Building Safety
Robert Jenrick Excerpts(6 years, 6 months ago)
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The Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government (Robert Jenrick)
With permission, Mr Speaker, I would like to update the House on the major package of reforms to the building safety system that I am announcing today.
The Government are committed to bringing about the biggest change in building safety for a generation. We took action to address the fire safety risks identified following the Grenfell Tower tragedy, and in the autumn we committed to adopting in full the recommendations of the Grenfell Tower inquiry phase 1 report. We will shortly publish our response to the phase 1 report, and a full debate is scheduled tomorrow for the House to discuss this important issue at length. The focus of this statement will be on the wider programme of building safety reforms and the work that I am leading to ensure that everyone is safe, and feels safe, in their own home.
The Government have already taken steps, including on aluminium composite material remediation, to tackle fire safety, but as that work continues, it becomes ever more evident that problems have developed over many decades, leading to serious incidents and the risk of further loss of life. This is completely unacceptable. It is clear that the problems will take many years to put right, but all of us—building owners, the construction industry, local authorities, the fire service and the Government—have an absolute duty to ensure that action continues to be taken as quickly as possible so that a tragedy such as the one at Grenfell Tower can never happen again.
There has been progress, but it has been unacceptably slow, so today I am setting out reforms that go further, and I intend to ensure that they do so faster. First, we will begin immediately to establish the new building safety regulator. This new regulator will be established within the Health and Safety Executive, which is an experienced regulator and is committed to introducing the new regulatory regime at pace. Ahead of legislation, the regulator will initially be in shadow form, and I am pleased to announce that Dame Judith Hackitt will chair a board to oversee the transition to this new regime. I expect the shadow regulator to be established within weeks, and we will be recruiting the first national chief inspector of buildings.
Secondly, our consultation on sprinklers and other measures for new build flats has now closed. I am carefully considering the responses and evidence received, but I can inform the House today that I am minded to lower the height threshold for sprinkler requirements in new buildings from 18 metres to 11 metres. Subject to further consideration, I will set out my detailed proposals in that respect in February.
Thirdly, we banned the use of combustible materials in the external walls of high-rise buildings in December 2018. My Department concluded a review into the ban’s effectiveness, and today I am announcing a consultation on the ban, again going significantly further, including by lowering the 18 metre height threshold to at most 11 metres.
Fourthly, my Department, with support from the independent expert advisory panel, has provided advice for building owners on the steps they should be taking to address a range of safety risks. We have listened to feedback, and I am today publishing updated advice that will provide the further clarity they have sought. This advice brings together 22 separate advice notes into one consolidated document.
There is evidence that there has not been enough focus among building owners on buildings below 18 metres. The expert panel has decided to clarify that more action is needed to review the risks in buildings below 18 metres, and owners of those buildings should review the advice and take action where needed. I want to be clear with the House that it has never been the case that, simply because a building is below 18 metres, owners are exempt from ensuring the safety of their residents. The requirement on building owners is to make sure buildings of any height are safe, and I expect all owners to be acting responsibly.
The panel’s new advice makes clear that ACM cladding with an unmodified polyethylene core should not be used on buildings of any height. This reflects the evidence from the materials research programme, which to date has confirmed that ACM presents a much higher risk than any other materials tested when used on the external walls of buildings.
The consolidated advice note also clarifies the actions building owners should now take in relation to fire doors. I welcome the commitment from members of the Association of Composite Door Manufacturers to work with building owners to remediate their doors that have failed tests, and we will continue to monitor the situation closely.
Fifthly, I am today publishing a call for evidence seeking views on the assessment and prioritisation of risks associated with external wall systems, such as cladding, within existing buildings. For many years, we have relied on crude height limits with binary consequences, and it is clear to me that this approach to assessing risk does not reflect the complexity of the challenge at hand. I have concluded that we need a better, more sophisticated system to underpin our approach. Height will remain a significant and material factor, but it will sit alongside a broader range of risk factors. I am therefore today commissioning leading experts in the field to develop, as quickly as possible, a sophisticated matrix of risk that will replace the historic system and underpin our approach to future regulatory regimes.
Sixthly, while I welcome recent progress, remediation of unsafe ACM cladding, especially in the private sector, is still far too slow. This absolutely cannot continue, particularly when funding is now being provided by the taxpayer. Although all unsafe ACM cladding now has mitigation safety measures in place where required, I do not underestimate the concern of residents living in buildings where remediation has not even started.
The latest data show that, out of 92 buildings in scope, 82 applications have been made to the private sector ACM cladding remediation fund, and that the 10 for which applications have not been made have exceptional circumstances, which I have reviewed. However, an application to the fund is not an end in itself; that can never be sufficient. Construction work to remediate these buildings should be proceeding as quickly as possible. We will therefore be appointing an independent construction expert to review remediation timescales and identify what can be done to increase the pace in the private sector.
Inaction must have consequences. From next month, I will name those responsible for buildings where remediation has not started and remove them from the public list only when it has. My Department will be working with the relevant local authorities to drive enforcement where necessary. The Home Secretary will deliver the fire safety Bill and associated regulatory changes in order to enable delivery of the recommendations of the Grenfell inquiry phase 1 report. The proposed Bill will place beyond doubt that external wall systems, including cladding and the fire doors to individual flats in multi-occupied residential blocks, fall within the scope of the Regulatory Reform (Fire Safety) Order 2005. These changes will affirm the ability to enforce locally against building owners who have not remediated unsafe ACM buildings. Building owners and developers who have not already taken action must do so now. Further delay is not acceptable.
Finally, I am aware of the concerns of leaseholders about meeting the cost of remediation. As I do not want cost to be a barrier to remediation, I am considering, with Her Majesty’s Treasury, options to support leaseholders. My right hon. Friend the Chancellor and I will set out further details in due course.
The safety of people in their homes is paramount. Through the reforms that I have outlined today, I want to make it clear that this Government will not falter in doing whatever it takes to ensure that all buildings and all residents are made safe. I commend this statement to the House.
John Healey (Wentworth and Dearne) (Lab)
I thank the Secretary of State for an advance copy of his statement this afternoon.
The Secretary of State will remember, as we all do, the shocking disbelief and grief in the immediate aftermath of the dreadful Grenfell Tower fire in June 2017, and he will remember, as I do, the solemn undertakings from all parts of this House to make sure that such a fire could never happen again. I never thought that, two and a half years later, I would be standing here facing a Secretary of State—the third Secretary of State—who still cannot say that all the necessary action has been taken and that a fire like Grenfell cannot happen again in Britain.
Directly after the fire, the then Prime Minister made this promise on behalf of the Conservative Government:
“Landlords have a legal obligation to provide safe buildings…We cannot and will not ask people to live in unsafe homes.”—[Official Report, 22 June 2017; Vol. 626, c. 169.]
Yet thousands of people continue to live in unsafe homes, condemned to do so by this Government’s failure on all fronts after Grenfell. Why, two and a half years later, are 315 high-rise blocks still cloaked in the same Grenfell-style cladding? Why do 76 of these blocks’ owners not even have a plan in place to replace the deadly cladding? Why have 91 social tower block landlords still not replaced their ACM cladding, when this Secretary of State promised that it would be done by the end of last year? And why have the Government not completed and published full fire safety tests on other unsafe, but not ACM, types of cladding? Why has the Secretary of State had nothing to say this afternoon in his statement on these points?
The Secretary of State has made pledges of his own on Grenfell action. He promised
“to take action of a scale and a pace that is commensurate with the tragedy that prompted it.”—[Official Report, 30 October 2019; Vol. 667, c. 419.]
Seventy-two lives were lost in that Grenfell Tower fire, yet there have been no prosecutions, no fire safety fund to retrofit sprinklers, no legislation to make private block owners, not leaseholders, pay the safety work costs, and still no legislation in place to overhaul building safety legislation more than 20 months after the Government’s own Hackitt review was published and accepted in full by Ministers.
I know that the Secretary of State has approached this task with a very serious intent since he was appointed in the summer, and we welcome the setting up of a national regulator to do the job that Ministers and the Department have been unable to do so far. I also welcome the decision to name and shame block owners who will not do the work, and the recognition that the system of building safety checks and controls does not just affect buildings of over six storeys.
There have been 21 announcements on building safety in this House since Grenfell, but there are still not enough answers and there is still not enough action, so let me ask the Secretary of State: given that the new building safety regulator will need legislation to underpin it, when will the new draft building safety Bill be published, and when on earth is it actually going to reach the statute book?
The Secretary of State has said this afternoon that ACM cladding with an unmodified polyethylene core should not be used on buildings of any height. How many additional buildings does he estimate fall into this category? Also, why wait a month to name and shame block owners who will not do the work? Why not do it now? In fact, why did he not do it in June, when I previously called for him to do so? And why has he not restated to the House that June 2020—fully three years on from Grenfell—is the Government’s hard deadline for the full removal and replacement of ACM cladding from all tower blocks in this country? I am afraid that this is too little, at least two years too late.
At every stage since Grenfell, Ministers have failed to grasp the scale of the problems or the scale of the Government action required, and I fear that we will reach the third anniversary—and, Lord forbid, the fourth anniversary—and still not be able to say to people with confidence that a fire like Grenfell can never happen again in Britain.
Robert Jenrick
I am grateful to the right hon. Gentleman for his questions and the tone with which he approaches this task. I think we can find a lot of common cause on this issue.
The right hon. Gentleman says that we have not done enough. This is an extremely challenging task, but the Government have already taken a wide range of steps of which he is aware. We announced the independent inquiry, the first phase of which has now reported, and the second phase of which will begin on 27 January. We commissioned Dame Judith’s independent review into our building safety regime, which was widely praised. It has reported back, and has led to the measures that we are taking today. Dame Judith remains closely involved in the process and will now be leading the establishment of the new regulator. I have taken the decision that that work needs to begin immediately, and have chosen the Health and Safety Executive to be the home of the regulator because it has the capacity to do so at pace.
We launched the social sector ACM cladding remediation fund in 2018, and that has led to a very large number of properties having remediation work on ACM cladding. We later extended that to the private sector. The right hon. Gentleman is right to say that it is frustrating that the pace of work has not been faster. I am frustrated by it. I said to the House in September that I would name and shame building owners who had not already commenced work or who were not taking the issue sufficiently seriously. I think that threat contributed to an increase in action from building owners, and now every private sector building with ACM cladding—bar 10—has a plan and is working with my Department to commence or complete remediation works. The 10 buildings that have not done so already are in exceptional circumstances; they are mostly buildings that have only recently been discovered to be clad in ACM, so they are late to join the process. We are none the less working to expedite those cases to ensure that they get moving at pace. I have said that we will publish that list next month, so it will happen within a matter of weeks. I hope that that will be a further spur on those building owners to do the right thing and get moving.
We have set out today a very significant set of measures that will have a profound effect on the industry, particularly on new buildings built in the years ahead. I have said that I am minded, subject to the final review of the consultation, to lower the height threshold for sprinklers. We have to be guided by evidence. Dame Judith and our expert panel suggest that it is too crude to say that all high-rise buildings should be remediated and have retro-fitted sprinklers—that we need to take an individual-building approach, because it might be the right thing for some buildings but not for all. I will certainly, as long as I am in this job, be guided by the evidence.
We have set up the protection board that I announced last year, which is working with the Home Office, with my Department and with fire and rescue services on a priority basis to assess those buildings where assessments have not yet been made and ensure that the building owners take action.
