Building Safety and Social Housing

Danny Kruger Excerpts

Thursday 6th July 2023 Commons Chamber

[Michael Gove]

The hon. Lady raises two important points. Yes, absolutely, we are now moving to accelerate support for those living in buildings between 11 and 18 metres high. The cladding scheme we are bringing forward has all the energy that Homes England, the Under-Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, my hon. Friend Member for North East Derbyshire (Lee Rowley), and the Department can deploy behind it. On her second point, of course it is the case that, while ACM was responsible for this particularly horrific tragedy, and also previously responsible for fires in the Gulf and elsewhere, there are other forms of cladding that are also a risk and that we need to remove and have been removing.

[Danny Kruger (Devizes) (Con)]

I also pay tribute to the families and the survivors who have come here today. While the Secretary of State is rightly focusing on the systemic failures that led to this disaster and on the responsibility of the big players, the agencies and indeed the Government themselves in the lead-up to the disaster and in the immediate aftermath, will he pay tribute to the community groups that stepped forward so impressively on the ground, including some council workers—I am thinking of councillors such as David Lindsay and others? Does he recognise that they were not given a proper voice in the period preceding the fire and that we should do more to engage community groups?

Oral Answers to Questions

Danny Kruger Excerpts

Monday 5th June 2023 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

I have allowed some contributions to stretch, but we are on topicals, so you will not mind staying a while.

[Danny Kruger (Devizes) (Con)]

Wiltshire urgently needs a lot more housing, and the good news is that we are getting it. For the past six years, we have met our house building target by 130%, with 4,000 new houses in Wiltshire every year, but because developers routinely underestimate their future building forecasts, we have a theoretical shortage in the five-year land supply. Because inspectors routinely declare that local plans are out of date, it means that developers can impose unwanted and ugly developments that communities do not want. Will the Secretary of State use the NPPF review to exempt—

Leasehold Reform

Danny Kruger Excerpts

Tuesday 23rd May 2023 Commons Chamber

[Danny Kruger (Devizes) (Con)]

I agree with what the Minister said about the Government’s plans. It is good that we have cross-party consensus on the need to radically reform leasehold. I recognise and agree with the points that have been made by Members on both sides of the House. It is a feudal system that ultimately needs to be abolished, in ways that I will come on to describe.

There is a danger, perhaps, that we leap straight from one extreme to another: we Conservatives have a bit of a fetish for property ownership, and there is a small danger of our making a cult of freehold and the principle of owning one’s house outright. I understand why we do this—we all want to own our homes, and we believe that a free market will help to grow the supply of new homes that we urgently need—but there is a limit on the supply of new house building, and that limit is land. It is possible to release more land into the market, and we need to do that, but there do need to be limits; I hope that even the most extreme libertarians on the Conservative Benches will recognise that there must be limits to the release of land for house building.

The free market must have some limitations, because without limits, or with limits that companies with deep pockets can game at the expense of local communities, it is not a free market at all; it is a speculator’s charter. We need a system that is both better than the feudalism of leasehold and better than the perversion of capitalism that we sometimes see in our communities.

We need to grow supply, and I recognise that we need more freehold and more traditional ownership, but as I say, land is finite, and the price of a house, which we all worry about, is really the price of the land underneath the house. There are two effects of this. The first is that the building—the bricks and mortar—hardly matters to the house builders. We see the way they knock up buildings without beauty, without quality and without much innovation. I pay tribute to the work that my hon. Friend the Member for South Norfolk (Mr Bacon) has done on self-build and the opportunities for far better innovation, beauty and quality in house building if we recognise that the quality of the structure matters more than the land it is built on.

The second effect of the system we have at the moment, whereby the price of the land is the real factor, is that the overall price of housing rises. We now have the highest house prices in history. That has a reinforcing effect, because it privileges the volume house builders—the speculators in land—who can afford to bid at these auctions and who bet on rising prices, hoard sites and hold back land from development; they game the development system. I mention in passing the egregious five-year land supply rule, which is such a gift to developers, who ride roughshod over local plans and the wishes of local communities. There are a number of cases in my Wiltshire constituency where that is a problem.

[Sir Peter Bottomley]

May I add one point, which I hope my hon. Friend will not regard as discordant? People ought to know the sums that public affairs companies and lobbyists get paid by the developers, those involved in exploiting leaseholders and those who buy freeholds, for lobbying the Prime Minister’s office, the Treasury, the Department and the media. If equal resources could be given to the National Leasehold Campaign, the cladding groups and the Leasehold Knowledge Partnership, we would have equality of arms.

[Danny Kruger]

My hon. Friend is right: the way these companies operate is shameful.

The price of land is the issue. There is a way to get through this, and it is along the lines of what we are debating today: not leasehold and not pure freehold, but a form of commonhold. I want to end by mentioning a particular form of commonhold that I would like to see much more of and that we see a little of around the country. My hon. Friend the Member for Worthing West (Sir Peter Bottomley) mentioned the need for housing providers that can be trusted. They do exist, and they exist using leasehold: it is the community land trust model. Community land trusts act as long-term stewards of community housing, and they often use ground rents as a way to finance their work, with the consent of leaseholders.

We need to worry about scrapping leasehold without replacing it; that would be bad. We need to replace it with something along the lines of commonhold. Around the country, we see brilliant innovations of community land trusts in pockets of rural and urban areas. The Government have indicated in previous debates that any ban on leasehold would include an exemption for community-led housing, and I hope that consideration will be given to ensuring that community-led housing is also protected under any changes to leasehold and any replacement with commonhold.

I pay tribute to the Community Land Trust Network. The Secretary of State came to an event that I hosted in Parliament a few months ago. A number of really inspiring CLT groups came to talk about their experience. I encourage the Government to listen to the Community Land Trust Network and to use the ongoing consultation on the national planning policy framework to make real changes, such as reopening and extending the community housing fund and, crucially, helping local CLT groups and community groups to buy land. At the moment, they find it so difficult to outbid the speculative developers, because they intend to make a large proportion of the housing affordable, and they simply cannot make the numbers add up in the way the speculators can.

