HC Deb 14 June 1972 vol 838 cc1485-7
9. Mr. Skinner

asked the Secretary of State for the Environment what has been the average quarterly increase in the price of houses built by local authorities in 1970, 1971 and 1972.

The Minister for Housing and Construction (Mr. Julian Amery)

The quarterly rate of increase in tender prices for the construction of two-storey five-bed-space houses in England and Wales was about 2.6 per cent, in 1970 and, provision ally, 2.7 per cent, in the first three quarters of 1971; information for the final quarter of 1971 is not yet available. The average lag from tender approval to completion of a council house is about seven quarters.

Mr. Skinner

I hope the Minister has told the CBI, which has been interested in land use prices recently. Do not these figures show that it is economic madness to sell off the community's stock of council housing because, as each day goes by, it becomes dearer to replace those houses which are sold? Does the right hon. Gentleman accept that the Government have a vested interest in council houses being sold from the economic point of view, because half the money that accrues from their sale will go to the Exchequer when the housing revenue account gets into surplus, as it will under the provisions of the Housing Finance Bill?

Mr. Amery

In the Government's view, it is the duty of local authorities to try to meet the desire of council tenants who may wish to buy their own homes. We are not motivated by any consideration of any part of the surplus. It would be a small proportion which might accrue to the Exchequer. We are concerned with the provision of home ownership, for which there seems to be a strong desire.

Concerning the hon. Gentleman's reference to the CBI, I am glad to tell him that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for the Environment and I asked Mr. Campbell Adamson to come to see us yesterday. I think that at the end of our talk he was satisfied that any reduction in building society lending would not only be harmful to the building industry but would prevent people buying their own homes. An inevitable consequence of any delay in the implementation of the Housing Finance Bill would be to defer the provision of rate rebate and rent allowances to lower-paid workers, whose problems are uppermost in the present wage bargaining.

Mr. Allason

Does my right hon. Friend agree that the best way to halt the disastrous rise in house prices would be to increase the supply of houses? Will he therefore make every effort to make a great deal more building land available so that builders can get on with the job?

Mr. Amery

I agree entirely with my hon. Friend that the only way to overcome the present steep rise in prices is to make more houses available. The provision of land is one way, more building by the building industry is another, and more building of council houses by local authorities is yet another. The sale of council houses to sitting tenants is also not negligible, particularly as it is now much easier than it was previously for local authorities to build new council houses under the present system.

Mr. Denis Howell

Is the Minister aware that the sale of council houses does not add one house to the total stock of housing available? If he is concerned to increase home ownership, why is he not readily approving the plans of Birmingham and 20 other local authorities to build houses for sale to young married people? Would he announce the complete removal of any such ban on these authorities?

Mr. Amery

The hon. Gentleman is right to say that the sale of a council house does not add one house to the total. Nor does it take one away. There is nothing to stop—indeed with the rising cost subsidy and the slum clearance subsidy proposals in the Housing Finance Bill, much to encourage—local authorities from building new council houses.

Nor is there any attempt by the present Government, as there was by the previous Government, to limit the capital programme of new council house building. Any obligations falling within the yardstick will be virtually automatically approved. The hon. Member is barking up the wrong tree.

On the question of the sale of council houses, as I tried to explain yesterday, we consider—as Lord Greenwood considered under the previous Administration—that the private developer is the best instrument for the provisions of houses for sale—

Mr. Heffer

Speech.

Mr. Amery

But nothing like the speech that the House had yesterday. I have equally made it clear that, with specialised types of building, such as old people's homes, or where the private industry is not prepared to come in, I have by no means set my face against building for sale.