Budget Resolutions

Neil Coyle Excerpts

1st reading: House of Commons
Thursday 1st November 2018 Commons Chamber

[James Brokenshire]

I am grateful to my right hon. Friend for his early intervention. I intend to cover several housing announcements, but he rightly underlines the Government’s commitment to build the homes that our country needs. We want councils, housing associations and the private sector to build, thereby meeting the challenges and problems that the broken housing market has presented. The Government are determined to fix that.

[Neil Coyle (Bermondsey and Old Southwark) (Lab)]

If the Secretary of State is serious about house building, where is the funding in the Budget for the Bakerloo line extension, which would provide not only vital transport infrastructure for south-east London, but bring with it house building—private house building as well as 5,000 social housing homes and 2,000 genuinely affordable, London living rents?

Oral Answers to Questions

Neil Coyle Excerpts

Monday 23rd July 2018 Commons Chamber

[James Brokenshire]

Last year, we saw the homes that are being delivered at a high, and that has not been any greater, other than in one year, over the last 30 years. The right hon. Gentleman glosses over Labour’s record, but what did we see when Labour was in power? House building—down by 45%. Homes bought and sold—down by 40%. Social housing—down by 400,000. However, there was one thing that kept going up: the number of people on the social housing waiting list. It is this Government who are determined to deliver.

[Neil Coyle (Bermondsey and Old Southwark) (Lab)]

3. What assessment his Department has made of the effect of the use of planning viability assessments on the number of council houses being built.

[The Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government (James Brokenshire)]

Local authorities have built 12,340 dwellings since 2010, up from 2,920 over the previous 13 years. However, we recognise that viability assessments can be used to reduce contributions towards affordable housing. That is why we are introducing a new approach to viability, through changes in the national planning policy framework.

[Neil Coyle]

The current framework means that last year the number of affordable homes provided under section 106 agreements was only half the 32,000 peak in Labour’s last year in office. Despite that, Southwark’s Labour council has built 535 council homes in just four years, with over 1,000 more in the pipeline. However, the waiting list is 11,000, so will the Minister tell us whether right to buy will now be banned for those seeking not a home to live in, but a cash cow to rent out? Will he also say how the imminent Green Paper will empower Southwark to build the genuinely affordable council homes that local people need?

[James Brokenshire]

The right to buy has been a powerful and important initiative in ensuring that people have places that they can call their home. We will set out an approach in the new NPPF that will reduce delays from the use of viability assessments to negotiate developer contributions by front-loading that. The Government are taking steps to speed up home delivery, which is something the hon. Gentleman should welcome.

Building Safety

Neil Coyle Excerpts

Thursday 15th March 2018 Commons Chamber

[Sajid Javid]

Last August I wrote to every single local authority, asking them to carry out the work of finding all the private sector buildings in their area, and providing support for them. In fact, we have just given additional funding to help with that. All of them have acted with urgency and are working at pace. Some are still discovering buildings, because the work partly requires the co-operation of the private sector. We have spoken to many private sector institutions. It would be wrong to blame the local authorities; it is right that we work with them and give them all the support necessary to find these buildings.

[Neil Coyle (Bermondsey and Old Southwark) (Lab)]

Immediately after Grenfell, Southwark Council’s leader, chief exec and the three borough MPs wrote to the Secretary of State asking for help to retrofit sprinklers in more than 170 tower blocks in the borough. That was a clear request for financial support. It is simply disingenuous to claim that no request has been turned down. The Department dismissively said that it would assess the council’s means to do the work itself. Nine months on, how is that assessment coming along? Has it been designed, will it be published, and when will Southwark Council be given the resources to complete the works?

[Sajid Javid]

We have made it very clear that all local authorities, including Southwark Council, should determine for themselves the essential work required for fire safety—public safety is the No. 1 issue—and if they need financial flexibility to help them pay for it, that will not be turned down. We are in discussions with more than 40 local authorities, many in detail. We are working with them and I am not aware of us having turned down any discussions with a single local authority. We are happy to work with them all and make sure that they get the financial flexibility they need.

Homelessness

Neil Coyle Excerpts

Tuesday 27th February 2018 Commons Chamber

[Layla Moran]

I have to make some progress. I am sorry, but I am mindful of what Madam Deputy Speaker said.