We need to find ways to give more land to CLTs, and my suggestion is quite simple: we need to transfer public land quite deliberately to community land trusts. At the moment, legislation states that public landowners who want to divest themselves of those assets need to seek “best consideration”, which local authorities or other public landowners often interpret as simply seeking the highest price. We need to specify that “best consideration” means the objects set out by the Secretary of State, which I suggest should include affordability and community ownership. We also need to enable CLTs to buy private land at agricultural prices, not speculative prices.

I welcome the cross-party consensus on reforming leasehold—I think that is absolutely right. I hope consideration will be given to ensuring that these community-led housing models will also be protected in the new plans and will be able to thrive. I welcome the debate, and I give thanks to the shadow Secretary of State, the hon. Member for Wigan (Lisa Nandy), and to Members on the Opposition Benches who are campaigning alongside Government Members for these sorts of reforms. I also share my hon. Friend the Member for Worthing West’s wish that we do not push this rather partisan motion to a vote.

Caravan Site Licensing (Exemptions of Motor Homes) Bill

Danny Kruger Excerpts

2nd reading
Friday 3rd February 2023 Commons Chamber

[Sir Christopher Chope (Christchurch) (Con)]

I beg to move, That the Bill be now read a Second time.

First, I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Blackpool South (Scott Benton) on the success of his important Bill completing Second Reading, and I thank him for giving me time to say a little bit about the Caravan Site Licensing (Exemptions of Motor Homes) Bill.

Mr Deputy Speaker, you will be familiar with the expression—I think it is an old Arabic proverb—“The dogs bark, but the caravan moves on”. The issue here is that a lot has happened since the Caravan Sites and Control of Development Act was introduced in 1960, because motor homes and campervans are increasingly used as a substitute for static or towed caravans. The latest information I have from the National Caravan Council is that there might be more than 500,000 towed touring caravans and some 365,000 caravans used as holiday homes, many of which would be park homes. I am pleased to say that earlier today the Mobile Homes (Pitch Fees) Bill received its Second Reading in the other place, and that legislation is now due hopefully to get on to the statute book before the end of March.

There are 225,000 motor homes in this country, apparently, and some 16,000 new registrations in the most recent year for which there are statistics. It is in that context that I have tabled this Bill, which would amend the provisions in the Caravan Sites and Control of Development Act 1960. That Act was based on a 1959 report by Sir Arton Wilson on the problems of people living in caravans, which found that the principal problem was unclear and insufficient legislation that gave neither local nor planning authorities power to deal with caravan housing. The Act came into force on 29 August 1960, and section 29 of that legislation defines a “caravan” as

“any structure designed or adapted for human habitation which is capable of being moved from one place to another (whether by being towed, or by being transported on a motor vehicle or trailer) and any motor vehicle so designed or adapted, but does not include—

(a) any railway rolling stock which is for the time being on rails forming part of a railway system, or

(b) any tent”.

and adds that

“‘caravan site’ has the meaning assigned to it by subsection (4) of section one of this Act”,

obviously relating to the same definition of caravans.

Since 1960, what we now know as motor homes have come into the marketplace. The earliest camper vans in Europe were introduced by Volkswagen in 1947, and were essentially motorised trollies, but we now have purpose-built, carriage-built motor homes in large quantity.

[Danny Kruger (Devizes) (Con)]

I congratulate my hon. Friend on the Mobile Homes (Pitch Fees) Bill having its Second Reading in the other place—I am delighted that that Bill is making such good progress, and look forward to its remaining stages.

I listened carefully to my hon. Friend’s definition of a motor home just now, and the exclusions, including a tent and so on. Is he aware of whether houseboats qualify as motor homes or park homes? They are homes that are capable of moving from one place to another, so it would be interesting to hear my hon. Friend’s view on that. I raise that question in the context of the Government’s commitment to support homes that receive their energy off-grid with their energy bills. Does my hon. Friend share my concern that that money could be made available to people living in park homes and houseboats rather quicker than it is at the moment?

[Sir Christopher Chope]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for his intervention, and I hope that the Mobile Homes (Pitch Fees) Bill will make progress. I share his disappointment that the 100,000-plus residents of park homes will have to wait until 27 February to be even able to register in order to qualify for help under the energy bills support scheme. As a member of the all-party parliamentary group on park homes, my hon. Friend knows how hard we have lobbied to try to get that money brought forward sooner, and it is a great disappointment that it has not been. As far as houseboats are concerned, I do not think a houseboat is a motor vehicle, which is the essence of what we are talking about here. In order for something to be a motor vehicle, its owner has to be able to register it with the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency, and I do not think that houseboats can be registered in that way.

Getting back to the point, the Bill would change the definition of “motor home” so that motor homes, alongside tents and railway sleepers, would be excluded from the definition of a caravan, and would thereby be excluded from the site licensing arrangements that exist for caravan sites. The consequence of that would be to give a big boost to the motor homes sector, and to all those who travel in motor homes and have staycations in them—indeed, quite a lot of people come to our country in motor homes. At the moment, those people are discriminated against: they find it very difficult to park their vehicles overnight in council car parks, for example, because those vehicles are regarded as caravans, and the council may quite reasonably have a prohibition on caravans or say that the site is not licensed for them.

However, a motor home nowadays is essentially a self-contained unit which does not need access to fresh water, waste water, chemical toilets and other elements that we would regard as essential on a camp site or caravan site. Because all that equipment is already on board—tanks of fresh water and waste water, as well as chemical toilets—motor homes should surely be given the flexibility to operate more widely and with less restriction.

The current legislation prevents us from treating motor homes in this country in the same way as they are treated on the continent. As those who use them may know, on the continent there are a great many “aires” where people can stop overnight in their motor homes, with few restrictions, and go about their business. We do not have an equivalent provision in England, although many more aires have been developed in Scotland, for different legislative reasons. There is a real opportunity here for us to deregulate the sector and bring it up to date. We can do that by redefining what we mean by a motor home, and making it clear that it is excluded from the provisions of the caravan site licensing legislation.

--- Later in debate ---

[Lee Rowley]

My hon. Friend is correct: we should always look to update our legislative canon. We should always seek to ensure that it works for the challenges and the opportunities that face us at the current time. To the point of my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch: we should always look for opportunities to deregulate and remove legislation where we are able to so and where it is no longer relevant or proportionate.

