Asked by: Dehenna Davison (Conservative - Bishop Auckland)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, what recent assessment his Department has made of the potential merits of updating the valuations upon which Council Tax bands are set.
Answered by Simon Hoare
As set out previously, the Government has no plans to conduct a revaluation of council tax bands.
The Government remains committed to improving the local government finance landscape in the next Parliament. The Government confirmed in the Policy Statement published ahead of the provisional Local Government Finance Settlement that in response to calls for stability the Government is prioritising stability in this Parliament and will work with local government and the wider sector on the new challenges and opportunities they face in the next Parliament.
Asked by: Dehenna Davison (Conservative - Bishop Auckland)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, what steps his Department is taking to support the long-term viability of high streets.
Answered by Jacob Young
This Government is fully committed to supporting our high-street businesses and communities.
Thanks to my Hon friend’s hard work, provisions in the Levelling Up and Regeneration Act for High Street Rental Auctions (HSRA) give local authorities new powers to force landlords to rent out vacant units in high streets. HSRAs will be backed by £2 million funding announced as part of the Anti-Social Behaviour Action Plan, to help communities and local businesses take control of empty properties, covering the cost of refurbishing properties, the auction process and council fees.
The High Street Accelerator pilot programme will incentivise and empower local people to work together to develop ambitious plans to tackle vacancy and anti-social behaviour, and work on long-term regeneration plans to future proof their high streets.
The Government’s Long-Term Plan for Towns has identified 55 towns to develop the first wave of Town Partnerships, backed by £1.1 billion overall, to drive ambitious plans to regenerate local towns across the UK over the next decade.
Long-term investment also includes £2.35 billion of Town Deals and over £830 million of Future High Streets Funding across 170 high streets, town centres and local communities in England.
At the last autumn statement, the Chancellor announced a business rates support package worth £4.3 billion over the next five years, freezing the small business multiplier and extending the Retail, Hospitality and Leisure scheme.
I want to thank my Hon friend for her work, and I look forward to continuing to work with her on levelling up projects in Bishop Auckland and our Long-Term Plan for Towns in Spennymoor.
Asked by: Dehenna Davison (Conservative - Bishop Auckland)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, what steps his Department is taking to help ensure that people sleeping rough have access to emergency accommodation.
Answered by Felicity Buchan
The Rough Sleeping Initiative 2022-25 is investing over £530 million in funding to local authorities across England from April 2022 to March 2025. This includes an additional investment of £34.6 million announced in September 2023, to increase funding of rough sleeping services in local areas with the greatest need. The Rough Sleeping Initiative supports local authorities to develop their services from emergency interventions for rough sleepers to a focus on prevention, more sustained off-the-street accommodation offers and tailored support for those who are most vulnerable.
The Night Shelter Transformation Fund is investing £13 million to small – medium sized community and faith groups to increase the provision of quality single-room accommodation within the night shelter sector. The multi-year grant funding provides capital and revenue funding to support the sector to transform towards single-room year-round accommodation as the norm, as well as increasing the availability and quality of support for service users.
Asked by: Dehenna Davison (Conservative - Bishop Auckland)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, what steps his Department is taking to ensure that the building regulations on trickle vents are consistent with making houses more efficient.
Answered by Stuart Andrew - Shadow Secretary of State for Health and Social Care
In December 2021, Government published its response to the Future Buildings Standard consultation, including a suite of new regulations and standards to improve energy efficiency, ventilation and other matters covered by the Building Regulations
When windows are replaced in existing dwellings, it is necessary to ensure that the ventilation provision in the dwelling is no worse than it was before the work was carried out. A common way of meeting this requirement will be to install trickle ventilators. Approved Document F: volume 1 sets out the detail of the new standard
The purpose of ensuring ventilation provision is maintained is to protect the health and safety of people in the dwellings they occupy. The purpose of the new guidance is to make sure that any ventilation lost when replacing the window is replaced with purposeful ventilation. The standards do not require any more ventilation to be provided than is necessary. An assessment of energy demand due to replacement windows with ventilators can be found within the final stage Part F impact assessment
As part of the standards published in December 2021, we also increased the thermal efficiency standard for various types of work to existing buildings, including when replacing windows
New guidance and requirements for Part F and Part L of the Building Regulations are due to come into effect on 15 June 2022
Further information can be found at the following link: https://www.gov.uk/government/consultations/the-future-buildings-standard
Asked by: Dehenna Davison (Conservative - Bishop Auckland)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, what steps the Government is taking to ensure that there is sufficient social housing stock available for larger families.
Answered by Stuart Andrew - Shadow Secretary of State for Health and Social Care
Our £11.5 billion Affordable Homes Programme (AHP) will provide up to 180,000 new homes across the country, should economic conditions allow. The Programme supports a wide range of affordable housing, including social housing for homes of all sizes.
Local authorities should determine the types of social housing needed for their communities. In March 2020 Government set out a clear expectation that local planning authorities must have an up-to-date plan in place by the end of 2023. This will ensure that they will be in the best possible position to adapt to the new plan-making system, further details on which we will set out in due course. Having an effective, up to date plan in place is essential to planning for and meeting housing requirements; in ways that make good use of land and result in well-designed and attractive places to live. The Government expects local authorities to work together to plan for and deliver the housing and infrastructure our communities need.
Asked by: Dehenna Davison (Conservative - Bishop Auckland)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, if the Government will take steps to ensure that British citizens wishing to sponsor Ukrainian refugees are able to do so.
Answered by Eddie Hughes
I refer the Hon Member to the Secretary of State's Oral Statement to Parliament of 14 March 2022.
Asked by: Dehenna Davison (Conservative - Bishop Auckland)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, what steps the Government is taking to ensure that social housing providers are accountable to local authorities and residents.
Answered by Neil O'Brien - Shadow Minister (Policy Renewal and Development)
The Government is committed to ensuring that social housing providers are accountable to their tenants and residents. The Charter for Social Housing Residents: Social Housing White Paper set out a range of commitments on how we will improve the experiences of social housing residents, including strengthening the transparency and accountability of social housing providers
Registered providers of social housing are formally held to account by the Regulator of Social Housing. The Government set out in the Charter for Social Housing Residents our plan to reform the regulation of social housing, creating a strong, proactive consumer regulatory regime within the Regulator of Social Housing, reviewing the formal standards against which landlords are regulated and requiring them to be transparent about their performance so they can be held to account. The new regime will include regular inspections of the largest landlords, the creation of new Tenant Satisfaction Measures against which all social landlords will need to report, and the introduction of a new Access to Information Scheme for tenants of private registered providers of social housing.
We will legislate as soon as practicable to bring forward these changes.