Oral Answers to Questions

Christina Rees Excerpts

Monday 14th September 2015 Commons Chamber

[Brandon Lewis]

We agree that the growth of the small and medium-sized sector is an important part of delivering the housing that we need, and we want local authorities to do more to support it through local plans. In the Housing Bill, we intend to introduce a new fast-track process of establishing the principle of development for small sites. It will allow developers to obtain an earlier and more certain view from councils of whether sites are suitable for development, and will reduce their up-front costs.

[Christina Rees (Neath) (Lab)]

T9. What are the Government’s plans to extend to more than a one-off payment the use of funds from the international aid budget to help local authorities to assist refugees? Will authorities in Wales receive any moneys from that budget, now or in the future?

[Greg Clark]

As I said earlier, representatives of local government are participants on the ministerial committee that is putting those arrangements in place. We will take their advice to ensure that all the different costs that are incurred by authorities are sensibly addressed in the settlement that we provide.