The right hon. Gentleman asked about legislation. We announced in the Queen’s Speech last year that the building safety Bill would come forward. Following the outcome of the first phase of the Grenfell Tower inquiry, I took the view that that was too long to wait, and so we have now divided the work into two Bills, one of which will come forward very swiftly—a fire safety Bill. That will place into legislation the recommendations of the judge that require legislation; some require regulatory change rather than primary legislation. Later this year, we will follow that with the larger, more complex building safety Bill, which we intend to publish before the summer recess. That will be the biggest change to our building safety regime for 40 years. I do not underestimate the complexity of that, and it is obviously right that we get the details correct so that we can move forwards.
Several hon. Members rose—
Sir Peter Bottomley (Worthing West) (Con)
There will be a welcome for the announcement about the role of Dame Judith Hackitt.
Many points will be made in the next half hour or so, but I want to concentrate on two. First, the Leasehold Knowledge Partnership and the all-party parliamentary group on leasehold and commonhold reform were the first to point out the difficulties of private leaseholders in these tower blocks. When the Secretary of State and his Department work closely with the LKP and with the all-party group, we will not have all the answers, but I commend to him the fact that we can certainly point to many of the questions and some of the problems as well.
Additionally, may I commend what Nick Ross, the independent commentator and expert on risk, has said—that people do not die in buildings where there is a fire if there are sprinklers? We ought to pay more attention to that. Even if they are not required everywhere, we ought to consider whether they would be useful and valuable.
Finally, at the all-party group meeting, leaseholders talked about the sixfold or greater increase in their insurance premiums. The Government should get together with the Association of British Insurers and say, “Are people being scalped or is there scope for a scheme like Flood Re, which made premiums affordable to ordinary people trying to go on living in their homes?”
Robert Jenrick
I thank the Father of the House, who has been heavily involved in this issue and has a long-standing interest in leasehold reform. We are working with the insurance industry and the mortgage industry to try to unblock the issues that are flowing there. We have had some success with that. There is now a deal between the major lenders and the Royal Institute of Chartered Surveyors to find a simpler way to assess the condition of high-rise buildings and ensure that lenders can make a proper assessment of the value of people’s homes. We will continue to engage with that very closely.
I am happy to work with my hon. Friend and any others who represent or are interested in leasehold reform. He knows my personal interest in that and commitment to bring forward legislation later in the year. I have been contacted by many leaseholders who feel trapped in their homes and are very concerned about their ability to meet the costs that flow through. It is obviously right that building owners should meet the cost of remediation work, but we need to work with leaseholders to ensure that meeting those costs is not a barrier to getting the work done and keeping them safe. I have made that commitment today.
Alison Thewliss (Glasgow Central) (SNP)
I am glad to see the Minister bringing forward some recommendations. He says that he will be guided by evidence, but in Scotland we already have gone from 18 metres to 11 metres. I have raised this in the House three times now, so I do not understand why he is still at some kind of consultation phase on it. There is evidence already and he could act on it to make those changes. I am pleased that he is bringing forward a building safety regulator, but what additional funding will the Health and Safety Executive get for that? It is already under significant pressure and should not be asked to take on more without the funds to back it.
What is the Minister learning from the Scottish Housing Regulator, which I have mentioned to him before? Has he met it to discuss the work that already goes on in Scotland? Will people be able to make complaints to the shadow regulator in the interim, or will they have to wait until it is fully set up? Will the reporting of significant performance failures be part of that, as it is in the Scottish system?
On the Secretary of State’s point about consolidation of advice notes, I have had constituents contact me about the consequences of advice note 14, which was drawn up by his Government but is having an impact on people in Scotland who cannot sell their properties and are struggling with insurance issues. What communication has he had with the Scottish Government on that? I know that the Housing Minister, Kevin Stewart, has been in touch with him about that issue. We cannot resolve it, because it is an issue for this Government and about mortgage lending, which is not in the Scottish Government’s purview. It would be useful to know what discussions the Secretary of State has had and how he intends to resolve this issue in the consolidated advice note.
Lastly, on remediation, we do not have quite the same problem with leasehold in Scotland that exists in England, but we do have issues. I want to ask the Secretary of State, as I have asked him before, about incentivisation to resolve some of these issues. For example, is he looking at reducing the VAT on sprinklers and cladding to encourage people to act at a speedier rate, and will he ensure that the fund is accessible to those who need it in Scotland?
Robert Jenrick
I am happy to work with the hon. Lady and her colleagues in Scotland and to ensure that my Department is properly engaged with the Scottish Government, to learn all we can from their experience and vice versa. With respect to the mortgage market, I have said that we have been working closely with lenders and RICS to find a way forward. We have made significant progress, and they announced their deal during the general election campaign in the autumn.
We listened to the commentary that it was too confusing having multiple sources of advice for building owners, so we have worked to consolidate those 22 pieces of advice into one document: advice note 14. That has been published on the gov.uk website, and we remain open to comments on it and refinement of it, if necessary. The research and testing process that lies behind advice note 14, which the right hon. Member for Wentworth and Dearne (John Healey) raised, will be published next month. That process is coming to its final conclusions, and that information will also be in the public domain, so those who take a particular interest and require to see the evidence behind advice note 14 will be able to do so.
We will, of course, give the Health and Safety Executive the funding required to set up the regulator. We chose the Health and Safety Executive, as opposed to creating a stand-alone building safety regulator, precisely because it has the expertise and the capacity and is ready to get going at pace, which I think we can all agree is essential.
Felicity Buchan (Kensington) (Con)
I welcome the fact that my right hon. Friend will consult on whether height alone should be the determining factor or whether there should be a more sophisticated matrix of risks. I am very concerned about vulnerable residents in the likes of care homes and hospitals. Will they be taken into consideration in the matrix of risks?
Robert Jenrick
I welcome my hon. Friend to the House and will no doubt work closely with her on these issues in the years ahead. I think it was right to take the decision that height alone was too crude a measure and that we needed to consider this carefully and involve a whole range of factors, including the likely use of the building and the likely nature of the residents of that building, whether it be a hotel, student accommodation or something else. That is exactly what we are doing, and we will use the best possible expert advice to draw up a new regime.
We saw in the Bolton fire, where the building was 17.6 or 17.8 metres high—just a matter of centimetres away from the 18-metre threshold—that height alone was simply too crude a measure and that building safety needs to be proportionate to the building. Height is likely to continue to be a very material factor—perhaps the most material one—but a range of other factors now need to be considered.
Ms Karen Buck (Westminster North) (Lab)
The issue of retrofitting sprinklers in social housing blocks seems to be less determined by risk assessment than by cost and the legal right to access those properties. We have seen Wandsworth Council lose its case in the first-tier tribunal. My council has suspended work on retrofitting because of a lack of clarity about rights of access. Can the Secretary of State tell us exactly what the policy is and whether he accepts that, in almost all social blocks, there are multi-tenures—there are private leaseholders—and there needs to be clarity about how retrofitting will be funded and what rights of access councils will have to private leasehold properties?
Robert Jenrick
I will take up the issue the hon. Lady raises with respect to rights of access so that I can give her the best possible advice there. With respect to cost, the position today, as it has been throughout, is that this remediation work is the responsibility of building owners. As I have already said now on a number of occasions, I am aware of the fact that clearly there are some leaseholders who will struggle to raise the necessary funds. We have precedents for this: we see, for example, homeowners who purchased their property through right to buy and who may then be presented with significant costs, perhaps by a council or a housing association. Measures have been put in place to help them through that process so that that is not a bar to doing the essential works that now need to be done. That is exactly the conversation I will now be having with the Treasury to see whether we can put in place some sensible proposals to help people in that situation.
David Simmonds (Ruislip, Northwood and Pinner) (Con)
As someone who, in a past life, chaired a local authority housing committee responsible for these matters, may I welcome my right hon. Friend’s announcement of the new regulator? I ask my right hon. Friend to update us on the discussions that he has been having with local authority leaders on both how to use the information in their possession to identify buildings and structures at risk in their area, and how the learning from that might help the new regulator to bring some clarity to the often confusing area of building control.
Robert Jenrick
We have been working closely with local authorities ever since the Grenfell tragedy. We have supported them with advice and funding so that they can draw up lists and provide data on buildings over 18 metres—we have provided them with £4 million for that—and we should be in a position to publish that data in March, which is the deadline that we set local authorities. We have also created the protection board, which is designed to take that work to another level—bringing together the fire and rescue services, the Home Office and my Department with local authorities to assess, on a priority basis, the fire safety of those buildings that have not yet been assessed.
Marsha De Cordova (Battersea) (Lab)
Would the Secretary of State like to take this opportunity to apologise to all residents and those in privately owned blocks who still are living with this unsafe Grenfell- style cladding wrapped around their homes, when the Government set their own target of December 2019 to have this cladding removed? Will he apologise in particular to those in a social housing block in my constituency, Castlemaine, where this work has been delayed—it has been held up by chaos—and Wandsworth Council is not taking responsibility for ensuring that the work is done and done to a high standard?
Robert Jenrick
I am sorry to hear about the example that the hon. Lady raises, and I will look into that if she could give me the details after this statement. Since becoming Secretary of State, I have taken action to ensure that the remediation fund moves forward at pace. We now have a named contact working with every one of these buildings. I review the lists regularly, and we have made a great deal of progress. We have now reached the point, as I have said, where every building is within the system and is working with my Department. The only ones that are not are those that emerged only recently as having ACM cladding. I hope that we will now, finally, make rapid progress.
Kevin Hollinrake (Thirsk and Malton) (Con)
May I welcome my right hon. Friend’s statement and his proactivity on this issue? Advice note 14 states that only limited combustibility materials should be used on external surfaces, but our work on the Select Committee has shown that the actual guidance was much more ambiguous, which leaves many leaseholders in limbo. Will he consider extending the remediation fund to cover other types of combustible cladding?
Robert Jenrick
The expert advice that we received said that ACM should be the priority of Government. That is why my predecessors announced the £600 million remediation fund for ACM on high-rise buildings. The testing results, which I will publish next month, confirm that decision and make it clear that ACM is significantly more dangerous than any other substance. That has rightly been the focus of taxpayers’ money in terms of grant, but there may be other ways forward to assist those leaseholders trapped in other types of buildings.
Jack Dromey (Birmingham, Erdington) (Lab)
Before Christmas, two tenants from a Stockland Green tower block in my constituency asked me why it has taken the best part of three years for the Government not to come up with one single penny towards making safe the 213 tower blocks in Birmingham, which include 10,000 households. They were right, because despite the warm words and promises made at the time, not one penny has been forthcoming. Will the Secretary of State personally look again at the request by Birmingham City Council for the necessary financial support to complete the task of making safe those tower blocks?
Robert Jenrick
I am happy to review that once again, but as I said in response to previous questions, we have provided £600 million of funding to ensure that properties in the private and social sectors are remediated as swiftly as possible.
Alex Chalk (Cheltenham) (Con)
I am grateful to the Secretary of State for the urgency with which he has approached this issue. Employers who employ people in unsafe conditions could be liable to prosecution under the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974, and there is a parallel with this issue. Does the Secretary of State agree that if this final opportunity to make safe these dwellings is not taken, enforcement action should not be ruled out?
