Social Housing and Regulation Bill (First sitting)

Sarah Owen Excerpts

Committee stage
Tuesday 29th November 2022 Public Bill Committees

[Siobhain McDonagh]

I support the amendments tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Greenwich and Woolwich. At the moment, we have two things going on. First, we have exempt accommodation, where private property developers access vulnerable people and place them in houses in multiple occupation, cream off large amounts of housing benefit and provide no support to those individuals. They are exploited and left until the police, in many cases, or mental health services come along and take them away. Secondly, neighbourhoods are completely terrorised by people who are vulnerable but unable to control their behaviour, and absolutely nobody regulates that.

I represent a suburban south-west London constituency. Do not get me wrong; properties are not cheap, but they are cheaper than in other bits of London. Companies such as Stef & Philips are exploiting wholesale every loophole and making large amounts of money to bring fear and distress to neighbourhoods and to the residents who occupy those premises.

Last week, a lady who lives in the Pollards Hill area came to my surgery. The 1930s semi-detached house next door to her had been converted into an HMO for five vulnerable tenants. There were no bins to collect the rubbish and no facilities to ensure people could live adequately. She lives next door and has cancer. One of the residents in that home had pulled a knife on her only the day before, and all the other vulnerable tenants in the house had to stay locked in their rooms to avoid that individual. Stef & Philips are making hundreds or thousands of pounds every week from that property.

In Ravensbury, another ward in my constituency, on Malmesbury Road, the same company had a man who was so vulnerable that the police raided the property and had to withdraw because he had a crossbow and they needed firearms support. The whole street was blocked off. That is St Helier estate, for any hon. Members who may know it. It is a beautiful local authority estate built after the first world war to provide homes fit for heroes. The house is beautiful, but not as an HMO for five vulnerable people. People in the street are terrified. Who knows how terrified the other residents in the property are? The company’s balance sheet goes up and up while people go out to work to pay ever-higher tax rates to sustain that company in exploiting people.

[Sarah Owen (Luton North) (Lab)]

My hon. Friend is making excellent points. That is the human impact of the lack of regulation and enforcement on rogue providers that are making millions out of very vulnerable people. Their impact is felt not only by the individuals who are being harmed, but by entire communities. Does she agree that although we do not want regulation for regulation’s sake, we need not just regulation but enforcement for those who are getting away with this scot-free right now? We do not just need legislation; we need the ability to enforce and act.

[Siobhain McDonagh]

I absolutely agree with my hon. Friend. If there is no regulation, this will just grow and grow. As mortgage interest rates go up and business for buy-to-let landlords becomes less profitable, more people are going to look at providing this style of housing, because they can exploit the housing benefit system. If that is not happening in the constituencies of all the hon. Members of this Bill Committee, it will be coming to them soon.

--- Later in debate ---

[Siobhain McDonagh]

I believe that the regulator should have power to look at this area of housing. It is all very well for councils to get more powers, and I would be the first to agree with that, but many councils already have a lot of powers that they cannot use because they cannot afford to. They do not have access to social housing units. They do not have access to the level of environmental health officers that they need. They do not have access to the number of planning officers they need in the area of planning enforcement.

[Sarah Owen]

My hon. Friend hits the nail on the head. The pilot work that the hon. Member for Harrow East just spoke about is fantastic. We will take whatever we can from that and learn, but the point is that the councils and authorities that did that work had to have extra resources to use their existing powers. This is not just about legislating and enabling local authorities to have more powers; it is also about them having the funds and resources to use those powers.

[Siobhain McDonagh]

Absolutely, and I know the hon. Member for Harrow East will be aware of how few London councils ever prosecute anybody under their current powers. It is about regulation, but it is also about local authorities being able to use their powers. In the light of the recent Budget, local authorities’ powers will become even less well used if their finances continue to be squeezed.

Let us go back to Aves in Pollards Hill and Longthornton. I met the regulator and spoke about Aves and my concern about the exploitation of tenants. The regulator said to me, “We completely agree with you, but there is nothing we can do. We do not have the power to do anything.” Either we give the regulator the powers and do something about it, or we go on talking about it in a well-meaning way while the problem exponentially grows. I, for one, want to see some action rather than none.

Oral Answers to Questions

Sarah Owen Excerpts

Monday 21st November 2022 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

I call the shadow Minister.

[Sarah Owen (Luton North) (Lab)]

Before the Chancellor’s statement, the Conservative leaders of Kent County Council and Hampshire County Council wrote to the Prime Minister warning of their likely bankruptcy. Instead of hearing the concerns of local leaders across the country, the Government passed on responsibility to them by forcing councils to raise tax. Not only is that another unfair burden on the British taxpayer, but local government experts have estimated that the Tory plans to raise council tax will bring in more than £80 per household in Surrey but only £39 per household in Manchester and Hull. That sounds dangerously like another Tory failure in the making on levelling up. Does the Minister truly understand the financial emergency facing councils today? If so, how can he justify local residents and businesses having their council tax raised while the Government allow non-doms to avoid paying between £1 billion and £3 billion-worth of tax?

[Lee Rowley]

The hon. Lady highlights a number of things that she obviously wants to make a point about. The reality is that billions and billions of additional taxpayer subsidy was made available within the settlement last week. We will come forward with further information in due course. Ultimately, the Labour party’s position is fundamentally that there can be no contribution from local taxpayers. That is a very interesting place to be given that there ultimately has to be a link between services and taxation. That is something that the Government recognise while still providing billions in taxpayer subsidy from the centre to improve lives and services in the long run.

Management of the Economy and Ministerial Severance Payments

Sarah Owen Excerpts

Tuesday 15th November 2022 Commons Chamber

[Sarah Owen (Luton North) (Lab)]

Thank you, Mr Deputy Speaker. I am proud to respond to the debate on behalf of Labour. Despite what Government Members may say, this is an important debate. Why? Because it reflects the discussions being had around every kitchen table by parents with hushed voices behind closed doors so as not to worry their children. It is the sinking feeling that people are getting every time another bill comes through their letterbox. As we have heard throughout the debate, that is especially so with mortgages.

