Asked by: Ben Bradley (Conservative - Mansfield)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, whether applications to the Levelling Up Fund are required to have planning permission in place and be ready to begin implementation immediately; and if he will make a statement.
Answered by Luke Hall
The £4.8 billion Levelling Up Fund (LUF) will invest in infrastructure that improves everyday life across the UK, including regenerating town centres and high streets, upgrading local transport, and investing in cultural and heritage assets.
Applications to the LUF must meet the pass/fail gateway criterion where bids will be assessed against whether they can deliver some LUF expenditure in 2021-22 and demonstrate how they fit with the criteria set out in the prospectus and technical guidance.
Asked by: Ben Bradley (Conservative - Mansfield)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, whether his Department is holding discussions with local authorities in Nottinghamshire on the potential benefits of reform to local government in that county.
Answered by Simon Clarke
My Department and I regularly have discussions with local authorities, including those in Nottinghamshire, on a wide range of issues including local government reorganisation. We are always ready to discuss with councils proposals for local government reorganisation that can improve services, increase efficiency, give rise to savings, result in stronger local accountability and leadership, and genuinely empower towns, parishes, and communities. We intend to bring forward further plans on this in our Devolution White Paper this Autumn.
Asked by: Ben Bradley (Conservative - Mansfield)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, what steps his Department is taking to reduce the number of homeless people under the age of 25.
Answered by Heather Wheeler
The Government is committed to reducing homelessness and rough sleeping. That is why we introduced the Homelessness Reduction Act, the most ambitious reform to homelessness legislation in decades, on 3 of April 2018. The Act included changes to ensure that there is better support for young people, families and care leavers by ensuring that there are more opportunities to prevent or relieve homelessness.
In addition to this, we published a cross-government Rough Sleeping Strategy in August 2018, which set out an ambitious £100 million package to help people who sleep rough now and put in place the structures that will end rough sleeping once and for all. As part of the Strategy, my Department committed to developing the Young Future’s Fund - a social impact bond programme aimed at supporting vulnerable young people who are homeless or sleeping rough. This will build on the success of the Fair Chance Fund (2015-2017), which supported over 1,900 homeless young people to improve their accommodation, employment and education outcomes.
We have also put in place bespoke support for local authorities through our Homelessness Advice and Support Team, the team includes dedicated youth homelessness adviser roles which have a commitment to work with local authorities to proactively promote positive joint working across housing authorities and offering training, advice and support to all local authorities.
The Government is committed to building upon this work and to continue to bring down the number of young people without a home. The Government is committed to building on recent success of bringing down the number of homelessness acceptances for 16-17 year-olds.
Asked by: Ben Bradley (Conservative - Mansfield)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, what recent steps he has taken to increase the standard and quality of social housing for tenants.
Answered by Kit Malthouse
Progress has been made on improving standards of decency in social housing. The number of social homes failing to meet the Decent Homes Standard is down 32 per cent since 2010.
The Social Housing Green Paper ‘A new deal for social housing’ (August 2018) recognised that the Decent Homes Standard has not been revised since 2006 and asked whether it should be reviewed to consider whether it delivers the right standards for social housing. We are assessing the consultation responses and are finalising our response.
The Government also supported the Homes (Fitness for Human Habitation) Act 2018 which will require social landlords to ensure that their properties are free from potentially serious hazards at the start of and throughout a tenancy.
Asked by: Ben Bradley (Conservative - Mansfield)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, how many homes are planned to be built on public land in the East Midlands under the Public Land for Housing Programme 2015-20 by 2020.
Answered by Kit Malthouse
As of March 2018, there are around 1,800 homes planned to be built in the East Midlands which have been released under the Public Land for Housing Programme 2015-20. Departments are looking to dispose of land in all regions of England by March 2020.