Robert Jenrick
Absolutely, and we have not ruled it out. Local authorities have the power to take enforcement action, and we are working closely with them to ensure that they do so if progress is too slow. When we have legislated for our new building safety regime and put the regulator on a statutory footing, there will be new criminal offences in this area. Every building will have a named individual who is responsible for its safety, not just at the point that it is built, but for the whole of its life, and that individual will be criminally liable for the safety of that building.
Meg Hillier (Hackney South and Shoreditch) (Lab/Co-op)
I should declare that I am a leaseholder and all my cladding is being removed—happily, I am one of the fortunate few whose developer is paying for it. However, many of my constituents are mortgage prisoners, shared owners, or people on low incomes, and they are trapped in that position and unable to move their lives on. The Secretary of State has said warm words about talking to the Treasury, but we all know how difficult it can be to get money out of it. Is he looking at other options, such as interest-free loans on a long-term basis? How quickly can he move? These leaseholders are trapped and need to know whether they will be waiting for months or years.
Robert Jenrick
The hon. Lady is right—I am concerned about the position of those leaseholders, and we will work closely with the Treasury to see whether there is a way forward. There are already examples of building owners or private finance providers bringing forward low or zero-interest loans, on a hardship basis, to help individuals who are on low incomes or without savings to make the payments required to remediate their buildings. There may be a role for the Government in ensuring that that works, that the loans are affordable, and that it is done as quickly as possible.
Eddie Hughes (Walsall North) (Con)
I remain a proud member of the Chartered Institute of Building. Will the Secretary of State endorse the work of the CIOB in driving up standards in construction to ensure that we build safer buildings in the future, not least with its code of quality management, which was published in September last year?
Robert Jenrick
I am happy to endorse that work. Our building safety regime in this country is flawed in many respects, and decades of neglect now need to be addressed. That will have to work through all parts of the system, whether Government or the construction sector, and we must ensure that builders and developers pay far more attention to quality and safety than they have done in the past. We have recently seen disturbing reports, such as the independent report on Persimmon that was published at the end of last year, and action is now required from the whole construction industry.
Grahame Morris (Easington) (Lab)
The Minister referred in his statement to long-standing problems and, quite rightly, to a loss of public confidence. Does he think it will help to improve public confidence if, as newspaper reports state, the investigation panel into what went wrong with the Grenfell cladding is set to include an engineer, Benita Mehra, whose previous organisation was in receipt of thousands of pounds from Arconic, the company that manufactured the Grenfell cladding?
Robert Jenrick
I am aware of the issue raised by the hon. Gentleman. As Secretary of State I am a core participant in the inquiry, and I cannot comment on the judge or his panel. Appointments to the panel are made by the Prime Minister, advised by the Cabinet Office. I know the Prime Minister is aware of the issues raised by the hon. Gentleman, and he will be considering them carefully.
Bob Blackman (Harrow East) (Con)
I thank my right hon. Friend for his statement. There are two issues I want to raise briefly. The first is the extent of the buildings that will now be brought into scope. Clearly, a large number of buildings will now be in scope. Has my right hon. Friend examined how many there will be? Secondly, there is a lot of criticism of the tests themselves and whether they are fit for purpose. Will he review the safety tests to ensure they are brought up to modern standards?
Robert Jenrick
I do not have precise figures for my hon. Friend today, but he is right that the changes we have announced will bring a large number of additional buildings within the safety regime that we have been working through since the Grenfell tragedy. That is a difficult decision to take, but I think it is right. We have to be guided by the evidence. We have to make the necessary changes and then take whatever steps emerge afterwards, but I am very mindful, for example, of the impact on leaseholders and on the mortgage market. That is why my Department is working very closely with lenders to ensure that the steps we have announced today do not have an adverse impact on the market.
Hilary Benn (Leeds Central) (Lab)
The Secretary of State justifies the particular help because of the risk from ACM cladding, but many leaseholders, including in places like St George’s Building, Leeds Dock and Timble Beck in my constituency in Leeds, have been told by the West Yorkshire Fire and Rescue Service that if they do not have a waking watch they will have to move out. The cost of a waking watch risks bankrupting leaseholders even before we get to the point of determining who will pay for the replacement of the cladding. I very much welcome the hint in the statement today about working with the Treasury, but since leaseholders are so stressed by all of this can the Secretary of State give some indication of when that announcement might come? Will they have to wait for the Budget or could it be earlier?
Robert Jenrick
I cannot give the right hon. Gentleman precise details of the negotiations, but they are continuing and we will work closely to see what arrangements we can put in place. I encourage any building owner to take action immediately. Building owners need to conduct a fire safety assessment of their building, if that is required, and then take any steps required. No delay should be encouraged by any of us.
Robert Halfon (Harlow) (Con)
I welcome the statement. My right hon. Friend will be aware of the issue of permitted development rights and the problems it has caused my constituency. How will the building safety regulations apply to that? What is he doing to ensure quality housing and proper building safety for permitted development rights buildings?
Robert Jenrick
My right hon. Friend and I have discussed permitted development rights in the past, and he has taken me to Harlow to see some of the issues there. That is why we have reviewed the permitted development office-to-residential regulations and will be taking forward any reforms necessary as a result. All properties built in this country need to be safe. That will have to feed through to all of the Government’s policies and our whole building safety regime.
Kate Green (Stretford and Urmston) (Lab)
Generally, leaseholders do not enjoy third-party rights to claim under the latent structural defect insurance taken out by a developer or his design team. Will the Secretary of State consider legislating to provide for minimum levels of cover, minimum terms for such insurance and the third-party rights of leaseholders and managing agents to make claims under those policies?
Mrs Natalie Elphicke (Dover) (Con)
I draw the House’s attention to my entry in the Register of Members’ Financial Interests. I welcome the steps outlined to progress the building safety regulator and the progress that has been made to remediate the majority of the social housing properties. With continuing progress in the private sector, I share the desire expressed that all such properties are made safe and secure as quickly as possible. Will my right hon. Friend confirm that all those involved in building and maintenance of housing will be required to meet the important reforms of new building safety systems that he has outlined today?
Robert Jenrick
Yes, I certainly can. I also draw attention to the fact that my hon. Friend has taken forward our new homes ombudsman. I will bring forward legislation in due course to put that on a statutory footing, so that developers are held to account and there is a proper redress system for those purchasing properties.
Wera Hobhouse (Bath) (LD)
I welcome the appointment of Dame Judith Hackitt as chair to oversee the establishment of the new regulator within the Health and Safety Executive. However, I worry that such regulators have become severely underfunded. The Secretary of State said that there would be new funding, but I worry that it will just disappear within the HSE. Can he reassure me that the budget for the new regulator will be ring-fenced?
Robert Jenrick
I reassure the hon. Lady that whatever funds are required to ensure that the regulator succeeds will be made available. A very large number of individuals are already working on building safety in my Department —well over 100 people are engaged in this activity, many of whom will, in due course, transition to the new regulator—but, as I said before, the reason we chose the Health and Safety Executive is that it has the experience and the capacity, and it can move quickly.
Paul Blomfield (Sheffield Central) (Lab)
I wrote to the Secretary of State over two months ago highlighting the case of a student housing block that had been evacuated, with all tenants relocated, as a result of multiple fire regulation failures. This was a building that had been signed off by a Government-approved private building inspection company without a site inspection. Does he agree—he has not replied to me yet—that he needs to review the entire process of building control in the context of that case?
Robert Jenrick
I will look up the hon. Gentleman’s letter and make sure that a proper response is given to him as soon as possible. However, the premise of Dame Judith’s work, which will be legislated for in our building safety Bill, is to ensure that there is a proper, robust system for the inspection of buildings at the point that they are constructed, meaning that we do not have building inspectors appointed by the developers, but that these are independent individuals working to robust procedures, and then that an individual is criminally liable for the outcomes.
Margaret Ferrier (Rutherglen and Hamilton West) (SNP)
I thank the Secretary of State for his statement. Will people be able to make complaints to the shadow regulator? When will he meet Kevin Stewart to discuss the implications of his advice notes for owners in Scotland? Finally, how much money will he allocate to the Health and Safety Executive?
Robert Jenrick
I have already said that we are very happy to engage with colleagues in the Scottish Government, and I will make sure that that happens. The funding that the Health and Safety Executive requires will be available. We are still having those conversations with it, so I do not want to wrongly advise the hon. Lady, but I say again that we will ensure that it has the resources it requires to take forward this incredibly important work.
Matt Western (Warwick and Leamington) (Lab)
The Secretary of State says that he is minded to review the minimum height of new buildings for the fitting of sprinkler systems. In November 2007, Warwickshire Fire and Rescue Service lost four firefighters in a terrible blaze. Why will the Government simply not legislate for the fitting of sprinklers in all new builds and retrospectively?
Robert Jenrick
With respect to the hon. Gentleman, we have to follow procedures so we have consulted, which is the way we proceed on such matters. The consultation is now complete, we have reviewed the evidence and we will be publishing it shortly. However, I have said today that, subject to our exact response in the coming weeks, I am minded to make that move, and that will be done through regulation so it can happen swiftly.
Lucy Powell (Manchester Central) (Lab/Co-op)
As the Minister knows, 79 unsafe blocks still remain in Manchester. Some have non-ACM cladding. In most cases, the cost of remediation is being passed on to leaseholders—upwards of £80,000 each. I am not sure after two and a half years, with this statement and the big package announced today, what a “name and shame” and conversations with the Treasury will do to reassure my residents in Manchester that their unsafe buildings will be dealt with immediately.
Robert Jenrick
I have laid out today a very significant series of reforms—not least creating immediately the first regulator for building safety—and I have said that we will continue to work with leaseholders, such as the ones she represents, to ensure that cost is not a barrier to remediation. However, this is a complex challenge that will clearly take this country a very long time to work through.
Matthew Pennycook (Greenwich and Woolwich) (Lab)
The Secretary of State referenced the new industry-wide valuation process that was announced in December. Will he tell the House whether the Government have formally endorsed the new EWS1—external wall system—process? Have he or his officials had any evidence that it is working to resolve the problems that leaseholders in high-rise buildings face in selling or re-mortgaging their properties? If not, and if he has found any evidence that it is lacking, will he tell us what further clarification the consolidated advice note will provide in that area?
Robert Jenrick
I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman. He raised these issues with me in the summer and has contributed to our work since then. My officials and I have worked closely with lenders, UK Finance and RICS to reach this agreement. It is too early to say whether it has been successful yet—it has only been in place for a matter of weeks—but I am hopeful that it will provide a much simpler system for valuing buildings and getting people’s mortgages flowing in the way we all hope.
Oral Answers to Questions
Robert Jenrick Excerpts(6 years, 6 months ago)
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Mrs Pauline Latham (Mid Derbyshire) (Con)
The Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government (Robert Jenrick)
We want a planning system that encourages beautiful development, guards against ugliness and is based on stewardship and place- making. That is why we convened the Building Better, Building Beautiful Commission, which submitted its report to me in December.
May I take this opportunity to pay tribute to the commission’s co-chair, Sir Roger Scruton, who died yesterday? Sir Roger was an intellectual giant, a brilliant writer and a fearless fighter for freedom, not least in eastern Europe, and he made a unique contribution to public life.
Mrs Latham
I thank the Secretary of State for that answer, and I associate myself with his remarks about Sir Roger Scruton.
Will the Secretary of State confirm whether he will implement the Letwin review and whether his Department plans to capture development value to fund infrastructure as well as encourage sustainable building with very high-quality design? Will he meet me and a delegation from the Academy of Urbanism to discuss these ideas?
