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Mr. Stephen: The hon. Lady has identified a number of problems, but what is the Liberal Democrat policy for solving them? The document entitled, "Towards 1996", prepared in her Whips Office, says:
- "Our intention to phase out MIRAS will cripple mortgage payers and exacerbate negative equity. Our policy on freeing up council house sales receipts no longer stands up, being a little bit dated. We are still not sure what we would do about housing benefit. Our policy on helping home owners suffering from negative equity is expensive and ill thought out."
Mrs. Maddock: We always get the old chestnuts. I thought that people had got to the bottom of this, but I shall explain once again. The document from which the
hon. Gentleman quotes was used internally to make us think about those questions. Interestingly, when we were discussing the matter someone said that they wondered what Conservative Members would say if they got hold of the document. I regret to say that the document was somehow purloined, although we tried to keep it to ourselves. It was a discussion document.
Mr. Nick Raynsford (Greenwich): The hon. Lady is a teenage scribbler.
Mrs. Maddock: The hon. Gentleman disappoints me. He does not usually descend to that level of debate. We shall produce a policy document in the future.
Before I gave way, I was about to ask how we can progress towards meeting housing needs and produce good-quality housing that people can afford to stay in, even if times get tough. I shall devote the rest of my speech to that and deal with the matters raised by the hon. Member for Shoreham (Mr. Stephen).
We must help people to stay in their homes and tackle need before it becomes desperate. The Liberal Democrats propose a mortgage benefit, which would be paid for by phasing out mortgage income tax relief. We would not phase in mortgage benefit overnight as the Government would, because that is not fair on people who have made long-term financial plans. Such a scheme has been part of our policy for a long time.
The Government's attempts to help people who lose their jobs not to lose their homes have not been successful. Insurance is sensible and I would encourage people to cover themselves as much as possible, but research shows that huge numbers of people could not get insurance cover--at least two or three have come to my Saturday morning surgeries. Part-time workers, those with temporary contracts, the self-employed or people approaching retirement age are denied such insurance cover. Increasing numbers of people are experiencing job insecurity, so we must tackle that problem.
Many people cannot move to a room in the private rented sector, not because of high rents--although those affect some people--but because of the deposit that is required. Many local authorities and charities have set up good rent deposit schemes, which lend deposit money to people who cannot find it. The Environment Select Committee looked into the problem of deposits, and we must consider the matter further. As tenants cannot get their deposits back, they sometimes leave the property without paying the last month's rent. That is a ridiculous way to carry on. We need to put in place a system that does away with rental deposits. Australia has a scheme that takes care of all the deposits. A proposal to solve the problem was made in the Committee considering the Housing Bill, although it was not ideal. The problem must be solved if we are to have a thriving private rented sector.
We must make better use of our property resources by discouraging under-occupation, ensuring that empty properties are used as homes, using brown-field sites, and accommodating people in shops and offices in town centres. Clearly, we cannot spread across the countryside. An important question for people who live in rural areas is what will happen under the right-to-buy proposal in the latest Housing Bill. Where will people in rural areas replace the social units that may be lost through that scheme, and how will social housing units in rural areas be replaced?
There has been a lot of agreement around the Chamber tonight--I say "around the Chamber" because I think that far too often we talk about this side and that side. There was also agreement around the Chamber during the passage of the Housing Bill and the Housing Grants, Construction and Regeneration Bill. It was agreed that there is unmet housing need, but there was disagreement about the level. One of the problems is that the Government are always on the lower end of everything, not the top end--although they do not always have to be at the top end. The Select Committee believes that the Government are hitting far too low.
Mr. Thomason:
The hon. Lady's assessment of the situation assumes that there will be no private sector investment in rented accommodation. Does she feel that there is no contribution to be made by the private sector?
Mrs. Maddock:
I did not realise that I was being incoherent. I have been talking at some length about the private rented sector and about how important it is. I believe that it should exist and that we should do things to enable people to get into it. As a party, in the past we have supported various tax benefits and schemes to enable people to rent properties out and to make renting much more of a business.
Mrs. Maddock:
I shall not give way to the hon. Gentleman because I want to progress. I have said quite a lot about the private rented sector, but if the hon. Gentleman wants to know more, I can recommend quite a lot of our documents to him and he can read them at his leisure. If he orders them and pays for them at Cowley street, they will be the genuine thing--they will have been passed by our members at our party conferences.
There is agreement about better use of sites and better use of buildings, but there is not agreement about how much investment we should put into it. Over the years, Governments have encouraged local authorities and everyone else to use sites and to bring properties back, and they have set up wonderful schemes that go for only a year and are then changed. I would like to see some long-term thinking in this regard.
Most hon. Members agree that we need to plan for demographic change, but the question is how much and for how long. The hon. Member for Denton and Reddish said that he was disappointed that we were not looking ahead to 2011 and 2021 in relation to housing need. That is not easy to do, but we should be looking at it and making estimates. If we can encourage people to look that far ahead, they might focus on the short term as well.
It is agreed that we need flexibility--people need to be able to move in and out of the private sector. However, there is not always agreement on how that should be done. We also need investment, and I am not sure where the Government stand on this. The Government always ask the Opposition where they are going to get investment from, but they do not say where their investment will come from.
We need to use the money that is locked up in councils in capital receipts but, as the hon. Member for Denton and Reddish said, that will not solve all the problems. To get more money into housing, we need to recognise that
putting capital into bricks and mortar is a good investment. If we continue to account in a way that means that, every year, we have to hit the public sector borrowing requirement, which does not separate capital and revenue, we shall be in this mess for ever. I am pleased that the hon. Gentleman recognises that, I know that other Labour Members recognise it, and I hope that we can convince other hon. Members of the need for it. Studies have shown that that will bring more money into housing--not just public money but private money. We all want to see that happen.
There is disagreement about how we should deal with those matters, and about who should deal with them. I believe in local control. I recognise that the Government have put a lot of time and money into schemes that hon. Members have talked about tonight. In my role as the Liberal Democrat spokesman on housing, I try to get out and see what is happening in the country. I know that there are good regeneration schemes--there just are not enough. As we have heard, the schemes that are in place are good but so many other people need their homes to be improved.
Local authorities are in the best position to know what they need in their area. I would like the Government to keep a less tight rein on who will get the money and enable local councils to invest in their areas. During the debate on the recent housing legislation, we spoke about the need to allow local authorities to get private money. If they know what the need is, and if there are regulations to ensure that that spending does not go through the roof, we shall get more sensible investment and some of the severe need will be met.
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