Under the Tories, we have seen next to no growth for the last 12 years and the economic picture is about to get worse. Over the next two years, the IMF predicts that the UK will see just a third of the growth of Canada and Japan, and less than half that of France and the US. The most recent GDP figures show the UK’s economy shrinking by 0.2%. We are teetering on the edge of what is predicted by some to be one of the longest and deepest recessions in history and, as my hon. Friend the Member for Bradford West (Naz Shah) rightly said, it is a problem made at No. 10. It is not a problem made solely by Russia’s war with Ukraine—if it was, surely every country would be enduring the levels of next-to-no growth that we have had to experience.

[Clive Efford (Eltham) (Lab)]

My hon. Friend points out that this is a problem created in No. 10. On Thursday, after we have taken into account the reversal of the unfunded tax cuts that the mini-Budget put in place, the Chancellor will be dealing with the £30 billion gap left from that Budget, and taxpayers will have to pay for that in the months to come. On top of paying higher mortgages, therefore, people will be paying higher taxes because the Government frittered away £30 billion in a matter of weeks.

[Sarah Owen]

Unfortunately, my hon. Friend is absolutely right. As my hon. Friend the Member for Rhondda (Chris Bryant) has said, even an 11-year-old knows that the Tories “broke the money”. While our European neighbours are working with mortgage rates of about 2.2%, a two-year fixed-rate mortgage in the UK is currently 6.3%. What makes the UK so different from other countries to the extent that our mortgage rates are more than double those of France, Germany, Sweden and Norway? The list goes on. What they do not have to contend with, though—unfortunately, we do—is a Tory Government weighing down our country with more than a decade of stagnation and failure, a shockingly ill-judged mini-Budget and the distraction of scandal after scandal.

[Emma Hardy (Kingston upon Hull West and Hessle) (Lab)]

When the Treasury Committee looked at mortgages in detail, one thing that was highlighted in the evidence sessions was the impact on the buy-to-let sector, where fewer properties will mean rents become more expensive. Does my hon. Friend agree that the Budget not only managed to harm people who own properties but is having a detrimental effect on the income levels of people who are renting?

[Sarah Owen]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. What is shocking is that, time and again, we have heard warm words from Ministers at the Dispatch Box, but there has been absolutely no meaningful action for renters. Labour has called on the Government to bring forward urgent legislation to end section 21 eviction notices. Thousands of people across the country are being evicted from their homes through no fault of their own. The Government could act, but they choose not to.

Ministers cannot hide behind the spectre of Putin forever. At some stage, surely, they have to own their own mistakes. Who has to pay for this failure? Is it the people who caused it? It is not the people who crashed the economy, according to the Government. This warped world we live in now means that the former Conservative Prime Minister and former Conservative Chancellors are actually being rewarded for crashing the economy. It beggars belief.

[Naz Shah]

Not only have the Government trashed the economy, but what adds insult to injury is the fact that, while they recognise the mistake, they are trying to spin a new narrative to try to fool the British public into believing that this was not made in No. 10, but made by other factors across the world.

[Sarah Owen]

Absolutely. My hon. Friend makes a powerful point. Yes, everybody makes mistakes, but this mistake is a £30 billion mistake that the British people are going to have to pay for because Government Members refuse to take responsibility for their actions. It goes against every sense of decency and fairness we have in this country. I would love the Treasury Minister to tell me how they can justify rewarding the former Prime Minister and the former Chancellor with a golden goodbye, paid for with taxpayers’ money—not theirs, but taxpayers’ money. I will give way to anyone who can give me a justification for that—anyone who believes they should not give that money back and can give me a reason. We have heard that former Ministers can give back their severance pay—we have seen that happen and we have seen former Ministers donate it to charity—yet we hear nothing from the former Prime Minister and the former Chancellor who crashed the economy.

[Taiwo Owatemi]

My hon. Friend is making an important point. Given the fact that the former Chancellor and the former Prime Minister crashed our economy, it is absolutely insulting to so many families who will be struggling to pay their mortgages that they will not give back their severance pay.

[Sarah Owen]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. What is also shocking is that they could not turn up today to say sorry, apologise, and face up and take responsibility for the damage they have done.

There are millions of people in this country who do the right thing. They work their fingers to the bone. They are the ones paying for this Government’s repeated mistakes. They include people like the nurse in the heartbreaking case spoken of by my hon. Friend the Member for Birmingham, Erdington (Mrs Hamilton), and a couple in Peterborough, who told us,

“My husband and I are both teachers. We work full-time and have a joint income of nearly £80,000. We have a deposit sitting and waiting of £35,000. I have only ever rented for the past 18 years. We couldn't afford to buy at the start of our careers. We were recently told we would be snapped up as first-time buyers. But then the crash came. We can't keep adding to our savings, costs are going up and some banks now want a 40% deposit.”

They include people like Jon, who works full time and whose wife is a small business owner. They and their two children live in London and now face a 60% increase in mortgage payments—an extra £600 a month. They include people like Bernadette in Hastings. Her fixed-term mortgage comes to an end in December and the earliest she can renegotiate is this month. She is incredibly worried about what the costs will be. She is a hard-working mum and a Communication Workers Union member who works two jobs, one as a postwoman and one as a small business owner, which she works around her schoolchildren.

As for the hon. Member for Sedgefield (Paul Howell), when he tells us to shut up—no. When people in this country are suffering, when people in this country cannot afford their bills and when people in this country cannot get on the housing ladder—no, I will never shut up, because the Conservatives crashed the economy. We on the Labour Benches will always, and proudly, be on the side of ordinary working people. Perhaps he should go away and learn some manners.

[Emma Hardy]

In a Treasury Committee evidence session, Charles Roe, director of mortgages at UK Finance, said that, when the Prime Minister was the Chancellor, he agreed to get rid of the zero earnings rule for the mortgage interest rate relief system. He signed it off. Does my hon. Friend agree that the Prime Minister should follow through on that promise, so that people who cannot afford their mortgages are able to get the support they need, which they were promised months ago by this Government?

[Sarah Owen]

That perfectly highlights the problem here. We may have had a change at the top, but we have not had a change of the people making the decisions. Ultimately, there was a problem before the mini-Budget. As we have rightly heard from across the House, people were struggling to get on to the housing ladder and that is continuing. So we need to hold the Prime Minister to account for what he promised when he was Chancellor, but we also need to hold him to account for his inaction since.