Robert Jenrick
I thank my hon. Friend for her question. We are currently reviewing the recommendations of the commission and I shall respond in due course. I would be very happy to meet her and representatives from the Academy for Urbanism.
As regards capturing uplifts in land value, local planning authorities already use section 106 and the community infrastructure levy to pay for crucial affordable housing and infrastructure, and, as a result of changes we have made recently, there will shortly be greater transparency so that residents can see where this money is going.
Gareth Thomas (Harrow West) (Lab/Co-op)
I have absolutely no idea whether co-operative housing is likely to benefit from the Government’s Building Better, Building Beautiful initiative, but by my definition it certainly should. Would the Secretary of State be willing to meet me and a small delegation from the co-op housing movement to see whether there can be a replication here in the UK of the successes that co-ops have had in the US in housing veterans and other people?
Robert Jenrick
I would be very happy to meet the hon. Gentleman. The recommendations of the commission that we will publish shortly speak to all forms of housing, including co-operative housing and social housing, where, of course, there have been some fantastic examples of good-quality design, not least the RIBA award-winning new social homes in Norwich.
Mr Laurence Robertson (Tewkesbury) (Con)
The question refers to simplifying the planning system, but one of its many complications is that there is no standard methodology for calculating five-year land supply. Will the Government look at this and please address the problem pretty quickly?
Robert Jenrick
We will be giving that further thought. The Government are committed to bringing forward a new White Paper on planning reform. I will work closely with the Chancellor to draw up those proposals, and I would be very happy to speak with my hon. Friend and take his views as we do so.
John Healey (Wentworth and Dearne) (Lab)
May I welcome the Secretary of State back? Given the turnover of Housing Ministers, I trust that his first oral questions in the post will not also be his last. The Conservatives’ failure on planning is at the heart of their failure on housing. Their permitted development loophole lets developers sidestep the planning rules and build modern-day slum housing. It has been in place for four years now, so can he say whether the number of new affordable homes being built has gone up or down directly as a result of this planning change?
Robert Jenrick
May I thank the right hon. Gentleman for his remarks? Permitted development rights are subject to a review, and we have consulted stakeholders. He is right to say that there are some examples of poor practice, and I will carefully consider the information we have received before coming forward with proposals. Those rights have led to a large number of net additions that would not otherwise have been brought forward. That is important, and it is a contributing factor to the fact that, last year, we delivered more homes than any other for 30 years. Therefore, the planning reforms taken forward by my predecessors, which I will take forward with my new White Paper, have contributed to getting the homes built in this country that we desperately need.
John Healey
For the record, the number of new social rented homes is at a near record low. Rather than the net additions that the Secretary of State talks about, the Conservative-led Local Government Association says that this policy has led directly to 13,500 fewer new affordable homes. It hits at the heart of the Tory failure on housing: the rules are loosened so that big builders profit while renters and buyers on ordinary incomes lose out. Every Conservative MP should know that they have lost the argument on housing. With Ipsos MORI showing a 17 point lead for Labour over the Conservatives on housing, people know the country has a housing crisis and they know the Conservatives are failing to fix it. The Secretary of State had nothing to say on housing at the election, so what will the Government now do differently to win public confidence on housing?
Robert Jenrick
The right hon. Gentleman is on dangerous ground talking about the general election. He managed to take one of Labour’s safest seats to a marginal seat, and his colleague—the other shadow Secretary of State—was the co-ordinator of the Labour party’s general election campaign. The facts speak for themselves: last year we built more homes in this country than in any other year for 30 years; we built 1 million homes in the last Parliament and will build at least 1 million homes in the next Parliament; more affordable homes were built under this Conservative Government than under the last Labour Government; and we built more council houses last year than in the 13 years of the last Labour Government.
Mark Pawsey (Rugby) (Con)
Sally-Ann Hart (Hastings and Rye) (Con)
The Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government (Robert Jenrick)
We have delivered more than 1.5 million new homes since 2010 and last year saw the highest level of delivery in over 30 years, but there is more to do. Later this year I will publish a White Paper on planning reform, an objective of which will be a simpler and faster system for the benefit of everyone, including homeowners, and small and medium-sized builders.
Mark Pawsey
Conservative-led Rugby Borough Council has ambitious plans for social housing in Rugby, replacing unpopular old tower blocks with new, traditional housing. How can the Minister help the council to get on with this as quickly as possible? In particular, what discussions has he had with Treasury colleagues about the interest rate available from the Public Works Loan Board for projects such as this, which provide a very clear social benefit?
Robert Jenrick
We want to build more homes of all types. We have delivered 464,000 new affordable homes since 2010, and we have abolished the housing revenue account cap and established a five-year rent deal. Councils can secure grant funding from the existing affordable homes programme, and I am pleased to say that Rugby Borough Council is benefiting from that. In our manifesto, we said that we would create a successor to the affordable homes programme that is at least as generous. Finance from the Public Works Loan Board plays an important role in these investments. In October the Treasury made an extra £10 billion of lending available, and the interest rate remains very favourable, returning only to 2018 levels.
Sally-Ann Hart
The housing White Paper provided that developers should start to build within two years of securing planning permission. Will the Minister update the House on what progress has been made to ensure that developers build the homes we need and do not sit on land?
Robert Jenrick
I welcome my hon. Friend to the House. We want to see new homes built as soon as possible once planning permission is granted. She is right to refer to the previous housing White Paper, and this matter will be an important element of the forthcoming planning White Paper. Developers and authorities should be working closely together locally to deliver this, and I will look at whatever is necessary, including amending legislation, to ensure that we build the homes this country needs, and that we do so quickly.
Wera Hobhouse (Bath) (LD)
The climate emergency is real and we need to tackle it. Building new homes to a net zero standard must be at the heart of the solution. What action are this new Government going to take?
Robert Jenrick
The hon. Lady is absolutely right. We have committed to the future homes standard, which means that no new home will be built in this country from 2025 unless it has the highest levels of energy efficiency, and low or zero-carbon heating. We are consulting on that and further proposals will be brought forward shortly, meaning that planning applications will be made very shortly for those homes to be delivered post 2025. This will be a major change in the delivery of homes across the country, and a very welcome one.
Bill Esterson (Sefton Central) (Lab)
Thousands of new homes are due to be built at Maghull in my constituency. The developers are reluctant to build an access road, which means that construction traffic will now have to use totally unsuitable residential and rural roads. The experience in Maghull is all too typical. Does this not just show the problems with the planning system that favour developers over existing communities?
Robert Jenrick
I am happy to look into the instance that the hon. Gentleman raises. These matters are usually dealt with by councils in the planning conditions that they choose to set. The role in this for central Government is ensuring that infrastructure flows first—that was one of our manifesto commitments—so that GP surgeries, roads and schools flow at an appropriate time. We are going to take that forward. In the previous Parliament we created the housing infrastructure fund, which was a huge success and has delivered billions of pounds of infrastructure. We have committed to create a new version of that, which the Chancellor and I will be announcing shortly and will be larger and longer-term than its predecessor.
Lucy Allan (Telford) (Con)
It is a pleasure to see you in your Chair, Mr Speaker.
I thank the Secretary of State for recently visiting Telford. It was very much appreciated that he came to a new-build development where we have been having some difficult issues. As a new town, Telford experiences a very rapid rate of house building that can be overwhelming for communities and for local services. What steps is his Department taking to ensure good practice by developers and adequate local services for residents?
Robert Jenrick
It was a pleasure to visit Telford—a town that, as my hon. Friend knows, I know well. Telford is one of the fastest-growing towns in the country. While there are many examples of good-quality development —she took me to Lightmoor Village, being built with the Bournville Village Trust—there have been examples, on which she has fought for her constituents, of poor-quality development. Developers need to build high-quality, well-designed and safe homes, and we will take the steps necessary to ensure that they do. One step we are taking forward is the creation of a new homes ombudsman, which has been led in recent months by—now—my hon. Friend the Member for Dover (Mrs Elphicke). We will put that on a statutory footing in due course.
Lloyd Russell-Moyle (Brighton, Kemptown) (Lab/Co-op)
Dr Rupa Huq (Ealing Central and Acton) (Lab)
The Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government (Robert Jenrick)
We are committed to reforming the leasehold market so that it is fairer for consumers and the abuses that we have seen in recent years are addressed. To achieve this, we have a comprehensive programme of reform, and we are moving forward with legislation, beginning with the Bill set out in the Queen’s Speech banning new leasehold houses and reducing ground rents on future leases to zero.
Dr Huq
The Secretary of State says he is committed to reform. Since 2015, I have come across countless cases of people trapped on iniquitous terms in relation to ground rent, cladding—you name it—and unable to extend without paying through the nose. In that same time, however, the Government have had seven consultations, and there is no concrete legislation about anything they are actually going to do. Can he tell us when he will end this feudal hangover, which is unique to England, once and for all?
Robert Jenrick
The hon. Lady is incorrect. The Queen’s Speech made it clear that we will be bringing forward legislation. We intend to publish a draft Bill shortly, which will take the first steps that I have just described. We are also awaiting the next report of the Law Commission. We have just received one on enfranchisement. It is a very important issue, and I certainly want to take forward its recommendations to ensure a simpler and fairer system. The next report of the Law Commission will be on commonhold. Again, we will be paying close attention to that. At our encouragement, the Competition and Markets Authority is now looking into the mis-selling of leaseholds, which is another important issue. Be under no illusion: we will be taking forward leasehold reform, and soon.
Sir Peter Bottomley (Worthing West) (Con)
I thank the Secretary of State and his predecessors for the work they have done in commissioning work from the Law Commission that will provide a guide to the way forward. May I put it to the Secretary of State that, as his representatives at the all-party group meeting last week will confirm, there is a whole range of strong issues—the hon. Member for Ealing Central and Acton (Dr Huq) mentioned them—and that the Government, the Select Committee and the whole House need to make sure there is action, not just good intentions?
Robert Jenrick
I thank the Father of the House for the work he has done over many years on this issue. I campaigned on this before I became a Minister. I have seen a number of abuses with respect to leasehold properties, and we want to take action. Now is the time for action. We have the first report from the Law Commission. There will be a further one. There will then be the report from the CMA. Together with the evidence, we will take this into careful consideration and move forward to reform leasehold and put it on a more sustainable footing for the future.
Meg Hillier (Hackney South and Shoreditch) (Lab/Co-op)
As many of us heard at a meeting here on Thursday night and many of us know from our case load, so many people are caught in really difficult circumstances because of the issue of cladding. Those leaseholders are mortgage prisoners or their properties are valued at zero. Will the Secretary of State give them some assurance that the Government are taking this seriously and will act fast, because people’s lives are unable to move on while they await a decision on the second type of cladding?
Robert Jenrick
I appreciate the issue the hon. Lady has raised, and I read about the meeting of the all-party group the other day. This is a very serious challenge; I am aware of a number of leaseholders who are struggling to find the finance required to make the necessary changes to their homes. We are giving this careful consideration. We have already provided £600 million for those living in high-rise buildings with ACM cladding so that that work can now proceed at pace, and I will certainly meet with any of the hon. Lady’s constituents who might wish to discuss what further steps the Government can take to unblock this important issue.
Andrew Bridgen (North West Leicestershire) (Con)
May I press my right hon. Friend: will he reassure leaseholders in North West Leicestershire and across the country that the Government will set up a mechanism for them to seek proper redress for their genuine grievances?
