Ending Homelessness

Rebecca Long Bailey Excerpts

Tuesday 21st October 2025 Westminster Hall

[Rebecca Long Bailey (Salford) (Lab)]

I thank the co-sponsors of this debate, my hon. Friend the Member for Liverpool, Wavertree (Paula Barker) and the hon. Member for Harrow East (Bob Blackman). We start from a position where we have lost more than 260,000 social rented homes in the last decade. Even now, most so-called affordable homes are out of reach for the people who need them most. Ultimately, if we are serious about ending homelessness, we must give local authorities the power, funding and freedom to build social homes at scale.

That starts with looking at the affordable homes programme, which is sadly not enough. It too often delivers homes at supposedly affordable rents that, in many places, are anything but. Councils need grant rates high enough to deliver homes at true social rent so that ordinary families can actually afford them. While we are at it, we must lift the shackles from council borrowing and address the issues that councils face in meeting borrowing rules. From cuts to budgets, maintenance backlogs, right-to-buy losses and falling rent yields as local housing allowance fails to meet housing spend, housing revenue accounts are in a state of crisis and that must be addressed to remove barriers to borrowing.

We must also fix the planning system and rebuild council capacity. Decades of cuts have gutted planning departments and valuable experience has been lost. We must also rebuild those local housing teams and council-owned development companies that can plan for the long term and with social purpose at their core. Salford city council has led the way on that with its own model, Dérive, and that could be replicated across the country.

I know that the Minister agrees with much of that, which is why I am hopeful about her response. When we truly invest in council housing, we do not just end homelessness; we create jobs, strengthen communities, cut carbon emissions and give people a stake in their own future.

Indefinite Leave to Remain

Rebecca Long Bailey Excerpts

Monday 8th September 2025 Westminster Hall

[Rebecca Long Bailey (Salford) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Sir Jeremy. I thank my hon. Friend the Member for South Norfolk (Ben Goldsborough) for his poignant opening remarks. The White Paper has caused huge fear among many of my constituents who work here, have built lives here and have families and friendships here. They pay tax towards our public services, they volunteer and they play a huge part in our local communities. Many of those workers came here to support our economy. They were invited by UK businesses to fill key skills gaps in defence, manufacturing, transport, aerospace, health, prisons and social care, to name just a few sectors.

The White Paper introduces preferential immigration routes for what it calls high-value contributors, including a shorter qualifying period for ILR and citizenship, but it fails to define what sectors or roles actually qualify and there has not been an impact assessment on the loss of these workers to each sector. Oxford Economics found that in defence alone, in just one north-west manufacturer—BAE Systems—each skilled migrant employee contributes over £84,000 per year to the UK economy. Moreover, as well as being economically valuable, they are integral to our national security and sovereign capability.

Will the Minister provide reassurance today and outline the sectors whose workers will qualify as high-value contributors, and which sectors will be provided with an exemption? The White Paper also fails to provide any transitional protections for current skilled migrants already working here on the five-year skilled worker visa pathway to ILR. That is causing anxiety to workers and businesses alike. Again, will the Minister reassure these workers today and confirm that there will be no attempt to make retrospective changes?

Social care is another sector that would collapse without the support of skilled migrant labour, but it has endemic low pay and exploitation. I have heard at first hand harrowing stories from workers who were brought here on skilled worker visas, and have been threatened, exploited and frequently underpaid—or not paid at all—but because they are reliant on visa support from their employer, they are often forced to keep silent about these abuses or face having their visa removed.

To protect those migrant workers, in addition to the retention of the five-year route to ILR and a commitment not to apply retrospective changes, I also ask the Minister to consider sector-wide visa schemes in social care, enabling them to challenge bad employers without the threat of dismissal and removal. This extends beyond social care; there must also be greater protection for migrant workers in all sectors from exploitation and the strengthening of access to trade union rights.

Finally, the second group of constituents who are most affected in Salford—and have contacted me in great fear—are those within the Hong Kong community. Salford is home to one of the largest Hongkonger communities in the UK, and I was proud to attend their community awards recently, which awarded members of the community for their efforts in doing good for the city of Salford, from litter picks to supporting those most in need. It was clear that all these people were dedicated to giving back to the society and economy that embraced them. Many came as part of the BNO visa scheme set up in recognition of the UK’s historic and moral commitments to the people of Hong Kong. Many were British citizens prior to 1997, and they maintain British nationality via the BNO passport.

