Asked by: Perran Moon (Labour - Camborne and Redruth)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, what assessment she has made of the potential merits of increasing the weight of transport accessibility in allocating regional funding by including metrics such as (a) transport cost as a percentage of household income, (b) public-service frequency, (c) waiting time for buses, and (d) reliability and (e) time taken to travel to capture transport poverty’s multiplier effects.
Answered by Alison McGovern - Minister of State (Housing, Communities and Local Government)
The majority of funding in the Local Government Finance Settlement is distributed through the Settlement Funding Assessment. This funding includes Revenue Support Grant and retained business rates.
The Settlement Funding Assessment uses a range of formulas to determine the relative funding need of areas, which when combined with a measure of tax base, determines their relative income. Further details on the current funding methodology can be found online, within the ‘Calculation of 2013/14 Formula Funding’ page, linked here.
The government recently published the Fair Funding Review 2.0 consultation, which outlines proposals to update the distribution of funding within the Local Government Finance Settlement for the first time since 2013 – ensuring our approach uses the best available data and evidence. Our proposals include taking account of journey times when calculating the relative differences in cost local authorities face when delivering services to inform funding allocations.
We will publish further information in the government’s consultation response in the Autumn, followed by the provisional Local Government Finance Settlement later this year.
The Department for Transport leads on all other wider public transport funding for local authorities.
Asked by: Perran Moon (Labour - Camborne and Redruth)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, whether assessment of local housing needs includes (a) share of second homes, (b) prevalence of short-term lets and (c) local house-price-to-income ratios.
Answered by Matthew Pennycook - Minister of State (Housing, Communities and Local Government)
The government’s revised standard method for assessing local housing need, introduced in December 2024, uses a baseline of local housing stock, adjusted for affordability using median workplace-based affordability ratios. The affordability adjustment directs more homes to where they are most needed.
As set out in the government’s response to the proposed reforms to the National Planning Policy Framework, which can be found on gov.uk here, the revised standard method does not adjust the housing stock baseline to account for vacant and second homes.
Local authorities have powers available to respond to locally specific concerns related to vacant and second homes.
Asked by: Perran Moon (Labour - Camborne and Redruth)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, what assessment she has made of the potential merits of using smaller geographic units in assessing deprivation at local levels.
Answered by Alex Norris - Minister of State (Home Office)
The indices of deprivation provide an assessment of deprivation at the lowest possible spatial level for which data is available, this is the lower super output level. These are aggregated up into functional spatial outputs for users of the Indices to use. The Indices provide the most granular assessment of local area deprivation across all the domain indicators included for which data exists. The methodology for the Indices of Deprivation has been consulted upon, as it is a national statistic, and reflects the best fit to respond to the range of different needs from users.
Further details of the methodology behind the Indices of deprivation are found on gov.uk here.
Asked by: Perran Moon (Labour - Camborne and Redruth)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, what steps her Department is taking to ensure that housing associations are held accountable for the (a) quality and (b) safety of homes they (i) manage and (ii) build.
Answered by Matthew Pennycook - Minister of State (Housing, Communities and Local Government)
Alongside delivering the biggest increase in social and affordable housebuilding a generation, the government is committed to driving a transformational and lasting change in the safety and quality of homes.
Registered providers of social housing are required to deliver the outcomes of the standards set by the Regulator of Social Housing (RSH). The Regulator conducts routine inspections of large registered providers to assess whether they are delivering the outcomes set by the standards. The Regulator has a series of powers at its disposal when it identifies serious failings.
On 2 July 2025, we launched consultations on an updated and modernised Decent Homes Standard and on a new Minimum Energy Efficiency Standard. These new standards would be binding on registered providers of social housing.
The government will bring Awaab’s Law into force for the social rented sector from October this year. Awaab’s Law is vital legislation that will empower social tenants to hold their landlords to account using the full force of the law if they fail to investigate and fix hazards within their homes within set timescales. It will also allow tenants to access the Housing Ombudsman if their landlord does not adhere to strict timelines for action.