Mike Amesbury (Weaver Vale) (Lab)
The Secretary of State rightly refers to action, but when? That is the key question my constituents are asking in the Winnington part of Weaver Vale and Sandymoor. We have had consultation upon consultation; when will there be action? We need action now, not careful consideration.
Robert Jenrick
I appreciate the hon. Gentleman’s remarks, and the north-west has been particularly badly affected by this. The statistics suggest that new-build homes in the north-west peaked at as high as 71% of all new homes being built in 2017—in the first quarter of that year. That has now fallen very considerably as a result of the actions and the statements of this Government and the general anger across this House and across the country at the abuses; that has now fallen to as low as 8%, but we will be legislating and we will outlaw these practices.
Nickie Aiken (Cities of London and Westminster) (Con)
Gareth Johnson (Dartford) (Con)
The Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government (Robert Jenrick)
From Kensington to Sedgefield, and from Workington to Wrexham, this Government were elected to represent all parts of the country. My Department is focused on repaying that trust by levelling up every community with a renewed focus on those areas that have been overlooked and undervalued for too long. We will ensure that local government is properly supported to deliver the services that we all rely on with the best financial settlement in a decade. We will keep building the homes that this country needs with investment in infrastructure and affordable housing, while making the dream of home ownership a reality for everyone, and we will redouble our efforts to bring about the biggest change in building safety for a generation.
Gareth Johnson
This year, we commemorate the 75th anniversary of the liberation of the world war two concentration camps. I ask the Secretary of State, in his communities role, what is being done to mark the occasion, and furthermore, what is being done to tackle antisemitism more generally wherever it occurs?
Robert Jenrick
On 23 January, I will accompany His Royal Highness the Prince of Wales to the holocaust forum at Yad Vashem, Jerusalem, to mark the 75th anniversary of the liberation of the concentration camps, which brought an end to the murder of 6 million Jewish men, women and children, but as we know, did not bring an end to the cancer of antisemitism. The Government have provided an additional £2.2 million for schools to teach lessons from Auschwitz and £1.7 million for visits to Bergen-Belsen, the camp liberated by British troops. I will continue to champion the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance definition of antisemitism, including requiring all councils to adopt it forthwith.
Mr Stephen Morgan (Portsmouth South) (Lab)
Council funding cuts under this Government have created a shortage of safe accommodation for vulnerable children, and now thousands of at-risk young people are being placed in care homes that are illegal, miles from their school or unregulated. Does the Secretary of State agree that responsibility for this injustice lies at the feet of his Government?
Robert Jenrick
We have recently published, and will be debating shortly, the most generous settlement for local government for a decade. It will provide a 4.4% real- terms increase in funding for local government and will include a £1 billion grant for social care. These are important issues that we need to take forward. I am aware of some issues with supported housing, for example, and the Under-Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, my hon. Friend the Member for Thornbury and Yate (Luke Hall), is taking that forward, but as a result of the economic renewal that the country is undergoing, after almost a decade of economic growth, we are now able to invest more in local government. I hope that the hon. Gentleman and all Members of the House will support the local government settlement next month.
Joy Morrissey (Beaconsfield) (Con)
Matt Western (Warwick and Leamington) (Lab)
Robert Jenrick
As I have already said in previous answers, the Government want to build more homes of all types. If we are to tackle the housing crisis, we will need to spend more on infrastructure, which we are doing; further reform the planning system, which I intend to do; and invest more in affordable housing, and we have already invested £9 billion through our affordable housing programme and made a manifesto commitment to introduce another one that is even larger. But do I believe that people in this country fundamentally want to own a home of their own? Yes, I do, and we will do all we can to help more people on the housing ladder.
Bob Blackman (Harrow East) (Con)
Robert Jenrick
My hon. Friend, who has campaigned on this issue for many years, speaks for the whole House. I will of course be signing the book. I am informed by the Leader of the House that there will be a debate in the House on or around Holocaust Memorial Day in the usual way. We must all continue to fight the cancer of antisemitism, in all its forms, on every occasion, and this Government will always do that.
Emma Hardy (Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle) (Lab)
Ruth Edwards (Rushcliffe) (Con)
Robert Jenrick
I welcome my hon. Friend and parliamentary neighbour to the House. I think she is the first new Member of Parliament for Rushcliffe for 49 years. She has a lot to live up to, but I look forward to working with her as we power up the midlands engine. I think her constituency was the only Conservative constituency in the county of Nottinghamshire in 1997. Today, all the constituencies are Conservative. One area that we will of course work on together is delivery of the new development co-operation at Ratcliffe power station, which is a brilliant opportunity for the whole country.
Hilary Benn (Leeds Central) (Lab)
Further to the Secretary of State’s answer to my hon. Friend the Member for Hackney South and Shoreditch (Meg Hillier), may I suggest—given that the only difference in the crisis facing many of our constituents is that they have problems with high pressure laminate or other forms of external cladding, as opposed to aluminium composite material—that it would be sensible to extend the coverage of the fund that the Government have established for the private sector to cover those blocks? Otherwise, the residents will face a very bleak future.
Robert Jenrick
I am grateful for the right hon. Member’s comments, and I saw the early-day motion that he laid in the House to that effect, but we must be guided by the evidence. My predecessors chose to provide the £600 million remediation fund in relation to ACM in high-rise buildings because the expert panel which advises us had said that that was the urgent challenge that needed to be addressed. We have commissioned experts from the Building Research Establishment to carry out further tests on a range of materials, including HPL. I will publish the information shortly, and will say more at that time.
Henry Smith (Crawley) (Con)
Town of the Year Competition
Robert Jenrick Excerpts(6 years, 6 months ago)
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The Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government (Robert Jenrick)
Today I am announcing the opportunity for towns across England to compete in a new town of the year competition. The competition aims to celebrate towns’ achievements in areas such as entrepreneurship, technology, community, enterprise, and integration. This will help deliver on the Prime Minister’s bold agenda for the future, making this decade a time of renewal for towns and communities.
In the months ahead, I will complete a countrywide tour of all the 100 areas receiving funding under the £3.6 billion towns fund. This will ensure these places are receiving the practical support and investment they need on the ground so we can help local communities to deliver real change.
Some £16 million of funding has now been delivered to local authorities to help develop new innovative proposals in the 100 areas across England, as part of the towns fund. Each place will have the opportunity to bid for funding of up to £25 million.
To assist with this, I will establish a new towns hub’ within my Department, which will work to develop each town’s investment proposals. The hubs, based across the country will have a named representative from the Department, supporting local people on the development of their plan. They will also evaluate the emerging town investment plans, share best practice across towns and build on the towns fund investments for potential future support to towns from across Government.
Finally, today I am also announcing a new expert-led advisory panel, which will be convened to advise on how we can revitalise our towns over the next year. The specialists, including entrepreneurs and people who have delivered real change, will help shape this Government’s policy to support the growth agenda.
These announcements reaffirms out the Government’s ambition to level up the country. It sets out how we will help restore the fabric of our towns and cities and give local people far more control in how they are invested in, and to hear directly from people in these communities on the specific support and investment they need.
[HCWS28]
Departmental Update
Robert Jenrick Excerpts(6 years, 6 months ago)
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The Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government (Robert Jenrick)
Troubled Families allocations
On 5 January I announced up to £165 million of new funding for the Troubled Families Programme for 2020-21. This funding will provide intensive support for some of the most vulnerable families and place the programme on a stable footing for the future. It will help more families to get early, practical and co-ordinated support to transform their lives for the better, with key workers working with the whole family to address their needs holistically rather than responding to each problem, or single family member separately.
This funding will also help local authorities and their partners to work together to reduce demand and dependency on costly, reactive key public services. The latest evaluation results show that as a result of the Troubled Families Programme, two years after joining there were a third fewer children going into care, a quarter fewer adults going to prison, 15% fewer juvenile convictions and 11% fewer claiming job seekers allowance.
Pets in privately rented accommodation
As part of the steps the Government are taking to secure a better deal for renters, I have called on landlords to make it easier for responsible tenants to have well behaved pets in their homes while recognising landlords’ rights to protect their properties from damage. Pets bring a huge amount of joy and comfort to people’s lives, but some families cannot experience this because they rent their homes privately. We will publish a revised model tenancy agreement shortly, which can be used as the basis of lease agreements, to remove restrictions on responsible tenants with wellbehaved pets.
Rogue landlord enforcement
I have awarded more than 100 councils across England a share of over £4 million to crack down on criminal landlords and letting agents through the Private Rented Sector Innovation and Enforcement Grant Fund. This builds on £2.4 million awarded in January 2019 and will continue the Government’s ongoing work to make the private rented sector fairer and stamp out criminal practices for good. Most landlords provide decent homes for their tenants, but a small minority persist in breaking the law, making tenants’ lives a misery by offering inadequate or unsafe housing. The grants support a range of projects to enable councils to make the best use of their enforcement powers and include trialling innovative ideas, sharing best practice and targeted enforcement where we know landlords shirk their responsibilities. The Government are committed to helping good landlords to thrive, and ensuring that hard-working tenants across the country get the homes they deserve—creating a housing market that works for everyone.
High Streets package
At the heart of this new Government’s mission is a commitment to supporting places and communities that have been overlooked and undervalued for far too long. We will make an immediate start on levelling up across the regions and I am reorganising my Department to relentlessly focus on these places so that we can deliver real change for communities through our £3.6 billion Towns Fund, announced by the Prime Minister in July 2019. It will support an initial 100 town deals across England and includes £1 billion for the Future High Streets Fund.
The Future High Streets Fund aims to renew and reshape town centres in a way that improves experience, drives growth and ensures future sustainability. Last week we released over £1 million of additional funding, on top of £13.5 million already invested in local authorities, to further support places developing detailed business cases of their original proposals.
In addition to this funding I also announced that the High Streets Task Force, established to provide hands-on support to local areas, will be piloting interventions, products and services in 20 places in early 2020 before rolling out expert, training and data offer across the country later in the year. The places benefiting from being part of this pilot will be a mixture of local authorities, business improvement districts and community groups. The taskorce is also holding an open recruitment for a board chair to provide expert leadership to this programme.
My Department has also launched a survey to consult on the proposed register of empty commercial properties, to improve transparency of ownership on the high street and make it easier for businesses or community groups to make use of vacant commercial properties and identify landlords. The consultation exercise will remain open until 9 February 2020, after which we will consider responses and decide how to proceed.
Cold Weather Fund
This Government are committed to tackling homelessness and rough sleeping within the term of this Parliament. To this end, on 23 December I announced the allocation of £263 million in funding to local authorities designed to support the delivery of services to tackle homelessness. This is an increase in overall funding for local authority homelessness services of £23 million on the previous financial year.
My Department is also funding many additional rough sleeping services across the country this winter through our £10 million cold weather fund. In recognition of the level of interest in the fund we have announced a further £3 million available to all local authorities in England. This will enable us to build on the successes of the fund so far by increasing outreach work further and extending winter shelter provision to support rough sleepers off the streets this winter. These announcements underline our commitment to tackling homelessness and rough sleeping and will ensure local authorities are given the resource they need to make this a reality in local areas.
Housing First
My Department announced recently that 200 people have so far been housed through the Housing First pilot, underway since 2018 in Greater Manchester combined authority, Liverpool city region and west midlands combined authority areas. The Housing First approach offers permanent affordable housing to rough sleepers with multiple complex needs as well as wraparound support to ensure that they are able to maintain their tenancies and provide the support that they need to recover from mental health issues, substance misuse and the physical effects of living on the streets.
