John Healey
MP for Rawmarsh and Conisbrough · Labour · United Kingdom
“Mr Spock, I think some would say, Mr Speaker! My hon. Friend is right. Despite global conflicts, trade tensions and rising threats in the world, which are pushing up inflation, bearing down on growth and pushing up borrowing costs, the UK economy is demonstrating huge resilience.”
“The Prime Minister and I have been clear that we must cut the costs of welfare. On levels of taxation, we had a period of Conservative Government, with low growth and high debt. They crashed the economy with the mini-Budget, and we had levels of taxation that were putting pressure on business, adding to the cost of living.”
“The hon. Lady is talking to the person who led the work to establish a defence and security partnership with the European Union and bilateral agreements with other countries, on which we now build both our economic strength and our national security strength. On the question of the Budget, I ask the hon.”
“Since day one in the job, the Prime Minister and I have been in lockstep in our determination to meet Britain’s fiscal rules. This is the bedrock on which we build good growth and help give a bit of breathing space to families and businesses.”
“May I start by paying tribute to my predecessor, my right hon. Friend the Member for Leeds West and Pudsey (Rachel Reeves)? I am proud to have been a member of a Government with the first female Chancellor in 700 years.”
“My hon. Friend speaks up very strongly for his local area. He is right about the importance of pubs, social clubs and live venues, and about the importance of the 20% cut that we announced in July. These are the things that make the places where we live the places that we also love.”
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“Lady said, the planning system has to be about decisions that balance often competing and conflicting interests, whether they are environmental, social or economic. In the end somebody has to take those decisions, and the principal people taking them should be the elected councillors on the local planning authority. Question put and agreed to.”
“Lady will pass this on to her Front-Bench colleagues who have prepared her party’s policy proposals—it is simply not good enough to think that giving a green light to those who largely want to oppose any development in their area is the proper discharge of elected office or responsibility in the planning system. To design a planning system based on that type of reform would lead to the chaos that some of the concerned organisations talk of, but also to letting down the very people who need decisions to be taken about long-term development so that they can have the homes that their children or elderly parents need, so that businesses can bring them jobs and so that they can have leisure facilities that may improve their area and their life for the future. There are tough decisions to be taken, and as the hon.”
“That is why when I published the new policy planning statement on climate change and renewable energy a couple of weeks ago, I also made available nearly £10 million in order that councils can step up and improve their ability to understand the responsibilities involved and conduct those responsibilities rather more effectively locally than we may have seen in the past. It is also because of this desire to reinforce the ability of the public to be well informed, to have an influence and to make their views count in the planning process that I have increased the funding available for planning aid. That is designed to support local community groups and residents’ groups who want to understand the planning system better and want to use their position, and the planning system so that their views count. In the end—perhaps the hon.”
“All of us, as Members of this House, can play a part in and have an influence over these matters, but clearly, as constituency representatives, we are not the decision takers. None of this will work well in future unless local authorities, councillors and officers—not just officers in the planning department—better understand the nature of the planning process and the nature of their responsibilities and act better to deal with the concerns of local people in consultation and information exercises.”
“Lady has specific criticisms or suggestions for improvements instead of the rather sweeping generalisations that she gave, I encourage her to write to me with them, because I do see an ability for local councillors to let their local residents, whom they are elected to serve, know about potential planning applications. I see as two sides of a very important coin their role in being able to represent the concerns of their electors and to serve their purpose and their proper role as decision takers as part of the local planning authority. As for MPs, I am reluctant to follow the logic of the hon. Lady’s argument in suggesting that we should somehow specify, at a national level, the precise role that MPs should play in planning applications. That has to be a judgment for the locally elected Member.”
“Lady said, that many local councillors feel hesitant about becoming too involved in planning applications. They fear the bounds of propriety, but we need to strengthen the support, advice and guidance to councillors on that issue, and that is why a recent Government-endorsed plain guide to the role of councillors was produced. I was not responsible for the title, because it is called “Positive Engagement”—two words that I tend to avoid. Nevertheless, the sentiment behind it is clear, and the Local Government Association also recently updated its guidance on probity, planning and the role of local councillors. If the hon.”
“That is one way in which we can ensure that more people are better informed about proposed planning applications in their area. Thirdly, we have to beef up involvement at the stage before an application is lodged with a local authority. The hon. Lady will be aware of the provisions that I put in place for that pre-application stage—for nationally significant investment projects—when I led through the House what became the Planning Act 2008. We are looking to follow through that principle locally, because when developers and local authorities seek views, open up discussions and are ready to be informed and influenced by local views at an early stage, applications are likely to be better crafted and potentially more acceptable, if not universally popular. Fourthly, there is the role of elected councillors, and I know, as the hon.”
