Housing

Annette Brooke Excerpts

Wednesday 5th September 2012 Commons Chamber

[Annette Brooke (Mid Dorset and North Poole) (LD)]

I start by congratulating the Minister on his new position. In this short speech, I would like to acknowledge what the coalition has done. I do not know what the promised announcements will be, so I would like to comment on what I would like to see and what the Liberal Democrats would like to push for in the future. Throughout, I feel that we need to acknowledge that some of the problems we are discussing have indeed gone back over decades and under all previous Governments.

Just to keep up with the rate of household formation, we need between 206,000 and 282,000 additional homes each year between now and 2025, yet the average number of new homes added to the housing stock each year in England over the last two decades has been just 160,000 and is currently even lower than that. It is quite clear that we have not met housing need. We need to think about housing demand, too, because the fact that people cannot access mortgages at the moment is another cause of reduction in demand. There is a shortage of mortgage finance, which I feel has to be addressed. I acknowledge, however, that the coalition has done much to help first-time buyers.

I want to concentrate on the supply side, while acknowledging that both demand and supply are important to the issues we are addressing. Undoubtedly, investment in housing would provide an important kick-start to the construction industry, and hence to the economy. We know of the massive multiplier effect of everything spent internally in our country on the construction industry. It is a win-win situation, with more jobs and more money created for our own economy, without particularly sucking in imports.

Social housing waiting lists have grown by 70% over the last 10 years. Over 1.7 million families are stranded on housing waiting lists, yet social housing stock has fallen by 420,000. We have seen very little council house building. My hon. Friend the Member for Colchester (Sir Bob Russell) repeatedly questioned the last Government on that point. We want to see councils building more.

The coalition Government have taken some significant steps to give local authorities more freedom to raise more money in order to invest in their local areas—for example, the new homes bonus, tax increment financing and the community infrastructure levy. Reform of the housing revenue account is also important, as it leaves local authorities free to determine how housing revenues are invested. However, there is the cap on borrowing, and I agree with previous speakers that we should be looking to lift it and secure more powers for local authorities to borrow and invest in councils. Securing private finance is critical, and we need to explore further how the long-term investment needs of pension funds and insurers can be met through housing.

The coalition Government have increased local authority new build. We have the new homes bonus, the one-for-one replacement condition attached to the right to buy, and the new “affordable rent” model, which will provide 170,000 new social and affordable homes. However, as a Liberal Democrat I should like more local rather than centrally led decisions to be made on the right to buy.

The coalition is taking steps to provide more land for development by freeing up public land and trialling land auctions to enable more homes to be built, but I am sure that more can be done. For instance, there are 300,000 or 400,000 existing outstanding planning permissions. I think it outrageous that, when planning permissions have been granted, developers come back wanting to intrude on our green belt. We need a stronger “use it or lose it” policy on planning. That is a Liberal Democrat point, by the way. We should also think about the environmental impact of housing. The challenge is to deal with the dilemma of quantity versus quality. It is more expensive to provide homes that meet renewable and energy efficiency conditions.

I congratulate the coalition on its empty-homes policy. We have taken big steps in this regard. There are 720,000 empty homes in England, 279,000 of which are considered to be long-term empty properties. Under the last Labour Government, there was no dedicated source of central Government funding to tackle empty homes, but the coalition Government have established a £100 million empty homes fund and some really good schemes to help people to return empty homes to use. The new homes bonus is paid in such cases, and there is also an empty homes premium. I pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Hazel Grove (Andrew Stunell), who initiated the premium, and congratulate him on the work that he did in the Department for Communities and Local Government. I also pay tribute to the hon. Member for Bromley and Chislehurst (Robert Neill).