Community pubs
On 22 December I announced a £1.15 million fund that will assist an estimated 100 communities to either own their local pub or benefit from new, pub-based community services and facilities. This funding will also create valuable new jobs and volunteering opportunities. Pubs run by the community and for the community help bring people closer together. Importantly, they are a space for older, vulnerable and more isolated residents to access important local services and feel part of their communities.
The £1.15 million fund will support pubs through two key programmes. £650,000 will be allocated to the second “More than a Pub” programme. More than a pub provides small grants and specialist advice for community groups at the start of their journey to community ownership. It also supports groups later in the process who require specialist professional advice with larger grants and loans to help with business planning, conveyancing, architectural help or financial advice.
Five hundred thousand pounds will be allocated to” Pub is the Hub” to enable a range of projects providing new, pub-based community services from post offices and shops to libraries and allotments. This will increase the services available in rural and remote communities and help sustain pubs as community assets and businesses.
[HCWS22]
Local Government Finance
Robert Jenrick Excerpts(6 years, 7 months ago)
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The Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government (Robert Jenrick)
Today I have published the provisional local government finance settlement for 2020-21. The proposals set out in this consultation will give local authorities a 4.4% real-terms increase in their core spending power, which will rise from £46.2 billion in 2019-20 to £49.1 billion in 2020-21. It is a strong and well-balanced package that delivers significant extra resources to the priority areas of adult and children’s social care, while offering protection to other key service areas.
In October this year we launched a technical consultation, within which we invited views on the proposed package for 2020-21. I would like to thank all colleagues in local government for their responses to the October consultation and thank them in advance for comments on this next consultation. I have now taken the responses to the technical consultation into account and, following this, I am now publishing our proposals for the provisional local government finance settlement for 2020-21:
https://www.gov.uk/government/collections/provisional-local-government-finance-settlement-england-2020-to-2021.
Extra social care resources
We recognise the importance of addressing the challenges in our social care system. This is why we want to build the same level of cross-party consensus on social care as we have with the NHS, to make far-reaching changes to the way these services are financed and delivered.
In the meantime, we will do all we can to support local authorities. The proposals I have published today will allow local authorities to access an additional £1.5 billion for social care. This comprises £1 billion of additional grant—for both adult and children’s social care—and a proposed 2% council tax precept for adult social care, which will enable councils to access a further £500 million. Some £150 million of the additional grant will be used to equalise the distributional impact of the council tax adult social care precept.
These additional resources sit on top of the existing social care package, which will continue at 2019-20 levels, and mean that local authorities will have access to over £5.5 billion of dedicated funding across adult and children’s social care in 2020-21.
Core settlement resources
The provisional settlement also provides protection for vital services by increasing core settlement resources, which includes revenue support grant and business rates baseline funding levels, in line with inflation, and by continuing other key grants from 2019-20.
Council tax
The proposed referendum principles strike a balance between giving local authorities the flexibility to address service pressures, without overburdening council tax payers with excessive increases. Local authorities will therefore be able to increase council tax in 2020-21 by a core principle of up to 2%, without holding a local referendum, with a bespoke council tax referendum principle of 2% or £5, whichever is higher, for shire district councils. In addition, councils with adult social care responsibilities will be able to increase their council tax by a further 2%, on top of the core principle, to be spent exclusively on adult social care. If confirmed, this package will mean that the expected average council tax increase for 2020-21 will be the lowest since 2016- 17.
New Homes Bonus
To reward local authorities for house building in their area, I can confirm that we will make a new round of allocations of the new homes bonus for 2020-21 amounting to £907 million. As part of this, I am committing an additional £7 million to maintain the growth baseline for payments at 0.4%. We will make no legacy payments on these new allocations, but the Government will make legacy payments on allocations made in earlier years which are due to be paid in 2020-21.
It is not clear that the new homes bonus in its current form is focused on incentivising homes where they are needed most. I am therefore announcing that the Government will consult on the future of the housing incentive in the spring. This will include moving to a new, more targeted approach that rewards local authorities where they are ambitious in delivering the homes we need and which is aligned with other measures around planning performance.
Rural Services Delivery Grant
We will continue to recognise the extra costs of delivering services in rural areas and propose to maintain last year’s rural services delivery grant of £81 million, which is the joint-highest paid to date. It will be distributed using the same methodology as in 2019-20, which allocated funding to the top quartile of local authorities on the “super-sparsity” indicator.
Independent Living Fund and Schools
Following the closure of the independent living fund (ILF) in June 2015, the Government agreed to continue funding pre-existing ILF arrangements until the end of 2019-20, through the former ILF recipient grant.
We can confirm that the former ILF recipient grant will continue to be paid to local authorities in 2020-21. The total value of the grant in 2020-21 will be maintained at the 2019-20 value of £160.6 million, with the same approach to individual local authority allocations. Details will be published shortly.
We recognise that the settlement is just one source of funding that local authorities need to know about. Government have now also confirmed dedicated schools grant allocations for 2020-21:
https://www.parliament.uk/business/publications/written-questions-answers-statements/written-statement/Commons/2019-12-20/HCWS2/
Conclusion
Local government has asked us for certainty and stability from the settlement for 2020-21. This provisional settlement delivers on this, building on spending round 2019 and our recent technical consultation. It provides certainty for 2020-21 for those planning vital frontline services and provides significant extra resources where they are needed most.
[HCWS17]
Work of the Department
Robert Jenrick Excerpts(6 years, 8 months ago)
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The Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government (Robert Jenrick)
Boosting Home Ownership and Getting Britain Building.
Getting more much-needed homes built
Since 2010 we have delivered over 1.3 million homes.
In 2017, we published our ambitious housing White Paper, and set an ambition to increase the delivery of homes to 300,000 a year by the mid-2020s. In 2017-18 over 222,000 new homes were created, the highest number in all but one of the past 31 years.
There was a net increase of 232,800 in the number of domestic properties with a council tax band in England between March 2018 and March 2019.
We are also ensuring that people have access to high-quality, affordable homes, having delivered over 430,000 affordable homes since 2010.
In 2018, we launched a new national housing agency—Homes England—to increase the supply of new homes, bringing together money, expertise, planning and compulsory purchase powers.
We have invested in overcoming the barriers to building.
In 2017 we launched the £5 billion housing infrastructure fund, to provide infrastructure in areas where housing need is greatest. At Budget 2018 we increased the funding by another £500 million, taking it to £5.5 billion in total, which will potentially unlock up to 650,000 homes. Over £3 billion has now been allocated to housing infrastructure fund bids—25 forward funding projects and 110 marginal viability fund projects—to unlock up to 297,100 homes, with more expected to be allocated over the coming months.
In 2018 we launched the £1.3 billion land assembly fund to acquire land needing work, making it less risky for developers to invest in. We also launched the £630 million small sites fund to help public landowners or local authorities speed up getting the right infrastructure in place to support stalled small sites.
In total, the Government have provided financial support for housing of at least £44 billion since the start of this spending review period to 2022-23. This includes £15 billion allocated at Autumn Budget 2017.
We have released land from the public estate for 109,000 homes through the 2011 to 2015 public land for housing programme, exceeding its 100,000 target. We have launched a successor programme, which aims to identify and release land for 160,000 new homes.
Boosting home ownership
In total, we have helped over 566,000 households into home ownership since 2010 through Government-backed schemes including help to buy and right to buy. The number of first-time buyers is at an 11-year annual high and has increased by 84% between 2010 and 2018.
Since its introduction in 2013, the help to buy scheme has helped over 221,000 households to get on the property ladder. In August 2019 we closed a loophole in the scheme, giving people the freedom to reduce their monthly mortgage repayments. This has opened up the help to buy re-mortgage market for more lenders, giving customers more choice and potentially paving the way to more competitive deals.
At the Autumn Budget 2017, we introduced stamp duty land tax relief for first-time buyers, which will help over 95% of first-time buyers who pay the tax, benefiting a total of 401,900 households so far and it is expected to benefit over 1 million households in the first five years. To date, this has saved first-time buyers an estimated £955 million.
We have launched two pilots of voluntary right to buy—one in 2016 and one in 2018—giving thousands of housing association tenants the opportunity to buy their homes.
In 2019, we announced plans for a new national model for shared ownership, which will help thousands of lower earners to step on to the housing ladder.
Improving people’s experience of the housing market
In 2010 we scrapped home information packs, removing unnecessary regulation and making the process of selling homes easier and less costly.
In August 2018 we published the social housing Green Paper, which set our ambitions for a new, fairer deal for social housing residents, including making it easier for residents to progress into home ownership. The Green Paper was informed by conversations with over 1,000 social housing residents and 7,000 online submissions.
Since 2012, the social housing waiting list has dropped by 40%. The Localism Act 2011 has given local authorities the power to set their own qualification criteria for social housing and to set policies which are appropriate to their local area.
We are helping renters by:
Passing legislation banning unfair letting fees and capping tenancy deposits, which will bring an end to costly upfront payments and renewal fees. The Tenant Fees Act came into force on 1 June 2019 and is set to save tenants £240 million in the first year alone.
Empowering tenants to tackle bad landlords through the Homes (Fitness for Human Habitation) Act 2018.
Ending the practice of evicting tenants with no clearly specified reason, by committing in April 2019 to repeal s.21 of the Housing Act 1988.
Cracking down on rogue landlords. Last year alone we introduced banning orders and a database of rogue landlords and agents, and we extended mandatory licensing to protect tenants from overcrowding and poor housing conditions in houses in multiple occupation.
We are helping leaseholders by:
Announcing a range of measures to cut out abusive practices within the leasehold market, including prohibiting the development of new build leasehold houses other than in exceptional circumstances and restricting ground rents in newly established leases of houses and flats to a peppercorn, zero financial value.
Reforming the planning system to ensure that the right homes are built in the right places
In 2012 we published the national planning policy framework, replacing over 1000 pages of individual policy statements. In 2018, we revised the national planning policy framework, implementing around 80 planning reforms whilst making it more streamlined and easier to use.
As of the end of September 2019, 301 of 338 local planning authorities (89%) have an adopted local plan. 152 of these local plans are up to date (45%). This compares to 58 (17%) local planning authorities that had an adopted local plan in May 2010.
We are now preparing an accelerated planning White Paper to speed up the planning system, including the potential for more fees to be refunded if councils take too long to decide on specific planning applications.
We have given communities more power to plan for their areas, by introducing neighbourhood planning in 2011. Since 2012 over 2,600 communities have started producing a neighbourhood plan.
We have introduced permitted development rights for change of use to residential; over 46,000 homes have been delivered in the three years to March 2018 through these.
In May 2019 we announced changes to permitted development rights, allowing thousands of homeowners to extend their properties quickly and easily without the need for a full planning application.
We have continued to protect the green belt and it is now larger than in 1997, when records began, if we disregard land re-classified as national park.
We have reformed the system of developer contributions, to support local authorities to better collect and spend contributions. Local authorities received £6 billion in developer contributions which go toward affordable housing and local infrastructure in 2016-17, a £2 billion increase in real terms than in 2011-12.
Improving Quality and Design of Housing
We recently launched our national design guide. The first-ever Government-backed national model design code will be published in the new year and will set out a clear model for promoting a better design and style of homes across the country, shaped by what local people want.
We launched the future homes standard consultation in October 2019, to ensure that every new home that’s built in this country from 2025 will have low or zero-carbon emissions and the highest levels of energy efficiency.