“As we put in place that new system of sustainable urban drainage plans, which I think is what SUDS stands for, we would certainly consider that suggestion. So, there is the process of improving the influence that statutory consultees and organisations with expertise can bring to bear. Secondly, there is the process of improving planning application publicity for local people. Having consulted on that last summer, I decided to maintain the requirement that local authorities publicise certain planning applications in local newspapers. I stand by that, but I have also introduced a new requirement whereby, from 1 October, local authorities must publish on their websites specified information on all planning applications.”
“Information can be accepted after the deadline when there has been a material change in circumstances or when there are demonstrably good reasons for the deadline to have been missed.”
“The material change of circumstances in that case was the offer from the developer, after the inquiry, to increase the proportion of affordable housing in the proposals—something that I would have assumed that the hon. Gentleman welcomes. Clearly, it would have been wrong if the Secretary of State had not then sought the views of the parties at the inquiry to that change in the proposals. My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State has acted openly and done the right thing in seeking those views. He is currently considering the case carefully.”
“The Department receives a large number of representations on house building. I must tell the hon. Gentleman that almost all of them argue that we should do more to build more homes in all parts of the country, including Lichfield. That is exactly what I have set out to do in my great nine months as Housing Minister.”
“No, the HBF is reflecting the fact that, over the last 12 to 18 months, during the most serious recession in this country for 60 years, private sector house building by the HBF’s members has fallen through the floor. At the same time, instead of stepping back, we have increased the investment in building affordable homes and we will build more this year and next year than in any year since we came to government.”
“For the first time, I have made available Government grants and backing, on a similar basis to housing associations, to all local councils that are willing to build and want to meet the needs and aspirations that local people have for new homes. That means that this year we have under way the largest council housing building programme for nearly two decades. I am really disappointed that Chorley council is not playing a full part in that programme and not doing more to meet the need for more homes in the area.”
“I welcome the hon. Gentleman’s recognition that the steps that we have taken locally and nationally, including on the funding to support the scheme, to try to help people struggling with their mortgages during this recession have been working well. We have put that funding in place for this year and next year. That action—Government action that we have been prepared to take—is one of the reasons why repossessions in this recession are running at around half the rate that they were in the last recession.”
“We are not just making grant available to support councils that want to build affordable homes across the country, including in Southwark, but we are looking at ways of dismantling the system of financing council housing for the future. I hope to be able to update the House on that before long.”
“The Government have received no representations to date from local authorities on the outcomes of the review that I announced on 19 January.”
“I do not accept that and, more importantly, the independent research from Kingston university that I published on Tuesday last week did not accept it. I will send the hon. Gentleman a copy of the report, because it confirms that the problem is not widespread or national, and that local authorities already have the power to take steps to prevent development on garden land, if they choose. They are also able to reinforce their position if the matter goes to appeal.”
“Indeed, and my hon. Friend may want to send the council copies of my statement to the House last Tuesday and of the Kingston university report. He may also want to draw attention to the fact that I have made it clearer in PPS3 that there is no presumption that previously developed land such as garden land will be appropriate for development. It therefore rests with local authorities to put in place a proper local plan that can cover concerns about garden land. It is for them to make the decisions, and to protect people against unwelcome development.”
“The hon. Lady is wrong on two counts. The independent research by the university confirms that, in four out of five cases, the planning inspectorate backs the local authority on appeal. It also says that local authorities are in a stronger position if they have in place their own local plan covering garden land. If the developer has gone ahead in the way that she describes, that is because the council has not put in place what it could and should have put in place.”
“The problem that my hon. Friend describes is slightly different from the one we studied in the research report. Local authorities have some fall-back powers to deal with extreme cases of the sort that she has described. If she would like me to, I shall write to her with details of those powers.”
“I know that the hon. Lady and some of her hon. Friends have pressed this case very hard over the past couple of years, but the research and the facts do not bear out her assertion or her concerns. This is a problem in some areas, but they are clearly in the minority. It is also clear, as the report confirms, that councils have the powers to deal with such matters where they present a problem for neighbours and are unwelcome in the local area.”
“The hon. Lady is wrong again. The definition she takes issue with was set in 1985 and has not been changed since. It was reconfirmed in one of the Conservative Government’s Green Papers and in planning guidance in 1988, and again in 1992. That is not the problem. The problem, I am afraid to say, is councils that have the powers but will not accept the responsibility of taking the decisions to protect local people and defending those decisions on appeal. If they had proper local plans in place, their hand would be strengthened in doing so. The hon. Lady would do better to address her concerns to her own councils, which are falling far short of what local residents expect of them.”