New requirements relating to electrical safety will also require social landlords to carry out electrical safety checks at least every five years, as well as mandatory appliance inspections on all electrical appliances that are provided by the landlord.
In respect of new build homes, all building works must meet the safety and performance requirements set out in the Building Regulations 2010. The building regulations set minimum legal performance standards for new building work including when a building is being designed, constructed, or subject to major re-design. The building regulations are enforced through the building control process. Building control conduct checks to assure compliance with the building regulations.
Asked by: Perran Moon (Labour - Camborne and Redruth)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, whether her Department plans to expand the (a) remit and (b) powers of the New Homes Ombudsman to include freehold homeowners with unresolved structural issues.
Answered by Matthew Pennycook - Minister of State (Housing, Communities and Local Government)
In October 2024, this government committed to establish a statutory New Homes Ombudsman which will give homeowners improved access to redress. The government will set out further details in due course.
Asked by: Perran Moon (Labour - Camborne and Redruth)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, what assessment her Department has made of the potential merits of resolving shared ownership arrangements of properties where offshore freehold ownership precludes staircasing.
Answered by Rushanara Ali
Leases for shared ownership properties, whether these are grant funded or Section 106 delivery, must follow one of the shared ownership model leases provided by Homes England or the Greater London Authority. These model leases contain a fundamental clause which ensures that staircasing is permitted. In certain types of shared ownership, staircasing is however restricted to below 100%, this is to ensure properties remain as affordable housing in perpetuity.
Properties sold by private developers, and without grant funding or through Section 106, are not required to follow a model lease when sold via a shared ownership arrangement.
Asked by: Perran Moon (Labour - Camborne and Redruth)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, what assessment her Department has made of the potential implications for her policies of the recommendations set out in the Fifth Report of the Levelling Up, Housing and Communities Committee on Shared Ownership, Session 2023-24, published on 26 March 2024, HC 61.
Answered by Rushanara Ali
Shared ownership has an important role to play in supporting households into home ownership who would otherwise struggle to purchase a property on the open market that meets their needs.
The Government is aware that some people who have entered shared ownership have faced significant challenges with their properties and there is ongoing consideration of what more can be done to improve the experience of shared owners, including consideration of the former Levelling Up, Housing and Communities Select Committee’s report recommendations on shared ownership.
Asked by: Perran Moon (Labour - Camborne and Redruth)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, what steps her Department is taking to reform the Shared Ownership system.
Answered by Rushanara Ali
Shared ownership has an important role to play in supporting households into home ownership who would otherwise struggle to purchase a property on the open market that meets their needs.
The Government is aware that some people who have entered shared ownership have faced significant challenges with their properties and there is ongoing consideration of what more can be done to improve the experience of shared owners, including consideration of the former Levelling Up, Housing and Communities Select Committee’s report recommendations on shared ownership.
Asked by: Perran Moon (Labour - Camborne and Redruth)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, what assessment she has made of the level of risk of eviction of social housing tenants who remain in a property after a joint tenant has served notice to quit (a) in cases involving relationship breakdown and (b) in general.
Answered by Matthew Pennycook - Minister of State (Housing, Communities and Local Government)
Joint periodic tenancies can be ended unilaterally by one of the joint tenants.
Once one of the joint tenants terminates a joint tenancy, then as a matter of law it ceases to exist and the landlord has a right of possession, though that may be challenged in the Courts.
Social landlords, subject to complying with their own allocations policies, have the flexibility to provide a new tenancy to a current resident where a notice to quit is served, either for the same property or for a different property.
Asked by: Perran Moon (Labour - Camborne and Redruth)
Question to the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government:
To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, what assessment she has made of the potential merits of improving basic amenities for Park Home residents.
Answered by Matthew Pennycook - Minister of State (Housing, Communities and Local Government)
On privately owned park home sites, the site owner is responsible for the amenities on site.
Site owners are required to have a site licence, issued by local authorities. Local authorities have discretion to attach conditions to licences which may cover matters such as the site amenities, physical standards, and layout of the park.
The Mobile Homes Act 2013 gave local authorities substantial enforcement powers to ensure they can take action if a site owner is found to have breached any of their site licence conditions.