Diversifying the housing market
We are backing councils to build more homes by removing the housing revenue account borrowing cap in 2018, enabling them deliver around 10,000 homes a year by 2021-22.
We established the £4.5 billion home building fund in 2016 to get more homes built. This will provide £2.5 billion funding specifically for SMEs, custom builders and innovators, giving them the funding they need to compete in the market. The fund also provides £2 billion in long-term infrastructure funding to unlock between 160,000 and 200,000 homes by 2020-21, with an emphasis on developments on brownfield land.
We have supported the build to rent sector to deliver over 30,000 homes across the UK since 2012, with over 110,000 further such homes in the pipeline. The build to rent fund provided over £630 million of development finance for the supply of 6,000 new privately rented homes. The fund closed to new applications in 2015. The £3.5 billion private rented sector guarantee scheme finances new build rented properties, and as of October 2019, £1.75 billion in total has been approved for 9,050 homes.
In autumn 2017 we announced a further £8 billion in guarantees to support housebuilding, including purpose-built rented homes and SMEs; £4 billion has been allocated so far:
In April 2019, we launched the £1 billion ENABLE build programme to support SME housebuilders.
At spring Statement 2019, we announced £3 billion of guarantees to support affordable housing delivery. The invitation to tender to run the scheme opened in November 2019.
Levelling up across the country
We continue to decentralise power away from Whitehall and back into the hands of local councils, communities and individuals to act on local priorities. In the 2019 Queen’s Speech, we committed to publishing a devolution White Paper to unleash regional potential in England and enable decisions that affect local people to be made at a local level.
Eight metro mayors have been elected since 2017, most recently in North of Tyne in May 2019. Through a major programme of secondary legislation, we devolved significant new powers, including over transport, housing, skills and planning to the mayors and combined authorities. Mayors are growing local economies by working with local councils and businesses to create jobs, boost skills, build homes and improve connections.
We replaced top-down regional development agencies in 2012, following the establishment of local enterprise partnerships in 2011.
In 2014, we established the £12 billion local growth fund and have since funded three rounds of growth deals for local enterprise partnerships to support local areas, creating jobs, supporting businesses and encouraging growth.
We have agreed 26 bespoke city deals through two waves in 2012 and 2013. These deals devolved powers and opened up new and innovative ways of doing things to unlock growth and deliver jobs.
We have supported the creation of three mayoral development corporations at Old Oak, Stockport and Teesside, to drive regeneration and growth.
In March 2019, the Department announced two new housing communities in London, Old Oak Common and Brent Cross Cricklewood. The investment package totals £570 million and will create 20,000 new homes and new jobs opportunities in the area, whilst benefiting from new transport infrastructure.
Supporting our towns, high streets and coastal communities
In July 2019 the Prime Minister announced an expanded £3.6 billion towns fund. The Government have since announced an initial 100 places that Government have invited to enter into a town deal negotiation, and 100 places that are benefiting from the future high streets fund.
The Town Deal funding will enable communities to develop ambitious transformative plans, improving their economic growth prospects, transport, broadband connectivity, skills and culture. In October 2019, Government launched the #MyTown campaign to give people a say in how a new generation of town deals should transform the place they call home.
The high streets funding will empower local leaders to help transform their high streets and town centres as consumer habits change. In August 2019, we announced its expansion, meaning that an additional 50 towns will now benefit from £1 billion of available funding. Part of the fund will be used to support the regeneration of heritage high streets. We have also funded successful initiatives such as “love your local market” and the “great British high street awards”, and established the high streets task force to give high streets and town centres expert advice to adapt and thrive.
In November 2018 we launched the open doors pilot scheme, which has matched landlords struggling to find tenants for their empty high street properties in five locations around England with community groups looking for space.
We are supporting our coastal communities through our coastal communities fund which supports projects in the UK delivering sustainable growth and jobs. In September 2019 we announced a further five towns which will benefit from this funding. Since 2012, we have awarded grants to 369 projects across the UK, totalling over £229 million.
Unleashing regional potential
Northern powerhouse
In 2016 we published the northern powerhouse strategy. Since then we have:
Invested £3.4 billion of local growth funding in the region to support locally determined projects across the north.
Seen record levels of investment in transport—over £13 billion between 2015-16 to 202-/21—and the creation of the first statutory, regional transport body outside of London, transport for the north.
Created the northern powerhouse investment fund, worth £400 million, to support SMEs to grow and scale up.
Boosted the international profile of the northern powerhouse through a commitment of £15million to support trade missions and £7 million for the northern powerhouse taskforce.
Improved education in the north, with £70 million for the northern powerhouse schools strategy.
Seen almost 50% of the north being covered by devolution, with metro mayors in place across the north.
In the autumn Budget 2018, the Government extended the transforming cities fund by another year, 2022-23, providing an extra £240 million available for six metro mayors for locally determined projects to improve transport connections. This builds on the initial transforming cities fund of £436 million in the northern powerhouse regions.
Midlands engine
In 2017 we published the first midlands engine strategy which included an additional £392 million for midlands local enterprise partnerships to support local growth projects, bringing the total growth deal funding for the midlands to nearly £1.9 billion.
We have supported enhanced connectivity in the region with £25 million of funding for midlands connect to publish its first strategy in March 2017. Further transport support has included, in March 2019, the transforming cities fund with Derby and Nottingham receiving £7.2 million, Leicestershire receiving £7.8 million and Stoke on Trent receiving £5.6 million.
We are investing over £250 million through the midlands engine investment fund to support small businesses to start and grow.
Skills development is being supported in the region through a £20 million midlands engine skills challenge, delivering targeted support to the unemployed through work coaches, providing English language training to help more people access employment and empowering employers to help employees with mental health issues.
Three institutes of technology have been established at Aston University, Dudley College of Technology and the University of Lincoln.
The west midlands was selected to become the home to the UK’s first multi-city 5G testbed in September 2018. The £50 million trial of new high-speed connectivity will pave the way for rollout across the UK. This builds on the already active 5G testbed in Worcestershire, putting the midlands at the forefront of 5G developments.
Birmingham was selected to host the prestigious 2022 Commonwealth Games and in Budget 2018, £165 million was announced to support the games athletes village and unlock 5,000 homes.
Coventry was announced as UK city of culture 2021 and has been provided with £8.5 million for its plans to showcase the city.
In May 2017, the people of the west midlands combined authority (WMCA) elected their first mayor, Andy Street. Government have agreed a second devolution deal with the WMCA which included £6 million for a housing delivery taskforce, £5 million for a construction skills training scheme and £250 million from the transforming cities fund to be spent on local intra-city transport priorities.
In October 2019, following the £2 million already granted to the midlands to develop the Toton growth zone near Nottingham, we announced intent to establish a new locally led development corporation with the aims of delivering new houses, jobs and economic growth.
Western gateway
In November, alongside the Secretary of State for Wales, we announced the western gateway: a strategic partnership promoting and maximising economic growth across south Wales and the west of England to create jobs, boost prosperity and support the world-renowned universities and businesses of the region.
To represent a strong business voice and lead the project to success, Katherine Bennett, senior vice president of Airbus, is the first acting chair of the western gateway.
MHCLG is providing £400,000 start-up funding to kick-start the partnership.
Helping Vulnerable People
In 2018 we published our rough sleeping strategy, setting out our vision for halving rough sleeping by 2022 and ending it altogether.
We have allocated more than £1.2 billion to tackle homelessness and rough sleeping over the spending review period to April 2020. This includes a flexible homelessness support grant of £617 million for homelessness services, £28 million of funding to pilot a housing first approach in three major regions of England and the rough sleeping initiative (RSI). The RSI began with a £30 million fund for 2018-2019 targeted at 83 local authorities with the highest levels of rough sleeping. The Government announced a further £46 million fund for the RSI for 2019/20. We expect this to provide 750 staff and 2,600 bed spaces this year.
These efforts are having an impact on rough sleeping levels: the 2018 annual rough sleeping statistics showed a decrease for the first time this decade, and a 19% reduction in those areas receiving additional funding and support under the rough sleeping initiative. And our recent impact evaluation of the rough sleeping initiative showed that the true impact was even greater with a 32% reduction in rough sleeping in these areas, compared to what it would have been had the initiative not been in place.
At the spending round in 2019 we announced £422 million offunding to help reduce homelessness and rough sleeping in 2020-21, which is an additional £54 million of funding compared with the previous year.
The Homelessness Reduction Act came into force in 2018, which will transform the culture of homelessness service delivery. For the first time, it placed new duties on local housing authorities to take reasonable steps to try to prevent and relieve a person’s homelessness.
Since 2011 we have delivered 34,000 units of supported housing for disabled, vulnerable and older people.
Supporting Local Government to deliver
high quality services with sustainable finances
Making public services better and more efficient
Between 2011 and 2016, we have provided almost £5 billion of council tax freeze grant funding to local authorities that froze their council tax level to help keep bills low.
We have worked with councils on agreeing locally led proposals to establish new unitary councils and to merge district councils, saving millions annually. In 2018-19 we supported two new unitary councils in Dorset and three merged district councils in East Suffolk, West Suffolk and Somerset West Taunton.
In 2011, we launched the troubled families programme to support local areas over the long term to transform the way services worked with families with multiple high-cost and complex problems. In 2015 we launched the second troubled families programme. As of March 2019, it has funded areas to work with nearly 380,000 eligible families, with 172,000 families achieving significant and sustained progress against the problems identified when entering the programme.
In 2013 we introduced new legislation to allow councils across England to charge double the rate of council tax on homes left empty for two years or more, and therefore raising funds which can be used to keep the overall rate of council tax down.
Council tax in England is 6% lower in real terms than it was in 2010. This follows a doubling of council tax over from 1997 to 2010.
We have also taken steps to ensure local authorities and private operators provide adequate parking spaces and are fair to their customers. These include:
Amending the national planning policy framework and planning guidance to reduce restrictions on parking and help local authorities and householders rent out empty spaces in 2011;
Reducing over-zealous parking enforcement through the Deregulation Act 2015, and giving local residents, community groups, and businesses the ability to challenge parking policies in the same year;
Tackling rogue private parking operators through supporting Sir Greg Knight’s Private Members’ Bill, helping it to secure Royal Assent in March 2019; and
Proposing a new code of practice, to be developed by the British standards institution, to provide drivers with a 10-minute grace period after their tickets expire and crack down on intimidating and aggressive debt collection practices.
Improving local government sustainability
The 2019 spending round provides access to the largest year-on-year increase in local authority spending power since 2010. We expect core spending power to rise by £2.9 billion, from £46.2 billion to £49.1 billion in 2020-21. This includes an additional £1.5 billion to help local authorities to meet rising demand for adult social care. Average spending power per dwelling for the 10% most deprived authorities is around 16% more than for the least deprived 10% in 2019-20.
The total net revenue service expenditure by all local authorities in England is budgeted to be £96.2 billion in 2019-20. This is 3.8% higher than the £92.6 billion budgeted for 2018-19.
We have helped to drive the integration of health and social care services following the establishment of the better care fund, from a total of £5.3 billion in 2015-16 to a total of £7.8 billion in 2018-19.
In 2013 we introduced the business rates retention system, giving local authorities more control over money they raise locally. We have conducted a series of pilots for full business rate retention.
Since Budget 2016 the Government have introduced a range of business rates measures in England worth more than £13 billion over the next five years.