With regards to the 1960 Act: I do accept that it has been around for many years—for much longer than I have been alive—and that it has worked in many instances. Equally, though, things have moved on. As my hon. Friend knows from his tireless work as chair of the all-party group on park homes, of which that is an element, there has been a need to move the regulation on in recent years, especially with the Mobile Homes Act 2013 and then the work that has been done in relation to park homes since then.

Before I come on to the specifics of the Bill in front of us today, let me just say that, at least on park homes, there has been a significant change in operation, in activity and in how owners of park homes work. It is fair to say—I hope my hon. Friend will agree—that the operation of park homes has got ahead of what the historical law said, which is why changes need to be made.

[Danny Kruger]

The Minister is right that the operation of park homes has, in a sense, outlived the legislation. One thing that has not changed is that most of these homes still receive their energy off grid. Can he respond to the point that we discussed earlier about the arrangement for supporting homes, including houseboats—particularly those on the Kennet and Avon canal that runs through Wiltshire? We want to see those homes receive the subsidy that has been promised to them as soon as possible. I understand that there have been some significant delays in implementing the new scheme, which is not the Government’s fault. Can he give us any update on that?

[Lee Rowley]

Like my hon. Friend, I also want to see the money that was announced some months ago to go to residents of park homes and to others who are off grid at the earliest possible opportunity. I know that my colleagues in the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy are working hard to do that, and they have recently made information available to us all, and I am passing that back to the residents of my constituency who live in park homes in Clay Cross, Old Tupton, Staveley, Marsh Lane, New Whittington and elsewhere. They are as keen as my hon. Friend’s constituents in Devizes are to make sure that progress is made on this payment and that we can support them during this difficult period with regard to energy.

In the short time that I have left, I wish to do two things, the first of which is to respond to the question from my hon. Friend the Member for Christchurch about the Bill itself. Secondly, I must say that I was the duty Minister back in November when my hon. Friend’s initial Bill on park homes was introduced. It was so universally supported in this place that, for the first time since 1997 or 1998, there was no need for anybody from the Treasury Bench to stand up and even argue why we thought it was a good idea. It is immensely pleasing that, where we can make collective progress on such issues as park homes, we are able to do so. I congratulate my hon. Friend on both introducing the Bill and on the progress that it has made—particularly today, when his Bill saw its Second Reading in the Lords.

Management of the Economy and Ministerial Severance Payments

Danny Kruger Excerpts

Tuesday 15th November 2022 Commons Chamber

[Lucy Frazer]

The hon. Member is cherry-picking—and, of course, that particular announcement was of measures that will help the economy. He will know that, to help the most vulnerable, we have cut fuel duty and increased the personal threshold for national insurance contributions, raising it from £9,500 to £12,500. We are providing the cold weather payment, the warm home discount and the increase in the national living wage. For those with young children, we are providing £200 million a year to support the holiday activities and food programme. To help people into jobs, we have the kickstart and restart schemes and the skills bootcamps. We are helping vulnerable people across the board. Moreover, we have been doing so over the past year as these challenging circumstances have manifested themselves. [Interruption.]

[Danny Kruger (Devizes) (Con)]

My right hon. and learned Friend is reciting a list of all the generous support packages that are in place while facing a barrage of chuntering from the Opposition. Does she think they are aware that global energy prices have risen eightfold in the last year thanks to Putin’s invasion? That is causing the inflation that the whole world is suffering. European countries have higher inflation than the UK, and the Government are doing what they can to help households.

[Lucy Frazer]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for that intervention, because I think it is really important to be honest with the British people about the challenges we face, why we are facing them and, therefore, how we can deal with them. To suggest that they are simply being caused by an event that happened two months ago is simply wrong, and Opposition Members know that.

As well as providing immediate support, we have focused on doing everything we can to get our finances in order domestically, because the risk of higher inflation becoming entrenched is the greatest danger. Sound money and a stable economy are the best ways to deliver what the hon. Member for Wigan asked for: lower mortgage rates, more jobs and long-term growth. We have taken every opportunity to do that in the first weeks of this Government—to restore credibility to the public finances, being up front about the enormous task ahead—and the markets have responded positively to what we have done and the direction in which we are going.

Let me now deal with a specific issue raised by the hon. Member for Wigan, that of interest rates. It is important to point out that the pricing and availability of mortgages are not decided by the Government; they are commercial decisions for lenders in which this Government—indeed, any Government—do not seek to intervene. However, let me highlight four points that I am sure Opposition Members would like to hear.

First, as I mentioned earlier, we have already taken immediate action to secure the UK’s economic stability, demonstrating our commitment to fiscal discipline. That has provided stability for the markets, including mortgages. Secondly, although I recognise that many people are concerned about their mortgage payments and do not want in any way to diminish their real and legitimate concerns about the cost of living, about 75% of residential mortgages are on a fixed rate and are therefore shielded from rate rises in the near term. Moreover, because of changes that have been made to the regulatory regime introduced by the coalition Government applying the lessons of the last financial crash, the mortgage application process has been more rigorous, ensuring that borrowers will be able to continue to afford to make repayments. Today’s mortgage holders are therefore better placed to weather the changes.

Thirdly, the Government have some lines of support available aimed at helping people to avoid repossession, including support for mortgage interest loans for those in receipt of an income-related benefit. As I am sure the hon. Member for Wigan heard, the Government announced earlier this year that they would allow homeowners to access support for mortgage interest earlier than the current nine-month wait time. The details on that will follow shortly.

--- Later in debate ---

[Patricia Gibson]

The public are becoming increasingly wise to the snake-oil salesman approach in which one thing is said, accompanied by handwringing and head shaking, but no real action is taken to tackle those who profit in a way that most people would find obscene.

If we listened to the Minister, we would think that the so-called mini-Budget had not happened at all. The name “mini-Budget” is ironic because it makes it sound small, but the damage it has caused is very considerable. This Budget revealed, for those who still harboured any vestiges of doubt, whose side the Tories are really on. The so-called mini-Budget sought to scrap the bankers’ bonus cap, reduce taxes for the most well off, cancel the planned increase in corporation tax, refuse to bring forward an extended windfall tax and weaken the rights of trade union members.

Labour’s opposition to the mini-Budget amounted to £24 billion out of £43 billion of tax cuts, and it was left to the right hon. Member for Hayes and Harlington (John McDonnell), as it so often is, to call this mini-Budget what it actually is:

“the most socially divisive Budget in a generation.”