Citizens Advice Scotland reports a 25% increase in views of the webpage, “What to do if you can’t pay your mortgage”. As my hon. Friend the Member for Merthyr Tydfil and Rhymney (Gerald Jones) said, it is not just customers, but lenders who cannot have certainty or confidence in the Government to make life better. As the shadow Minister, my hon. Friend the Member for Wigan (Lisa Nandy), rightly said, why are Ministers not meeting with lenders in the same way that Labour Front Benchers are?

If hon. Members think that is bad, across all advice webpages relating to mortgage problems, there has been a 277% increase in page views between this year and last. People are desperate. As my hon. Friend the Member for Dulwich and West Norwood (Helen Hayes) said, that is not scaremongering. People are terrified because there is no leadership and because of the Government’s failure.

First-time buyers have yet again been the most affected, with home ownership down 26% compared with last year. That is not progress. I am glad that the hon. Member for South Cambridgeshire (Anthony Browne) is back in the Chamber, because I would like to update him. His points, which were either given to him by a researcher or his Whips, were clearly wrong, because the peak home ownership rate was actually 70.9%. Guess when that was? In 2003, under a Labour Government. As my hon. Friend the Member for Ellesmere Port and Neston (Justin Madders) said, people should have the right to security and peace of mind in their homes. People would have that under a Labour Government again.

--- Later in debate ---

[Anthony Browne]

Home ownership rates peaked under the last Labour Government but then fell under that Government, and they are now going back up.

[Sarah Owen]

We can argue statistics all we like, but on home ownership, people know what is happening to them right now and the reality that they face outside this Chamber. On average under a Labour Government, home ownership was 5.5% higher than it currently is.

[Jonathan Gullis (Stoke-on-Trent North) (Con)]

The hon. Member makes the point about home ownership under the Labour party. Does she accept that the home ownership rate was high in 2008, when we had the global financial crash caused by mortgages and people not being able to make their payments? That was, sadly, on the watch of the last Labour Government, allowing a scheme to take place that enabled bankers to crash our global economy.

[Sarah Owen]

It is good to hear that the hon. Member is so concerned about people who crash the economy. I wonder whether he thinks his constituents would accept that the people who crashed the economy just a couple of months ago should take a severance payment and a golden handshake using taxpayers’ money.

[Jonathan Gullis]

Will the hon. Member give way?

[Sarah Owen]

I will not, because that would be a conversation, not an intervention.

To bring this back to the motion, for too many people, the dream of home ownership is now a never-ending nightmare of moving goalposts, with Tory Ministers reaching Jordan Pickford levels of blocking people from reaching their goals. It should never have been this way. The former Prime Minister should never have been coronated without an election, and the latest one should not have been either. The Conservatives should never have gambled other people’s homes, livelihoods and savings on their catastrophic economic strategy. The Ministers responsible for crashing the economy should never be rewarded for their failure, and the good people of this country can never afford a Conservative Government again. The damage has been done. We need a change of Government for good.

--- Later in debate ---

[Alex Burghart]

As I was about to make clear, it is not within the Government’s power to do that. This is a power set in law. It is a power set in the Ministerial and other Pensions and Salaries Act 1991.

[Sarah Owen]

The Minister has laid out the legalities behind severance pay for Ministers, but—we on the Labour Benches have already asked this question several times—does he feel that it is right for the former Prime Minister and the former Chancellor who crashed the economy to take that severance pay?

[Alex Burghart]

The House will be aware that my right hon. Friends the Members for South West Norfolk (Elizabeth Truss) and for Spelthorne (Kwasi Kwarteng) served continuously as Members of Parliament for long periods before taking up the offices of Prime Minister and Chancellor of the Exchequer—in the case of the former Prime Minister, for 10 years, and in the case of the former Chancellor, for four.

Let me be clear. The fact that this is a statutory entitlement does not mean that Ministers are not able to waive such payments. However, that is a matter not for the Government but for the individuals involved. I am not a Treasury Minister; I am a Minister for the Cabinet Office. This is one of the basic facts that the Opposition do not seem to have picked up on when they embarked on the motion.

Let me now address the points raised throughout the debate about mortgages and housing. I recognise the anxiety that people feel about mortgage payments, which obviously constitute one of the biggest bills that many people experience. There are a range of factors affecting mortgage and other interest rates, but this Government will do everything possible, under this Prime Minister and this Chancellor, to get a grip on the problem of inflation and seek to limit the impact that it has on mortgage rates.

The Government are providing unprecedented levels of support to tackle the rising cost of living. From last week, nearly one in four families across the UK will receive a £324 cost of living payment as part of our £1,200 package for the 8 million most vulnerable families. Our energy price guarantee will save a typical household £700 this winter, on top of the £400 through the energy bills discount.

Homes and Buildings: Levelling Up Health and Wellbeing

Sarah Owen Excerpts

Thursday 20th October 2022 Westminster Hall

[Sarah Owen (Luton North) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to see you in the Chair this afternoon, Mr Hollobone. I congratulate the hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) on securing this valuable debate on an area of importance to all our constituents, and one that too often flies under the radar. He speaks with compassion and experience about the link between health and housing. I also thank the other speakers this afternoon, the hon. Member for Tiverton and Honiton (Richard Foord) and my hon. Friend the Member for Coventry North West (Taiwo Owatemi), for their reasoned and insightful comments.

Whatever melodrama is happening outside, this issue matters to the people we represent. When it comes to the nation’s health, we know that prevention is unequivocally better than cure, in terms of the human cost and the toll on individuals, but also in terms of the sound management of public finances.

We see the impact of under-investment in social and primary care settings on our acute hospitals. We know that investment to tackle the scourges of public health, such as smoking and obesity, ultimately pays for itself in the long run, as well as helping people to live happier, healthier and longer lives. It should not be controversial to aspire to want that for our constituents. It is common sense, not nanny-statism, as some would have it. It is no different from other factors that impact public health and wellbeing, which are many, varied and not always immediately obvious, as we have heard today.

