Private Rented Sector Database Regulations 2026

Lord Jamieson Excerpts

Wednesday 28th October 2026 Grand Committee

[Lord Jamieson (Con)]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for introducing this SI. It follows the Renters’ Rights Act 2025 and establishes the detailed requirements for the Government’s new private rented sector database, as the Minister said. They also introduce fees for registering and renewing property entries with the amount to be determined by the database operator, although it has already been suggested that this will be £65.

On this side of the Committee, we fully support the principle that tenants should be able to tackle rogue landlords and have access to safe and decent accommodation, which is why the previous Conservative Government brought forward our own proposals for a private rented sector ombudsman. However, we were very clear, during the passage of the Bill, that this database needs to be user-friendly and light-touch; it needs to enable electronic data entry and minimise unnecessary bureaucracy. The Minister herself gave us assurances that this would be the case. This comes down to our fundamental request: we need a database that works. The noble Lords and the noble Baroness who have spoken have expressed a great deal of concern that the database does not work. These concerns were echoed in the submissions to the Secondary Legislation Scrutiny Committee, which has drawn the SI to the special attention of the House.

I welcome the fact that the department has committed to continuing to work with the sector to make continuous improvement. The question remains: can it get it working in the first place? Can the Minister tell us why the Government have not halted implementation of the system until it can be fully piloted, so that the recommendations can be implemented and the sector and tenants can have confidence that it works?

This SI comes at the time of a housing crisis. Are the Government aware that they are already driving landlords away? The latest Rightmove survey shows that there are 2% fewer properties for rent nationally—with a particular issue in London, where there are 9% fewer rental properties and where rents have risen by 3.2%. This is before today’s announcement of higher taxes on landlords. Even the OBR is forecasting long-term increases in rents.

It appears that the database is not fit for purpose. While it may work for a few individual landlords, insufficient consideration has been given to the practical requirements of large-scale, professionally managed rental businesses or the role of agents. As my noble friends Lord Fuller and Lord Howard of Rising said, large landlords will be required to register properties individually, entering up to 70 separate data points for each home. That may work for a landlord with one or two properties who knows what they are doing, but it does not work for a landlord managing, say, 3,000 properties. As my noble friend Lord Fuller suggested, we could be talking about 200 days of work just to register those properties; that is an extraordinary figure for a system that is supposed to simplify and modernise the regulation of the private renter sector.

Private landlords already face extensive regulatory obligations, including gas and electrical safety requirements, energy performance standards and, where applicable, property licensing. These regulations require much of the same information to be provided again through a central government database. Why are landlords being asked to enter information that the Government already hold on existing databases?

During the passage of the Bill, the issue of simplifying and consolidating was raised frequently by many noble Lords. The Government claimed that the system for bulk uploads will not offer time savings and that integration will better meet the needs of stakeholders as described. The purpose of digital government should be to reduce duplication, not institutionalise it. Can the Minister explain what appropriate integration with existing property management systems will look like? Can she assure the Committee that this will be fully implemented and trialled before the database is rolled out?

I am also concerned about the severely limited role that letting agents will be permitted to play in the registration process. As the noble Lord, Lord Best, mentioned, landlords rely on professional letting agents to manage both their properties and their regulatory obligations, and to ensure that they comply. Under the proposed system, landlords themselves must initiate and complete the registration process, with agents permitted to provide only certain information on their behalf. This is particularly difficult to understand, given that the Government’s impact assessment assumed that letting agents would register properties on behalf of the landlords. For agents managing thousands of properties, this will mean repeatedly returning to individual landlords to initiate registrations, obtain access and secure further information. Can the Minister explain why professional letting agents cannot be authorised to manage the entire registration process on behalf of their clients, as they do with many other regulatory requirements?

As my noble friend Lord Fuller mentioned, this whole plethora of passwords being shared between different people, properties and so forth raises significant cyber security issues. What happens, when a person at a large landlord or agent leaves, to the hundreds or thousands of passwords and databases that they have to share? Are they shared across businesses?

Can the Minister also assure the Committee that not every individual property under landlords and agents will require its own registration and password, as proposed? This is an obvious burden and a financial one too, and it is on top of the £65 registration fee that, as has already been mentioned, is not a one-off but an annual fee. These costs of additional bureaucracy, time and so forth will simply be passed on to tenants. Can the Minister tell the Committee to which metrics the fee will be pegged? What safeguards exist to prevent this becoming an unsustainable cost? The proposed system lacks the necessary integration to automate changes.

We also raised concerns regarding potentially significant fines. As has already been described, this is a bureaucratic nightmare. The risk of unintended, innocent, data-entry errors is significant, yet the landlord faces a potential £7,000 fine for each one of those errors. That is unreasonable. We need to get the database system working. As others have said, the whole aim of the Bill is to remove rogue landlords; it should not make the life and processes of genuine, good landlords so difficult that rogue landlords can hide in the background. This seems especially punitive considering that the Prime Minister has now introduced a system whereby parking fines can be appealed on the basis of an honest mistake.

As my noble friend Lord Howard of Rising raised, the current system provides an alternative for landlords, as they can create their own database, print out the necessary forms and send them on to the department. Many large landlords may find that simpler, because they are able to maintain their own database and assure themselves that it is up to date; they are able to update it electronically and provide their own reports, which they just fire off the printer. They send thousands of forms to Marsham Street, as my noble friend Lord Fuller said. That cannot be the right way of doing things.

In many parts of the country, there is a desperate shortage of private rental housing. Yet, whether an individual landlord or a large-scale corporate landlord, the Government continue to make being a landlord more difficult, thus reducing the incentive to become a private landlord. This is already having an impact on the market: not only are we seeing landlords exiting, but I am told by the development industry that the private build-to-rent sector has stalled. Ultimately, it will be tenants who will bear the consequences at a time when we urgently need more homes to rent.

It makes little sense to introduce a database that is not fit for purpose, driving up administrative costs, which will discourage the very investment that is needed to increase supply. I ask the Minister: why does the database not allow the bulk input of information? Why can apartment blocks not be registered where there is a single landlord? Why is there not API integration from day one? Why is the database not linked to other government databases? Why does the fee structure not reflect the different types of landlord? Why can agents not input information on behalf of their clients? Why is there not a longer transition period? Most importantly, has the database been piloted? If so, what were the lessons from those pilots? If not, when will it be piloted?

We support effective regulation, but regulation must also be proportionate, practical and properly implemented. The objective should not be to drive responsible landlords and investment out of the sector. When introducing a database, it must be practical, must work and must have been trialled. I hope that the Minister will consider these points.

[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

My Lords, I thank all of the noble Lords who have contributed to the debate on this statutory instrument this afternoon.

First, I want to tackle an issue that has been raised many times: the testing of the database. In fact, we have been engaging with landlords, including organisational landlords, in user research and testing since 2023 on a database; as the noble Lord, Lord Jamieson, said, that was because his Government had considered doing this before. We have been formally testing since May this year. In testing with organisational landlords, almost 90% reported the service as easy or very easy to use, and 80% rated the registration guidance clear or very clear. We have taken note of all the comments that have been made as we have gone through this testing process. We have made improvements to the database according to those comments and, of course, we continue our dialogue with the sector. We have not just jumped into this in the past two weeks, as has been suggested by some contributors.

It is very important that we have transparency for both tenants and councils; the noble Baroness, Lady Thornhill, referred to this. We need to keep the database accurate and up to date, which is why we have asked for annual updates: some databases fail where you update them only if you have a change. This is an annual prompt to change it. Noble Lords will be very familiar with their registration of interests, which we have to update; we get a prompt to update that regularly. That is the point of having an annual update.

I will go through some of the issues that noble Lords have raised, some of which were raised by more than one Peer. I say to the noble Lord, Lord Howard, that our department remains willing to discuss this with anybody who wants to how the database may operate, so, to pick up his question directly, we are of course willing to do that.

A number of noble Lords—in particular, the noble Lords, Lord Fuller, Lord Howard and Lord Jamieson—raised the fee and asked why it is higher than the initial £20 estimate that we gave. The £65 fee is needed to fund a national database that is fair, sustainable and capable of supporting effective enforcement. All landlords will be required to pay the annual £65 fee for each property they register on the database. The fee is charged per property, so landlords will need to pay the fee each time they register a different property.