I understand that Labour is a bit worried about upsetting hardcore Tory voters in England, but sometimes harsh language has to be used.

Once the markets took fright and Labour saw the extent of the mini-Budget’s fiscal irresponsibility, it demanded that the entire mini-Budget be reversed, which was not its original position. The Resolution Foundation noted that almost half the gains from the proposed tax cuts would have gone to the richest 5%, who would have gained £8,650 on average, while the poorest half of households would have gained £230 on average. Almost two thirds, 65%, of the gains from the personal tax cuts would have gone to the richest fifth of households.

Torsten Bell from the Resolution Foundation described the measures as a

“simply staggering…tax cut for richer households”.

Save the Children described the tax cuts as

“a hammer-blow to low-income families”.

There were £45 billion of unfunded tax cuts, almost exclusively benefiting the rich.

While all this was going on, the SNP in Scotland was being urged, not least by the hapless hon. Member for Moray (Douglas Ross) among others, to follow the Tories in Westminster in entering the bowels of tax-cutting hell, where the most well off enjoy the windfall of a tax-cutting bonanza. Of course, he U-turned on this, as he so often does. It is often hard to tell if he is going somewhere or coming back.

It was, quite frankly, immoral for such a Budget to be delivered when so many are struggling to pay their bills, and the consequences of announcing these measures—again, it is difficult to call it a mini-Budget given its consequences—were catastrophic. The pound dropped by nearly 2% against the dollar, to the lowest level since 1985. The IMF rebuked the Government for causing such damage to the economy, and international investors declared that the UK’s greater economic suffering than similar countries is a consequence of the “moron premium” it pays due to its terrible leadership under the Tories. The cost of this so-called moron premium stands at £30 billion.

For households across the UK, the cost of the Government’s staggering incompetence is still being counted. Forty-one per cent. of mortgage deals that had previously been available were pulled by the banks, with more than 1,700 mortgage products being reintroduced at rates 2 percentage points higher, leaving hundreds of thousands of families across the UK paying far more for their mortgage. Pensions almost collapsed, and the instability within the UK was the talk of the international steamie. The Minister talks about restoring financial stability, but such urgent measures would not have been needed had the Government not caused such instability.

[Danny Kruger]

It is true that mortgages are at their highest rate in 10 years, in Germany. Does the hon. Lady blame the mini-Budget for that? If not, what does she think might be happening?

--- Later in debate ---

[Naz Shah (Bradford West) (Lab)]

May I first respond to the contribution of the hon. Member for Newbury (Laura Farris)? “It’s Ukraine; it’s everything else in the world,” the Government keep saying, but the disaster was cooked up in No. 10, and my constituents and those of Conservative Members are paying the price. The Government cannot keep faking it till they make it. They cannot carry on saying, “It’s this, that or the other to blame,” because the people out there—the public—can see what is happening. There is an air of desperation. The Government are going back to votes from 2010 and 2008 just to cover up their incompetence—

[Danny Kruger]

rose—

[Naz Shah]

No, I will not give way.

For the past 12 years, we have been seeing the crisis develop under the Government’s watch, but we will not be taking any lessons from their “Fake it till you make it” approach. Bring on the next general election—the sooner it comes, the better, because people will say exactly what they make of the Government. This crisis was made in No.10, and nowhere else. It was made by the Government’s own hierarchy. The current mortgage crisis—and not just this one—was created by the incompetency of the Conservative party. The current Prime Minister, then a leadership candidate, warned the former Prime Minister that her economic plan was a “fairy tale”, but still the former Prime Minister experimented with the economy and gambled with the livelihoods and the savings of our constituents—of working people—knowing full well that people across the country were enduring a cost of living crisis.

The Prime Minister now warns of more difficult decisions to come and a profound economic crisis—a nightmare, not a fairy tale—for hard-working people, homeowners, first-time buyers and private renters who will now pick up the tab. The horrific incompetence of the former Prime Minister and the former Chancellor, which the Prime Minister, in his first speech, seemed to describe as well-intentioned “mistakes”, means that millions of families are currently facing mortgage interest rates of 6.5%. For people in my constituency, and those in the wider Yorkshire and Humber region, this means a monthly increase of £348. According to analysis by The Daily Telegraph, 1.8 million homeowners on two-year fixed mortgage rates will need to refinance in 2023. Interest rates are currently at 6.49%, which means that millions of families will face eye-watering hikes in mortgage repayments.

I ask the Minister to put herself in the shoes of families living in Bradford West—that is a tall ask to be fair. This year’s statistics by the End Fuel Poverty Coalition show that 44.6% of households in Bradford West are living in fuel poverty, a stark increase of 22.2% on the comparable figures for 2019. More than one in three children—almost 40%—are living in poverty, literally forced to skip meals. Parents are now looking towards a cold winter, not knowing whether they can keep their families warm in the year to come or whether they can even keep their homes.

The economy has been in the hands of the Tories for more than a decade, during which we have seen a fall in home ownership rates and affordable homes, with 800,000 fewer households being owned by the under-45s. It is clear that, due to this Conservative-made mortgage crisis, it will be harder for people to afford their own homes, robbing generations of independence, comfort and stability.

Since 2010, there have been seven Conservative Chancellors, four in the past year alone. When they first came to power, the future of our young people plunged. It was a Conservative Government who cut the education maintenance allowance, tripled university tuition fees, closed down libraries and youth centres and, with austerity, dragged our economy into downward growth. They failed to build homes and to allow first-time buyers a chance to buy affordable homes. As a consequence of their recklessness with the mini-Budget, they are now attacking working people and working families once again.

Under the Conservatives, the price of food to feed our families is up, the price of energy to heat our homes is up, the price to save us from losing our homes is up, and the price of transport to get us to work is up. Everything has gone up; it is not going down. The price for businesses to invest more has gone up. The price to rent a home has gone up. The price for childcare has gone up. The price for Government borrowing has gone up.

