Housing and Planning Bill

Debate between Lord Porter of Spalding and Lord Deben

Wednesday 13th April 2016 Lords Chamber

[Lord Porter of Spalding (Con)]

My Lords, I rise to speak to Amendment 54 and the other amendments that would add those two letters, “er”, to the word “high” in the clause. Noble Lords will already appreciate my lack of a grasp of the English language, but even I could see how dangerous those two small letters would have been in the wrong hands. I thank my noble friend the Minister for clarifying the Government’s intent to add those and where they will be applied. I ask her to confirm in her closing remarks that this will be used not as an attempt to raise additional income, but as purely a means to spread the burden across more authorities.

Had my noble friend not agreed in the letter she sent earlier and in her remarks on the manifesto commitment that councils would be allowed to retain sufficient receipts to build one-for-one replacement of the same tenure, I would probably have been speaking against these amendments. I should explain to noble Lords why I am prepared to move purely on that basis, and properly in response to the noble Lord, Lord Foster.

In councils such as mine, where we are able to retain sufficient receipts to build a council house out of the sale of a high or higher value, I would probably volunteer to sell all my council houses to anybody who would buy them on the open market, on the basis that the cost of building a replacement unit would probably be about 30% cheaper than the value received on the sale of that unit. I would be quite happy to replace my beautifully maintained 1,600 homes for 1,600 brand new homes in the immediate future, thus doubling the number of affordable homes in my district. On that basis, I earnestly thank the Minister and the Secretary of State in the other place for listening to our proper arguments and the case we made, and for responding appropriately.

[Lord Deben]

I had not intended to speak in this debate until the noble Lord, Lord Foster, spoke. The House ought to remember that the idea that we cannot do anything here and should leave it to the local authorities to make all these decisions runs up against the problem that we have not built the houses we have needed to build over a long period. The people who have had all these opportunities to do so and who know their localities and their needs so well do not seem to have noticed that the big need in most localities is to build some houses. I am a bit suspicious of the Foster doctrine. The truth is that many local authorities need a kick up the backside on housing. That is obvious and real.

[Lord Porter of Spalding]

I cannot let that remark go unchallenged. The problem of the housing shortage in this country is not the fault of any local authority; it is the fault of successive Governments of all colours. They have gone out of their way to stifle the ability of local councils to build houses. I am pleased that the current Government and, to some extent, the coalition Government moved towards that. I am pleased that the current Government are fully encouraging local councils to build houses. It is not the councils’ fault.

[Lord Deben]

If my noble friend had let me finish what I had to say he might have found that we rather agreed. I was going on to say that the second lot of people who have not done what they ought to have done in building houses are successive Governments. When I hear some of the speeches from the Front Bench over there, and realise the appalling history of Labour Governments and housing—