The estimates show a £259 million reduction in Homes and Communities Agency funding for starter homes and a £72 million reduction this year in affordable homes spending. This worries me. Meanwhile, the estimates show a significant increase in funding for Help to Buy. But those who are about to become homeless are very far from accessing Help to Buy: they have no spare cash, so how are they meant to raise the money for even a small deposit? The estimates also show that capital spend on other housing programmes will fall by £1.2 billion—a reduction of 40%—from £3 billion to £1.8 billion. Help to Buy is useful, but it is certainly not the fix-all solution. The Government have got the emphasis wrong.

Liberal Democrats would like to see a more ambitious programme of house building, but one that aims to be truly affordable—not 80% of market value—and that, critically, also includes rented housing. We have yet to hear from the Government how they are going to achieve that, in the latest Budget or elsewhere.

We also need to consider that people become homeless for a number of other reasons, the most common of which is the end of a private tenancy. Decreasing numbers of houses available for social rent means that local authorities are having to rely on private accommodation providers. This accommodation is often of a poor standard and does not offer value for money. There is a problem with landlords who do not want to accept people in receipt of housing allowance, and we suspect that universal credit will make this situation much worse.

[Neil Coyle (Bermondsey and Old Southwark) (Lab)]

The hon. Lady is making an incredibly powerful speech, and a lot of personal commitment has clearly been put into addressing this issue. She mentioned universal credit among other policies. Given that this has contributed to the problem, is it one of the policies that she is most embarrassed about her party pursuing while in government with the Conservative party?

[Layla Moran]

I am afraid that that is not what this debate is about; I am going to move on.

The NAO has found that

“changes to Local Housing Allowance…are likely to have contributed to the affordability of tenancies for those on benefits, and are an element of the increase in homelessness.”

The key point about joined-up thinking predates any Government. If we are truly to tackle the issue of homelessness, a key recommendation of the Committee’s report is that not only should the money and the provisions of the Homelessness Reduction Act be available, but that we also press Governments to work together.

My last point is that a taskforce from the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government is meant to be leading this work, yet we were shocked to hear that the previous taskforce met only three times between 2015 and 2017. My understanding is that, as of last week, the new taskforce set up under the Homelessness Reduction Act has not even met once. It is critical that the Government take this matter seriously. Those who are homeless are in dire straits. They deserve not just our compassion and care, but, critically, they need us to find the money to put a roof over their heads. That is the best thing for them and, in the spirit of these estimates day debates, it is the most cost-effective thing to do.

--- Later in debate ---

[Neil Coyle (Bermondsey and Old Southwark) (Lab)]

I speak as co-chair of the all-party group for ending homelessness, which I am pleased to co-chair with the hon. Member for Colchester (Will Quince). I work with him to highlight solutions in a non-partisan way. Doing so takes awareness of the policies contributing to the problem as well as ability to identify the policies that are missing altogether. It also takes an admission that Ministers try very hard to avoid: homelessness has risen every year since 2010. This year-on-year growth is avoidable and appalling. In 2005, the numbers of people rough sleeping across the whole of England were 459. It is now estimated that 8,000 people slept rough in London alone last year. Shelter estimates that more than 300,000 people were in temporary accommodation last year, including, as we have heard, 120,000 children who woke up on Christmas day in often unsuitable places, perhaps sharing a bathroom or kitchen with strangers. That growth is a direct result of Government policies since 2010. When Ministers axed national funding for genuinely affordable homes and brutally slashed council funding, including £200 million from my borough of Southwark, it is hard to deny the impact.

When our safety net of the social security system is picked apart, leaving disadvantaged people with no income at all in too many cases, especially under universal credit delays, it is inevitable that homelessness will rise. When mental health services are eradicated, Ministers cannot pretend not to know that 40% of homeless people have mental health conditions. When Ministers undermine supported housing for people with mental health conditions and other vulnerable groups, the problem will only grow. When drug and alcohol cessation services are decimated, it is simply deceitful to pretend it will not contribute to a rise in homelessness and costs to the NHS, as people end up admitted to A&E in crisis.

Costs are rising. Southwark Council spent £3 million tackling homelessness last year, on up-front help to prevent people from losing homes and to tackle rough sleeping. But still in my surgery sessions I see the problem every week. I have seen a 65-year-old cleaner sleeping on night buses, in work but carrying as many of her belongings with her as she could carry. I have seen a 19-year-old woman sleeping with different men every night rather than go back on the streets. I have seen a working family with three children under 10 wrongly denied the right to continue working in this country by the Home Office and put on the streets by a private landlord until a local church stepped in.

