§ 2.43 p.m.
§ LORD BOSSOMMy Lords, I beg leave to ask the first Question which stands in my name on the Order Paper.
§ [The Question was as follows:
§ To ask Her Majesty's Government whether they will state their best estimate of all living units or habitations of all types that will be required annually for the next ten years, irrespective of whether they are to be provided by Governmental or local authorities, by speculators, by private investors, or by individuals.]
THE JOINT PARLIAMENTARY SECRETARY, MINISTRY OF HOUSING AND LOCAL GOVERNMENT (EARL JELLICIDE)My Lords, I would refer my noble friend to the Answer given by my right honourable friend the Minister of Housing and Local Government in another place on November 7, when he stated that the best estimate he could make was that, if in the whole of Great Britain we could continue building at the rate of about 300,000 houses and flats a year, we should, over the next twenty years, meet the needs as we at present see them.
§ LORD BOSSOMMy Lords, while thanking my noble friend for that Answer, could he give any indication of the possible number it is the Government's intention to build or to insist are built by some agency?
EARL JELLICOEMy Lords, I think the best answer I can give to my noble friend is that we shall endeavour to see built the minimum number we think are required—namely, 300,000 a year.
§ LORD OGMOREMy Lords, is the noble Earl aware that, according to the Alliance Building Society, the minimum needed in order to house the people in the next twenty years will be 400,000 a year?
EARL JELLICOEMy Lords, I am of course aware that, according to the Alliance Building Society, we shall need 400,000 a year. I should like straight away to say that I think that the Society's report is an extremely valuable one in helping to focus attention on the great problems of housing lying ahead of us. But, with deference to the Society's report, I would say merely that the information which I have indicates that they have possibly overestimated. However, I would add that all this is inevitably highly speculative.
§ EARL ATTLEEMy Lords, arising out of the Question, might I ask the noble Earl whether we should now call a grave a "dying unit"?
§ BARONESS SUMMERSKILLHe means a crematorium.
LORD SALTOUNMy Lords, may I ask the Government two supplementary questions? I am not asking whether they are aware of the excruciating need for houses suffered by some families, because that was made clear by my noble friend the Leader of the House in a recent debate. But I should like in the first place to ask them whether it would not be possible greatly to increase the provision of houses by giving a reasonable and not excessive subsidy to all houses below a certain value that are built by private enterprise, because so many families are deterred by the tremendous cost of providing houses for themselves.
EARL JELLICOEMy Lords, in answer to my noble friend's first question, I would, of course, agree that in certain places there is a real and excruciating housing shortage, and it is our intention to do what is within our power and within the limitations of the economy to overcome that shortage. I will, if I may, take up the second suggestion that my noble friend has made.
LORD SALTOUNMy Lords, may I further ask Her Majesty's Government whether they will use their influence with the Postmaster General to urge upon him the importance of supplying houses for his own postmasters in order that they may not jump the local authority queue and so displace families agonisingly in need of housing?
EARL JELLICOEMy Lords, I will take up that question, if I may, with my noble friend Lord St. Oswald.
§ LORD SILKINMy Lords, the Question related to the number of houses that would be required in the next ten years; the reply related to the number of houses that would be required in the next twenty years. May I ask the noble Earl whether he is expecting that families who are to-day badly housed may have to wait anything up to twenty years before, according to his statement, they are rehoused? According to the noble Lord's Question, is not ten years quite long enough? To extend the period to twenty years before we can be said to have solved the problem is really suggesting that we are not solving it at all.
EARL JELLICOEMy Lords, I think it is a false assumption that, because we have a problem lying ahead of us which on present estimates it will certainly take at least twenty years to solve, people who are now short of houses will not have them within that period. It is, of course, a question of priorities. Since the noble Lord has, as it were, queried the figures, as did the noble Lord, Lord Ogmore, perhaps I ought roughly to sketch how that estimate of 6 million over twenty years—300,000 a year—is arrived at. It is, first, half a million slums to be replaced; secondly, to overtake the present shortage of houses, which we reckon will need another half a million; thirdly, meeting the increase in the number of 1033 separate households, which we will reckon will take something like 100,000 a year—that is two million over the next twenty years, which brings us up to three million—and, fourthly, the replacement of properties which are becoming worn out. There are about four million which we reckon were built before 1880 and at least three million of those will need to be replaced, making a total of six million.
§ LORD SILKINMy Lords, I am much obliged to the noble Earl for those figures and I do not think it is profitable to debate them by question and answer at this moment. We are hoping to have a debate in the near future. But I should like to ask him this. The noble Lord who put the Question has asked how many houses will be required over the next ten years. The noble Earl says that he wants six million spread over twenty years. Therefore, is not the answer to the noble Lord that if that is extended over ten years you will want 600,000 houses a year?
EARL JELLICOEI think the answer to that is, No, because a lot of this housing which will be obsolete in ten years' time is not obsolete now. That is one of the major factors in this equation. My arithmetic makes six million divided by twenty 300,000.
§ BARONESS HORSBRUGHMy Lords, is the noble Earl also not taking into account the new families, the families which will have grown up and will be requiring houses after the ten year period?
EARL JELLICOEYes, that is precisely what we are taking into account, but in a slightly different way from the Alliance Building Society who have projected the present tendency of people to marry earlier. Well, my Lords, that particular factor is not infinitely extensible; there becomes a point, as it were, of no return.
§ LORD TAYLORMy Lords, have the noble Earl and the Government thought about where they are going to put these three million houses, and just how many New Towns they ought to have been starting? I estimate that this is equivalent to about thirty New Towns. Is it not high time that they thought about having a few more?
EARL JELLICOEFunnily enough, the Government are giving considerable attention to this particular problem, and, as the noble Lord is probably aware, there are special regional studies going on which are considering this particular matter at this very moment.
§ LORD MORRISON OF LAMBETHMy Lords, could the noble Earl say whether the figures of estimated requirements and their filling include private enterprise building as well as municipal?
LORD HAWKEAs all these estimates of the future must be speculative, could Her Majesty's Government publish the vital statistics on which they are basing their future estimates, so that the people may see whether they appear to them more credible than those on which the Alliance Building Society estimate was based?
EARL JELLICOEI will, if I may, pass on that suggestion which my noble friend has made, but a lot of this derives from the provisional report of the Registrar-General on the last Census, which is, of course, published.
§ LORD WALSTONMy Lords, before we leave the subject, could the noble Earl give us an assurance that, when he is looking at the obsolescence of houses, due attention is paid to the obsolescence of rural houses where the shortage is now becoming increasingly acute in very many areas?
§ LORD BOSSOMMy Lords, while thanking my noble friend for the information he has given us, may I ask whether, in considering the disparity between the need as stated in his figures and the figures that he stated before, he does not think it is essential to make a rather greater effort than he has indicated already?
EARL JELLICOEI have tried to indicate that, if we managed to hit and continue to hit 300,000 a year, we should be, broadly speaking, fleeting the need. But of course this is a continuing problem. We will never solve the housing problem as such—never.