The fee has been set at a level that balances fairness and sustainability for landlords with the cost of operating the database and tackling non-compliance in the private sector; that last point is equally important. The fees will support activity to identify and act on non-compliance with the Renters’ Rights Act 2025 reforms. That includes funding to help councils have the staff and skills they need to identify and tackle non-compliance and to drive landlords who persist in breaking the law out of the sector. When we talked to the many landlords to whom we spoke during the course of the then Renters’ Rights Bill, they were just as concerned as the rest of us about driving out those rogue landlords, because they do not do the sector any good at all and undercut some of the really decent and good landlords that we have.

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

I am happy to take back that feedback. The point about paying in one go is fair. It was my understanding that that could happen, but I will take that back and respond to the noble Lord, Lord Fuller, in writing, if that is okay.

The noble Lords, Lord Fuller and Lord Jamieson, raised the security of the database. That is important. We are all concerned about cyber security. The database has been developed with security and privacy at its core, using established government and cyber security standards. The department is assessing the database against the National Cyber Security Centre’s cyber assessment framework, and the database will also be subject to penetration testing to identify and address vulnerabilities before and during operation. We are working with the department’s data protection officer on the necessary data protection work, including an impact assessment, data-sharing arrangements and privacy arrangements for landlords, local councils and agent users. The database will also use monitoring tools to help identify potential vulnerabilities and support ongoing security assurance.

The noble Lord, Lord Fuller, talked about the potential duplication with selective licensing. The database will not duplicate or replace selective licences, because the two systems have entirely different purposes. The national database will provide consistent information about private landlords and rental properties across England, supporting transparency, compliance and local authority enforcement.

Selective licensing remains a targeted local tool used by councils to address specific local issues through more intensive proactive enforcement—for example, anti-social behaviour and those types of issues. We recognise the important role that licensing can continue to play where it is used appropriately, and we will continue to review how licensing and the national service interact as implementation progresses. Organisational landlords will use the GOV.UK One Login service to log in and authenticate. This is a service widely used across government and is built in accordance with government technology standards.

The noble Lords, Lord Best, Lord Howard and Lord Jamieson, all asked why letting agents cannot register on behalf of landlords. One of the key goals of the database is to improve landlord awareness and capability, and requiring landlords to initiate registration directly supports that by ensuring that they engage with their legal responsibilities from the outset. Letting and property agents will still be able to support landlords by providing certain information once the landlord has started the registration process. Where an agent agrees, the landlord will be able to delegate the provision of specific tenancy health and safety information to them.

Responsibility for ensuring that the registration requirements are met will remain with the landlord throughout. Letting and property agents will not have a mandatory role in registration and will not be separately registered through this database. I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Best, for his response on the regulation of property agents and I will feed that back to my right honourable colleague in the other House.

The noble Baroness, Lady Thornhill, asked about what data will be published. This instrument does not decide what information will be published; the public-facing database will be brought forward through secondary legislation once the initial rollout period is complete. At that point, tenants will be able to access necessary and proportionate information about landlords and rental properties, including some of the issues that the noble Baroness referred to about landlord enforcement actions that have been taken. We will carefully balance the benefits of transparency with landlords’ privacy rights, safety concerns and data protection requirements.

The noble Baroness, Lady Thornhill, also asked how to identify landlords who do not register. When the public-facing database is available, tenants and others will be able to tell the database that their rental property is not registered, as they will be able to check. That can be passed on to the local housing authority.

To conclude, this instrument is the practical next step in delivering the PRS database. It sets the registration framework that landlords, local authorities and the database operator will need as regional rollout begins. By doing so, these regulations will support landlord compliance, strengthen local authority enforcement and give tenants better information about the homes they rent. I beg to move.

[Lord Jamieson (Con)]

May I follow up on a couple of points that the Minister made? She talked about testing the database, and I appreciate the comments she made about how it was the Conservatives who started looking at a database. My point is to try to understand what testing has been done.

I know that a number of noble Lords on this side, and presumably the Minister herself, will have received a lot of emails from large landlords, various groupings of landlords and so forth, raising these sorts of issues. Clearly, they are not happy if they have been part of the testing system. Has this been testing where an individual person is trying to import a single property? I think that we largely acknowledge that the system could work reasonably well for that. It was different for multiple properties or for where a landlord was not very familiar with all the regulations and so forth and was reliant on their agents. It would be very interesting if the Minister could give a bit more information about whether this involved bulk-inputting of property.

The Minister slightly glossed over the key point here by saying, “You could cut and paste”. I know that we have all filled in forms by cutting and pasting, but that still means having to go individually into each form to cut and paste—and believe me, from past experience, that is where you get more errors.

[Lord in Waiting/Government Whip (Lord Katz) (Lab)]

For an intervention at the end of a speech, this is getting a bit long now, so perhaps the noble Lord could conclude.

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[Lord Jamieson (Con)]

I am afraid that this is quite an important issue, and a number of issues have been raised. We are going to get a lot of data problems here.

My point about an apartment block, again, is that most of those apartments may not be the same or identical, and they have to be registered individually, but there needs to be an ability to provide bulk information and then have separate individual registrations. We do not disagree with that. Otherwise, as I have said before, the risk is that there will be hundreds of repeated entries. Could the Minister clarify that real question: why is this not being tested in the real world—not offline testing—where agents would have bulk entries and so forth?

[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

There has been a lot of testing going on since 2023. If the noble Lord is happy with this, I will get some more information about how the testing has worked, what has been tested and so on. However, the figures were fairly outstanding —we had an 80% rating of “clear” or “very clear” on the registration guidance; and 90% reported that the service was “very easy” or “easy” to use—but I can give more detail about how this was tested, if that would help. I will get the noble Lord some more information on that.

It is not in the Government’s or landlords’ interest and certainly not in the tenant’s interest—at the heart of this is enabling tenants to have access to more transparent information—for this database not to work. So we have made sure that it works before its implementation in December, and we will continue to work with the sector to improve it as we go along.

[Lord Jamieson (Con)]

It may have had 90% acceptability among the people who used it, but my key point was: who?

Motion agreed.

Home Building Target

Lord Jamieson Excerpts

Tuesday 15th September 2026 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

There are a number of issues that we need to address. One is the rural homes exception, which we have thought about. Local authorities need to make sure that they have enough rural housing in their local plans. We need to make sure that we have rural homes exception policies, so that local people can determine what housing is built where. There is also the issue of making sure the services are there to support rural housing. All these issues are important, and we must bring those together as we make sure there is sufficient housing in rural areas.

[Lord Jamieson (Con)]

The Minister frequently trumpets the Government’s £39 billion social homes programme as a means of accelerating housing delivery. Can she tell the House how many social homes will be completed and occupied by July 2029 through this grant? Would she categorise that figure as a firm commitment or a “slim chance” target, as the Secretary of State describes the commitment to 1.5 million new homes by July 2029?

[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

I say it is a great investment, because it is an enormous investment in social and affordable housing. Significantly, the previous Government left us in a housing crisis, so I will not take any criticism from the other side about investing in social housing. The funding that Homes England is committing now will deliver 73,500 homes via strategic partnerships. The GLA intends to offer allocations of at least £8 billion and will set out shortly the number of homes it expects to achieve through the initial allocation. We will consider whether a national central government target or ambition is appropriate in this regard.

Representation of the People Bill

Lord Jamieson Excerpts

2nd reading
Monday 14th September 2026 Lords Chamber

[Lord Jamieson (Con)]

My Lords, as usual I declare that I am a councillor in Central Bedfordshire. There are positive aspects to this Bill, as outlined by my noble friend Lady O’Neill at the start. However, there are also many deficiencies, and I thank the many noble Lords who have raised such issues as the age of maturity, representation of British citizens abroad, the lack of true engagement, not addressing social media and the risk of bias in these donation rules. There is not time for me to debate all these issues today, so I am going to focus on some of the Bill’s contradictions.

The Minister has said the Bill will address loopholes in donations. However, it fails to address one of the most glaring loopholes. As confirmed by the Minister in a Written Answer, Chinese, Iranian and Russian citizens on the electoral roll in Scotland and Wales can make uncapped donations, whereas in England foreign nationals cannot donate, other than certain EU and Commonwealth citizens who are not entitled to vote. Is it right to limit the amount British nationals can donate while allowing Chinese, Iranian and Russian nationals living in Scotland and Wales on a temporary basis to make donations?

The Bill seeks to address unregistered voters through auto-enrolment and a modified reduced threshold. Have the Government truly thought through the implications of this? In an increasingly mobile society, the scope for errors is significant and the bureaucracy involved potentially huge. There is already an obligation for everyone contacted by an ERO to respond and verify their eligibility. Now we have the reverse situation. They will be on the electoral roll unless they prove that they are not eligible. Students or contractors who frequently move address could end up with multiple registrations and in many instances may not even be aware. You may say that this does not matter, but it does. The robustness of the electoral roll is fundamental to election integrity. The electoral roll is also used for other purposes, such as credit and fraud checks. The Bill is also not clear on what an ERO needs to do to find all these potential new voters, and I would appreciate the Minister giving clarity on this matter.