I am sure the Minister will agree that the fear that is caused within this community is unnecessary. I hope that today he can finally provide reassurance that the BNO visa scheme will be exempt from the changes proposed, and provide much-needed clarity and reassurance on the other points that I have raised. I welcome him to his new position; I am sure he will do fantastically.

Oral Answers to Questions

Rebecca Long Bailey Excerpts

Monday 9th June 2025 Commons Chamber

[Matthew Pennycook]

I hope that the hon. Lady recognises that we are putting significant amounts of investment into construction skills. In the spring statement, the Government announced a £600 million investment that will recruit an additional 60,000 construction workers by 2029. I am more than happy to recognise the contributions made by initiatives of the sort that she mentions in her constituency. We absolutely need skills across the built environment to meet our targets.

[Rebecca Long Bailey (Salford) (Lab)]

9. If she will take steps through the spending review to increase social housing supply.

[The Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government (Angela Rayner)]

In our first eight months in office, we have announced £800 million in new funding for the affordable homes programme and £2 billion as a down payment on future investment. The previous Government handed back precious cash for social and affordable homes. This Government will get those homes built. The Chancellor will set out details of new investment at the spending review.

[Rebecca Long Bailey]

I very much welcome the Secretary of State’s commitment to social and affordable housing. I know that she will be concerned by the new analysis by the National Housing Federation, which finds that local authorities in England with the most severe shortage of social housing now have waiting lists exceeding 100 years for a family-sized social home. With nearly 6,000 people on the waiting list in Salford alone, will she outline what support she will give local authorities and the social housing sector to deliver desperately needed social homes?

[Angela Rayner]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. We have a housing crisis in this country, and it is felt particularly acutely by those who need social and council housing. That is why we have been absolutely clear that we want to deliver the biggest increase to social and affordable housing in a generation. We have already outlined a number of measures, including allowing councils to retain 100% of right-to-buy receipts and making long-term funding settlements for rents. We have set out the investment that we have put into the sector, but we will say more at the spending review.

Disadvantaged Communities

Rebecca Long Bailey Excerpts

Wednesday 4th June 2025 Westminster Hall

[Rebecca Long Bailey (Salford) (Lab)]

I thank my hon. Friend the Member for Wolverhampton North East (Mrs Brackenridge) for her impassioned speech, which I very much associate myself with.

Salford is the 18th most deprived authority in England, and that deprivation is juxtaposed against immense growth: gleaming tower blocks, the highest productivity in Greater Manchester and 11,000 businesses—an 85% increase since 2010. So why is the growth that we have created not benefiting everyone? The Government should ask themselves that question.

Although many of the strategies the Government have outlined so far—from housing through to our employment rights programme and the neighbourhood plan—are all very welcome, the Government can take immediate measures now, while they are waiting to develop their anti-poverty strategy, to help to alleviate the suffering that many families in my constituency face. First, it is welcome that the Government have suggested they will look again at the cut to the winter fuel allowance, but the detail must be fleshed out urgently to avoid the anxiety that many pensioners face in my constituency.

On child poverty, only this week a report by Loughborough University showed that at least a quarter of children are in poverty in two thirds of areas across the UK. Experts found an extremely high correlation between child poverty and the two-child benefit limit. It is clear that the Government’s priority must be to scrap the two-child benefit cap and, ultimately, lift 470,000 children out of poverty overnight.

Thirdly, on disability poverty, although it is welcome to have programmes to assist people into work where it is possible, cutting people’s support is not the way to incentivise that. It will push 250,000 people into poverty, and I urge the Government to rethink their proposals.

Plan for Neighbourhoods

Rebecca Long Bailey Excerpts

Tuesday 4th March 2025 Commons Chamber

[Alex Norris]

The elected body that will be the fundholder will be a local authority. As I have said, in only one case do the arrangements differ from those for the other councils, apart from parish and town councils. As for the boundaries, they reflect the human rather than the political geographies; there may or may not be points of alignment. The best models will have a local political as well as a local community say—I think that that balance can be found—but if there are concerns about boundaries, now is a very short moment in which that could be revisited. There is not much flexibility to change the scope completely, but if sensible tweaks can be made, we will of course have the necessary conversations.