My hon. Friend the Member for Coventry North West spoke eloquently and passionately, from her considerable experience in the public health field. We know that diseases such as cancers, diabetes, cardiovascular disease and respiratory disease cause around 89% of deaths in the UK. The House of Lords Select Committee on the Long-term Sustainability of the NHS concluded that:

“These conditions are also, to a significant extent, preventable and the costs, in human, social and economic terms, are largely avoidable.”

The World Health Organisation has made it clear that poverty is closely linked with these diseases. Vulnerable and socially disadvantaged people get sicker and die sooner than people of higher social positions. As the hon. Member for Strangford rightly said, we saw that play out starkly with the covid-19 pandemic. We need to see action taken to close those health inequalities.

Risk factors associated with poverty and deprivation include tobacco use, physical inactivity, unhealthy diet and the harmful use of alcohol. Economic and social conditions contribute significantly to levels of preventable ill health. The levels of health inequality in the UK were already too great but, shamefully, they are just getting worse. According to the Office for National Statistics, in 2018 to 2020, males living in the most deprived areas were living almost 10 years less than males living in the least deprived areas, with the gap at around eight years for females. Both sexes have seen statistically significant increases in inequality and life expectancy at birth since 2015 to 2017.

This is not necessarily about regions, or differences from one end of the country to the other. In my constituency of Luton North, we see the difference in life expectancy from one end of the town to the other, and that is to say nothing of the consequences of poverty and deprivation for mental health. Being deprived is not just about a lack of money. It is a lack of quality of life. It is community insecurity and a lack of resources overall, whether that is about exposure to stressor such as violence and crime, or a lack of public green space.

Public Health England has stated that:

“Insecure, poor quality and overcrowded houses cause stress, anxiety and depression, and exacerbates existing mental health conditions. 19% of adults living in poor quality housing in England have poor mental health outcomes.”

I feel that figure might be a gross under-representation. We also know that the research shows that people with a mental health problem are much more likely to have preventable physical health conditions as well.

What can be done? It would be disingenuous of me to stand here and say that poor mental and physical public health could be remedied by action on housing alone, but it is a key part of the puzzle of reducing the UK’s entrenched geographic, ethnic and demographic inequalities. That being said, there are things that the Government can and should do now, which have the potential to have a rapid and significant impact on ending the creation of unhealthy homes.

In the longer term, we need to overhaul the complex, fragmented system that allows new homes and places to be built that do not guarantee that all new homes provide for residents’ basic human needs, such as access to green space and local services, and clean air. We need developments that are guided by communities, with input from public health professionals on design, and proper infrastructure to support them, whether that is about encouraging active travel, access to green space, public leisure facilities or even allotments and communal vegetable gardens—although do not let me anywhere near those, because I am not green-fingered.

We need to do much better in setting standards for developments across the country and looking at methods for how they can be delivered. Research by Public Health England in 2017 clearly demonstrated the relationship between the built environment and health and the positive impact provision of these basic amenities can have.

A matter of more immediate concern is the liberalisation of permitted development rights by the Government in 2013, which has had a significant detrimental effect on the quality of dwellings produced as a result. Ministers both past and present have claimed—and future ones possibly will—that liberalisation of planning and permitted development rights removes unnecessary impediments to development. However, the evidence overwhelming shows that the impact of extending permitted development rights to convert office, commercial and industrial units into supposedly residential spaces—although I think very few of them could be described as such—is negative.

We have seen a huge increase in poor-quality housing that lacks space and natural light, and there are accompanying implications for public health and wellbeing as a result. The Government’s own research has shown that schemes created through permitted development projects are far less likely to meet national space standards and far more likely to have reduced access to natural daylight and sunlight. Space and daylight are the very basics. The former Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government’s housing and safety rating system states that

“lack of space has been linked to psychological distress and various mental disorders”

and problems such as

“accidents and spread of contagious disease.”

Some residential conversions are as small as 13 square metres, which is a third of the minimum space standard recommended by Government. Terminus House in Harlow, a former office block converted into hundreds of dwellings, was described as a “human warehouse”. That sounds like something from the Victorian era, not 2022. The Government’s Building Better, Building Beautiful Commission’s final report also concluded that:

“In some instances, we have inadvertently permissioned future slums.”

The 2018 Raynsford review of planning also concluded in a reference to the liberalisation of permitted development rights that:

“Government policy has led directly to the creation of slum housing. Such slums will require immense public investment, either to refurbish them to a proper standard or to demolish them. Morally, economically and environmentally it is a failed policy.”

That is a damning indictment of this policy and the Government’s approach to housing. In the light of all we have heard in this debate and the examples I have outlined from reports commissioned by the Government themselves, I would be particularly keen to hear from the Minister what possible justification there is for retaining these liberalised permitted development rights in their current form.

Reducing socioeconomic and health disparities in this country cannot happen without serious consideration of the role of housing and planning in creating buildings and communities that promote healthy lifestyles. We owe it to communities up and down this country to make positive changes a reality. They will not be achieved by the proposed deregulation in planning in investment zones. We have seen from the experience of permitted developments that further liberalisation is a cowboy developers’ charter for poor-quality, profit-maximising estates. I look forward to hearing from the Minister how we will approach the issue of promoting health and wellbeing in new developments in these zones.

Oral Answers to Questions

Sarah Owen Excerpts

Monday 17th October 2022 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

I call the Opposition spokesperson, Sarah Owen.

[Sarah Owen (Luton North) (Lab)]

I know that today’s focus is on heating homes, but for far too many people it is on saving their homes. Nearly 20,000 households have been put at risk of homelessness by no-fault evictions in the past year, a rise of 121%, while the Government dither. Mortgages are soaring, rents are rising, homelessness is increasing, and 1,300 Ukrainian refugee households, many with children, are homeless because of the Department’s failure to act on repeated warnings. The Chartered Institute of Housing says that without action this Government will break their promise to end rough sleeping by 2024. Will the new Minister tell us whether they are sticking to that pledge, or will he tell us the truth—that the homelessness crisis will not be fixed by increasing bankers’ bonuses, but will only be fixed by a change of Government?

[Andrew Stephenson]

We remain absolutely committed to our manifesto commitment to end rough sleeping. According to the latest official statistics, published in February 2020, the number of people sleeping rough is at an eight-year low and has almost halved since 2017. Rough sleeping has now decreased in every region of England. We are committed to continuing the great work of my predecessor and implementing the “Ending rough sleeping for good” strategy, and, as I said earlier, there is £2 billion of funding for the next three years.