The Bill will also water down the integrity of voting. Photo ID is working. Why do we need to introduce a less secure form of ID? A bank card is not a secure form of ID, as the Electoral Commission has made clear. By way of an example, my father and I share the same name. How will a poll clerk differentiate us? Yet even the mildest scrutiny of a driving licence would establish that we are different people. In fact, there are an estimated 2,000 J Jamiesons in the UK. The Minister is not here at the moment, but she is even more popular than me, with an estimated 12,000 S Taylors in the UK. I would appreciate the Minister explaining how this improves integrity of voting.

Finally, I will address two issues this Bill is not addressing. First, the fragmented nature of electoral law causes significant issues of operation and interpretation, as my noble friend Lord Hayward has said today and previously many times. It is overly complex and conflicting. Do we really need another Bill that adds to that complexity? Secondly, according to the Electoral Commission, as has been mentioned by one or two other noble Lords, two-thirds of candidates faced abuse at this year’s local elections, which I can attest to from personal experience. We support robust debate, but if good people are unwilling to stand, if candidates are restricted in campaigning, if politicians are constrained in what they say from fear of abuse, it fundamentally undermines democracy and harms our country. We support the measures in this Bill to protect election officials and candidates, but much more needs to be done. In particular, why is online abuse and misuse of AI not a greater priority?

Home Owners and Home Ownership

Lord Jamieson Excerpts

Thursday 10th September 2026 Lords Chamber

[Lord Jamieson (Con)]

My Lords, I first declare my interest as I am still a councillor in central Bedfordshire. I thank my noble friend Lady Eaton for bringing forward an essential debate on housing and home ownership. It has been quite an enlightening debate across the House. I think there has been quite a lot of agreement and I would not say disagreement but puzzlement because, as the noble Baroness, Lady Thornhill, rightly says, this is a very complex issue. It will require trade-offs and there is no simple solution. I do not think anyone knows what outcome we all desire. There are so many different outcomes, whether it is housing numbers, affordability, security of tenure and so forth.

However, I think we can identify the biggest problems. Housing is the single biggest cost facing most families. It puts enormous pressure on household budgets. Too many people are living in overcrowded accommodation, paying too much rent or mortgage and increasingly unable to live anywhere near where they work. My noble friend Lady Eaton gave some statistics about how many people would like to own their own home. I will not repeat them, but there are some other good statistics from that survey. Some 65% of people believe it is harder to buy or rent today than it was for their parents, and 62% believe that housing is on the wrong track.

Many noble Lords, including my noble friend Lady Seccombe, the noble Baroness, Lady Paul of Shepherd’s Bush, and the noble Lord, Lord John of Southwark, raised the benefits of being able to own their own home and how it helped them or people related to them in their lives. We are unashamedly the party of home ownership. We recognise that not everyone will want to buy—that is perfectly legitimate—but everybody should have the opportunity to do so. Those who rent should have access to affordable, secure alternatives.

Sadly, this situation has deteriorated since Labour came into power. One-year mortgage costs have risen from around 5% to 5.7% and average rents are up 10% to £1,450 a month. This is not simply a housing crisis; it is a growth crisis. Building homes creates jobs, investment and economic activity, but the wider economic benefit is even greater. If people can afford to live close to where they work, businesses can recruit more easily, productivity improves and our towns and cities become more vibrant.

Look at London, as raised by the noble Lord, Lord Jackson of Peterborough. Rents for a two-bedroom flat in central London are above £2,000 a month. Someone needs to earn close to £100,000 a year to be able to afford to live in the centre of our capital city. That is not realistic. Alternatively, people face a punishing daily commute or overcrowding. Is it any wonder that London is losing its appeal as a destination for graduates and skilled workers?

We have repeatedly debated housing in this House. Since Labour’s election, every time I speak on this subject the position appears to worsen. The Government talk about building 1.5 million homes, but this is an ambition; it is not delivery. Delivery fell again last year, by 3%, to around 200,000 homes. By contrast, the last Conservative Government delivered their target of 1 million homes in four and a half years. The pipeline is getting weaker, as others have mentioned. Only 1,220 sites for private housing received planning permission in England in the first quarter of this year, down from the 2,000 sites approved in 2022.

When I first became a councillor in 2009, my priorities were about improving services, rebuilding the local leisure centre, reducing costs and fixing potholes. Those things all matter, but I quickly learned that in the long term nothing is more important than planning, than building great communities, good housing, infrastructure, local jobs, schools, leisure, public services and beautiful homes, as mentioned by the noble Baroness, Lady Hodgson of Abinger, and my noble friend Lord Gascoigne.

We have all seen the transformative effects of successful regeneration, whether it be King’s Cross, Brindleyplace in Birmingham or Kidbrooke Village in Greenwich. The Minister has on occasion suggested that I am a little too focused on London and brownfield development. I make no apology. Yes, there will be need for development on greenfield land, but our greatest missed opportunity is the failure to build enough homes in our towns and cities where there is the greatest demand. MHCLG’s own figures show that two-thirds of local authorities failing to meet the housing delivery test of 75% are essentially urban areas, and 21 of London’s 33 boroughs are also failing this test. The housing crisis is particularly acute in London. Since 2016, the number of households in temporary accommodation has increased by 50% to 76,000. There are more statistics, but we do not have the time.

The cost of building has also soared. It is not one regulation or levy: it is the cumulative effect of layer upon layer of additional costs, building levies, landfill tax, building safety requirements, Section 106, the future homes standard and others. That is not to say that any one of them is not valid in its own right, but the cumulative effect is clear: the Home Builders Federation estimates that the cost of building a low-rise home has increased by £76,000 since 2020. The Government argue that that will be reflected in lower land prices and so forth, but that ignores the reality. The problem is particularly acute on brownfield land, where remediation and build costs are often higher and the land value has higher alternative use. If we genuinely want to regenerate our cities, gentle densification of urban areas is essential. We must make brownfield land viable. We cannot load so many costs on to a development that the finished product costs more than people can afford. Manchester is an example: the council and the mayor recognised the need for compromise, including on affordable housing targets, and homes were built.

The principle is simple. If you want more affordable homes, the cost of building them must be below the price that people can afford to pay, whether to buy or to rent. The Government need to change direction. You cannot tax your way to growth, as my noble friend Lord Fuller said. The Social Housing Bill will undermine the right to buy—one of the greatest engines of social mobility that we have seen. If the proceeds are reinvested, this will also drive more housing and more availability of social housing. The Renters’ Rights Act risks yet more landlords leaving the sector, reducing supply and putting upward pressure on rents while undermining the build-to-rent sector.

By contrast, the Conservatives have proposed positive measures, such as removing stamp duty on housing—as mentioned by my noble friends Lady O’Neill of Bexley and Lord Evans of Rainow—which would free up the market and reduce the cost of buying your home. It is not just the deposit; when you have to find another £20,000 for stamp duty, buying a home gets even more difficult. Removing stamp duty would allow people to do what we used to do: buy a very cheap one-bedroom studio somewhere that is maybe not the most salubrious location and move up the housing ladder. That is no longer possible with stamp duty.

Finally, the Government should stop distracting councils with top-down local government reorganisation. We warned that this would consume local authorities’ time and resources, and that the Government’s proposals would not work. I am sad to say that we have been proved right not once but twice—please do not prove us right a third time. Will the Government commit to reviewing the burdens placed on urban brownfield development? Will they look at what support they can give buyers, such as Help to Buy, and when will they publish the report they commissioned on Help to Buy?

On the grey belt, will they ensure that those commitments in the NPPF are held to by developers, and that they do not walk back from them on the basis of viability? The Minister committed to a shared ownership review, which—as we discussed during the debates on the Social Housing Bill—if done properly, is another great way to get on the housing ladder. When will the Government move forward with that review and publish it? Is there a timetable?

Britain does not need more targets—it needs delivery. It needs homes people can afford in places where they want to live and work. It needs a planning system that enables rather than obstructs development, and a Government prepared to remove the burdens that make new homes unaffordable. If we get housing right, we do more than solve the housing crisis; we unlock growth, improve productivity, strengthen communities and give the next generation something that too many are being denied today: the chance to call a home their own.

