Housing Reform

Geoffrey Clifton-Brown Excerpts

Monday 21st November 2011 Commons Chamber

[Grant Shapps]

On the first point, the Barnett consequential formula will apply, which means £400 million for England. On the second point, there will now be discussions with the devolved Administrations to see whether they are interested in the indemnity scheme.

[Geoffrey Clifton-Brown (The Cotswolds) (Con)]

I draw the House’s attention to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests. I welcome my right hon. Friend’s announcement this afternoon of measures to reduce the 738,000 empty houses, which are a shocking waste of our built environment. Can he say what effect he thinks that those measures will have? He might also be interested to know that there were as many empty houses at the beginning of the 13 years of Labour Government as there were at the end.

[Grant Shapps]

I am grateful to my hon. Friend for that second statistic, of which I was not aware. Those empty houses are indeed a scandal, no matter who they have remained empty under. The Under-Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, my hon. Friend the Member for Hazel Grove will lay out more details of the new, enlarged fund to tackle the empty homes. It is important that we tackle them not only through some of the traditional methods, but by taking people who may be unemployed and reskilling them, using apprenticeships and much else, to ensure that we bring as many homes as possible back into use.