Coastal Communities

Sarah Owen Excerpts

Thursday 8th September 2022 Westminster Hall

[Sarah Owen (Luton North) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to see you in the Chair, Dr Huq. I thank all who have contributed to this incredibly important debate.

Covid has exposed many things, including the dysfunction of the British state. It is overcentralised, slow, wasteful and clunky. Our economy too often delivers great gains for too few in too few places. We need a new model of economic growth to spread wealth, security and opportunity fairly. As we have heard from the contributions today, nowhere is that more true, sadly, than in many of our coastal communities.

Coastal communities, like many former industrial towns, have seen 40 years of managed decline as the great industries of fishing, shipbuilding and port work have all but disappeared for many. Tourism, boosted in some places throughout covid, has not been enough to mitigate the decline of industry. Added to that, the natural geographical challenges for many of these towns—their location on the edges of our country—have often forced them to the periphery of our economy, but, as we have seen in this afternoon’s debate, not from our minds or hearts.

The problem has been turbocharged by 10 years of austerity that has hit our coastal communities hard, ripping apart the social fabric of those towns with the loss of very good jobs. Too many young people are faced with a choice between family and community or opportunity. Too many have had to get out to get on. For the many people who are left growing old hundreds of miles away from children and grandchildren, that is their inheritance, and it has been squandered.

A recent report by the Centre for Progressive Policy found that Conservative-held seaside towns were particularly likely to be pushed into poverty by the former Chancellor, the right hon. Member for Richmond (Yorks) (Rishi Sunak), and his failure to tackle the cost of living crisis. The Office for National Statistics found that the population declined 32% for smaller seaside towns between 2009 and 2018. So, stuck in a low-growth, high-tax cycle, Britain is now unique: a major country that believes it can power a modern economy using only a handful of people in a handful of sectors in one small corner of the country.

Coastal communities do not represent a small section of our society that can easily be forgotten. Approximately 18.5% of the population live in coastal communities—a huge pool of talent and resources that the economy needs. To get the economy growing nationally, we need it working everywhere. We must combat the decline in wages and job opportunities faced by coastal communities, rebalance the lack of opportunity, and entrust local communities with regeneration plans to bring back ageing high streets and infrastructure. That is what levelling up was meant to be about.

The future of levelling up under the new Government is uncertain, and so, too, is the future for many coastal communities. They are absolutely right to have pride in their areas and their rich history. I was born and raised in one. If we visit any of them, we meet people with unlimited energy and ambition for the future of their towns. They are crying out for a Government who will match that ambition, but they have been sorely let down.

Our fishing communities have been sold short by a deal that does not secure our future as an independent coastal state in full control of our waters. Hastings and Rye’s is the largest land-based fishing fleet of under 10-metre fishing fleets in Europe. Has Brexit delivered the utopia for them on quotas? No. Many fishermen in Hastings have said they feel stabbed in the back when it comes to the Brexit deal they have been given. Paul Joy and the New Under Ten Fishermen’s Association have said that they are angry about the deal the Government failed to secure for them. Their share of the cod quota has gone up from 9.3% to just 10% over five years.

The tourism sector has also not received enough support throughout the pandemic, and there has been a serious lack of affordable housing. Our coast is one of Britain’s greatest assets, but the people who live there have been let down by a lack of investment and poor infrastructure. A 2019 Lords Select Committee on Regenerating Seaside Towns and Communities report found that, in most seaside towns,

“Inadequate transport connectivity is holding back many coastal communities and hindering the realisation of their economic potential.”

I was interested to hear the hon. Member for Hastings and Rye (Sally-Ann Hart) speak about her campaign to secure better rail along the south coast. I thought, “I have been taken back all the way to the 2010 election, when her predecessor was campaigning for the same thing.” After 12 years of a Tory MP and a Tory Government, they are no further down the track in getting electrification between Hastings and Ashford. Coupled with limited access to education, particularly to further and higher education institutions, that curtails opportunities for young people, who deserve so much better.

Poor-quality housing was among the most significant problems reported by coastal residents. The stock of second homes and holiday lets continues to increase—up 40% in three years in England—pushing local people out of affordable housing. We desperately need to improve digital connectivity in coastal areas. We have seen how reliant we are on it over the past three years, and we will be even more so in the future. Many coastal towns have tragically become hotspots for rough sleeping and homelessness.

On all those key indicators, the Government have not delivered, even after the delivery of some pots of funding, such as the coastal communities fund. At the same time, those communities have borne the brunt of Tory deregulation and cost-cutting. Water companies in England and Wales pump raw sewage into our nature an average of every two and a half minutes. Areas such as beaches, playing fields and bathing waters have faced 1,076 years-worth of raw sewage over a six-year period. Hundreds of campaigners, such as the energetic Helena Dollimore, have taken to beaches in Hastings to protest the dumping of raw sewage on our beaches. If Ministers really value our coastal communities, they should stop dumping raw sewage on them.

Now from Rye to Redcar, where thousands of dead crustaceans washed up on the beaches, as my hon. Friend the Member for Stockton North (Alex Cunningham) powerfully set out. Those communities deserve answers and an investigation. If the Government and the Tees Valley Mayor have nothing to hide, they should welcome the scrutiny.

I want to hope for better, but the new Prime Minister was responsible for unleashing cuts of tens of millions of pounds to the Environment Agency. Environment Agency data shows that, in subsequent years, the Tories presided over a doubling of the rate at which water companies dump raw sewage. It never needed to be this way.

Under the previous Labour Government, one of the first places to see the potential of investment in wind energy was Grimsby. Now a new generation of young people are powering the world from the Grimsby docks through clean energy and life-changing apprenticeships. Communities know best what their natural resources and assets are, so they should have more say in and control over their investment and regeneration plans. We need to bring power, ownership and assets back to people and communities so that they have a stake in their future. That is why we want to replace the right to bid with a far more powerful right to buy, which would mean that communities got first refusal on local assets and the right to buy them without competition. Assets of community value include pubs, historic buildings, football clubs and high street shops—the things that make up the social fabric of our societies. This is about giving communities financial autonomy, which makes them more resilient and insulates them from decisions made at the whim of Whitehall.