As in so many other areas where the Government have abdicated their responsibilities, we see people and charities stepping in. I would like to thank the staff and all volunteers providing crucial support and services across our country, but in particular in my community. We have seen massive growth in visible rough sleeping around Elephant and Castle and London Bridge, and temporary accommodation in Southwark is simply exhausted. I have been trying to help the Robes Project over a number of years. I have slept outside Southwark cathedral three times—please do sponsor me this year—in winter to raise awareness and funds for its work in providing accommodation and food in 28 churches every winter, opening its doors in November. It relies on volunteers to provide that accommodation and food. It does an incredible job.

In recess, I spent a very cold evening with St Mungo’s outreach team on its StreetLink work. Anyone can refer a rough sleeper to StreetLink online, through their app, or on the phone 24 hours a day. Sadiq Khan has advertised StreetLink and since December, Londoners have referred over 2,000 homeless people using this service—double that at the same period last year. I think that demonstrates a public will to tackle the problem that is simply not matched by Government action. It is because of St Mungo’s amazing staff and volunteers like Eamon, Darren and Dave, who I met on that cold Monday evening in recess, that desperate people are getting the help they need in this extreme weather.

The cold weather is not the only reason people are more concerned about the issue currently. Just two weeks ago a homeless man died on our doorstep here at Westminster—a shocking case, but sadly not isolated. Just weeks earlier and within a mile of this place, another man died on the streets of our capital. Deaths of homeless people have been recorded from Edinburgh to Birmingham in the past couple of months alone.

Ministers have twiddled their thumbs, ignored the problem and passed the buck for far too long. There are clear policies to help: building more homes and supporting councils to build more, as well as lifting the local housing allowance freeze; intervening in the failing private sector to cap rents and provide secure, longer tenancies, in particular for families; funding the services we know help in mental health, and in drug and alcohol cessation; ending delays and cuts to disadvantaged people, from universal credit to the personal independence payment and the employment and support allowance; and backing a rent deposit scheme, as advocated by Crisis.

One of the lowlights of the 2010 election was the “Broken Britain” slogan. Little did we know that the Cameron soundbite was a destination, not a description. Nothing highlights how badly broken our country is than people freezing to death on our streets in the face of, and as a direct consequence of, a cold-hearted Government ignoring what worked, denying culpability, and refusing to fund and implement sufficient viable solutions today.

Space Industry Bill [ Lords ] (Second sitting)

Neil Coyle Excerpts

Committee Debate: 2nd sitting: House of Commons
Tuesday 23rd January 2018 Public Bill Committees

[Joseph Johnson]

The European Space Agency delivers a number of programmes for the European Union, but we continue to be a member of the ESA in our own right and, as I said, we are contributing record amounts—more than €1.4 billion in the current budget period.

[Neil Coyle (Bermondsey and Old Southwark) (Lab)]

For absolute clarity, is the Minister suggesting that payments via the EU could still be possible, in contrast with the Foreign Secretary’s position on that matter?

[Joseph Johnson]

I am not going to parse comments by others that I have not seen, but I can confirm that we remain a full member of the European Space Agency in our own right, we are contributing record amounts to its budget, and we have every expectation of continuing to be a full member of that organisation long into the future.

On the new clause’s requirement to undertake an assessment, the Secretary of State for Exiting the European Union provided the relevant Committees with reports for many sectors, including one for the UK space sector, on 27 November. As the hon. Member for Central Ayrshire said, that report contained a description of the sector, the current EU regulatory regime, existing frameworks for the facilitation of trade between countries in the sector, and sector views.

Space Industry Bill [ Lords ] (First sitting)

Neil Coyle Excerpts

Committee Debate: 1st sitting: House of Commons
Tuesday 23rd January 2018 Public Bill Committees

[Joseph Johnson]

The hon. Gentleman will be interested to know that we will be introducing draft legislation. Should he detect any shortcoming in its application and should he continue to have concerns about whether the spaceport and spaceflight activity enabled by the Bill would have risks posed to it by drone activity, there will be plenty of opportunities in the development of that legislation for Members to point that out to Government.

[Neil Coyle (Bermondsey and Old Southwark) (Lab)]

When will the draft legislation come forward? Given that the police have indicated they do not have the resources to investigate crimes such as shop lifting, bike thefts and mobile phone thefts, will it include resources to ensure that the police can adequately deliver those new responsibilities?

[Joseph Johnson]

Sorry, I did not catch the last bit of what you said.