“My hon. Friend makes an interesting point that illustrates precisely the general point that I am making: it is in the hands of local councils to decide local priorities, make local decisions and, in his case, demonstrate the difference in approach between a Labour and a Conservative local council in Chorley.”
“The Mayor of London and the London boroughs are required to assess demand for affordable housing in London. The Mayor’s own figures show that about 18,200 new affordable homes are needed each year. I regret to say that his current plan proposes to build 5,000 fewer than that each year.”
“I do. When almost two thirds of London households have a total income of less than £30,000 a year, and when we are ready, as we are, to help those people who otherwise could not get into the housing market for themselves, it seems strange to want to lift to that limit and spread the Government help more thinly. I see that as clearly the wrong priority for London and the wrong priority for Londoners.”
“I recognise and pay tribute to the work that the hon. Gentleman does on these issues, which I know he follows closely. The short answer to his question is no, I have not studied that report. I would be interested to know whether the Lords Committee studied the changes that I made recently to the policy under which councils allocate council and housing association homes, because that makes it clear that migrants are not entitled to be on waiting lists in general, and it has given local authorities more leeway to allocate homes according to local pressures.”
“Such discussions and plans demonstrate a lack of commitment to affordable housing to meet the needs of people who, in many cases, otherwise would not be able to afford to bring up their family and live in the private rented sector and never would be able to afford or maybe do not aspire to move into the housing market for themselves. The truth is that public housing in this country plays a critical role in the lives of many millions of people, including 8 million current tenants, and any plans to raise rents or reduce the security that they have in their own home will be met with justified alarm.”
“Low-cost, long-term tenancies are the foundation for the lives of millions of social tenants, and we are committed to safeguarding that security.”
“The comments that my hon. Friend attributes to the leader of Hammersmith and Fulham council are very revealing—they reveal a deeply held prejudice against people in public housing. As for the comments of the chief executive of the Tenants Services Authority, it would be worth while for my hon. Friend to reassure residents in his constituency that matters of policy concerning the security of people’s tenure are for the Government, not the TSA chief executive.”
“I can, Mr. Speaker. My hon. Friend is right. The range of measures that we have put in place essentially to help people to stay where they should be during a recession—in their own homes—has led to 333,000 families getting help or advice from the Government in the past year. The initiative in her area is a combination of extra press and radio advertising, and in some areas face-to-face advice events to ensure that people know what help is available and are encouraged to take it up. We know that if people bury their heads in the sand, their homes and futures are much more at risk.”
“The proposal for a national register of private landlords is only one of those that we are looking at to try to tighten up the activities of the worst landlords, who give the tenants to whom they rent their properties a bad standard of housing and service. The private rented sector is important to many people in this country, but it is our duty as a Government to ensure that the very worst landlords are stamped out.”
“It does, and it is in the hands of the hon. Gentleman’s council to provide that protection for itself against appeal and, more importantly, for residents against unwelcome developments. If his council is falling back on Government guidance, it is failing to put in a place a local plan for policies that suit the area of Sutton. That is the council’s responsibility. The report that I published last week confirms on the basis of the research that where councils do that, they are in stronger position to protect local residents and deal with any appeals that might crop up.”
“We consulted over the summer on our response to the independent review of the private rented sector conducted by Julie Rugg. We received more than 250 responses, and I intend to publish a summary of them shortly.”
“They may include such measures. My hon. Friend will be aware that we have also consulted on proposals to strengthen local authorities’ ability to deal with houses in multiple occupation, which sometimes give rise to the concern to which she refers. She will have to be a bit patient and wait for my summary, which will be available shortly to her and to all other Members throughout the House who take an interest in the issue.”
“In fact there are 3 million households in the private rented sector, not 8 million, but the hon. Lady has a point. The number is rising, and last year it was up to about one in seven. The hon. Lady is rightly concerned about the position of those who may be renting from landlords who are struggling with their mortgages, and who may not be aware that those landlords are having problems. My hon. Friend the Member for Bolton, South-East (Dr. Iddon) proposes to introduce a private Member’s Bill, to which I am more than prepared to give every assistance and a fair wind because it constitutes exactly the sort of legislation that I think the hon. Lady wishes to see. I hope that, in the best tradition of private Members’ Bills, it will receive support from Members in all parts of the House.”
“My hon. Friend is a member of the Select Committee on Communities and Local Government, and is one of the House’s experts on these matters. He is right to suggest that local authorities have an important role which could be reinforced, allowing them to take action against the worst landlords who provide the worst housing, and we are considering doing exactly that. It is one of a number of actions that we need to take to bring the general standard of the private rented sector up to scratch.”