The Welsh Government are introducing new planning laws and stronger licensing systems for holiday lets and second homes, which means that communities in Wales will be able to reap the rewards of thriving tourism while preventing areas from becoming ghost towns when holidays end. It will also put an end to people being priced out of their own neighbourhoods just so that homes can stand empty for months on end. As we have heard, that is a problem across the country, but particularly in Cornwall and the south-west. The Government must learn an important lesson from that. By trusting and working with the community, we can find the right balance. We can bring jobs, growth and income while protecting the fabric and spirit of our coastal communities, which matter so much.

Draft Business and Planning Act 2020 (Pavement Licences) (Coronavirus) (Amendment) Regulations 2022

Sarah Owen Excerpts

Monday 11th July 2022 General Committees

[Sarah Owen (Luton North) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to see you in the Chair, Dame Maria. I welcome the Minister to his role, although I will miss him as a fellow Whip.

No matter what is happening here, including the non-stop roundabout of the internal woes of this Government, sooner or later our constituents will raise the issues directly on their doorsteps, high streets and pavements. That is why this statutory instrument on extending temporary pavement licensing provisions in the Business and Planning Act 2020 is important. We will not oppose this extension, but I have some questions for the new Minister, which I will come to later.

I am sure we all agree how hard the last two or three years have been for businesses, our high streets and local authorities, but this trend started well before the pandemic. In recent years, we have seen an acceleration in the number of high street chains closing their doors forever. They include Debenhams, House of Fraser, Topshop and Dorothy Perkins, where I had one of my first jobs at the age of 16—a very long time ago.

I turn specifically to hospitality. Big names in the restaurant business have not been immune. Jamie Oliver’s restaurant chain closed its doors for good, and despite GBK finding a rescue deal, it had to cut 362 jobs and close 26 stores—a pattern of cuts similar to those in many big chain restaurants. This was not an easy time for the hospitality industry or our high streets. The Minister has talked about al fresco dining. Although we support the regulations, they are not the magic saviour of our high streets or our hospitality sector. What will make a difference is pounds in people’s pockets and tackling the cost-of-living crisis for all, including businesses affected by higher energy costs and gas and electricity bills.

As I said, the stripping back of our high streets started well before the pandemic. Local authorities had £18.6 billion cut from their budgets. Post levelling-up funding in 144 areas, people are £50 million worse off. When funding has come, it has often been far too little, far too late, with no long-term view or strategy from central Government, leaving towns and cities hitting against each other for ever-dwindling resources, and our high streets bare. Then, after a decade of Conservative cuts, we get covid. This was a perfect storm, which saw the end of many well-known names and longstanding local small businesses. We all know the ones that have disappeared from our local areas, and jobs and skills along with them. It is vital that every step is taken to offer the support needed to the hospitality sector.

As we come out of one period of uncertainty and into another, we now need to balance the objective of supporting the hospitality sector with other considerations, such as the impact of outdoor hospitality on local residents, highways and pedestrian access. On the issue of pedestrian access, one of the Royal National Institute of Blind People’s many important campaigns is on A-boards. I am aware that both the Guide Dogs UK and the RNIB raised concerns about the shortened timeframe for consultation when the temporary changes on pavement licensing were introduced. I seek assurances from the Minister that both those charities and other disability charities have been thoroughly consulted on this permanent change, and that their concerns have been fully addressed.

On the impact on local residents, I of course welcome recognition of the need for councils to be able to enforce rules and take action where necessary, such as when businesses are blocking pavements. However, the regulations do not outline a specific offence of erecting tables and chairs without authorisation and would instead require councils to confiscate a business’s furniture. This could be a logistical nightmare. Where should councils store such furniture? How would they be reimbursed for removal costs? Would the Minister consider allowing other means, such as councils using fixed-penalty notice charges instead? I would be grateful if he could offer some concrete solutions to these potential knock-on impacts.

Another potential issue for local authorities is any ongoing and associated costs. I know and welcome the fact that burdens funding was given to councils for year one of this temporary regime, and for year two. Will the Minister confirm that this funding will continue? Does he accept that, in order for enforcement to be effective, local authorities have to be adequately funded for that purpose?

As I said earlier, we need to give the hospitality sector as much support and opportunity to grow as possible. The Opposition will not oppose the regulations, but I would be grateful if the Minister please addressed the points of concern that I have raised.

--- Later in debate ---

[Mr Jones]

I start by thanking the hon. Member for Luton North for her good wishes. It was a pleasure to work with her in her role as an Opposition Whip when I was in the Government Whips Office.

The hon. Lady made a number of points about our high streets and the challenges there. I do not, as she mentioned, see the regulations as a panacea for dealing with all the problems on the high street, but they are part of the solution. She mentioned the cost of living—clearly, we all have concerns about global inflation and the cost of living. I remind her that the Government have put in £37 billion of support and that money is going into people’s pockets from this month to help with the additional cost of living.

The hon. Lady asked a number of questions and made a very good point about those who are partially sighted or without sight. We have been working with the RNIB and Guide Dogs and, with them, have worked to refine the guidance to help people as regards the hazard from furniture placed on the pavement in their way. We have refined that guidance to ensure that it works and I believe from my conversations—as the hon. Lady said, I was not party to those discussions—that we have been able to accommodate a number of suggestions that were made.

We are putting guidance in place to ensure that enforcement happens. We are clear that when people breach the conditions of a particular licence or do things that become a nuisance to the local community, the local authority has the opportunity to revoke that licence. I will take back the suggestions that the hon. Lady made.

On new burdens funding, a significant amount has been dedicated to the policy. In the first year, £4.83 million was given to local authorities and in the second year it will be £2.38 million. The funding is a little less in the second year because many people applying for licences are reapplying for the same licence; the amount of work the local authority will have to conduct will therefore be reduced significantly.

[Sarah Owen]

I hope I am not pre-empting the Minister, but I want to make sure that he will get to the point about year three and ongoing funding for burdens. We have agreed that enforcement is incredibly important; local authorities therefore need to be adequately funded to enforce the new rules.

