastest rate of building in 20 years. As for section 106 agreements, the hon. Lady well knows that they are a matter for local government to negotiate at local level, subject to local market conditions.
Emma Reynolds
It is a shame that the Minister does not recognise the Government’s own figures. The truth is that this Government are not building social homes: Labour councils across the country are out-building Tory and Lib Dem councils. Those Labour local authorities are being prevented from building even more social homes because one in four tenants affected by the bedroom tax is in arrears for the first time. Does he recognise that the bedroom tax is not only cruel but counter-productive? Is his party now against it? If this Government will not scrap it, we will.
Stephen Williams
There are several questions wrapped up in one there. The spare room subsidy is not a tax, although clearly there are a range of opinions on that issue. The housing benefit bill had reached £23 billion by the time Labour left office and that was an unaffordable forward commitment for any party, including the hon. Lady’s, which promised in its last manifesto to tackle overspending on housing benefit. All taxpayers would want to make sure that that money is spent wisely and not on subsidising spare bedrooms for people who do not need them.
Gavin Shuker (Luton South) (Lab/Co-op)
3. What assessment he has made of the effect on local authorities of recent changes in the proportion of local authority funding that comes from revenue support grants.
Grahame M. Morris (Easington) (Lab)
8. If he will grant additional planning protection for pubs that are listed as assets of community value.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government (Stephen Williams)
We have made it clear through the national planning policy framework that local planning policies and decisions should guard against the unnecessary loss of valued community facilities such as pubs.
Grahame M. Morris
The Minister has said that pubs are valued community assets and part of our national heritage, but even if a community has declared its support for a local pub by listing it as an asset of community value, the owners can still demolish it, or convert it to a supermarket or betting shop. What will the Minister do about that, because surely it is at odds with his localism agenda?
Stephen Williams
Various proposals are in place to give added protection to pubs, such as the scheme for assets of community value. If a pub is to change hands in a sale, that gives the community an opportunity to protect those assets. Local authorities can use the national planning policy framework to supplement their local plans, and Cambridge and the royal borough of Kensington and Chelsea are doing just that.
Meg Hillier (Hackney South and Shoreditch) (Lab/Co-op)
In my constituency, the Chesham Arms was listed as an asset of community value, but the owner tried to convert it into offices, just as my hon. Friend the Member for Easington (Grahame M. Morris) has described. When is the Department going to make sure that its policies do not clash in that ridiculous way to undermine what was a good policy on assets of community value?
Stephen Williams
I am glad that the hon. Lady has said that the assets of community value scheme is a good policy. Its purpose is to protect the community when there is a sale of a building of importance to the local community; it is not a planning policy to protect against change of use. Local authorities need to use the planning tools at their disposal for that, such as their own local plan or an article 4 directive, which several local authorities, including Lewisham and Camden in London, have done successfully.
Mary Macleod (Brentford and Isleworth) (Con)
9. What steps his Department is taking with the Department for Education to encourage the development of schools on former brownfield sites.
Julie Hilling (Bolton West) (Lab)
16. What assessment he has made of the effect of recent changes in local authority spending on youth work budgets.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government (Stephen Williams)
Local government accounts for a quarter of all public spending, so it must clearly share the burden of reducing the deficit that this Government are trying to bridge. We expect councils to make sensible savings, such as cutting waste and bureaucracy, not taking the lazy option of cutting front-line services, such as youth work.
Julie Hilling
But youth services up and down the country are being destroyed, even though local authorities have a statutory duty to provide or procure youth work. So what is the Minister doing to ensure that local authorities fulfil their statutory duty?
Stephen Williams
I understand that several local authorities are being innovative in their approach to discharging that statutory duty—for instance, placing their youth service in a social enterprise, where it might be provided more efficiently, or working with volunteers. My Department has a multi-million-pound programme in place via Youth United to find many hundreds of volunteers who are needed to run many of the youth services that flourish in all our constituencies.
Sir Andrew Stunell (Hazel Grove) (LD)
20. What further steps he is taking to increase the supply of social housing.
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government (Stephen Williams)
As my hon. Friend will know, as a former Minister in this Department, the Government have one of the most ambitious programmes of delivery for affordable and social homes of any Government, and I pay tribute to his party in setting that programme in train.
Sir Andrew Stunell
I thank the Minister for that somewhat disarming answer. Will he join me in congratulating Stockport Homes on opening its 4 millionth social and affordable home for rent? Does he see that as a really stark contrast with the performance of the Labour Government in reducing the housing stock by more than 400,000?
Stephen Williams
I was delighted to join my right hon. Friend in his constituency just before Christmas to open a street of new social homes in Stockport. It is certainly the case that this Government, at the end of this Parliament in 2015, will be the first for generations to leave more social and affordable homes in stock than we found five years ago in 2010.
Nigel Adams (Selby and Ainsty) (Con)
21. How his Department is supporting self-build projects. [R]
Gordon Henderson (Sittingbourne and Sheppey) (Con)
T4. A number of houses in my constituency were built by a small building company where serious breaches of building regulations have recently been discovered. This shoddy building work was signed off by independent building control inspectors over whom my local authority appears to have no influence. Will my right hon. Friend take steps to ensure that local authorities are given powers to force independent building control inspectors to ensure that there is proper compliance with building regulations?
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government (Stephen Williams)
Approved building inspectors do, of course, have that duty to inspect buildings as they are constructed, often through spot checks. If the hon. Gentleman has a specific allegation, I suggest that he write to me so that my officials can look at it and advise him on the course of action that may be available.
Graeme Morrice (Livingston) (Lab)
T2. Nine in 10 disabled people are cutting back on household bills in order to pay the bedroom tax, and many are now falling into rent arrears. If the Secretary of State were in their position, would he fall into debt or cut back on heating or even eating?