Housing

Baroness Hollis of Heigham Excerpts

Tuesday 22nd May 2012 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Hanham]

My Lords, I agree very much with my noble friend. The Government are doing just that. Public sector land is being freed up as we speak. As I am sure the noble Lord knows, there is a plan across all departments to free up any spare land, including Ministry of Defence land. There are also now policies to ensure that, where planning permission has already been given but the plans have not been implemented, there will be greater encouragement to those people to ensure that the land is developed. We all recognise that there is a great demand for housing. We very much appreciate the problems that first-time buyers are suffering, and the delivery of more houses—on which we are determined—should help.

[Baroness Hollis of Heigham]

My Lords, is the Minister aware of the effect of housing supply on jobs? As my noble friend Lord McKenzie rightly said, each new house built generates two and a half years-worth of job—one year for the construction and one and a half years for the supply of materials, the furnishings, the carpets and the rest. Not only will an enhanced housing programme meet desperate housing need, it will also meet desperate unemployment, particularly among young people who wish to be apprentices.

[Baroness Hanham]

My Lords, I do not think that anybody will disagree with what the noble Baroness said. There is no doubt that the construction industry provides jobs and training for young people and, as she has said, it has many offshoots as a result. It is therefore in everybody’s interests that we manage to ensure that the housing market is boosted, and the Government are firmly behind that.