Home Building Target

Debate between Baroness Taylor of Stevenage and Lord Stoneham of Droxford

Tuesday 15th September 2026 Lords Chamber

[Lord Stoneham of Droxford (LD)]

My Lords, I declare my interests as listed in the register. Given the dire state of the housing market, surely the response should be, “Yes Minister”—a very brave Minister retaining the target. Can the Minister reassure the House that to get construction moving, the Government will give priority to encouraging private sector investment in social housing, rather than relying on Help to Buy schemes, which normally end up with higher prices?

[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

I am keen to encourage as much investment in the delivery of social and affordable homes as we can. When I did a workshop on this in the City, there was a great appetite for patient capital investment in social housing. I hope we will be able to encourage that. We have reviewed the Help to Buy system, as the noble Lord, Lord Young, indicated. We are working through whether that is the right way to go. There were some issues with the previous Help to Buy scheme. We continue to explore ways to deliver more housing. Certainly, I would encourage investment in this.

Local Government Reorganisation

Debate between Baroness Taylor of Stevenage and Lord Stoneham of Droxford

Monday 7th September 2026 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

For elections that take place next year, if the programme works through as we anticipate it will, the shadow elections will be in 2028.

[Lord Stoneham of Droxford (LD)]

My Lords, I suspect one of the main reasons why there has been a delay is that not enough attention has been given to the financial viability of these new authorities. In my own area of Hampshire, that is certainly so. I dispute the assertion that opposition parties have not been co-operative in trying to help the reorganisation, but there is an issue about the viability of the authorities. Is the question of viability the problem, or is it more likely that the Government are reluctant to put the resources in that are needed to make them viable?

[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

To answer the last question first, we have already made a significant financial commitment to make sure that this programme works properly. A great deal of attention was paid to the issue of financial viability as we went through the process. We need to make sure we continue to focus on financial viability; it is incredibly important that these councils are financially sustainable. As I have already stated, we have seen that the councils that have already gone into unitaries make very significant savings, so that financial stability is absolutely key to what we are doing on this.

To come back to the original points that I made, we are making a generational change here to local government. We must make sure that we give the certainty to local government that we all want to see and that we create a local government framework across the country that can actually deliver the power and funding we need in every postcode, to see opportunity realised in every postcode in this country.

Social Housing Bill [HL]

Debate between Baroness Taylor of Stevenage and Lord Stoneham of Droxford

Report stage
Monday 20th July 2026 Lords Chamber

[Lord Stoneham of Droxford (LD)]

My Lords, I do not see a particular need to wind up on these amendments. The concession that the Minister has made on Amendment 14 is pretty acceptable, given what is being asked. I was disappointed by her not moving on rural housing, but those are not really my amendments.

Generally, I can see why the Minister is worried about delay and overbureaucratisation, but I am disappointed that she has not been prepared to go further, particularly on the provision of information. Although the information is there, certain aspects are not being collected and it is not being publicised. The Government should have an interest in knowing exactly what is going on here and following through on it. However, having heard the Minister’s response, certainly to my amendments, I do not propose to press them.

[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

The point I was trying to make was that the Regulator of Social Housing is undergoing a complete review of that subject at the moment. I think it is appropriate for us to feed all that into the regulator’s review and let it work out with the sector what information is appropriate.

[Lord Stoneham of Droxford (LD)]

I am very grateful to the Minister for suggesting that, certainly on Amendment 21. In other respects, I am prepared to withdraw my amendment.

Non-Domestic Rating (Chargeable Amounts) (England) Regulations 2026

Debate between Baroness Taylor of Stevenage and Lord Stoneham of Droxford

Wednesday 28th January 2026 Lords Chamber

[Lord Stoneham of Droxford (LD)]

My Lords, this is the last speech that I shall be making after midnight as Chief Whip for the Liberal Democrats, because I am stepping down at the weekend. I hope that the first thing that the next Session of Parliament does is bring in some legislation, or whatever we require, to modernise the hours of this House. It is ludicrous that we are sitting here at this time.

I will not speak for very long, because this SI is aimed at providing transitional relief to support business rate payers as they transfer to the new bills following the 2026 business rates revaluation. It is based on schemes that we have had for some time and has been improved by the Government. We will deal with extra support for public music venues when we look at the SIs on 10 February, so I am not going to go on about the impact of NI with the minimum wage and the rate valuation now. We will look more closely at those issues at that time.