After more than a decade of Conservative destruction, the people across Britain are simply fed up. Enough is enough, Mr Deputy Speaker. This is about party politics. This is about those on the Conservative Benches saving their own skins and not about putting Britain first. If they had been putting Britain first and not putting party over people, they would have called a general election weeks ago. All this has been caused by a decade of Tory Governments, and my constituents deserve better. The Government continuously say that this situation was not made in 10 Downing Street, and that the IMF and the Bank of England had to intervene because of what is happening in Ukraine. They try to measure us against other G7 countries. Their banks did not have to come in. They did not have a run on the pound. They did not have a run on their pension funds. We had that because of the Conservatives. That is what they did to our country. They made this mess, and they need to fix this mess.

On Thursday, I hope the autumn statement responds to my Bradford West constituents and does not put them into even worse poverty than they are in now—and if they really want to fix things, they should call a general election and let the people speak.

Levelling Up Rural Britain

Danny Kruger Excerpts

Wednesday 9th November 2022 Commons Chamber

[Danny Kruger (Devizes) (Con)]

It is always very good to be called last in debates because it means that I get to listen to everybody else’s speeches. I have enjoyed the debate enormously and it has been very edifying, particularly to listen to everybody boasting about how big and beautiful their constituency is. My Devizes constituency is as big and beautiful as any, but more importantly, I suggest that it is the oldest place in England—[Interruption.] My goodness me, 1066—in my part of Wiltshire, we were trading in the fourth millennium BC, as evidenced by recently discovered archaeology. In Amesbury near Stonehenge, there was the discovery of the body of an archer, who—carbon dating and testing demonstrates—came from somewhere in central Europe in about 2000 BC. They obviously had some freedom of movement arrangements, which some disapprove of. It did not turn out well for the Amesbury archer, who died near Salisbury.

I mention that because we have been an economic entrepôt since the dawn of time. Through the middle ages in particular, my part of Wiltshire was incredibly prosperous. The great wave of prosperity arose from the wool trade, particularly, and then by about 1800, when the town of Devizes was a very important centre of the wool trade, it started slowly to decline as industrialisation happened, as the Kennet and Avon canal that comes through the town was dug and as Brunel was building his railway out to Bristol. Those amazing industrial innovations were actually the harbinger of the economic decline of our area, as people moved from the land into the cities. However, even through the 19th century, all sorts of important innovations and technological developments happened in our area. I pay particular tribute to one of my favourite local firms, the agricultural engineers T. H. White, which has been going since 1832 and has a £100 million turnover. It is still based in Devizes and is still a family firm, employing people all over the country and, indeed, the world. I have seen some of its amazing agricultural machines in use in our area.

Places left behind by industrialisation are becoming viable again. Our rural economies are becoming viable and thriving. Brilliant companies are hidden up almost every farm track and in every little backwater. In all our towns and industrial estates, there are brilliant, modern, high-tech firms such as Varivane, which makes kit for the Royal Navy. Most of our frigates have been kitted out by this little firm on an industrial estate in Devizes.

The other day, I visited a firm just outside Marlborough called Design 360, which makes amazing writing. It is run by a man who noticed when he was growing up in the area that everything seemed to be made in China. He said, “Why does everything have to be made in China?” and dedicated himself to developing a business in Wiltshire that makes the best possible kit at good prices and employs local people.

We have all sorts of other amazing industries, particularly in the agritech space. We have artificial intelligence that can monitor a multitude of crops in a field, so we can get away from the monoculture model of farming and have a variety of crops being grown in the same place. The health of millions of plants is being monitored through AI. We have vertical farming industries and are developing proteins that can be a massive British export and feed the urban populations of the world.

It is not all high tech. We should not think of the rural economy of the future as being all about whizzy new technologies. Actually, the future could and should look much like the past. I particularly want to see a revival of local food processing. That should be one of our great ambitions in this space, because it feels all wrong that farmers have to send their produce miles away for processing. It disappears into other regions of the country, and if it comes back to Wiltshire at all, it is packaged by some other firm. Why should we not have shorter food journeys and good local processing, as other countries do?

I totally endorse everything that has been said about the importance of food security and about the opportunity that environmental land management schemes bring to enhance the production of food as part of our public goods regime. There is no conflict between supporting the environment and supporting growth, but we need to recognise that the production of food is farmers’ primary objective. I would say that food security is more important than enhancing global trade, so I would prioritise it over trade deals.

How can we help? I agree with everything that has been said about the importance of support with energy and about VAT and rates relief, particularly for pubs and brewers. I want to mention a few other things quickly, beginning with skills. We export too many young people. We have a culture of higher education; we should invest more in further education. Wiltshire College is a brilliant local institution. I would like to see more support there.

I echo everything that has been said about housing. We need more housing in our local villages. We should say no to the five-year land supply rule; every village should be able to build more houses without having to use that rule.

I turn to connectivity. We need more broadband. Thankfully, I am confident that we will get a railway station in Devizes. I agree about demand-responsive buses. We must say no to HGVs. I echo my hon. Friend the Member for Buckingham (Greg Smith): we have to improve the situation.

Lastly, I turn to planning. I must mention a brilliant firm, Poulton Technologies, which is run by the Coplestone family. They want to build an amazing factory to create undersea technology for fixing pipes, but they cannot do it here. They are having to do it in Saudi Arabia, because the planning system does not allow the space in the UK. That is what we need.

[Mr Deputy Speaker (Mr Nigel Evans)]

We now come to the wind-ups.

Covid-19: Funding for Local Authorities

Danny Kruger Excerpts

Tuesday 24th November 2020 Westminster Hall

[Danny Kruger (Devizes) (Con)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Hollobone. I am grateful to the hon. Member for Bethnal Green and Bow (Rushanara Ali) for giving us the opportunity to pay tribute to council staff across the country.

The whole country has been knocked sideways by the pandemic, and frontline workers in all sectors and industries have stepped up in the most tremendous way, and that really does apply to councils and council workers. They have faced huge costs and huge reductions in their income because of the crisis, but the real effect is not financial. It is on the staff who deliver services for councils. I want to acknowledge that. When we were having the daily press conferences at 5 o’clock, the leader of Wiltshire Council, Philip Whitehead, said to me in despair one evening, “Can we please have the press conferences in the morning,” because all those announcements were coming out and his staff were having to work right through into the middle of the night to respond. That made me realise how hard council staff work, not only out in communities, but in council offices as well.