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[Lord Jamieson (Con)]

Before the Minister sits down, may I just clarify a couple of things? First, there was a lot of discussion on planning and there was some recognition that some of the things in the NPPF—not necessarily all—are positive. The biggest issue now is not just getting planning permission but the viability of the site. The Minister did not address that issue, other than mentioning a temporary measure in London. If it is not viable to build in London, then it is not viable not just on a temporary basis. Will the Government consider extending that? What else will they do, as I mentioned in my contribution, to make sites viable, possibly by reducing these levies and regulations on sites?

Secondly, if the Minister wishes me to share with her the full calculations of how we would fund the stamp duty cut, then I would be happy to do so.

[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

My Lords, we continue to have active discussions with the sector on viability. There are elements in the National Policy Planning Framework that look at that, and we continue to debate this very important issue. The immediate crisis was in London, and we worked with the mayor and his team to introduce measures that we hope will help with that. Homes England is looking at it as well, so we continue to explore that.

We have to be careful about broad statements about how we are going to cut away at the welfare bill. It is easy to say we are going to chop the welfare bill and do this, that or the other with the money. It is when it comes to actually saying which bit of the welfare bill you are going to cut that the difficulties start to arise.

Nature Restoration Levy Regulations 2026

Lord Jamieson Excerpts

Thursday 3rd September 2026 Lords Chamber

[Lord Jamieson (Con)]

My Lords, I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Taylor of Stevenage, for her introduction to these regulations and my noble friend Lord Roborough for his amendment and thoughtful words. I also thank other noble Lords who participated in this debate for their thoughtful words. I think there is universal agreement that these regulations do not work.

We all want to see our natural environment preserved, but people also need somewhere to live. There are 1.34 million people on council waiting lists. Homes in many parts of England are simply unaffordable, with the average home costing 10 times average London wages. For private renters, rent is taking an increasing proportion of household income, about 40% in England and nearly two-thirds for some of the lower-income households. The situation is worsening, with Pepper Money estimating that there are 220,000 fewer rental properties as landlords exit the market following the Government’s Renters’ Rights Act.

We have a housing crisis, but the Government continue to make the situation worse. Despite their commitment to build 1.5 million new homes, only 200,000 were delivered last year, down 4% on the previous year. By contrast, the Conservatives delivered 1 million homes, as promised, over the last Parliament, and that included the impact of Covid. The Government continue to increase the burdens on housebuilding, which ultimately increases the cost to home buyers and renters. It is not just any one regulation or levy but the continual layering of additional burdens: the building levy, landfill tax, high-rise building safety, Section 106 and the future homes standard, among others. The Home Builders Federation estimates that the cost of building a low-rise home has increased by 76,000 since 2020.

It is easy to say that this should be reflected in the price of land, but often the value is simply not there, particularly for brownfield land. With the poor economic outlook and increasing interest rates, people cannot afford higher house prices or rents. If the cost of building is greater than the sales price, homes will not be built, and I fear that in many areas of the country we are approaching that point.

We do not dispute that harm to nature must be managed, mitigated and compensated for. It is a crucial consideration for any planning application, but people also need somewhere to live. During debates on the Planning and Infrastructure Bill, mitigation hierarchy, viability and mandation were discussed and assurances sought by this House. We need developments to provide infrastructure, whether it is schools, roads or health facilities, as well as affordable homes, but these regulations risk cuts to these in order to make sites viable.

My noble friends Lord Fuller, Lord Roborough and Lady Coffey all raised the effectiveness and efficiency of Natural England. Do we really want it to be judge, jury and executioner, setting the policy, determining whether it has been met and then setting up its own schemes and levies with no accountability? Do we want it to be able to create its own monopoly and eliminate competition, as in the Solent, mentioned by the noble Baroness, Lady Parminter?

The Minister has said that Natural England will be accountable to the Secretary of State, but is it realistic that the Secretary of State will be able to evaluate fully the financial effectiveness of every EDP and all the potential competing schemes that are being eliminated for it, not to mention the needs of every single site that might be affected by it? I am not sure that this is realistic. The Minister has said that this will not be an obligation on developers. However, the regulations are littered with words such as “obligation”, “imposed”, “mandatory” and “enforcement”.

We must also reduce our reliance on major housing developers, yet it is the smaller developers which will be most exposed to the individual costs and levies of these regulations. What assurances can the Minister give that viability will be a core part of these regulations; that schools, infrastructure and affordable homes will not lose out; that Natural England will not be able to impose a mandate; and that consideration will be given to SME builders, with recognition of the need to prioritise brownfield? As my noble friend Lord Randall of Uxbridge pointed out, when will we see the impact assessment of these regulations?

We need a balance between the need to preserve our environment and the need for housing. Regulators need to be accountable.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lord Jamieson (Con)]

Before the Minister sits down, can I just clarify a couple of comments that she made? She was very clear that there would be an option as to whether one went with the Natural England EDP. Can we be absolutely clear that that will always be the case, particularly when Natural England is marking its own homework and deciding whether the mitigation put in place by a developer, whatever that is, is sufficient or not? Secondly, she said that it would be mandatory only in very specific situations and gave the example of an EDP that was specifically brought forward for a particular large development. Can she be clear that that is the only instance in which it would be mandatory? Thirdly, I think she said that developers cause pollution. I believe additional housing results in additional burdens on nutrient neutrality; it is not necessarily that the developer itself is polluting. The Minister might want to clarify that one.

[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

I will clarify that, in all but exceptional circumstances, EDPs are voluntary for developers. The Planning and Infrastructure Act establishes that Natural England can recommend that use of an EDP be mandatory only where it deems it to be necessary. This is a high legal bar, and it would ultimately be for the Secretary of State to consider whether an EDP is made. Given that the vast majority of EDPs will be voluntary, if an EDP is not a viable, competitive or attractive option, developers will continue to use existing routes to meet their obligations, limiting the ability of Natural England to deliver the wider environmental benefits that the NRF is designed to achieve.

We want to make this process work better for nature while continuing to allow the growth we all want to see take place, particularly housing growth. There is no doubt in my mind that we could not carry on as we were. We have had to make some changes to make sure that we protect our natural environment and get the growth we want to see.

Building Safety Levy (Amendment) (England) Regulations 2026

Lord Jamieson Excerpts

Wednesday 2nd September 2026 Grand Committee

[Baroness Pinnock (LD)]

My Lords, first, I wish to welcome the noble Baroness, Lady Blake of Leeds, to her new role. I look forward to working with her; I am sure that we will agree on some occasions, maybe more than most. Let me say right from the beginning that we Liberal Democrats accept the technical changes in this SI, because in effect that is what they are. The amendments are sensible, practical and entirely necessary to prevent any chaos following the levy’s coming into force in October.

The positive changes to which the noble Baroness, Lady Blake, has referred are important to remove the loophole of previously developed land. Developers are very good at finding loopholes, so that is important. The spot check and having a strict notification period are also important, as well as separating purpose-built student accommodation from being classed alongside residential. That is positive and we support it.

The Government have set a target of raising £3.4 billion, which is good. However, they are planning to raise this over 10 years. In the first year, the levy raises zero. In the second year, it raises—these are estimates I found from, I think, the Office for Budget Responsibility—just £55 million. By the fifth year, so in 2030-31, it will raise £395 million a year, so over the first five years it will raise just £1 billion of the £3.4 billion that it is estimated to raise. I guess there will be reasons for that, but it is unlikely to raise significant sums in the first couple of years.

Once you have in mind that that is how the funding is going to be and that it will be five years before anything significant comes into the coffers to support remediation, you say to yourself that the Grenfell Tower tragedy was nearly 10 years ago and the Government are still having to find ways of raising sufficient funds to pay for remediation on top of the £5.1 billion, I think, that they have put aside. About 50 major developers have signed up to a scheme to fund it. The Minister has just said that there is no justification for buildings to remain unsafe, but 46% of buildings have not even had work started on them.

Although the levy is important, and I accept the positive changes that are being made, the lack of urgency in all this is worrying, especially if you live as a leaseholder in one of those blighted apartments. I say “blighted” because, if you are a leaseholder waiting for flammable cladding to be removed or safety defects to be remedied, you are stuck in that flat because you cannot sell or remortgage. You are stuck. That is 10 long years, more so when this levy is coming to light.

I have some questions for the Minister. Considering that only £1 billion will be raised in the first five years, who will then fund any of the schemes that would be funded under this levy? How will they be funded? Presumably, nobody is going to say, “You can’t get on and do it because we haven’t got the money coming into the coffers just yet”. Is there any way that the Government could find to accelerate the scheme so that more funding comes in in the first five years? That would give leaseholders some hope. My next question is also about leaseholders. Despite the Government’s best efforts, which I support, some of them are still finding that freeholders and management companies are putting some of the costs on to service charges. How can the Government get the message out to leaseholders that that is not right and that they can go to First-tier Tribunals to challenge it?