We support the new structure of rates designed to shift the burden from the high street to large warehouses. The only problem that I want to raise is that the Government would do well to publish data on the impact of the revaluation on specific sectors to help analyse the need for targeted support.

[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

My Lords, before I respond to the regret amendment, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Stoneham, for all his work as Chief Whip of the Liberal Democrat group. I am very grateful to him for everything he has done. I know that he will continue to contribute in the House, but we are very grateful for what he has done in that role.

Quite honestly, it was the party opposite that sat on their hands as our high streets crumbled around them for 14 years. Therefore, I find this simply astonishing, and the selective memory on Covid measures, again, is quite baffling. The measures were put in as a response to the situation during Covid. I will respond to some of the points that the noble Lord, Lord Jamieson, made, but I do so in the hope that, at some point, those who were part of the previous Government will have a bit of humility about the fact that we have had to come in and sort all this out, because it was left in such a mess when we took over in 2024.

In relation to the noble Lord’s comments on stealth tax, the retail, hospitality and leisure relief introduced by the previous Government in 2020 is unsustainable and was always temporary in nature. We have ended the uncertainty of that relief and replaced it with permanently lower tax rates for eligible retail, hospitality and leisure properties. We have done this in a way that is financially responsible and sustainable by funding this support from within the business rate system via the high-value multiplier for ratepayers with a rateable value of £500,000 and above.

In relation to further support for high streets, as I set out in my opening speech, the Government have introduced permanently lower multipliers, and we have also provided an expanded supporting small business rate relief scheme to help those ratepayers gradually move from the 2025-26 relief to the new tax rates by moderating their bill increases over the next three years. We went further in the announcements yesterday with the additional 15% relief for pubs and live music venues on top of the Budget package.

Birmingham: Waste Collection

Debate between Baroness Taylor of Stevenage and Lord Stoneham of Droxford

Thursday 24th April 2025 Lords Chamber

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government (Baroness Taylor of Stevenage) (Lab)]

My Lords, Members across the House will be aware of the continuing disruption caused by this industrial action in Birmingham. The people of Birmingham sit at the heart of our determination to see this strike resolved as quickly as possible. I thank Councillor Cotton for speaking with me last week and for providing me with an up-to-date briefing this morning. The work has already begun on clearing up the backlog of street waste, and the council confirmed yesterday that that backlog has now been cleared. It continues to monitor and keep on top of it, and all households are now getting at least one bin collection a week.

Birmingham faces a specific set of circumstances, and no evidence has been put forward that this issue will spread to other cities. According to the National Audit Office, Birmingham saw a 53% decrease in government-funded spending power between 2010 and 2020. We ought to see some sign of recognition of the party opposite’s role in causing the problems that Birmingham has been facing.

The bureaucratic hurdles of the Trade Union Act do not and have not prevented strikes. Our Employment Rights Bill looks to Britain’s future. It is a pro-worker, pro-business and pro-growth Bill and will create an industrial relations framework fit for a modern economy.

[Lord Stoneham of Droxford (LD)]

My Lords, in my experience, it is not helpful to comment on the complexities of a dispute from a distance. However, I am sure everybody in this House supports the view that this dispute should be resolved soon in the interests of the residents of Birmingham and the reputation of Birmingham.

I go back to the previous question. Given the large reorganisation of local government that is in prospect, what are the Government doing to anticipate these sorts of disputes emerging as councils merge in the future reforms?

[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

As I said before, Birmingham faces a specific set of circumstances here. Unite is striking against Birmingham City Council’s decision to reform the unfair staffing structures, and we have to think about the 7,000 women employees of Birmingham who were effectively underpaid. That is what the whole situation that Birmingham has faced has been designed to resolve. Many other councils across the country have already dealt with equal pay issues. They go back a long way in Birmingham and are now in the process of being resolved. I pay tribute to Birmingham City Council and the commissioners supporting it for getting on with delivering this pay structure review so that they can reform it for the future. All councils have had to face this challenge. Most have done so, and we will be keeping a careful eye as we go through the reorganisation programme to make sure it does not impact further on councils that are involved in that process.