[Mr Jones]

I am sure the hon. Member knows that the intention is to legislate for the regime through the Levelling-up and Regeneration Bill. There will be an opportunity for local authorities to put forward further charges in relation to the application fee. However, it will not be anywhere near the current situation. The average application fee before this regime was about £500, and in some cases fees were £1,000. We expect the fees to be far lower, but we also expect local authorities to be reimbursed for the work they do.

I thank the hon. Member for Lancaster and Fleetwood for her kind comments. It sounds like she will be knocking on my door to talk about her local area. I reiterate that we had extensive dialogue—although it is not required by the legislation—with organisations such as the Royal National Institute of Blind People and Guide Dogs before making the extension. We wanted to have that dialogue, because it is extremely important that we support people with disabilities. We have refined the guidance significantly, and that will be reflected in the guidance for local authorities.

On the hon. Lady’s final point about the cost of living, there is a significant package under which people on the lowest incomes and on benefits can receive in the region of £1,250.

Oral Answers to Questions

Sarah Owen Excerpts

Monday 27th June 2022 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

I call shadow Minister Sarah Owen.

[Sarah Owen (Luton North) (Lab)]

I read a rather lovely interview with the Minister in a recent issue of The Big Issue where he reconfirmed the Government’s commitment to end street homelessness by 2024. All Labour Members want that to happen, and I actually think the Minister does too, but can he honestly tell the House that this pledge has his whole Department’s backing when the Secretary of State, sat next to him, is seeking to bring back the universally hated, cruel and antiquated Vagrancy Act 1824? If this Government really believe their own promise that they can end rough sleeping within the next two years, why are they seeking to recriminalise it now?

[Eddie Hughes]

Our ambition to end rough sleeping in the lifetime of this Parliament does not just require the wholehearted investment of our Ministers but of Ministers right across the Government. We are working incredibly closely with Ministers from the Department of Health and Social Care and the Department for Work and Pensions to make sure that we do genuinely achieve that ambition. I look forward to working with Opposition Members in order to help us in that cause.

Homes for Ukraine: Child Refugees

Sarah Owen Excerpts

Wednesday 22nd June 2022 Westminster Hall

[Sarah Owen (Luton North) (Lab)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Davies. Unlike other Members, I welcome the Minister; it is his Department, DLUHC, that is responsible for Homes for Ukraine, and therefore responsible for its faults as well as its successes. Things have gone wrong, as they did in the heartbreaking case of Mariia and Nataliia, which was powerfully described by my hon. Friend the Member for Hampstead and Kilburn (Tulip Siddiq). Like others, I thank her for securing this important debate.

We have heard from my hon. Friend and other Members about a case of utter mismanagement, with logic and compassion thrown out of the windows of Departments that are not working together. In the early stages of the war, we saw cases where people from the UK were desperately trying to get loved ones to safety, but UK embassies were shut—held up by senseless bureaucracy. We saw Ministers telling people fleeing Putin’s brutal invasion to apply for visas to pick fruit. It was far from co-ordinated; it was a shambles. I welcome the announcement yesterday of changes to the rules on letting unaccompanied Ukrainian children into the UK—those changes are needed—but we await further details.

What we saw at the beginning of the war sadly had all the hallmarks of the shambolic and chaotic Government response to the crisis in Afghanistan less than a year before the invasion of Ukraine, with MPs’ emails going unanswered, specific cases not being responded to, and vulnerable people—children—left to fend for themselves. Unless there is urgent action now, Homes for Ukraine risks being another empty slogan from this Government. Like last summer’s Operation Warm Welcome for Afghans, it has been left to run cold. There are still over 10,000 Afghan refugees, including children, left in hotels and B&Bs or, worse still, abandoned to the mercies of the Taliban in Afghanistan. I mention that because that the Government had the chance to learn from the mistakes of last summer’s refugee programme, but sadly, they did not.

The outpouring of support and good will from the British public for the Ukrainian and Afghan refugees was not matched by this Government. Children are still unable to get the visas they desperately need. We have heard about the situation with Mariia and Nataliia. The hon. Member for Reigate (Crispin Blunt) spoke powerfully about Oksana and the bureaucracy that is holding up her safety. My hon. Friend the Member for Vauxhall (Florence Eshalomi) highlighted further the bureaucracy that is stopping people offering the safety of their homes to people in desperate need. The hon. Member for Strangford (Jim Shannon) made a typically heartfelt and moral case for why this is important. My hon. Friend the Member for Sheffield, Hallam (Olivia Blake) talked about trauma, and the importance of providing a place of sanctuary for children fleeing war.

The experience of war, fleeing the country that they knew as home, losing or leaving loved ones, and travelling to a foreign country would be traumatic enough for an adult; I cannot imagine what effect it would have on a child’s mental health. We know that the wait for child and adolescent mental health services for children born and raised in the UK is far too long, so it is important for extra, targeted support to be offered to traumatised child refugees. To that end, I would be grateful if the Minister could tell us what steps are being taken to see that mental health service providers are offering support in culturally sensitive ways, and in a language spoken by these children and their families.

As we have heard, recent data shows that 9,900 school places have been offered to Ukrainian children. Schools and schoolchildren have opened their hearts to the refugees, and that is welcome, but that figure is out of 11,400 applications, leaving a sizable number of children who have not applied for or taken up their places in schools. What steps is the Minister’s Department taking to encourage and support uptake of school places?

Some 155,600 applications have been received under the Ukraine visa scheme and there have been more than 120,000 generous offers to home refugees, but there still appears to be no definitive data on the number who have been matched and successfully housed. The last we saw was around 33,000 placements in May, so I would be grateful for an update from the Minister. Exactly how many people have been successfully matched and housed under the Homes for Ukraine scheme? How many hosts have been given the support needed to home traumatised children?

When the Homes for Ukraine scheme was first rolled out, I and many others, in the hope of building a robust, safe scheme, asked constructively about the importance of vetting. I know that many councils have not yet received additional support to assess and run checks on those people who have generously offered their homes, to ensure that they can offer stable, safe and appropriate accommodation to home some of the most vulnerable people leaving Ukraine—women and children.

