Asked by: Oliver Heald (Conservative - North East Hertfordshire)
Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:
To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, what plans the Government has to strengthen civil law in respect of intentional unauthorised development; and what the timetable is for such action.
Answered by Esther McVey - Minister without Portfolio (Cabinet Office)
In the Government’s response last year to our consultation on powers for dealing with unauthorised development and encampments, we committed to strengthening national planning policy on intentional unauthorised development. We intend to consult on proposals for doing so shortly.
Asked by: Oliver Heald (Conservative - North East Hertfordshire)
Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:
To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, with reference to his letter to Conservative Members of Parliament dated 7 February 2019, what plans he has to strengthen policy on intentional unauthorised development; what the timetable is for the delivery of those plans; and if he will make a statement.
Answered by Kit Malthouse
The Government amended national planning policy in August 2015 to make intentional unauthorised development a material consideration in the determination of planning applications and appeals. In April 2018 the Government consulted on the range of powers available to local authorities, the police and landowners for dealing with unauthorised development and encampments. In our response to that consultation, published in February 2019, we committed to strengthening policy on intentional unauthorised development and will consult on proposed measures shortly. This forms part of a comprehensive package of measures announced in February 2019, which includes:
Asked by: Oliver Heald (Conservative - North East Hertfordshire)
Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:
To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, what plans he has to issue good practice guidance to support local authorities’ use of powers to deal with unauthorised encampments; what his timetable is for issuing that guidance; and if he will make a statement.
Answered by Kit Malthouse
Although the majority of the travelling community are law-abiding, it is clear that unauthorised encampments can pose serious difficulties for local residents.
The Government is determined to tackle this issue. This is why, in the Government response to the consultation on powers for dealing with unauthorised development and encampments published 9 February [https://www.gov.uk/government/consultations/powers-for-dealing-with-unauthorised-development-and-encampments], my Department and the Home Office set out a comprehensive range of measures including a commitment to produce good practice guidance to support local authorities’ use of existing powers to deal with unauthorised encampments. We have committed to initially publish non-statutory guidance, which we will develop in consultation with local authorities and the travelling community. We will, in due course, create a power to place this guidance on a statutory footing and confirm the timetable.
Asked by: Oliver Heald (Conservative - North East Hertfordshire)
Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:
To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, pursuant to Answer of 29 October 2018 to Question 181533 on Planning Permission, whether intentional unauthorised development is still a material consideration in cases involving land outside the Green Belt.
Answered by Kit Malthouse
The Written Ministerial Statement (HCWS423) regarding Green Belt protection and intentional unauthorised development, made by my Right Hon Friend the Member for Great Yarmouth on 17 December 2015, is still a potential material consideration in a planning case, whether or not the land is within a Green Belt.
Asked by: Oliver Heald (Conservative - North East Hertfordshire)
Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:
To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, whether it remains Government policy that intentional unauthorised development should be a material planning consideration under the new National Planning Policy Framework.
Answered by Kit Malthouse
The Written Ministerial Statement (HCWS423) regarding Green Belt protection and intentional unauthorised development, made by my Right Hon Friend the Member for Great Yarmouth on 17 December 2015, is still a potential material consideration in a planning case.
Asked by: Oliver Heald (Conservative - North East Hertfordshire)
Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:
To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, how many people were homeless but did not qualify for priority access to social housing in each of the last three years.
Answered by Brandon Lewis
The information requested is not held centrally.
Asked by: Oliver Heald (Conservative - North East Hertfordshire)
Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:
To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, if he will estimate the number of tenants in private housing who have only sufficient funds to cover one week's rent.
Answered by Brandon Lewis
The English Housing Survey provides data on private renters’ housing costs, income and savings but is not detailed enough to make an assessment of how many private renters only have sufficient funds to cover one week’s rent.
Asked by: Oliver Heald (Conservative - North East Hertfordshire)
Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:
To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, what steps the Government is taking to increase the number of affordable rented homes.
Answered by Brandon Lewis
The Government’s 2011- 2015 Affordable Homes Programme exceeded expectations, delivering nearly 186,000 affordable homes since April 2011, about 16,000 more than originally planned.
£38 billion of public and private investment will help ensure 275,000 new affordable homes are provided between 2015 and 2020. This means we will build more new affordable homes than during any equivalent period in the last twenty years.
Asked by: Oliver Heald (Conservative - North East Hertfordshire)
Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:
To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, what steps his Department is taking to protect green belt and green open spaces in North Hertfordshire local authority area.
Answered by Brandon Lewis
As pledged in the Collation Agreement, this Government has safeguarded national Green Belt protection and increased protection of important green spaces.
We have abolished the Labour Government’s top-down Regional Strategies which sought to delete the Green Belt in and around 30 towns and cities. This has included revoking the East of England Regional Spatial Strategy (May 2008) which advocated reviewing and potential removal of Green Belt boundaries in North Hertfordshire.
We have also:
• Introduced a new Local Green Space planning designation, which allows councils and neighbourhood plans to give added protection to valuable local green spaces;
• Published the National Planning Policy Framework which re-affirms Green Belt protection;
• Given councils stronger powers to tackle ‘garden grabbing’, and stopped gardens being classified as brownfield land;
• Issued new waste planning policy which increases protection of the Green Belt;
• Published planning guidance which re-affirms the importance of the Green Belt during Local Plan preparation; and
• Consulted on proposed changes to planning policy on traveller sites to further increase Green Belt safeguards.
Asked by: Oliver Heald (Conservative - North East Hertfordshire)
Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:
To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, how much (a) North Hertfordshire District Council and (b) East Hertfordshire District Council received in New Homes Bonus in the last 12 months; and if he will make a statement.
Answered by Brandon Lewis
New Homes Bonus has been allocated to East Hertfordshire and North Hertfordshire councils in the year 2014/15 as follows:
East Hertfordshire £2,190,429
North Hertfordshire £1,982,455
The total New Homes Bonus allocated since April 2011 is as follows:
East Hertfordshire £7,628,975
North Hertfordshire £7,503,553
The Bonus ensures that local authorities who promote and welcome growth can share in its economic benefits, and build the communities in which people want to live and work. Councils are free to spend the Bonus as they choose, including on front-line services and keeping council tax low.
Fundamentally, the New Homes Bonus reverses the perverse situation under the last Labour Government, where councils were effectively penalised for building new homes; councils with a larger council tax base from house building found that the amount of formula grant they received from central Government was reduced during the equalisation process.