“The hon. Gentleman recognises that primary legislation is required. Perhaps I can take it from his question that he and his party’s Front-Bench team will support the private Member’s Bill to be presented by my hon. Friend the Member for Bolton, South-East—and if so, I warmly welcome that.”
“By the end of September, there had been almost 100 completions under the special mortgage rescue scheme and 1,800 rent to homebuy completions. Homeowners mortgage support scheme figures will be published later this month.”
“I am stunned. What on earth does the right hon. Gentleman say to the 100 families who are still in their own homes because of this special back-stop scheme? What does he say to the 1,000 families whose applications are in the pipeline? What does he say, too, to the 330,000 families who have had help across the range of advice from Government over the past year, which has helped them when they have been struggling with their mortgage repayments and helped them to stay in their own homes without running the risk of repossession, and which is testimony to the fact that this Government have been ready to act, unlike what happened in the 1990s? That is why repossessions are running at half the rate of the last recession.”
“My hon. Friend is absolutely right. Our experience tells us and our forecasts say that, as the economy moves out of recession during next year, the pressure on repossessions will increase. I can do better than she urges me: we will not only look to keep the current support in place, but we will extend and strengthen it. We are extending the campaign that allows people to get access to free advice. We are toughening up the rules in court, too. Through the Financial Services Authority, we are also looking at toughening up the regulations on lenders, so that any repossession is genuinely a last resort. In this way, we can get ahead of the pressures we anticipate for next year, and try to ensure that more families are able to stay in their own home, which is where they should be, despite the pressures of recession.”
“She might like to know that we have almost trebled the number of housing associations that are part of the scheme. We have a fast-track team in place that takes referrals directly from lenders and we are doing exactly as she urges—we are learning from the experience of the scheme so far and improving it so that it is better at providing the support that is needed. If the hon. Lady would let me have the details of her case, I shall certainly look into it.”
“I am disappointed in the hon. Gentleman. He was on the shadow Treasury team for a while, and perhaps we have seen why he is now on this team. He confuses expenditure with budgets. Not only have nearly 100 families stayed in their own homes because of the mortgage rescue scheme back-stop, but some 1,000 applications are in the pipeline and more than 11,000 families have had help and advice directly from their local authority that is part and parcel of the scheme. That is only part of the help that we have put in across the piece to help home owners who are struggling with their mortgages to stay where they should be—in their homes.”
“Since the introduction of the licensing provisions for houses in multiple occupation, councils in England have received applications for about 30,000 HMOs, and have issued licences for about 20,000.”
“The whole House will have heard my hon. Friend and learned the lesson that local authorities that are prepared to tackle the worst landlords in their area, and to build up concentrations of HMOs that change its nature and character, are able to put in place additional licensing schemes. I am glad to hear about the successful campaign that he has run to persuade his council in that regard. That is precisely the way ahead, as we want councils to make maximum use of the provisions that are in place at present.”
“Indeed, and that is why our general policy is to promote mixed communities, as they tend to be better balanced and more stable. The hon. Gentleman asked for an update on our examination of whether changes to the use classes might help us pursue our objectives. At present, we are sifting the 900 or so responses that we have received to the consultation, and I hope to be able to update the House on this shortly.”
“Forty-nine local authorities were successful in bidding for grant to build new council homes. All are set to start on site, with 217 schemes, before the end of March, which makes it the largest council house building programme for nearly two decades. The deadline for round 2 submissions was the end of October, and I hope to make announcements on successful bidders early in the new year.”
“My hon. Friend, who knows a great deal about those matters, is right. The level of interest and the number of bids that we have had for the second round of the council house building programme has certainly been greater than that which we received for the first. When I announced the £1.5 billion of extra funding in the housing pledge, I made it clear that the four elements of that pledge, and the budgets allocated against them back in the summer, included the capacity to flex some of that spend between those parts of the programme, and I am certainly ready to do so if there is a good case.”
“May I say that this Labour Minister in this Labour Government is pleased to have been able to offer the hon. Gentleman’s Tory council money to build council homes, which are needed in the East Riding of Yorkshire just as they are throughout the rest of the country.”
“The jury is very much out on Mayor Johnson and the pledges he made more than 18 months ago. In housing, more than any other area, there is a big shortfall if we compare what he promised in the run-up to his election with what he has been able to deliver so far to meet the very serious housing needs that exist throughout the capital.”
“There has long been a mismatch between the supply and building of new homes and the demand for those homes. That mismatch led the Government to consider and set the house building targets in the first place. Clearly, the situation has got worse as a result of the global economic downturn, with the demand and need for housing continuing to grow and, particularly in the private sector, the level of building falling through the floor. That is why we stepped in over the summer to put extra money—£1.5 billion—into building the homes we need right across the country.”