Housing Benefit (Abolition of Social Sector Size Criteria)

Yvonne Fovargue Excerpts

Wednesday 17th December 2014 Commons Chamber

[Yvonne Fovargue (Makerfield) (Lab)]

Kindly commentators may say that the bedroom tax is simply an example of a short-sighted, ill-thought-out, thorough administrative mess up, but actually it is worse than that: it is cruel, nasty, and the cause of a great deal of misery and hardship. It springs from the same policy mindset as the belief that food banks are somehow an acceptable part of the social fabric in the 21st century.

The mess-up theorists are right when it comes to how the bedroom tax works, because it does not work. The Government originally said that it was all about addressing overcrowding and freeing up bigger properties for bigger families, but the reality is different. In Wigan there is a real problem in finding tenants for three and four-bedroom houses, and they are remaining empty for long periods. In fact, the voids bill has risen to £1.1 million—double that of last year—because of the time it is taking to fill those properties.

[Andrew Gwynne]

My hon. Friend is making a powerful point. Is part of the problem with the bedroom tax that it was retrospective in nature? Many tenants were allocated those properties and accepted them in good faith. They now find themselves trapped and having to pay bills that they did not foresee.

[Yvonne Fovargue]

Absolutely. It is simply not the case that hundreds of families in Wigan are packed together like sardines, waiting for people with extra rooms to move out. The Government say that it is about fairness and levelling the playing field between those in social housing and those who rent privately who cannot afford spare bedrooms. Again, that is not the case in Wigan where one-bedroom properties are much rarer and people in the private rented sector can have a spare bedroom without paying for the privilege. That is because—contrary to the myth perpetrated by Government Members—the local housing allowance does not exactly work in the same way. It was not introduced retrospectively, and it is based on the average rent in an area for the size of property. Therefore, if a family can find a larger property that remains within the LHA rate, they can rent it with no penalty, as can be the case in Wigan.

Even if it were possible for a family to move easily to a smaller property, what would be the consequences? After all, a “spare”, or to put it crudely, “extra” room measure takes no account of disabled people’s adapted homes, foster parents who need rooms to take children in, separated parents who share custody of a child, or the grandparent in my constituency—as I know, grandparents are not always pensioners—who looks after her daughter’s child while she works nights. She would have to move.

[Kerry McCarthy (Bristol East) (Lab)]

I have had situations in Bristol where the housing department has decided that someone needs a second bedroom, but the housing benefit people have said that they are eligible for the bedroom tax. On one hand it is judged that someone does need an extra room, but on the other they are told that they have to pay for it. Is that not grossly unfair?

[Yvonne Fovargue]

Absolutely, and that is the problem with a discretionary payment. Do we really want people to move every time their circumstances change? Let us look at it logically. A young couple move into a one-bedroom flat. They have a child so they move to a two-bedroom flat. Then they have another child. The children start school and can share a bedroom for a certain time, but when the first child is older the family move again to a three-bedroom property. Then, when the eldest child is 18, they move back to the two-bedroom flat. Then they go to a one-bedroom flat. Is that not a sure way to break down communities, take away social cohesion and spoil children’s education just when they need it? However, that point is academic, because, as I said, there just are not the properties available for people to move around like that. People are not chess pieces.

Perhaps the Government know that. This is not really about overcrowding, but saving money. Even by that yardstick, however, it still does not work. The Department for Work and Pensions assessment has been downgraded a number of times. It now appears that the cost of dealing with the debt, eviction, abandonment of properties and widespread misery and mental health problems caused by this pernicious tax might mean that cash savings are minimal or non-existent.

[Lilian Greenwood]

Will my hon. Friend give way?

[Yvonne Fovargue]

Not at the moment.

Debt, eviction and widespread misery are what we are talking about. They are the result of the Government’s reform. People have not been given a choice. If they cannot move to a property with fewer bedrooms, they have to make up the rent difference themselves. For tenants in Wigan, the financial impact ranges from nearly £10 a week to nearly £25 a week, or £1,273 a year. That is a lot of money to find on a low income. As I said, they cannot move because there is a shortage of housing, so they have nowhere to go, are staying put and building up debts. One clear consequence of the policy is the build-up of rent arrears. Figures from my constituency demonstrate that 44% of under-occupation households were in arrears in March 2014. The amount of arrears from the 3,319 households was £381,000, with £225,000 solely attributable to the under-occupation charge. That is not a good outcome for a local authority trying to balance its budget, and it is not good for the people themselves, who are at risk of being evicted because they simply cannot find the extra money to pay their rent. It is bad for tenants and it is bad for the councils that are trying to balance compassion with getting the money in. The only alternative to building up debts is to cut down on essentials, such as heating and food. I think we can certainly conclude that the bedroom tax has played its part in pushing people towards food banks, which have surely become the defining image of the Government in their dying days.

It is not too late for the Government to do the right thing and scrap this cruel and unfair tax. It has not given them what they wanted—budget savings—and has not helped to end overcrowding or make our housing system fairer. All it has done is to make poor people more stressed and desperate, living with the constant uncertainty of discretionary housing payments. I stress the word “discretionary”, because there is nothing certain about them at all. The human cost of the policy does not justify any savings that may have been made. I urge Government Members to look at that at Christmas and vote with the Labour party.