Uniting the Country
Building communities and great places
We have empowered communities by establishing a range of community rights in the Localism Act 2011, including the community right to bid to help protect local assets for community use and the community right to challenge to give communities a greater role in shaping and running local services.
We are ensuring that communities are heard through our £3.2 million communities fund which has supported 54 local authorities to shape and improve service delivery in partnership with community groups. As well as investing a £1.85 million endowment, from March 2016 to March 2019, to allow communities to buy their local pub.
In September 2019 the community infrastructure levy regulations came into force, helping local people see how every pound of property developers’ cash levied on new buildings is spent.
In July 2019 we published a communities framework to set out our renewed vision for building stronger communities and championing communities in every aspect of society.
Green spaces and parks
In 2018-19 we invested £15 million to improve parks through the local authority parks improvement fund, the future parks accelerator and pocket parks plus. In October 2019 we launched a further £1.35 million of funding to extend the pocket parks programme. Pocket parks is designed to create new pocket parks or renovate existing parks that have fallen into disrepair where it can be shown that physical changes could have a significant positive impact on the local community and address a specific local need. Through the 2018 programme, we funded 198 new and renovated parks across England.
Integration
We are continuing to invest in isolated communities and improve English language skills by committing to spend over £50 million in 2018-19 and 201-20 to support priorities set out in the integrated communities Green Paper and subsequent action plan. At the spending round 2019, we announced an additional £10 million of funding to continue the integration areas programme with a major focus on English language provision, building on the success of the first five integration areas announced in 2018.
We are supporting English local authorities to tackle the impacts of recent migration through our £102 million controlling migration fund. Funded activity includes supporting newcomers to learn English and understand local social and cultural expectations, caring for unaccompanied asylum-seeking children and tackling rogue landlords.
Tackling hatred in all forms
We are committed to tackling all forms of hate crime as demonstrated through the hate crime action plan, this was refreshed in 2018. As part of the refresh, we have committed additional funding to continue to protect places of worship. We have committed over £1.5 million for projects to tackle racially and religiously motivated hatred.
We have committed to launching an anti-Muslim hatred working group and an antisemitism working group. Most recently, we have appointed an antisemitism advisor—Lord John Mann—and appointed the first advisor to take forward the Government’s commitment to work on a definition of Islamophobia.
In September 2019, the communities secretary committed £100,000 funding to stem the spread of anti-Semitic material online. The Secretary of State also wrote to all councils and universities encouraging them to adopt the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) working definition of anti-Semitism as a matter of urgency.
We are honouring and remembering Holocaust victims by committing up to £75 million for a striking new national memorial and a state-of-the-art learning centre next to Parliament, to be matched by at least £25 million from private donations. Subject to planning permission, construction will begin in 2020.
Achievements in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland;
The UK government has committed up to £1.6 billion for six city deals across Scotland and Wales and has committed to extending city deals to Northern Ireland. A funding commitment that has been matched by £1.4 billion from devolved Governments and a further £1.6 billion from other partners including local authorities, universities and the private sector.
[HCWS101]
Heritage: National Listings Process
Robert Jenrick Excerpts(6 years, 9 months ago)
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The Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government (Robert Jenrick)
The listing process has ensured some of England’s most special and distinctive historic buildings have been protected. However, the process which begun in the post-war era, both nationally and locally, was never completed and many buildings that are important locally have gone unrecognised and are not protected from development.
The national listing process provides statutory protection to around 500,000 buildings across England. Where buildings are included on local heritage lists (as non-designated heritage assets), they are also better protected from development under the planning system. Until now, local lists have been the domain of local planning authorities, yet only around 50% of authorities have such lists and where they do, they are often out of date and incomplete.
We intend to change this. Protecting the historic environment must be a key function of the planning system. Today, the Government are taking action to address this issue and encourage greater listings.
As a first step, I have announced the most ambitious new heritage conservation campaign since the 1980s, with the ambition of significantly increasing the number of historic buildings protected from development. This will start with 10 English counties, supporting them to complete their local lists. It will involve local people nominating the buildings and community assets they cherish, which will be protected for future generations. The Government will back the campaign with £700,000 of investment, which will give counties the tools, funding and expertise they need to list and protect, what could be, thousands more buildings across England.
To support this vital work, the Government will appoint an independent local heritage adviser. They will boost conservation efforts through driving greater engagement with the local communities and heritage groups. This independent heritage adviser will also work with Historic England to identify the 10 counties who are home to many historic buildings that are not yet protected and would most benefit from the additional listings.
To involve the public in the national effort, I will contact all parishes to emphasise the importance and benefits of listing historic buildings to protect them from development and ask them to nominate buildings. To further this work, Historic England will run a national campaign in spring 2020 on “Local Identity”. This will involve a season of events to inspire connection with local places, raise awareness of locally listing historic buildings and get the nation talking about what defines our built heritage.
Finally, building on the £95 million fund announced in September by the Secretary of State for Digital, Culture, Media and Sport to help unlock the economic potential of 69 high street Heritage Action Zones across England, my Department will also be working with Historic England to support local communities to identify important buildings in these action zones and will consider which of these should be recommended to the Culture Secretary for inclusion in the national list.
[HCWS31]
Right to Shared Ownership
Robert Jenrick Excerpts(6 years, 9 months ago)
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The Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government (Robert Jenrick)
Two thirds of social housing tenants would like to buy a home, yet only a quarter believe they will ever be able to do so. That is why I have announced today the Government’s intention to reinvigorate the home ownership offer for social housing tenants, by introducing a new right to shared ownership.
This will help reduce the gap between ambition and expectation, and make home ownership attainable and affordable for many more social housing tenants. It is part of the Government’s wider commitment to support people and families from all backgrounds to realise their ambition to own their own home.
The right to shared ownership will give housing association tenants the right to purchase a share of the home they rent and to purchase further shares in future when they can afford to do so. Alongside this, the Government will also cut the minimum initial ownership stake from 25% to 10% for all shared ownership homes, making the tenure even more accessible for aspiring homeowners who are struggling to raise a deposit.
This will build on the Government’s existing proposals to introduce a new national model for shared ownership. This new model will be redesigned to work effectively for aspiring home owners in today’s housing market, for example, by allowing shared owners to buy further shares in smaller increments, cutting the costly fees charged for additional shares and introducing a standardised preferred model to improve mortgage availability. The combined package will make it much easier to buy an initial share and to purchase additional shares in order to build up to full ownership.
The Government intend to make the right to shared ownership available to tenants in all new social homes delivered with grant in the future. Future investment will be considered at a future fiscal event.
We will also work with the housing association sector on a voluntary basis to determine what offer can be made to tenants in existing homes, so that the new right to shared ownership is extended as widely as possible. The right to shared ownership will not apply to tenants living in existing local authority homes, who already have the statutory right to buy.
[HCWS21]
Domestic Abuse Support
Robert Jenrick Excerpts(6 years, 9 months ago)
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The Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government (Robert Jenrick)
My Department has published the Government response to the consultation on the future delivery of support for victims and their children in accommodation-based domestic abuse services.
Through the consultation we heard from victims and survivors, service providers, local authorities and other public agencies, as well as other professionals who support victims including children every day. All responses to the consultation were carefully considered—I am grateful to everyone who took the time to respond, providing vital insight and evidence.
The majority of respondents agreed with the proposals as set out. The Government will therefore introduce a statutory duty on local authorities, placing clearer accountability on local areas to ensure the needs of survivors and victims within safe accommodation are met in a consistent way across England. By introducing this statutory duty, we want to ensure all victims of domestic abuse are able to access support within safe accommodation that meets their specific individual needs. All victims, no matter their background, should feel safe and supported as they recover from this terrible crime.
Under this new duty tier 1 authorities (county councils, metropolitan, and unitary authorities, and the Greater London Authority) in England will be required to convene a Local Domestic Abuse Partnership Board to support them in undertaking local needs assessments and developing local strategies. Tier 1 authorities will also be required to effectively commission services based on a robust needs assessment, and report back to the Government demonstrating how they have met the needs identified. The duty will also require tier 2 authorities in two-tier areas (district, city, and borough councils) to co-operate with the lead tier 1 authority.
To support local authorities, my Department will develop statutory guidance which will set out the Government’s expectations of local authorities in delivering this duty. We will also establish a ministerial-led national steering group to monitor and evaluate delivery of support within safe accommodation—working closely with the newly appointed Domestic Abuse Commissioner.
The full response can be found at:
https://www.gov.uk/government/consultations/support-for-victims-of-domestic-abuse-in-safe-accommodation.
The Domestic Abuse Bill demonstrates the Government’s commitment to supporting all victims of domestic abuse. The Government will now introduce this new statutory duty as an amendment to the Domestic Abuse Bill at the earliest opportunity, to enable proper parliamentary scrutiny.
My officials will continue to work closely with local authorities, national organisations, and specialist domestic abuse service providers to ensure the proposals are effectively delivered on the ground.
I am also pleased to announce ahead of this new duty coming into force in 2021, that we are confirming today a further domestic abuse accommodation services funding round for 2020-21. Councils will be invited to bid for a share of £15 million—a 20% increase on 2019-20—to ensure essential support services are able to run for those that need them.
A copy of the Government response to the consultation will be placed in the Library of the House.
[HCWS10]
House Building and Planning
Robert Jenrick Excerpts(6 years, 9 months ago)
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The Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government (Robert Jenrick)
Building new homes is not just about bricks and mortar, it is about ensuring everyone, including developers, does their bit, to make swift progress, protect the environment, and give the next generation well designed, environmentally friendly houses that they can be proud to call home.
That is why, today, I have announced the publication of new guidance, including the “National Design Guide”, to drive up the quality of new homes. I have set out more detail on this guidance in the statement I also made today titled “National Design Guide”. “The National Design Guide” can be found at https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/national-design-guide
The Government have also launched a consultation on stronger building regulations that will pave the way for the future homes standard. These 2020 changes aim to improve the environment by cutting carbon emissions in new homes by almost a third, while keeping household bills low. The Future Homes Standard consultation can be found at:
https://www.gov.uk/government/consultations/the-future-homes-standard-changes-to-part-l-and-part-f-of-the-building-regulations-for-new-dwellings
Using new technologies such as air source heat pumps and the latest generation of solar panels, developers will need to ensure they are doing their bit to tackle the threat of climate change.
Views are being sought on how changes to building regulations can drive down the carbon footprint of homes built after 2025, including changes to the ventilation and efficiency requirements, as well as the role of councils in getting the best energy standards from developers. The consultation will run until January 2020.
The Government will consult on a new accelerated planning Green Paper that will provide the blueprint to overhaul the planning system to create a simpler, fairer system that works for everyone—from home owners to small and medium businesses, local communities to larger housing developers—ensuring councils work at pace to decide proposals.
Local residents will no longer have to contend with a complicated and outdated planning system, but a more user-friendly approach designed to simplify the process. Small developers will similarly benefit from the simplification of guidance, with the introduction of a new tiered planning system.
Application fees will also be reviewed to ensure council planning departments are properly resourced, providing more qualified planners to process applications for new homes and other proposals, but if councils fail to meet their targets then sanctions could be applied, including the potential for consumers’ fees to be refunded.
The Government have also set out its ambition to reduce planning conditions by a third, and will take forward proposals to allow homes to be built above existing properties as well as seeking views on demolishing old commercial buildings for new housing, revitalising high streets in the process.
The accelerated planning Green Paper will be published in the autumn.
[HCWS1841]