I want quickly to acknowledge the financial commitments that the Government have made to local authorities through the crisis: nearly £5 billion of non-ring-fenced money, specific grants for a range of special activities that councils have to perform, £6 billion in cash-flow facilities to help councils, and compensation for the loss of fees they have incurred. However, I acknowledge that councils are still out of pocket, and we need to think about how that gap will be met in the months and years to come.

In Wiltshire we have a prudent council that has balanced the books in recent years. It has received additional money from the Government—£15 million is due. That is still to be confirmed, but we trust that it will arrive. Also it has been possible to increase the council tax through the social care precept, which, again, is to be confirmed. We understand and hope that it will be allowed. The authority still faces a budget gap of nearly £30 million, and I recognise that it will be a long task to match and meet that. I hope more money can be found.

I want to finish with two more strategic solutions that all councils have to grapple with, and opportunities that they can take. The first is in reform of social care, which makes up the bulk of spending by local authorities—65% in the case of Wiltshire. I am not going to get into a debate on how to reform social care, but clearly our model is not working and we need to fix it and the financing of it. I support the call by the Health and Social Care Committee and the Housing, Communities and Local Government Committee in the last Parliament for a new model of social insurance to fund social care, which will enable us to get on top of costs.

Finally, I want to pay tribute to a Labour council, Wigan, which, over the last 10 years, has faced all the challenges of austerity, and coped with them by doing a deal with the community of Wigan—the people of Wigan. It kept frontline services open and cut its own back office. It kept the frontline services open by trusting communities and working properly in partnership. That is the model for all of us.

Towns Fund

Danny Kruger Excerpts

Wednesday 18th November 2020 Commons Chamber

[Danny Kruger (Devizes) (Con)]

I very much support the towns fund, but I support even more the principle of the town deal, which lies behind it. That is the right way to level up the country—not just by allocating dollops of funding from Whitehall but by working with local leaders, councils and local enterprise partnerships that have a vision for their town to develop a plan to invest in it. Does my right hon. Friend agree, though, that we need to go beyond just councils and LEPs and ensure that money and power go directly to civil society and community groups that have a more granular vision for their place?

[Robert Jenrick]

My hon. Friend has been a champion of this for some time, and his brilliant report published earlier in the year made the case once again. One of the ideas behind the town deal is, exactly as he describes, not just for central Government to work directly with a particular local council—although, as I say, relations with local councils have been uniformly excellent in this process—but to broaden it out by bringing in members of the business community, members of civil society and Members of Parliament of all political persuasions. That is happening across the country. On Friday, I had the pleasure of joining a Zoom call with St Helens Council and the local community of St Helens, including the two Members of Parliament for St Helens, to hear their brilliant proposals and to offer my support and that of my Department as they bring them forward to fruition.

Local Government Responsibilities: Public Services

Danny Kruger Excerpts

Wednesday 18th March 2020 Commons Chamber

[Danny Kruger (Devizes) (Con)]

I thank the Opposition for introducing this important debate, and the Minister for some very helpful information that he gave in his response.

Let me put on record my appreciation of the efforts of the ministerial team. This is an enormous crisis for everybody, but I want to congratulate them for the speed with which they are responding in ways large and small. Some of the information we have just heard is very helpful in small ways for councils, particularly as regards making it easier for councils to meet to do their business more flexibly given the crisis. That will be very welcome at local authority level.

I pay tribute to the spirit of the Opposition Front Benchers as well. It is absolutely tremendous to see how this House is coming together to address these issues. I want quickly to address two points. The first, which has been raised by other Members, is the amazing response of our communities to this crisis and to the impending demand for support from the elderly, in particular—it is absolutely wonderful to see.

I have some anxiety about how we will co-ordinate that effort in a way that does not stifle it. I was a community worker in north Kensington at the time of the Grenfell disaster. I saw a huge uprising and upsurge of voluntary support and effort—an outpouring of love and resources from the community—but there was a huge challenge of co-ordination. We are going to have to get that balance right in all our communities in the coming months. Today, I was speaking to council workers in my local authority of Wiltshire, where there is a good balance. Council staff are not attempting directly to co-ordinate the efforts of the volunteers and local community groups that are rising up. They are not trying to tell them what to do or how to do it. What they are doing is providing a hub for information exchange, and providing support when gaps do emerge.

[David Linden]

That has been one of my concerns throughout this process. Lots of organisations in my constituency are absolutely up for the challenge, but we need to ensure that there is no duplication, particularly when it comes to things such as food security. Does the hon. Member agree that although it is not necessarily for local authorities to do that co-ordination, it would be good if helpful tips and ideas were disseminated throughout the UK so that we avoided the issue of duplication?

[Danny Kruger]

I entirely agree. There is a huge role for social media in the sort of organic, spontaneous co-ordination that we are seeing, but there is also a role for the public sector, particularly local authorities. It would be very helpful for the public to hear a clear communication from the Government that we entirely support and encourage this sort of voluntary effort, but that anybody who wants to try to match volunteers with households and so on needs to plug into local government in parishes and towns, particularly in rural areas such as the one with which I am concerned.

Secondly, on local authorities’ lost income, I hear the points that have been made very powerfully about the additional burdens that will be placed on local authorities as a result of the demand that we are going to see, but councils are also going to endure lost income as a result of this crisis. In Wiltshire, we are worrying about up to £25 million-worth of income that is normally received through all sorts of activities such as leisure services, parking, council tax and so on. We are stepping in to support businesses with lost revenues, but we need to think about how to do that for councils as well—not just helping them to meet the additional demand for services, but compensating them for their losses.

Community Housing

Danny Kruger Excerpts

Thursday 12th March 2020 Commons Chamber

[Mr Bacon]

I recommend that my hon. Friend talks to the National Community Land Trust Network, because the truth is that there are lots of different solutions that work in different environments. He will have heard, as I did, the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government say earlier that the great idea of neighbourhood plans does not work if it is then overridden by developers who take no account of what local communities have said they want. It undermines the credibility of the whole neighbourhood plan process. In my hon. Friend’s particular case, I suggest that he talks to Tom Chance and Catherine Harrington at the National Community Land Trust Network, to see if there is a way forward, particularly if my right hon. Friend the Minister does what I hope he will do, which is relaunch the community housing fund so that the funding continues to be available, preferably on a long-term basis.

