Results 101–120 of 3500 for (in the 'Commons debates' OR in the 'Westminster Hall debates' OR in the 'Lords debates' OR in the 'Northern Ireland Assembly debates') speaker:Baroness Hollis of Heigham

Housing and Planning Bill: Committee (5th Day) (10 Mar 2016)

Baroness Hollis of Heigham: If the Government are placing crucial policy decisions beyond the possibility of amendment in this House, because instead of being embedded in primary legislation they are going to be carried by SIs, any attempt to amend them in whatever form will produce synthetic outrage down the other end, and we will be told we should accept them whether we like it or not. This will not do. I absolutely...

Housing and Planning Bill: Committee (5th Day) (10 Mar 2016)

Baroness Hollis of Heigham: But councils with retained stock—and that stock is not coming forward as fast as government would wish—will have a levy in view until their own vacant stock is forcibly sold. That levy has to come from somewhere. Why on earth should some local authorities be expected to fund RTB discounts out of their money when other local authorities are not? What is the basic fairness in that? I...

Housing and Planning Bill: Committee (5th Day) (10 Mar 2016)

Baroness Hollis of Heigham: Will the noble Lord expand on his first point, which concerned the situation of stock transfer authorities such as his own? I agreed with so much of what he said. Given that he has no high-value council property to enter into forced sales, as we have been discussing, to finance RTB for housing association tenants, his authority will, instead, be levied to fund it, in the absence of stock to...

Housing and Planning Bill: Committee (5th Day) (10 Mar 2016)

Baroness Hollis of Heigham: Yet some of us have been assured, as my noble friend says, that Clause 68(3) was drafted precisely to cover those authorities with stock transfer. In my county of Norfolk, Norwich has retained its council stock, there is limited retention in Great Yarmouth and King’s Lynn, and the other four authorities transferred their stock into housing associations. Are we saying that authorities such...

Housing and Planning Bill: Committee (5th Day) (10 Mar 2016)

Baroness Hollis of Heigham: I thank the noble Lord, Lord Kerslake, for that explanation. In that case, it means that there is going to be double the levy, not just one levy, for RTB for local authorities that have retained their stock—mainly city authorities. The cross-subsidy will come from those local authorities not just to fund RTB in their own district—we do not yet know how much redistribution there will be or...

Housing and Planning Bill: Committee (5th Day) (10 Mar 2016)

Baroness Hollis of Heigham: Does the noble Lord agree that while his figure of a 20% discount may make perfectly good sense in terms of the finances for London, in cheaper areas outside the capital a discount of £77,000 or £80,000 can represent getting on for 40% of the value of the property?

Housing and Planning Bill: Committee (5th Day) (10 Mar 2016)

Baroness Hollis of Heigham: My Lords, we have heard some very powerful speeches. I certainly do not wish to repeat, to the boredom of the House, the points made very effectively by the noble Lords, Lord Kerslake and Lord Best, but I entirely agree that the sums do not stack up. A few months ago, the Minister took the Cities and Local Government Devolution Act through this House very skilfully, patiently and...

Housing and Planning Bill: Committee (5th Day) (10 Mar 2016)

Baroness Hollis of Heigham: After 40% cuts more generally and 1% cuts on council rents in particular per year, coming up to 12%, to say that local authorities can find another way of doing this is utopian.

Housing and Planning Bill: Committee (4th Day) (Continued) ( 8 Mar 2016)

Baroness Hollis of Heigham: Only if the Government adopt it.

Housing and Planning Bill: Committee (4th Day) (Continued) ( 8 Mar 2016)

Baroness Hollis of Heigham: The money is not going to stretch that far. We have already established that it is supposed to pay for expensive discounts, brownfield sites, and a replacement for local authority stock. The Minister says that local authority tenants have the right to buy: we did not expect housing associations to pay for their discounts, but we now expect local authorities to pay for the discounts on not...

Housing and Planning Bill: Committee (4th Day) (Continued) ( 8 Mar 2016)

Baroness Hollis of Heigham: My Lords, I also congratulate the noble Lord, Lord Kerslake, because it is possible that he has found a way to square a circle. Whether you support right to buy or have reservations about it in terms of the implications for waiting lists and so on, nobody today has defended the argument that local authorities should not find their stock sold to fund the tenants in another tenure. As the...

Housing and Planning Bill: Committee (4th Day) (Continued) ( 8 Mar 2016)

Baroness Hollis of Heigham: My Lords, when the Minister has a chance—perhaps over the weekend—to look at the “Dispatches” programme, would she like to reflect on the information given to that programme by experienced housing professionals? It concerns the implications of illegal deferred sales, in which the money does indeed come from the wide boys and is given to an older person to buy, and many of these people...

Housing and Planning Bill: Committee (4th Day) (Continued) ( 8 Mar 2016)

Baroness Hollis of Heigham: It is probably 31% rather than 30%. I think it is from the house condition survey.

Housing and Planning Bill: Committee (4th Day) (Continued) ( 8 Mar 2016)

Baroness Hollis of Heigham: My Lords, I am sympathetic to the intent of my noble friend’s amendment although, like him, I have reservations about the way it is drafted. I want to put the question back to the Minister. I do not think that anyone would wish to undermine the capacity of people, particularly young people, to become homeowners, and that is not what we are debating today. The problem is that, given that the...

Housing and Planning Bill: Committee (4th Day) (Continued) ( 8 Mar 2016)

Baroness Hollis of Heigham: On top of that, the taxpayer will then go on, in appropriate circumstances, to pay the housing benefit on rents that have doubled or tripled.

Housing and Planning Bill: Committee (4th Day) (Continued) ( 8 Mar 2016)

Baroness Hollis of Heigham: The Minister emphasised, perfectly sensibly I think, that housing associations should have some discretion in how they meet local needs and what types of housing they provide. I also take the point about shared ownership. Will she extend that same freedom so that housing associations can replace housing with social housing at social rents rather than at affordable rents, given that affordable...

Housing and Planning Bill: Committee (4th Day) (Continued) ( 8 Mar 2016)

Baroness Hollis of Heigham: I do not know how the Minister can say that when more than 30% of private rented sector accommodation is below the decency standard.

Housing and Planning Bill: Committee (4th Day) (Continued) ( 8 Mar 2016)

Baroness Hollis of Heigham: My Lords, I have a lot of sympathy for what the noble Lord, Lord Porter, said, but what we have been trying to say repeats to some extent what he said. The argument is about not just right to buy, although we can have different views on that, but who funds the discount. I agree that the proportionality of the discount matters and we want it to be only enough to help people realistically into...

Housing and Planning Bill: Committee (4th Day) ( 8 Mar 2016)

Baroness Hollis of Heigham: It would perhaps have been more appropriate if the Minister could have taken the query at the time she was answering questions, as she did with the noble Lord, Lord Taylor. None the less, the point that was being established by the noble Lord, Lord Porter, my noble friend Lord McKenzie and I was that irrespective of one’s views about right to buy—I can absolutely understand the argument...

Housing and Planning Bill: Committee (4th Day) ( 8 Mar 2016)

Baroness Hollis of Heigham: But they were raised tonight. I think we have a right to hear what the Minister says so that when we address those subsequent groups, we can take her answer into account.


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