HC Deb 09 December 1992 vol 215 cc837-40
10. Mr. Wells

To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment what estimate he has for the amount of social housing which will be provided from public funds over the next three years.

12. Mr. Moss

To ask the Secretary of State for the Environment how much the Government will be investing in social housing over the next three years.

Mr. Howard

Our manifesto promised that 153,000 houses would be provided over the three years beginning April 1992; we now estimate that the Housing Corporation should be able to provide some 170,000 additional homes in that period.

Mr. Wells

I congratulate my right hon. and learned Friend and his team on obtaining that additional money for social housing. Will he find innovative financial methods to use the additional money from taxpayers to lever the private sector into social housing? That would enable us to extend social housing provision to constituencies such as mine where there are poor people who are equally in need of housing for themselves and their families.

Mr. Howard

My hon. Friend has made an important point. The autumn statement was based on the assumption that we should be able to increase the private sector contribution to social housing. We intend to do that with the additional money made available for the remainder of this financial year; taking into account the private sector contribution, we shall provide nearly £1 billion worth of additional social housing in the period to the end of the current financial year.

Mr. Moss

I congratulate my right hon. and learned Friend on the fact that the autumn statement commits us to exceeding our manifesto pledge for the provision of social housing. However, does he agree that the needs of rural regions such as my constituency of Cambridgeshire, North-East are just as pressing as those of urban districts? Does he accept the need to encourage private sector houses to be made available in the rented sector at affordable rents?

Mr. Howard

I certainly agree with my hon. Friend, and I hope that his constituency and other rural districts will benefit from the package announced with the autumn statement. He is right to emphasise the importance of encouraging the revival of the private rented sector, which the policies of the Labour party have done so much to damage for such a long time.

Mr. Raynsford

Will the Secretary of State tell the House of the estimates of housing need in Britain that have been produced by a series of organisations, including the Institute of Housing, and, most recently, estimates produced for the Housing Corporation by Mark Kleinman and Christine Whitehead? Will the right hon. and learned Gentleman confirm that they all make it clear that at least 100,000 new homes are needed each year for rent? Therefore, on the basis of the Secretary of State's projections this afternoon, there will be a serious shortfall over the next three years, which will mean that the problems of homelessness will get worse. When will the Government recognise that their programme is inadequate?

Mr. Howard

Estimates of need vary widely. If the hon. Gentleman is seriously interested in making a constructive contribution to the resolution of such problems, I invite him to devote a little more of his time and attention to the solutions to the problems—solutions such as those that I mentioned earlier.

Ms. Abbott

The Minister will be aware of the excellent work done by the housing associations in the London borough of Hackney, particularly through inner-city challenge. Does the Minister accept that the Government's stated policy—that housing associations alone should provide all new housing—cannot hope to meet the extent of the need in inner-city districts? If the Government insist that all new houses must be provided by housing associations, they will consign thousands of my constitutents to homelessness and poor housing conditions. If the Government are serious about housing the people of the inner cities, they must give councils the money to do the job.

Mr. Howard

I am glad that the hon. Lady has recognised the important contribution made by housing associations. It is not only housing associations that provide new houses. If the hon Lady pays careful attention to the state of council housing in her constituency—I am sure that she does—she will see the importance of getting away from solutions that were tried in the past, and failed, and of tackling the problems in a way that fully meets contemporary needs.

Mrs. Currie

Is it not right that social housing can be provided not just out of public funds? I draw to the attention of my right hon. and learned Friend the imaginative schemes brought together by South Derbyshire district council, Toyota and a housing association, in which accommodation which has been built for the Toyota executives and trainers who will be here on a short-term basis will revert to public housing for low-cost rent when Toyota has finished with it.

Mr. Howard

I am grateful to my hon. Friend. I had not heard of that scheme, but I shall study it with great interest. I know that on this, as on so many other issues, my hon. Friend invites the rest of the country to look to South Derbyshire for a lead. I shall see to what extent we can follow that lead in this area.

Mr. Battle

No doubt, next week the Secretary of State will tell local authorities that their housing investment programmes and their permission to borrow to provide will have to be cut. Is it not true that estimates do not vary—that there is consensus among everyone, except the Government, on the need for more than 300,000 more homes to rent in the next three years? However, Government measures, including the recent initiatives for housing associations, are now revealed as providing well below that target. When will the Secretary of State and the Government get to grips with the scale of the housing and homelessness crisis and ensure that there are enough homes to rent? That is what people desperately need.

Mr. Howard

When will the Labour party learn that it is no use one Front-Bench spokesman after another getting up and asking for, more and more money to be spent while the shadow Treasury team wanders around the country trying to persuade everyone of how responsible the Labour party is? When the hon. Gentleman has talked to the shadow Chief Secretary and received his sanction to call for additional public expenditure, we shall listen to what he says with some seriousness—not before.