I have said all along in this terrible situation that the one group of people who are completely innocent is the leaseholders. They do not even own the bricks and mortar; they lease the space in between the bricks and mortar. They should not be paying anything. Anything that the Government can do to protect them further would be welcome. Having said that, I support what is in the statutory instrument.

[Lord Jamieson (Con)]

My Lords, I also welcome the noble Baroness, Lady Blake, to her role on the Front Bench. It is great to see her. I remember the number of times that we stood on opposite sides in the LGA. We move on, and we are still in the same relative position.

I thank the Minister for bringing forward these regulations to make corrective amendments to the levy regulations introduced last year. We recognise the need to make buildings safe—it is important—and the role that the levy plays in that, and the need for clarity. I agree with the noble Baroness, Lady Pinnock, who rightly raised the time it is taking to make these buildings safe and that, in effect, people are trapped within them. Recently, on the Social Housing Bill, we raised the issue of shared ownership, which is in a particularly egregious position.

We welcome some of the changes: the earlier deadline for the authorities responsible for collecting and administering the levy to notify the person who is liable of an information check. But can the Minister confirm that authorities will have the capacity to meet these earlier deadlines? The Government have also made the decision not to take forward an extended exemption threshold for major residential development in the levy regulations. Can the Minister please expand on the rationale behind this decision?

I want to touch on something else, because we have a housing crisis and a shortage of housing, and we are not building enough. The regulations include amending the definition of a previously developed site, whereby 75% of the land has to be previously developed. The SI now clarifies the treatment of fixed-surface type infrastructure and unlawful operations and excludes wholly underground buildings from the definition, as well as underground parts of buildings, from the 75% calculation. As I understand it from the impact assessment, this will result in an increase in charges to developers, as less brownfield land comes within the scope of the 50% discount to the standard rate. I do not know how to interpret that, so I would appreciate it if the Minister could clarify it and the level of the increase.

We have said on many occasions, and I believe that there is support across the House, that we should prioritise brownfield development. Ostensibly, this discount prioritises brownfield development. However, given that the levy relates to the value of property, its impact is greater on brownfield sites in urban areas of high value, such as London. While the revised impact assessment suggests that this will be taken off the land value, in practice, much of the additional cost will be factored into the sales price and borne by the purchaser. This is particularly so on brownfield land, where the existing use is obviously not subject to these costs. Indeed, many alternative uses, such as retail, care homes and data centres, would not be subject to this cost.

Social Housing Bill [HL]

Lord Jamieson Excerpts

3rd reading
Tuesday 1st September 2026 Lords Chamber

[Lord Best (CB)]

My Lords, I will add a Cross-Bench voice to the thanks due to the Minister and the Bill team, not just for listening in numerous meetings to the case made for a series of amendments that we proposed but for the actions being taken as a result. As I can testify from many years of trying to improve the housing Bills that come before us, change seldom follows directly from the adoption of an unaltered amendment accepted by, or imposed on, the Government. But change can be achieved none the less, and in this Bill, thanks to commitments made by the Minister, progress has been forthcoming on a range of important issues.

The value of these improvements, which will be embodied in better guidance from government, statutory instruments that contain the small print and, yes, some government amendments, should not be underestimated. They include better-defined exemptions for right-to-buy sales in rural areas, pressed for by the noble Lord, Lord Cameron of Dillington, and me; additional protections for tenants in domestic abuse cases, championed by the noble Baroness, Lady Neate, and her supporters; better practice for those losing their social housing because police advice has been to leave accommodation targeted by violent gangs; a longer timescale for housing associations to notify local authorities before selling off precious social housing, achieved after several fruitful meetings involving the Chartered Institute of Housing, the Local Government Association and others; and clarification of the law to enable social landlords to gain access to properties to carry out safety checks, but only after meeting strict conditions for assessing vulnerability for tenants, giving adequate notice before entry and so on, as advocated by the tenant representatives of the G15 residents’ group.

The Bill has led to a whole range of significant changes, mostly non-legislative but effective none the less, thanks to the Minister listening and acting—not least in response to the Cross-Benchers’ representations. This is much appreciated.

[Lord Jamieson (Con)]

My Lords, I trust that everyone has had the opportunity to recharge their batteries over the summer, as I see that we have a rather busy schedule over the coming few months. The Recess provided an opportunity to reflect on the Bill. As mentioned by my friends in the Liberal Democrats, despite being named the Social Housing Bill, its real focus has been to restrict tenants’ rights to buy their own homes. We oppose that approach.

Right to buy has been one of the greatest drivers of social mobility this country has ever seen, enabling millions of families to build capital and stand on their own two feet. We are the party of opportunity, while it seems the party opposite and others favour increased state dependency. We on these Benches believe that combining right to buy with a one-for-one replacement policy with 100% retention of sale proceeds, as introduced by the last Conservative Government, would see increased availability of social homes and deliver the new homes that we all want to see.

With 1.34 million people on council housing waiting lists, we have also sought to address how the current stock of 5.3 million social homes is managed—cracking down on fraud, reducing underoccupation, encouraging those who can afford it to move on and, as the noble Baroness mentioned, looking at greater transparency. This move could free up hundreds of thousands of social homes for those British citizens truly in need.

We pursued amendments to address the problems within shared ownership. I thank my noble friend Lord Young of Cookham for his work in this area. We appreciate the Minister’s commitment to look at this, but I am at one with my noble friend in saying that more needs to be done. This is a key area.

We strongly welcome the Government’s commitment to tackling the issues that domestic abuse victims face in the social housing system. This House discussed its practical implementation.

Finally, I place on record my sincere thanks to the Minister for the time she has taken to engage outside the Chamber and for the considerable work she has done in steering the Bill through the House. Her professionalism has been greatly appreciated across your Lordships’ House. I thank my noble friends for their support over the many hours in this Chamber and all noble Lords who have engaged generously throughout. In particular, I thank my noble friends Lady Scott of Bybrook and Lady O’Neill of Bexley. I also thank those not in the Chamber—Amrita, Richard, Hannah and Henry—who all provided considerable help. I thank all the staff and doorkeepers. Fortunately, this Bill was not quite as long and strenuous as some of the other Bills we have debated.

The Bill may not deliver the housing that our country needs, but our debates have shown that your Lordships’ House remains committed to addressing this issue.

[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

My Lords, I echo the noble Lord, Lord Jamieson, in welcoming everyone back to the House. I omitted to do that when I stood up earlier. It is great to be back here. If the noble Lord thinks this Bill has been a bit less painful, I remind him that we have the elections Bill next; I look forward to those debates.

I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Thornhill, for her comments. She is quite right that this is a very narrowly scoped Bill. The title might perhaps suggest otherwise, but the reason it has been so narrowly focused is that there is a complete review of the allocations process going on simultaneously, and those things can be changed without going through a primary legislation route.

The noble Baroness was right to refer to both shared ownership and rural issues; both are things that we are still debating. The noble Lord, Lord Young, also raised the issue of shared ownership. The department looks forward to further discussions with him as the Bill makes its progress through the Commons. I will be happy to meet him at any time to try to move this on.

I thank the noble Lord, Lord Best, for all the work he did during the passage of the Bill, particularly around access for safety issues. It is key that our housing providers are able to access. We put a lot of stress on them in insisting that their properties are safe, and they need support to do that. There is more work to be done before we can move that forward.

The noble Lord, Lord Jamieson, and I have fundamental differences about the purpose of this Bill. Our Government are not withdrawing right to buy—we do not think that is the right thing to do—but the fatal flaw in the right-to-buy process was not replacing those properties. There are towns such as mine where we went down from over 30,000 council homes to 8,000; that has been a big generator of some of the housing issues that we have seen over the years. This Bill aims to make sure that we get the balance right in giving people the opportunity to buy their own home without impacting unnecessarily on that housing supply. The issues around fraud and underoccupation that the noble Lord mentioned can be dealt with outside legislation; I know that councils are looking at that all the time as well. I am grateful for all the contributions that have been made.

