§ LORD BOOTHBYMy Lords, I beg leave to ask the Question which stands in my name on the Order Paper.
The Question was as follows:
To ask Her Majesty's Government whether they propose to introduce legislation to deal with the present astronomical rises in the price of land, property and rents.
§ THE PARLIAMENTARY UNDERSECRETARY OF STATE, DEPARTMENT OF THE ENVIRONMENT (LORD SANDFORD)My Lords, no legislation is proposed to control rises in land and property prices. It is considered that the best way to mitigate these rises is to increase the supply of land and houses, and the Government have already taken vigorous measures to that end. The Housing Finance Bill will for the first time ensure that all tenants of all unfurnished accommodation both in the public and in the private sectors will be paying no more than they can reasonably afford. We have been holding discussions with local authority associations with a view to introducing similar arrangements for tenants of furnished accommodation.
§ LORD BOOTHBYMy Lords, arising out of that Answer, may I ask the noble Lord whether Her Majesty's Government do not think that this is really the root cause of the inflation by which we are beset and that what has become a racket approaching the dimensions of the South Sea Bubble must be stopped, and that ultimately it can be stopped only by legislation?
§ LORD SANDFORDNo, my Lords; I think it rather the other way round.
§ LORD SHEPHERDMy Lords, can the noble Lord indicate to the House how in the South-East of England, where the pressure is perhaps greatest and the rise in prices has been at its most obscene, land is to be made available for building?
§ LORD SANDFORDMy Lords, fortunately this is the first region that has been studied in a regional way. The South-East Joint Planning Study has been completed. It was commissioned by our predecessors and has been approved; it specifies and designates a number of growth points where land can be released for development.
§ LORD SHEPHERDMy Lords, can the noble Lord indicate to the House how land is going to be made available at a price that ordinary people can afford to pay in order to put up a house?
§ LORD SANDFORDMy Lords, my right honourable friend has met representatives of the local planning authorities in the South-East and impressed upon them the urgency of this issue. Thanks to the existence of the South-East Joint Planning Study it is possible to identify areas in which the release of land for housing can be expedited.
§ LORD SHEPHERDMy Lords, is the noble Lord aware that he has not yet answered my question?
§ LORD GEORGE-BROWNMy Lords, did the noble Lord hear a radio programme about a farmer, some of whose acres were given planning consent for the building of houses, who overnight became worth a million and a half pounds? Are there any provisions in Government planning for preventing this sort of rise in land values, which is inevitably reflected in the price of housing, from taking place in the future?
§ LORD SANDFORDMy Lords, I did not hear that particular programme.
§ LORD PLATTMy Lords, are Her Majesty's Government aware that in the part of Surrey where I live a semi-detached three-bedroomed house is now worth an average of £15,500 and that young professional people—school teachers and young doctors—just cannot afford to live in such an area?
§ LORD SANDFORDMy Lords, I am very much aware of this situation, and we are doing all we can to mitigate it.
§ LORD STRABOLGIMy Lords, what are the Government proposing to do about the thousand flats in Westminster alone which are being deliberately kept empty in order to provide increased scarcity value?
§ LORD SANDFORDMy Lords, that again is another factor on housing in London on which my right honourable friend is taking particularly vigorous action.
§ LORD LEATHERLANDMy Lords, may I ask the noble Lord how it is that the Government can pass legislation to put rents up and yet pretend that they cannot pass legislation to keep land prices down?
§ LORD SANDFORDMy Lords, that is quite a different matter.
§ BARONESS SUMMERSKILLMy Lords, can the noble Lord say whether the Government propose to encroach on the Green Belt?
§ LORD SANDFORDMy Lords, no.
VISCOUNT ST. DAVIDSMy Lords, can the noble Lord say how, in the long run, in an England which is an island and cannot possibly grow larger, in-habited by a population which is growing larger every day, it will be possible to keep prices down unless Government action of a vigorous type is taken to control them?
§ LORD SANDFORDMy Lords, this is one of our basic underlying problems. No Government so far have found a satisfactory way to deal with this matter by legislation.
§ LORD HARVEY OF PRESTBURYMy Lords, is my noble friend aware that, apart from the price of land, building costs have gone up something like 100 per cent. in the last ten years and ought not both sides of the House to direct their attention to this aspect of the problem?
§ LORD BOOTHBYMy Lords, the words " impress upon them the urgency " struck me as a kind of death knell. Surely Her Majesty's Government must 1034 realise that the days have gone by when " impressing the urgency " on any individual can seriously affect the situation. Sooner or later legislation must be introduced.
§ LORD ROBBINSMy Lords, would not the noble Lord agree that the main cause of the rise in land values is an excessive rise in national expenditure above the rate of increase of productivity which has given rise to inflation generally, and to the fear of more inflation which has led many people to turn their demand towards real property as being something which will keep its value better than paper?
§ LORD SANDFORDMy Lords, all this is so, and I acknowledged the fact in the answer I gave to the first supplementary question of the noble Lord, Lord Boothby.
§ LORD POPPLEWELLMy Lords, if, as the noble Lord says, there is to be no further encroachment on the Green Belt, would he say how he expects more land to be available?
§ LORD SANDFORDMy Lords, this problem, as noble Lords know and have recognised, is chiefly concentrated in the South-East. The South-East has had a special planning study directed to it and areas where growth can be accepted have been designated within it. It is land within these areas which is being brought forward with all due despatch for release for housing. These areas by and large are not in the Green Belt.
§ LORD WELLS-PESTELLMy Lords, if there is not to be legislation to control the price of land when it is being sold, will the noble Lord say how houses can be built without such legislation, at the price that normal young married couples can afford having regard to their income and the amount of money the building societies will advance to them?
§ LORD SANDFORDMy Lords, the rise in land prices and the rise in house prices, especially in the South-East, is causing us all concern, but the fact remains that 24 per cent., nearly a quarter, of all mortgages went in the first quarter of this year—the most up to date figures we have—to people earning not more than £30 a week, and the proportion of borrowers under 25, a 1035 group we are all concerned about, went up from 20½ per cent. in the last quarter of 1971 to 22 per cent. in the first quarter of this year. We certainly want to keep these prices from rising at the present rate, but I think all noble Lords will agree that these two factors must give us some satisfaction.
§ LORD WELLS-PESTELLMy Lords, may I ask the noble Lord whether the borrowers were not in fact young people who were buying council houses being sold at £4,000 and £5,000?
§ LORD SANDFORDMy Lords, if they were borrowers they would be included in those figures, and one would wish there were a large number of them. But at the present moment the number of council tenants buying their own houses is running at the rate of only 7,000 a quarter. We hope to be able to increase that number.