[Danny Kruger (Devizes) (Con)]

Does my hon. Friend agree that community land trusts offer potentially a large part of the answer to the housing shortage in this country —uniquely among new developments, they frequently have considerable support from local communities—and that, although this Budget was overwhelmingly brilliant, it is disappointing that the community housing fund was not extended to meet the enormous demand for community land trusts?

[Mr Bacon]

I agree with everything my hon. Friend says. I draw attention to an utterly apposite quote on the front page of “Community Builders”, a book by the Demos think-tank. I happened to attend the launch several years ago. It says:

“Giving communities more power over local housing developments can help to get more homes built”.

Various arguments are made against community housing and alternative ways of doing things. I want to stress something and make sure that the Minister is aware of it by the end of this debate, so I might as well say it now. We know very well that the Treasury’s infrastructure targets are based on what housing can be delivered. I was in a meeting with the Transport Secretary the other day and, like many of us lobbying for our areas, I have been in various meetings with Ministers over the past few weeks. The clear indication given is that if a proposal brings more housing, it is more likely that a Member’s constituency will get the bypass it needs or that its major road will be dualled, and so on. My point to the Minister is this. If he and his colleagues want extra housing to be accepted, greater density than might otherwise be achieved, a system that is against sprawl and in favour of the most efficient use of land, including brownfield, and if they want something that is more environmentally sustainable and green, rather than just greenwash, all of that, not just some of it, is made easier if we involve the community.

I talked to the Secretary of State earlier today. He mentioned a view that he believes may be held by some in the Treasury—it was not his view—that community housing may not represent good value for money. I will tell you what definitely does not represent value for money, Mr Deputy Speaker, and that is having a parcel of land handed from pillar to post, from one public sector body to another, sometimes for generations.

When he was Mayor of London, my right hon. Friend the Member for Uxbridge and South Ruislip (Boris Johnson) said, “Let’s cut this Gordian knot and make something happen.” The thing that happened was the scheme on the site of old St Clement’s Hospital in Mile End, which he had celebrated and opened as Mayor of London. It was the fact that it was community scheme that helped drive it forward. That is much better value for money. In an environment where we are talking about rewriting the Green Book in a more sensible way, we should be thinking much more laterally and broadly about how different approaches can deliver better, faster and greener outcomes that are in every sense better for the community, our nation and people, and also better value for money. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Devizes (Danny Kruger) for helping me raise that point.

As my hon. Friend alluded to, the Budget did not announce that the community housing fund will continue, although I am sure something will happen in due course. It is worth saying, for the benefit of the House, that the most common form of community-led housing, although it is not the only one, is via a community land trust, which is a legal entity that acquires land through purchase by the community, perhaps though a parish council, another local authority or a gift, and then oversees the development of affordable housing to buy or to rent. The housing remains affordable in perpetuity, while the land value is in effect removed from the equation because the land is held by the community land trust, which is a not-for-profit group that acts as the long-term steward.

Frankly, the community housing fund has been a tremendous success story for this Government. It was originally launched by George Osborne in his March 2016 Budget. The story of what happened next is important, particularly in terms of ensuring value for money. Over that summer, the community housing sector, led by the National Community Land Trust Network, worked up a detailed plan for how the money should be spent, although I regret to say that the Treasury initially decided, at the end of 2016, that the money should be handed to local authorities, which is in effect what happened—in two tranches totalling £148 million. This is a very important point to bear in mind if the Secretary of State or his ministerial colleagues want to discuss the question of value for money with the Treasury, because the Treasury may sometimes suggest that the community housing approach is not necessarily the best value-for-money approach. What actually happened was that the councils, having been given the money in a very non-ring-fenced way, spent it in the way that councils usually do. The Community Land Trust Network then did the obvious thing of talking to the councils about ensuring that the money was spent in the best possible way for community housing projects—and some of it was, which is good news, although, inevitably, not as much as might otherwise have been the case.

In November 2017, our right hon. Friend the present Business Secretary—who was in his place on the Front Bench not a few minutes ago—was Housing Minister, and he addressed the National Community Land Trust Network at its annual conference, announcing a rather more targeted scheme, and it is that scheme that has been such a huge success. In just 18 months, the pipeline in Homes England’s system has grown to more than 10,000 homes; that is actual projects that are good to go. Independent analysis by Sheffield Hallam University has found that 859 communities are bringing projects forward, and that the community housing fund has increased the potential pipeline from just under 6,000 homes—when I and some of my colleagues met the then Prime Minister my right hon. Friend the Member for Maidenhead (Mrs May) in 2017 to push the idea of announcing and getting on with the community housing fund—to over 23,000 homes today. That is staggering growth and it is down to the community housing fund.

The research estimates the total funding need for projects outside London over the next five years to be about £260 million. That includes £57 million of revenue funding and £172 million in capital funding via Homes England. The Government may ask why so much of the money that was available was underspent when the bids closed in December 2019. The answer is very simple: it was not open for long enough. Eighteen months is too short a time period, even for the very best of housing developers, and in many cases, community groups are, by definition, starting from scratch. They need longer to establish themselves and to develop projects using the revenue component of the fund. Since the fund opened in July 2018, Homes England has received 379 bids, and it is estimated that that would require double the revenue that was in the fund at the point of closure. It is absolutely clear that that part of the fund was a smash hit, but not enough projects, in 18 months, had reached the point where they could bid for the capital element. It makes sense to have a much longer, stable community housing fund over the life of a Parliament.

Communities in every corner of England are playing their part in tackling the housing crisis in this way. We heard the Secretary of State mention First Homes earlier today. Communities are pioneering First Homes. In Cornwall, a community land trust has built 252 homes over 10 years, sold at a discount to make them affordable to local people. Thanks to the community housing fund, there are now plans for another 209. Many colleagues have campaigned to make these schemes happen, including the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, my right hon. Friend the Member for Camborne and Redruth (George Eustice), and my hon. Friends the Members for North Cornwall (Scott Mann), for South East Cornwall (Mrs Murray), for St Austell and Newquay (Steve Double), for St Ives (Derek Thomas) and for Truro and Falmouth (Cherilyn Mackrory). Indeed, the predecessor of my hon. Friend the Member for Truro and Falmouth, Sarah Newton—whose loss to this House is much lamented by many—was one of the campaigners who originally suggested to George Osborne the idea of using the additional tax receipts from higher taxation of second homes to fund more community housing.