Misha Lagodinsky, who runs a matching scheme called UK Welcomes Ukraine, which has 100 Ukrainian and Russian-speaking volunteers connecting people, said:

“Some people are finding that they are homeless straight away because they have a visa granted and then their host fails DBS checks.”

Unfortunately, as we have heard, we have seen breakdowns occur even when successful, safe matches have been made, again rendering refugees homeless. We saw a horrific report about a Ukrainian refugee who was rehomed under a Government scheme but left homeless, along with her teenage son, after they were manipulated for money by their hosts. Having arrived in April, she was asked for money and told to leave after three weeks. That same month, the Local Government Association published a survey of local authorities across the country that reported 144 Ukrainian refugees as homeless following breakdowns with host accommodation.

The Department responsible—the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities—now wants to bring back draconian laws from 1824 to again criminalise rough sleeping. We could well be in the ludicrous position of Ukrainians who have fled their war-torn country falling out with their hosts in this country and then being slapped with a criminal record by the same Department that was supposed to help them in the first place. Vulnerable refugees need to be protected from homelessness, not to flee a warzone only to be criminalised, through no fault of their own, by this Government. When will the Government release the latest figures on the number of Ukrainian refugees who have been made homeless?

If the Home Office gets its way, we will be in danger of seeing Ukrainian refugees on a flight to Rwanda for processing. “Processing” is such a horrible, cruel word when we are talking about victims of war, people trafficking, torture and famine. Where is the compassion? Will the Minister give a cast-iron guarantee that we will see no deportations of refugees who fall through the gaps of the Homes for Ukraine scheme, and that none will be forced on to a plane to Rwanda?

We have heard some genuinely harrowing and heartbreaking examples of people who have fallen through the safety net that the British public desperately want to provide for Ukrainian refugees. On occasions, that compassion and ambition has not been matched by the processes put in place by the Government. I know that no Member who has raised individual cases—especially my hon. Friend the Member for Hampstead and Kilburn—will stop until their constituents get the help that they need, so my final question to the Minister is this: will the Government meet each Member who has raised a case to see what we all want, which is some peace for the people fleeing this dreadful war?

[The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (Eddie Hughes)]

It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Davies. I am grateful for the opportunity to discuss these issues today, and I congratulate the hon. Member for Hampstead and Kilburn (Tulip Siddiq) on securing the debate—I think we are old friends, given our previous time together on the Women and Equalities Committee. I am a tremendous admirer of the work that she has done supporting her constituent Nazanin.

I thank other Members for their thoughtful contributions, although I am slightly confused by my hon. Friend the Member for Reigate (Crispin Blunt), who has been a Member of the House for quite some time and who appears to have completely forgotten the protocol that says it is incredibly rude to contribute to a debate and then leave—not least without mentioning it to any of the other contributors or the Chair. Perhaps we will see him again some time. Who knows?

I believe the informed and impassioned contributions to the debate speak to the fact that we have not allowed there to be any creeping normalisation of the plight of the people of Ukraine. Let me put it on the record that the Government truly recognise and value the unanimity of voice with which we speak on the vast majority of issues around our collective support for Ukraine, although I fully accept that the hon. Member for Coatbridge, Chryston and Bellshill (Steven Bonnar) has to take issue with just about everything the Government are doing.

This is one of the rare times in public life when Members from all shades of the political spectrum come together to stand shoulder to shoulder in our defence of the values that we share. From the moment the first tanks crossed the border into Ukraine, the stoicism, courage and determination shown by President Zelensky and the Ukrainian people has been a source of great inspiration to us all. Officials, charities, Ministers and our Prime Minister are working intensively with our allies and international partners to support our friends in Ukraine.

I will come to the focus of the debate, but I want to emphasise that we are proud of the support that the UK Government are providing to Ukrainian nationals and their families. Most of all, we are proud that the scheme is being powered by the enormous generosity of the British public. They have come forward in their thousands to open their hearts and their homes to people who have had their lives torn apart by a conflict they did not ask for. Since the scheme—the first of its kind in the UK—was launched on 18 March, we have welcomed 46,500 people into the UK, and I commend Home Office staff for the work that they have done.

As the hon. Member for Chesham and Amersham (Sarah Green) said, the scheme is like trying to drive a car at speed and build it at the same time. Although I completely understand that it is not perfect and that there have been challenges, we have been acting at pace with incredible volumes. Combined with the Ukraine family scheme, we have now helped over 70,000 people to find a safe, secure home, with 150,000 visas issued so far. Some of those people are now living in the constituencies of Members who have contributed to the debate, including the hon. Member for Hampstead and Kilburn. Hampstead has had 573 applications, with 537 visas granted, and 382 people have already arrived. The constituency of the hon. Member for Luton North (Sarah Owen) is slightly further down the league table, Luton having had 72 applications and 32 people arrive, but there is still time to come.

[Sarah Owen]

On the helpful statistics that the Minister has just mentioned, does he have an accurate figure for the number of people who have been successfully homed with hosts through the Homes for Ukraine scheme?

Oral Answers to Questions

Sarah Owen Excerpts

Monday 7th March 2022 Commons Chamber

[Mr Speaker]

I call the shadow Minister, Sarah Owen.

[Sarah Owen (Luton North) (Lab)]

The Government’s rough sleeping snapshot recorded 2,440 people sleeping rough throughout the whole UK in the autumn. The Minister will know that the flawed method of data collection captures just a fraction of those without a home to sleep in. Those who are not represented in the figures include people who slept on public transport, who found a bed in a night shelter, who walked around at night and slept rough during the day, or who went under the local authority’s radar completely for any number of reasons. The reality of rough sleeping is far worse than the figures imply, so will the Minister tell me whether his Department is on track to deliver on its promise to truly end rough sleeping by 2024? If it is not, will it consider seizing the mansions of Russian oligarchs and putting those empty bedrooms to good use, once and for all?

[Eddie Hughes]

To a degree, I understand part of the hon. Lady’s point. It is clearly difficult to capture that information, which is why we trust local councils and charities to do it. We have the figures validated by Homeless Link. The hon. Lady may have missed the fact that we are publishing more data so that it will be available monthly and working with local councils to make sure that that data is used appropriately to reduce the number of rough sleepers. I look forward to working with her to that end.