Asked by: Faisal Rashid (Labour - Warrington South)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Minister for Women and Equalities, if the Government will bring into force section 106 of the Equality Act 2010 so that political parties would be required to publish diversity data on candidates standing in elections.
Answered by Victoria Atkins - Shadow Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs
We keep section 106 under review, as we do with other uncommenced provisions in the Equality Act 2010.
The Government Equalities Office is working to support women and disabled people to participate in politics. This includes the recently announced fund to support disabled candidates to seek electoral office, to meet the costs of campaigning, primarily for the forthcoming English local elections in 2019.
Ultimately, parties are responsible for their candidate selection and should lead the way in improving diverse representation. Many are already doing so.
Asked by: Faisal Rashid (Labour - Warrington South)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, what steps the Government has taken to increase the number of affordable homes being built each year since 2014.
Answered by Kit Malthouse
The Government is committed to increasing the supply of social housing and has made £9 billion available through the Affordable Homes Programme to March 2022 to deliver 250,000 new affordable homes of a wide range of tenures, including social rent
Our expanded programme will now provide a wider range of homes to meet the housing needs of a range of people in different circumstances and different housing markets – building the right homes in the right places
We have listened to the sector. We have increased the size of the Affordable Homes Programme and re-introduced social rent to it, lifted the Housing Revenue Account borrowing cap for local authorities, and are setting a long term rent deal for councils and housing associations in England from 2020.
In September 2018, the Prime Minister announced an additional £2 billion of long term funding certainty for housing associations. This extra funding will deliver more affordable homes and stimulate the sector’s wider building ambitions, through strategic partnerships
Our ten year funding commitment marks the first time any government has offered housing associations such long-term funding certainty.
Asked by: Faisal Rashid (Labour - Warrington South)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, what assessment he has made of the validity of the findings in the Crisis report, Everybody In: How to end homelessness in Great Britain.
Answered by Nigel Adams
I welcome Crisis's report and Government shares the broad ambition it sets out. That is why we have committed to halving rough sleeping by 2022 and ending it by 2027. As part of this we have established the Rough Sleeping Advisory Panel and a cross-Government Ministerial Taskforce to support the development and implementation of the Rough Sleeping Strategy. Crisis sit on the Advisory Panel and supported the work to put forward a number of recommendations for the Rough Sleeping Strategy.
I will continue to consider the findings outlined within the report ahead of the publication of the Rough Sleeping Strategy. My Department will also continue to work with Crisis once the strategy has been published and remain committed to tackling both rough sleeping and broader issues of homelessness as highlighted in the report.