Greater Cambridge Development Corporation (Establishment) Order 2026

Lord Jamieson Excerpts

Wednesday 22nd July 2026 Lords Chamber

[Lord Jamieson (Con)]

My Lords, I make the House aware of my potential interest as a councillor in central Bedfordshire, which neighbours this area. I support my noble friend Lord Lansley in his amendment. I was going to say how important Cambridge is to the economy of the UK, but I think the noble Lord, Lord Smith of Finsbury, has done a far better job than I can. It is an absolute critical part if this country is going to be successful and have the growth that it desperately needs. However, Cambridge is hamstrung by a lack of housing, infrastructure and commercial space for biolabs, technology and so forth. You have a town of around 150,000 which every day, according to the 2021 census, has 55,000 commuters coming in—bearing in mind that that was during Covid, the actual number is probably far higher—largely by car.

The Government are right that Cambridge needs to grow. That is why I was pleased that the last Government progressed with east-west rail, the A14 dualling and the A428 Caxton Gibbet to the A1, but there is much more to do. Cambridge, as I said, needs more housing, lab space and commercial space. It also needs to work with other areas of the wider geography. It is not just the Ox-Cam arc; it is the golden triangle, spanning Oxford to Cambridge to London, which is a global powerhouse in technology and biotech among others. It encompasses the Minister’s Stevenage, and it has central Bedfordshire at its geographic heart.

A DCO can be a useful delivery mechanism, but it needs to be one built on local support, functional geography and democratic accountability. It must have clear outcome-based objectives, with resources and powers linked to those outcomes. The Minister mentioned the negative instrument which is to come that will outline those, but I feel that is very much the cart coming before the horse. If you are going to look at the organisation, you need first to know what it will do and what its powers are. Then there is the question of local government reorganisation, as the noble Baroness, Lady Pinnock, mentioned. We may set up a geography here only for it to change completely in a few months’ time.

The issue of geography is very important. Major projects and developments just outside the proposed area could have huge impact. Tempsford new town is potentially almost as large as Cambridge itself. Around junction 13 of the M1, we have the new town in Milton Keynes, we have a large data centre, we have Universal and we have the Marston Vale development, which will have a huge impact, particularly on east-west rail, the M1 and east-west corridor travel. Then we have things such as the A1 realignment. That needs somehow to fit all together as a package.

Several noble Lords talked about planning powers. Clearly we need to know what the geography is when we look at the planning powers. If you are going to have a much bigger strategic overview, you should not have detailed planning powers. If you are going to have detailed planning powers, that raises the question: why can it not just be based on a council-led DCO rather than a centralised national DCO, or even a mayoral DCO?

I talked about resources. We have heard about a lack of water and we have talked about a lack of electricity. I know from my experience that development in Biggleswade could not go ahead until we had additional power, and there is a constant refrain of a lack of water. What powers will this DCO have over things such as Great British Railways, Anglian Water, highways and the electrical and power companies, not to mention east-west rail? Will it have defined outcomes and targets? Will it have a clear division of responsibilities between the DCO organisation, the local councils and others? I want to be clear on this because the Minister talked about strategic sites, and we discussed this during the passage of the planning Bill. Is “strategic” above nine houses? Is it above 500 houses? What size of development is it? I think many people have a different view of what strategic is.

Many have mentioned democratic oversight. How does central planning in government centralised body fit with the new Prime Minister’s promotion of devolution? I believe the answer will be the creation of so-called structured forums for local residents, but what are the details? What will their statutory status be? How will members be selected? What powers will they possess? How will their views influence decision-making? How will Ministers be held accountable if those views are ignored? It is for these reasons that I support my noble friend Lord Lansley in his amendment and look forward to the Minister’s response.

Local Government Reorganisation

Lord Jamieson Excerpts

Tuesday 21st July 2026 Lords Chamber

[Lord Jamieson (Con)]

My Lords, I thank the Minister for the opportunity to ask questions on this Statement. On these Benches, several of us have run unitary councils. We recognise the potential for improved efficiencies and better delivery for residents. However, that must be done on the basis of genuine communities and geographies, at a scale capable of delivering meaningful efficiencies and with the true consent of residents.

The Government set out clear principles at the beginning of this process: a scale of around half a million people, respect for existing boundaries and local consent. Yet looking at the proposals before us today, it is difficult to conclude that those principles have been applied in practice, with populations ranging from nearly 700,000 down to 170,000, the breaking up of existing district councils, and a lack of local support and consent.

Rather, the common thread that seems to run through the proposals is a focus on the needs of largely Labour-run city councils to the detriment of the rest of those counties. The Government have accepted the proposals of Leicester, Lincoln, Nottingham, Oxford, Plymouth and Exeter, among others, despite unanimous opposition from the remaining councils in those areas. Is this just about rescuing badly run Labour councils and facilitating cities shifting their housebuilding to the neighbouring green fields?

I highlight Devon, where the expansion of Exeter and Plymouth is necessitating the break-up of several district councils and will leave what can best be described as an orphan Devon coast and countryside council. This will be a unitary for a population of only 260,000 but spread over a vast rural area, stretching from Kingsbridge on the north coast to Sidmouth on the south coast—a journey of two hours or so by car, and a similar journey from east to west. This is setting up a council to fail. The situation is similar in Leicestershire, Lincolnshire, Oxfordshire and Nottinghamshire. As my honourable friend in the other place, the shadow Secretary of State, said, this appears to be gerrymandering for political benefit, not delivering for residents.

Ministers have repeatedly stated that councils should meet the standards of transparency, consultation, good governance and sound decision-making. Yet many communities and councils are asking themselves, have the Government applied those standards to themselves in reaching these decisions?

Having run a unitary council with a population of just under 300,000, I know that scale truly matters in key services such as adults’ and children’s social care and services such as highways, which will represent nearly 80% of the expenditure of these new unitary councils. We succeeded because we were well-run, but it was a struggle. No doubt my noble friend Lady Scott will tell Members here about the success of Wiltshire Council, which had the benefit of being substantially larger.

Breaking up counties into smaller units of 300,000 or less will cause significant dis-synergies, particularly following government funding cuts for many councils. How many more councils does the Minister expect will require exceptional financial support as a result of these changes? And that is before the impact of the disruption, as councillors and officers focus on the uphill of reorganisation, exacerbated by the break-up of district councils, rather than doing the day job of focusing on delivering for their residents.

It is particularly striking that these concerns are not confined to this side of the House. In the other place, Liberal Democrat Members have complained about things being “done to” and not “done with”. Even Labour Members themselves have objected to decisions affecting their own areas. Others have questioned why coherent communities were being split, why some selected proposals appeared not to meet the Government’s own criteria and why areas with such strong local identities are being carved up to fit the new structures.

Devolution should be about empowering local communities, not imposing structures from Whitehall. Reorganisation should be a means to an end, not an end in itself. If local government reform is to command public confidence, at the very least it should be transparent, consistent and demonstrably fair.

Can the Minister therefore explain why the Government departed from their original principles on population size, retaining boundaries and financial sustainability? What objective criteria were applied when choosing between competing local proposals? Why were proposals that split established communities or transferred areas into expanded city authorities preferred over alternatives? Have the Government truly examined the impact on the delivery and viability of those essential social care services that support some of the most vulnerable in our communities? What steps will the Government now take to reassure communities that these decisions have been taken in the interests of effective local government rather than political convenience? Can the Minister assure the House that these proposals are financially viable and will not result in the need for more exceptional financial support? Lastly, what will be the impact of the almost inevitable issuance of JRs?

[Baroness Pinnock (LD)]

My Lords, there are some deeply worrying elements in the Statement. First, it was issued on the final day before the Commons Recess. A momentous decision of that purport should be the subject of detailed scrutiny but that has been deliberately avoided. Secondly, the announcement has been made by a Minister who then resigned from the Government—it was his final throw of the dice. So this announcement is discredited before the details are even considered.

I trust that the new Minister for Local Government will make it her first task to reconsider the implications of these decisions. It is imperative that Angela Rayner does so, because the decisions that have been announced fail to meet the test of enhancing devolution and democracy or of creating new local authorities that will be financially sustainable. The claim is that creating unitary authorities will put an end to two-tier councils, but, at the same time, the Government intend to create an additional tier of local governance in the shape of mayoral authorities, so two tiers will remain.

The decisions that the Minister made about the boundaries are controversial. Some have described them as gerrymandering, and there seems to be no other explanation in some instances. For example, Devon, which has already been referenced by the noble Lord, Lord Jamieson, has been divided into four authorities—three are relatively small councils in geographical terms, based on Plymouth, Exeter and Torbay, each with a population of around 300,000, and the fourth is the rest of rural Devon, with a scattered rural population with no obvious centre—but Gloucestershire is to have one council serving a population of 670,000 people. Can the Minister explain how this huge range of population sizes is consistent with the parameters that were set by the Government or with creating genuine local democracy?