[Rebecca Long Bailey (Salford) (Lab)]

It is welcome that today’s plan finally delivers on the unmet promises made to communities through the last Government’s long-term plan for towns, but since the selection methodology in that plan was delivered, Pendleton in Salford has sadly lost its only leisure centre and pool to fire, which has left a community who were already starved of leisure facilities with nothing at all. Will the Minister meet me to discuss what help the Government can give Salford to ensure that this vital facility is rebuilt as a matter of urgency?

[Alex Norris]

I am very sad to hear about the fire, and I will of course be happy to have that meeting.

Local Government Finance

Rebecca Long Bailey Excerpts

Wednesday 5th February 2025 Commons Chamber

[Jim McMahon]

I thank the right hon. Gentleman for his question, and assure him that it is an issue we are acutely aware of. The disproportionate burden that drainage places on small district councils is quite a challenge. We met representatives from a number of district councils to talk about the internal drainage board levy system, and, as an interim measure—in the end, I think we do need a more fundamental review of how it is paid for—we have increased the levy grant by £2 million to £5 million, so we are beginning to get there. However, I agree with the right hon. Gentleman entirely: we do need a long-term solution to that. He has my commitment that we will find a way through that as we begin the wider reforms later on.

As the Chancellor said last week, this plan will be achieved first and foremost through growth, which will be driven by empowered local leaders working in partnership with local communities and local businesses; those who have skin in the game are now on the playing field, not confined to the terraces as spectators. This new approach has to start with strong and empowered local government, because whether we are talking about raising living standards, delivering 1.5 million new homes and vital infrastructure, getting our NHS and social care system back on its feet or creating good jobs and strong communities, it all comes back to local councils delivering for local communities.

Indeed, we cannot deliver on the national renewal that working people deserve without grassroots government leading the charge, which means resetting our relationship with local leaders and rebuilding the foundations from scratch. It means ditching the slogans and gimmicks in favour of a determination to get the basics right, delivering decent local services that people can begin to rely on once more.

After 14 years of neglect and decline, that will be easier said than done, and, because of the scale of the challenge, it will take more than six months to fix. But be clear: we have changed course. The work has begun with determination and with pace. Councils of all political stripes are feeling the strain, and it will be a long, hard road to get them back to full fitness. This final settlement marks an important milestone on that journey, as we finally turn the page on chaos, austerity and 14 long years of managed decline.

In that spirit, the settlement addresses the financial crisis facing councils head on, moving away from bidding wars for wasteful competitive funding pots and towards core, stable multi-year financial settlements.

[Rebecca Long Bailey (Salford) (Lab)]

The statement is extremely welcome. In Salford, our core spending for 2025-26 will increase by 8.7%. That is above the national average, but it is still less than the 14% we have had to increase our adult social care budget by to meet higher costs. Does my hon. Friend agree that the Government must move quickly on multi-year settlements and up-to-date assessments of councils’ funding needs?

[Jim McMahon]

I thank my hon. Friend for that question and pay tribute to Salford for its leadership in the work it is doing in many areas of public sector reform in Salford and across Greater Manchester. In the end, if all we do is pay at the back end for a system that, frankly, is broken, we will be paying more and more every single year for a system that is delivering worse outcomes for service users. That is bad for service users and bad for taxpayers, so we must have a more fundamental response and we fully intend to do that.

The multi-year settlements are essential to ensure local leaders have the time and space to plan their budgets. But we will not stop there. We are introducing a fairer system to give councils the certainty and stability they need to go from costly crisis management to long-term prevention and the root-and-branch reform of local public services. Crucially, I can now confirm that core spending power for the sector will be more than £69 billion for 2025-26, a 6.8% cash terms increase on this year. I can confirm that, despite some very difficult choices—there have been choices and trade-offs to make, as there always are—this settlement will mean that no local authority will see a reduction in its core spending power.