Housing and Planning Bill

Baroness Rawlings Excerpts

Tuesday 26th January 2016 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Rawlings (Con)]

My Lords, the great pleasure of following the noble Lord, Lord Thurlow, and welcoming him warmly to your Lordships’ House falls to me. He has made a remarkable and delightful speech. This Bill is obviously one of his main areas of expertise as a chartered surveyor and senior partner specialising in rural areas and global commercial property. He has all the qualities that are so important for your Lordships’ House both now and in future. Some of his other areas of serious knowledge include charities and Europe, which are both on the agenda at the moment. His historical tour d’horizon made for an interesting speech which your Lordships’ House always appreciates. On behalf of your Lordships, I extend our congratulations. We look forward to many more contributions in future.

I congratulate my noble friend Lady Williams and the Government on encouraging housing associations to give tenants the right to buy through a voluntary agreement with the housing association sector. I wish briefly to refer to a point raised by the noble Baroness, Lady Bakewell of Hardington Mandeville, on the impact of right to buy on the small, but growing and vital, community land trust movement.

The community land trust movement is vibrant in this country. Local people have set up and run organisations to develop and manage homes as well as other assets important to the community. The very purpose of CLTs is to develop homes that are affordable to local people in perpetuity—I stress “in perpetuity”. CLT homes are not supposed to benefit just one generation; they are intended to benefit every future occupier. Extending the right to buy to community land trusts would undermine the very purpose of a CLT—to create an asset for the community in perpetuity —and, I am told, the future of this growing sector. However, as the noble Lady, Baroness Bakewell, pointed out, many of the 175 community land trusts across the country are still nervous that an exemption in a voluntary agreement leaves them very vulnerable to pressure to sell their CLT homes. She pointed out clearly that it is important for the stability of this small but vital sector that the Bill gives them clarity and certainty to be able to plan securely for the future.

I have spoken to the Minister about this situation and very much hope, knowing how understanding she is, that she will find the solution during the passage of the Bill. I repeat: I commend her for exempting community land trusts in the voluntary agreement and trust that Her Majesty’s Government will find a way to support fully a future amendment to enshrine the exemption of CLTs from the right to buy.