The argument made in the Minister’s Statement is that there will be 3,000 fewer councillors. From my perspective, it is shameful to be proud of reducing the number of elected representatives. Democracy has to enable electors to feel that they have access to local decision-makers and can influence local decisions. Reducing the number of councillors means increasing the size of wards and making councillors more remote from the people they represent, so, on the test of enhancing democracy and enhancing devolution, these decisions have failed.

Then there is the claim that there will be cost savings by having fewer councillors and fewer council officers. That is a claim that government always makes, but it is not supported by facts. For example, in Devon, the previously single social care model for the whole country will be required to divide into four units, and financial benefits of the model will drop sharply. Very large councils of over 400,000 population see costs per head rise and the financial benefits lost, yet the Government have created several councils way above the 400,000-population size.

The Minister may be able to explain the financial argument with details omitted from the Statement, and I look forward to that if she has those details. In the Statement, the Government have admitted that they have failed in the task of making decisions on Cambridgeshire & Peterborough and West Sussex. When will those decisions be made? Meanwhile, the timetable for electing councillors for the new unitaries is set for May next year, while in some cases ward boundaries will have to be reviewed because of the way the boundaries for the new unitaries have been drawn.

Democratic representation is vital for communities. In England, each councillor will on average represent 3,000 electors. In France, that number is nearer 200 and in Germany it is 400. This Statement represents a retrograde step and a lost opportunity to revitalise local democracy.

Social Housing Bill [HL]

Lord Jamieson Excerpts

Report stage
Monday 20th July 2026 Lords Chamber

Moved by

[Lord Jamieson]

1: Clause 1, page 1, line 6, after second “years” insert “subject to subsection (A2)”
Member’s explanatory statement
This amendment, and another in the name of Baroness O’Neill of Bexley, seeks to extend the transition period for the commencement of provisions in clause 1 in relation to secure tenancies.

[Lord Jamieson (Con)]

My Lords, we begin with the amendment standing in my name and that of my noble friend Lady O’Neill of Bexley. As we discussed in Committee, the right to buy has brought transformational benefits for 2 million families across the country. I do not wish to focus on the benefits to those who access right to buy, as I believe that case is inarguable, but rather I wish to debunk the argument against right to buy, which has focused on the loss of social housing.

Let me first be clear that we believe in one-for-one replacement or better, which was why I was pleased that the last Conservative Government introduced 100% retention of right-to-buy proceeds, which enabled councils, including my own, Central Bedfordshire, to deliver more council housing than was lost through right to buy. If this could spread across the country, there would be no loss of social housing. This should be the focus of the Government: delivering one-for-one replacement, not seeking to deny the opportunity to some of our most disadvantaged families to own their own home, which has proven to be one of the greatest mechanisms for social mobility in this country.

I turn to why right to buy can increase access to social housing. Some might find this counterintuitive, so forgive me if I get a little into the weeds. I refer to the Government’s impact statement, in particular to table four on page 24, which shows that, in 2026-27, the pre-November 2024 baseline was 8,050 right-to-buy sales supporting some 5,450 replacement homes. That is the “do nothing” scenario. It also shows that, once the restrictions are fully in place from this Bill and the legacy impacts wind down in the period 2031 to 2035, annual right-to-buy sales are projected to fall to around 1,100 a year, with around 1,450 replacement homes.

I applaud the Government’s ambition for one-for-one replacement—in fact, rather better than that—but, despite that, by the Government’s own analysis, there will be 4,000 fewer new social homes funded every year, or 6,600 if there were a one-for-one replacement. The Minister has argued that more social homes will be retained and, yes, there will be around 3,000 per year. Notwithstanding that this assumes a failure to deliver one-for-one replacement, I would like to examine the impact of this figure, because it ignores a critical factor. Retaining a social home does not mean that it is available for a new tenant. The family still live there; it is just that they have been denied the opportunity to own their own home.

Based on figures from the House of Lords Library, around a net 3% of social homes become available each year for new tenancies, so, of the 3,000 additional homes that are retained, only around 90 would be available each year for a new tenant. Compare that with the 4,000 new social homes if the current right to buy were to continue. The cumulative impact over 10 years would be 35,000 fewer families having the opportunity to own their own social home and, if the Government focused on one-for-one replacement, 65,000 families. As we discussed in Committee, when we are having a housing crisis, this will result in 4,000 fewer homes being delivered every year. Can the Minister explain how denying a home to 4,000 families a year fits with the Prime Minister’s announcement this afternoon about eliminating homelessness?

That is why we have tabled amendments which seek to retain important features of the existing framework, including qualifying arrangements, discount provisions and other safeguards that have formed part of the scheme for many years. Amendments 1 and 2 would protect those who are already secure tenants when the legislation comes into force. The principle is straightforward: existing tenants accepted their tenancy with a legitimate expectation that, after three years, they would become eligible for right to buy under current arrangements. It is one thing to change arrangements for future tenants; it is quite another to make retrospective changes for existing tenants. This is about fairness and a fair transition.

Finally, Amendment 6 is in my name and that of my noble friend Lady O’Neill of Bexley. The Government are proposing to retain a right of first refusal in perpetuity for the local council whenever a right-to-buy property is sold by the owner. The current position is 10 years, which seems proportionate. Perpetuity is a very long time. This raises multiple questions about inheritance, redevelopment, long-term blight and evidencing many years after the event that you actually did offer it. This is bad law and risks inevitable problems for the future.

There is a simple choice before us. Do we support aspiration? Do we support the opportunity for families to own their own home? Do we support increasing the availability of social housing for those on council waiting lists? Do we support building more homes in a period of housing crisis? Or, for ideological reasons, will the Members opposite deny tenants the opportunity of home ownership? Will they deny those on council waiting lists the opportunity of a secure and affordable social home, while cutting housebuilding? We should not seek to stop right to buy. The better approach would be to strengthen replacement, reinvestment and local delivery. I beg to move and look forward to the Minister’s response.

[Lord Cameron of Dillington (CB)]

My Lords, I have Amendment 7 in this group and must once again refer to my interests as a retired member of a Somerset farming family which lets some houses on the farm.

During the passage of this Bill, I have explained how the shortage of affordable housing to rent in rural areas has had and continues to have long-term social and economic consequences for our communities. It has led to school, shop and pub closures and reductions in transport and other services—quite apart from the effect on the viability of local businesses. Traditional family and social networks have collapsed, and all this has been caused by a lack of affordable housing to rent in our countryside. We must protect this stock, both where it remains and where, hopefully, it is soon to be added to. I will not say any more about all this because your Lordships have heard it all before and I have had support from noble Lords on all sides of the House.

I thank the Minister and her team for meeting to discuss our concerns about how the strict interpretation in how Section 157 of the 1985 Housing Act was implemented resulted in over 60% of rural parishes being excluded from the exemption to the right to buy. Thus 60% of all rural parishes remained exposed to the near certainty of losing their council houses—and they did. We must not let this happen again. The problem was, and remains, that in the 1985 Act, Section 157 regulations require that local authorities apply to the Secretary of State for rural area designation of their rural parishes: that is, parishes that have a population below 3,000, with less than two persons per hectare. The problem was and is that few local authorities applied. Most local authorities did not realise that this was a requirement, had transferred their stock to a registered provider or did not have the resources to put together the necessary evidence. The point is that they did not apply and therefore we lost 60% of conforming rural parishes.

At our meeting with the Minister and her team, we all agreed that this must not happen again—hence my amendment, which I tabled in Committee and repeat here. We also agreed that it was not strictly necessary for the definition of a designated rural area to be in the Bill. Therefore, I agreed not to press my amendment to a vote, provided we had some sort of undertaking that, at least in the short term, all parishes that fitted the criteria could be included, whether or not their local authority had made an application following the 1985 Act. It would be unfortunate, to say the least, if the Government merely rolled over the post-1985 list of parishes with designated rural area status. I am counting on the Minister to reassure me on that point.

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On the basis of the reasons that I have set out and the reassurances I have given, I ask that noble Lords do not press their amendments.

[Lord Jamieson (Con)]

My Lords, I should have declared at the outset that I am still a council member in Central Bedfordshire.

This debate has highlighted a number of important issues concerning the future of right to buy. I thank the noble Lord, Lord Cameron, for raising the issue of access to rural housing. I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Jones, and my noble friend Lady Coffey for raising the issue of transparency, which is important, and my noble friend Lord Fuller for raising the issue of retention of local receipts.