Communities are pioneering new approaches to affordability. In York, a group called YorSpace has planning permission to build 19 homes and a common house. It is developing a tenure called mutual home ownership, which lets members build up equity in their homes through monthly payments. It has raised £400,000 through a community share issue—local investment by local people—but it needs the community housing fund to provide capital grants.

Communities are building better and building beautiful. Some of us attended the launch of the Building Better, Building Beautiful Commission, chaired by the excellent Nicholas Boys Smith and the much lamented late Roger Scruton. Marmalade Lane and New Ground are two co-housing communities featured in the new “National Design Guide”, and both have won numerous awards. They were featured in the Building Better, Building Beautiful Commission’s report. Communities are pioneering new methods of construction. In Brighton, a self-build co-operative called Bunker is on site as we speak, building its first two homes for families on modest incomes. It is one of many community groups using off-site manufacturing and other construction innovations that the Government want to encourage.

I could go on—there are many other examples. I will give just one, in particular. Communities are working with landowners on projects that no one else would build. In Taunton, Somerset Co-op community land trust got started by converting a disused building into flats for young homeless people, and then went on to develop eight new affordable homes. It had been developing a bid with Homes England to take forward a new 30-home development in partnership with a local landowner, but the community housing fund closed just at the point when it was ready to apply.

The Minister may be familiar with the Oakfield scheme in Swindon, the headquarters of Nationwide Building Society. I recommend that he visit the scheme when he gets the chance. As he will be aware, Nationwide is a mutual building society, not a profit maximiser, and, like many building societies, it is going back to its roots in thinking about how it can do more to solve the housing crisis. This is an interesting scheme because although it is in some senses conventional—that is, it is not a community land trust scheme—Nationwide held a statutory consultation process where it really, seriously took account of what the community wanted for a development on a derelict brownfield site that no other house builder would touch. It now has a beautiful scheme coming forward that lots of local people are supporting. The total number of statutory objections it had in the consultation phase for the planning was zero.

I urge the Minister to reflect on the fact that one of the big problems that not just this Government but every Government have faced is getting people to accept the idea of more housing. I have been on platforms with people taking part in election debates with their political opponents where they have talked about extra housing being a sad price that has to be paid. We have somehow forgotten that the idea of development is cognate with developing—it is supposed to be a good word. We have managed to turn “development” into a bad word. The only way we turn it into a good word again, and therefore get it to be more widely welcomed, is to have good development. It is not an add-on. It is not a small piece on the side that we can perhaps think about at some point in the future if we have time—it is part of recasting how we do housing in this country.

We should not expect that people will get it right all the time. Upstairs a few moments ago, I was reading David Vise’s book about Google, where he talks about the fact that we treat Google a bit like a university. We try lots of stuff, and some of it is going to fail. I am not advocating failure—I am advocating success, but the way we get success is by experimentation and learning. By having lots of small, early cheap failures, we are more likely to have success. This applies across Government projects, but it is true in housing, as in many other areas. The great thing about housing is that we have learnt a great deal already, so there are fewer opportunities to make mistakes if we bother to learn those lessons and take more opportunities to get it right.

The housing White Paper, “Fixing our broken housing market”, of which I have a copy here, came out three years ago, in February 2017. It has been the Government’s view for three years that we have a broken housing market and that we need to fix it. We have had a lot of position papers, we have had every think-tank under the sun coming out with policy statements, and we have had some movement, but we have not had quick enough movement in changing the way in which we do things.

Yesterday, like my hon. Friend the Member for Devizes, I was very pleased, in supporting the Budget, to hear the Chancellor say that there was going to be £12.2 billion extra for affordable housing. I thought personally that the shadow Chancellor was a little churlish in calling it “only” £12.2 billion—I would say that it is quite a reasonable start.

The £12.2 billion that the Chancellor announced yesterday is a five-year programme. The community housing fund was originally slated as a £300 million programme over five years—£60 million per year. The point is that if all that money had been spent—and it has not been yet, for the reasons we have discussed—£300 million is still only 12.45% of the £12.2 billion that the Government are planning to spend on affordable housing. The central burden of “Fixing our broken housing market” is that just doing the same again and again will not solve the problem. We have to start doing things differently. We have to start thinking differently. Community housing, supported through the community housing fund, is a very important part of that.

I was addressing a community housing conference in Surrey only a few weeks ago. I like to refresh my presentation, so that I say things that are interesting to me each time, and there is a chance they might be interesting to the audience. I put up a slide that talked about the well-known national organisation Grandmothers Against All Development, with a question mark after it. The audience looked rather blank, and I said, “I made that up actually.” I have yet to meet—and I do not think I ever will—the grandmother whose daughter has just had her second baby and wants her daughter’s family not to have somewhere decent to live. All we have to do is bottle that thought and create the wiring under the bonnet to turn it into reality, and we have gone a long way to solving the problem.

The central problem we face with housing is that most people feel that they have no voice. Most people feel that they have no say over what gets built, where it gets built, what it looks like or how it performs in terms of thermal performance. If the Minister really wants green housing, the best thing he can do is involve local people, because I have yet to meet the person who would not prefer to have a house that costs nothing to heat. We have known for many years how to build a house that costs basically nothing to heat—£100 to £150 a year for heat and hot water—and yet we do not routinely do it.

I heard the Secretary of State say in a statement a few weeks ago that the volume house builders would have to ensure they met the quality standards, otherwise they would no longer be eligible for Help to Buy. I found myself thinking: if they did not meet those standards, how can they have been eligible for all these years, basically producing small, expensive, poor-quality, environmentally-unfriendly dwellings that most people would prefer not to buy?

Believe it or not—I can demonstrate it with evidence, which I am happy to share with the Minister—there are more people in this country who want to build their own homes than people who want to buy new ones. Only 33% of people in this country would prefer to buy a new home. Two thirds of people would prefer not to, and 61% of people in this country would like at some point the chance to build their own home. We have to take the energy that is there and turn it into something real, and we need radical changes in how we do things to make that happen.

Rod Hackney, who was the adviser to the Prince of Wales and is a renowned architect, once said:

“It is a dangerous thing to underestimate human potential and the energy which can be generated when people are given the opportunity to help themselves.”

That is what we have to make happen.