Asked by: Chi Onwurah (Labour - Newcastle upon Tyne Central and West)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, whether he has had discussions with local authorities in Newcastle on delays to repair work on social housing.
Answered by Dehenna Davison
Last November the Secretary of State wrote to all providers of social housing, including those in Newcastle, following the tragic death of Awaab Ishak. His letter set out his expectation that all landlords treat complaints about damp and mould seriously, act swiftly to rectify them, and be prepared to respond to a request from the Regulator of Social Housing on the extent of damp and mould issues. The Secretary of State also wrote to all local authorities setting out that non-decent homes are completely unacceptable, and that landlords must take action to resolve poor housing conditions in their area.
To ensure that landlords respond quickly when homes are dangerous, the Government has also introduced 'Awaab's Law' as an amendment to the Social Housing Regulation Bill, which will require landlords to fix reported health hazards within specified timeframes.
Asked by: Chi Onwurah (Labour - Newcastle upon Tyne Central and West)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, what the average time is for an HM Land Registry Application Enquiry to be processed; and what steps he is taking to reduce it.
Answered by Baroness Maclean of Redditch
I refer the Hon Member to the answer I gave to Question UIN 187953 on 14 June 2023.
Asked by: Chi Onwurah (Labour - Newcastle upon Tyne Central and West)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, if his Department will publish a timeframe for consulting on amending the National Planning Policy Framework to include (a) an understanding of local research and development needs and (b) the provision of additional laboratory space.
Answered by Baroness Maclean of Redditch
Last month, government announced that it will consult on adding requirements to the National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF) to say that decision makers should pay particular regard to research and development needs, including the need for additional laboratory space, and proactively engage with potential applicants. Government also announced that we will update the Planning Practice Guidance to help local authorities take fuller account of the commercial land needs of businesses and better plan for inward and high value investment. We will work with stakeholders to further understand the changes needed.
We will publish a government response to the recent NPPF consultation in due course. As signalled by the consultation a wider review of the NPPF will follow, this will involve further consultation on proposals, enabling those who wish to comment the opportunity to do so.
Asked by: Chi Onwurah (Labour - Newcastle upon Tyne Central and West)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, how much and what proportion of the Shared Prosperity Fund has been allocated in each year for which information is available; what proportion of that funding was allocated to science, research and development and innovation; and what information her Department holds on how that funding was spent in each region.
Answered by Dehenna Davison
Funding is confirmed for three financial years - £400 million for 2022-23, £700 million for 2023-24 and £1.5 billion for 2024-25, all local allocations can be found on GOV.UK.
Places have been empowered to identify and build on their own strengths and needs at a local level, which can include funding science, research and development and innovation related interventions under the 'supporting local businesses' pillar of the Fund. However, it will be for places to decide how much of their allocation they spend on science, research and development and innovation depending on their locally identified priorities.
Allocations are managed locally, but DLUHC will collect spend and performance data captured through routine reporting.
Asked by: Chi Onwurah (Labour - Newcastle upon Tyne Central and West)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, whether his Department has had recent discussions with Newcastle City Council on the adequacy of the level of support for homeless people in Newcastle.
Answered by Felicity Buchan
Newcastle City Council are being provided with in excess of £4 million over three years through the Homelessness Prevention Grant and Rough Sleeping Initiative 2022 –25.
The Department has regular conversations with local authorities about their homelessness services and plans for ending rough sleeping.
Asked by: Chi Onwurah (Labour - Newcastle upon Tyne Central and West)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, with reference to 53.4 percent of people renting from Newcastle City Council in Elswick South from 2021 ONS census data, what steps his department is taking to support local authorities with social housing stock in Newcastle Upon Tyne Central constituency.
Answered by Dehenna Davison
It is for councils to decide how best to balance expenditure on delivering new homes and maintaining their existing housing.
We recognise that local authorities are facing increasing pressures on their social housing stock. To support new social housing supply, councils are able to apply to the £11.5 billion Affordable Homes Programme.
Asked by: Chi Onwurah (Labour - Newcastle upon Tyne Central and West)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, whether he has made an assessment of the implications for his Department's policies of trends in the levels of bidding for properties in the private rental sector in the last 12 months; and what steps his Department is taking to help prevent rental inflation in the private rented sector in Newcastle upon Tyne Central constituency.
Answered by Felicity Buchan
Letting agents and landlords must be transparent and open about pricing of properties.
Our White Paper 'A Fairer Private Rented Sector' which sets out our plan to reform the sector and level up housing quality in this country. These measures will help prevent unfair rent increases for tenants, in Newcastle upon Tyne and across England, while ensuring landlords can continue to make necessary changes to rent.
Asked by: Chi Onwurah (Labour - Newcastle upon Tyne Central and West)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, with reference to the Devolution Deal for the North East published on 28 December 2022, whether the funding announced includes funding for research and development.
Answered by Dehenna Davison
The North East devolution deal commits the government and the region to take further steps to strengthen the North East's local innovation capacity, to help realise the potential of local innovation assets and the innovation potential of small and medium enterprises. The deal includes a £1.44 billion investment fund over 30 years. It will be for the new mayor and combined authority to decide how best to spend this money.
Asked by: Chi Onwurah (Labour - Newcastle upon Tyne Central and West)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, how many homes in (a) Newcastle Central and (b) the North East are classed as affordable housing in the most recent available figures.
Answered by Lucy Frazer
Figures are not centrally collected by the department at parliamentary constituency level.
Estimates of dwelling stock by tenure for each year, in England and the North East region are shown in Live Table 109 at the following link.
Asked by: Chi Onwurah (Labour - Newcastle upon Tyne Central and West)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, whether his Department is taking steps to help provide new rented homes which are affordable for people earning the National Living Wage in Newcastle Central.
Answered by Lucy Frazer
The provision of affordable housing is part of the government's plan to build more homes and provide aspiring homeowners with a step onto the housing ladder.
Since 2010, we have delivered over 632,600 new affordable homes, including over 441,612 affordable homes for rent, of which over 162,800 homes for social rent. Our £11.5 billion Affordable Homes Programme will deliver tens of thousands of affordable homes for both rent and to buy right across the country.
The Levelling Up White Paper committed to increasing the supply of social rented homes and a large number of the new homes delivered through our Affordable Homes Programme will be for social rent.
The department records funding allocation for this programme on a regional basis. As of the end of November 2022 a total of £3.4 billion had been allocated to contractors in London from the 2021-2026 Programme, while a total of £289,409,600 was allocated to the North East.