However, I return to my main theme, which I discussed earlier. Right to buy and recycling the receipts from it gives an opportunity for people to own their own home. It enables the building of more social housing and reduces the housing list, because a new home is 100% available: you do not have to wait, on average, 30 years for that house to become available. It also increases the housing stock of this country. That is win-win-win. Stopping right to buy is lose-lose-lose. It stops aspiration. It will mean longer council housing waiting lists and fewer homes being built. It is particularly egregious that those who are already secure tenants will be denied the opportunity to buy their own home after three years, something that they could reasonably expect to do.

I am therefore still minded to press my Amendment 1 and its consequential Amendment 2, because this is about fairness and opportunity. On these Benches, we think this is an important issue and we wish to protect it. I would like to test the opinion of the House.

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[Lord Best (CB)]

My Lords, for once I rise to oppose—at least in part—an amendment in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Young of Cookham: Amendment 77. I want to defend the concept of providing secure social housing tenancies for life. The review proposed in Amendment 77 envisages five-yearly reviews of whether a tenancy should continue, with the possibility of a consequent requirement for a tenant to move elsewhere if their circumstances have changed sufficiently. This would engender a constant state of uncertainty and insecurity for every social housing tenant.

Apart from the administrative overload, to which the noble Baroness, Lady Thornhill, has drawn attention, I suggest there are some powerful reasons why denying social housing tenants a secure lifetime tenancy is likely to have undesirable consequences. First, the section of the Housing and Planning Act 2016 that has not been introduced to date, and which the Bill intends to repeal, would have required social housing tenants to pay a higher rent if their income improves. In theory, this would pressurise tenants to move on into the private rented sector or, less probably, to buy their own home elsewhere. I maintain that no regime should penalise tenants in social housing who improve their position in life by working hard and earning more. They should not be expected to pay for their success by facing higher rents. A system of rising rents for rising incomes brings disincentives to work longer hours, or even to work at all.

Secondly, if a tenant leaves subsidised housing because their improved financial position has meant a penalty in their rent, what happens if they have a reversal of their fortunes? The PRS property to which they have moved will no longer be affordable on their now reduced income, but it would be virtually impossible for them to regain a social home lost in this way.

Thirdly, if tenants are pressurised to move out of social housing and into private renting when their personal circumstances improve, they are likely to encounter the problem that their income will drop on retirement. A market rent that was affordable when they were working can swiftly become unaffordable when they are retired. The taxpayer will then get lumbered with a further increase in the housing benefit bill.

Fourthly, keeping households on an estate of social rented housing, despite their circumstances improving, has social and community advantages. A mixed-income estate that includes some tenants on rather higher incomes means successful neighbours providing role models for other families, often demonstrating community leadership for resident-led activity.

Fifthly, if tenants are encouraged or compelled to move out when they do well, those who remain could be stigmatised as losers and failures. This stigma can seriously affect children’s life chances, as American research into concentrated poverty has revealed.

Finally, there is the argument that tenants should be compelled to move on if they no longer need the space they are occupying—for example, if they have a spare bedroom. For this, the bedroom tax presents a case study. This reduction in housing benefit was intended to incentivise underoccupying tenants to move out but, in reality, very few of those facing the bedroom tax proved willing or able to move. Rather, the withdrawal of benefit from those with a spare room has served only to reduce the incomes of those affected. It has seldom been possible for the downsizing tenant to find a suitable home elsewhere. They have simply been made poorer through losing some of the housing benefit that previously covered their rent.

Instead, carrots rather than sticks have been shown to work in persuading older tenants to downsize into later living homes, such as a cluster of smart new apartments that replaced redundant garages on a council estate. Rather than pressurising elderly tenants to downsize, the incentive of a more suitable home—nearby accommodation that is more accessible and manageable —produces better results for everyone.

For all these reasons, I caution against a review that considers alternatives to secure-for-life social housing tenancies. These alternatives are likely to diminish the quality of life for tenants, especially measures that pressurise tenants unwillingly into an enforced move. Like most of us who are home owners, tenants in social housing thrive on the knowledge that they are secure in their own homes for as long as they choose.

On Amendment 78, I do not support the unhelpful provision in the Housing and Planning Act 2016 to terminate fixed-term secure tenancies, which has never been implemented. This Bill is right to repeal that measure and preserve long-term security of tenure for social housing renters.

[Lord Jamieson (Con)]

My Lords, I will not seek to elaborate on the excellent speech by my noble friend Lord Young of Cookham, who made a powerful case that, where we have an asset with a finite supply and excessive demand, we need to look at how we can use it effectively.

I say to the noble Lord, Lord Best, and the noble Baroness, Lady Thornhill, who spoke about the impact on the tenant: what about that person who is not able to access social housing because it is occupied by somebody who could comfortably afford their own private rented home or could afford a higher rent? I am not suggesting that everyone can but, where we have a finite resource, we need to use it efficiently. Ultimately, that is about fairness, not just to the existing tenant but to families, often in difficult circumstances, for whom the opportunity of a social home could turn their lives around—as it has turned around the life of somebody who has moved on and been successful. It is also about fairness to taxpayers. Why should someone who is struggling to pay their private rent see their taxes fund a subsidised home for someone earning more than they are? Again, I am not saying that they all are. This is about moving on.

I am pleased that the noble Lord, Lord Best, raised the issue of incentives and carrots, so I was surprised that, earlier on, he did not support the incentive of the ability to buy your own home under the right to buy. Surely that is a tremendous incentive for anyone who could afford to do it, thereby creating, through building, another social home for somebody in tremendous need.

With that, I very much support my noble friend Lord Young of Cookham’s amendment and the retention of the previous Conservative measure, because it is about fairness. It is about using stock wisely and about ensuring that it does the maximum amount of good for the maximum number of people.

[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Young of Cookham, for Amendment 77. I recognise that the intention is to ensure that social housing stock is being used as effectively as possible by requiring local housing authorities to review lifetime secure tenancies at least every five years. But the Government’s position is clear: we support secure tenancies because they provide stability and certainty for social housing tenants in the long term, and for the communities in which they live. This is especially important for families, older people, disabled people and other vulnerable households, who need a stable and secure home and the ability to put down roots in their communities that comes with the certainty that lifetime secure tenancies offer.

Local housing authorities already have tools to manage their housing stock and to support tenants who wish to move to accommodation that better meets their needs. Local authorities can carry out checks to assure themselves that tenants are meeting the terms of their tenancies. I agree that social homes should be used as effectively as possible to support housing need and that we should support landlords to ensure that this is the case. That is why the Government have launched a review into how effectively social housing providers are using their properties. This work is considering how landlords understand tenants’ changing needs and support tenant movement, including where changes result in tenants underoccupying homes. I wrote to all noble Lords ahead of Report with further details of this review. It will report later this year and will be used to help inform future policy development. It is important that we let this work conclude to better understand current practices and challenges before taking action.

On the extensive social housebuilding programme, the answer to lack of supply and to the people on the waiting list is: build more social housing. We have an extensive social housebuilding programme. Inevitably, it had a lead-in time but, now that funding is being allocated, it will quickly accelerate—and I suspect it might accelerate even more quickly now we have new management in place, but that is to be seen later.

[Lord Jamieson (Con)]

I feel it is important to comment on that. That programme was announced over a year ago—I am pleased that the Minister has told me now that the allocations are available—and it will be interesting to see when the cash is out of the door. It will not deliver housing for at least another 18 months to two years. That is not making the step change that we need now.

[Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)]

But it is a programme that we started on, immediately we came into power, to fill the gap left by not building social homes for all those 14 years before we were in power. I appreciate that it takes a bit of time to get going, but we need to make a start on it, get the money out to those who will build the homes, and get them built.

I thank the noble Baroness, Lady O’Neill, and the noble Lord, Lord Jamieson, for Amendment 78. I understand that this amendment seeks to ensure that social housing is focused on those most in need. However, we do not believe that this is the right approach. As I outlined in Committee, the provisions on high-income tenants contained in the Housing and Planning Act 2016 have never been implemented. To provide regulatory certainty, Clause 17 repeals the provisions. The noble Lord, Lord Young, spoke about ducking tough decisions. These measures were never implemented by the previous Government due to concerns that administrative costs would likely outweigh the revenue raised. We also want to avoid creating disincentives for tenants to increase their earnings.

Furthermore, income should not be equated with housing need or indeed a lack of housing need. Some households earning higher incomes may have additional needs that mean that social housing is the only appropriate option for them. This is an important consideration. Social landlords already have flexibility to run discretionary schemes for higher-earning tenants if they wish to do so, and they will retain this flexibility. For those reasons, I ask that these amendments are not pressed.