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21 Apr 2004 : Column 492W—continued

DEPUTY PRIME MINISTER

Regional Assemblies

8. Mr. Grogan: To ask the Deputy Prime Minister what assessment he has made of the effect on business of elected regional assemblies in the north of England. [166261]

Phil Hope: Improving the economic performance of the northern regions will be at the heart of the objectives of elected regional assemblies. Business will be actively involved in, and benefit from, the work of the assemblies—including economic development, planning, housing, transport, employment, and training and skills.

Deprived Communities

9. Ms Munn: To ask the Deputy Prime Minister what action his Department is taking to make deprived communities better places to live. [166262]

Yvette Cooper: The Government have introduced a range of new programmes backed by substantial investment to improve disadvantaged areas, including the Neighbourhood Renewal Fund, Sure Start and neighbourhood wardens.

Independent research published this week shows crime in warden areas has dropped by 28 per cent.

Housing

10. Mr. Jack: To ask the Deputy Prime Minister what studies his Department will be making of the impact of his latest housing policies on the north-west of England. [166263R]

Keith Hill: The Government's housing policies are encapsulated in the Sustainable Communities Plan. With four of the nine Housing Market Renewal Pathfinders located in the north-west, the region is set to benefit from £332 million over the next two years. A full programme evaluation for the pathfinder programme is to be commissioned. In addition, a full review of North West Regional Planning Guidance will start later this year, and will give further consideration to housing provision.

11. Mr. Blizzard: To ask the Deputy Prime Minister what plans he has to increase the amount of affordable housing for rent in rural areas. [166264]

Keith Hill: The target for approvals of rural housing in small settlements within the Housing Corporation's Approved Development Programme has been increased from 800 in 2000–01 to 3,500 over the two years 2004–05 and 2005–06. The target for these two years has been exceeded by about 500 in the programme announced last month. The programme includes homes for both rent and low cost home ownership.
 
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Mr. Ben Chapman: To ask the Deputy Prime Minister if he will make a statement on the effect of changes in the level of council funding for housing upon residents of Wirral, South since 1997. [166635]

Mr. Frank Field: To ask the Deputy Prime Minister how the change in the level of council funding for housing has affected the residents of Birkenhead since 1997. [166214]

Phil Hope: Since 1997 allocations of capital funding to local authorities for housing purposes have risen consistently by about 15 per cent. per annum on average. This includes the Major Repairs Allowance the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister introduced in 2001–02 specifically for the improvement of local authority stock alongside the Decent Homes standard which sets out minimum standards to be met by 2010. Wirral's allocations in the period 1997 to 2003–04 have risen by over 140 per cent. In addition to this welcome increase there is support through the Community Housing Task Force and Government Office for the North West to help the local authority and its tenants to choose the best strategy for long term improvement.

Matthew Green: To ask the Deputy Prime Minister if he will list those respondents to the consultation paper on licensing houses in multiple occupation (HMOs) who (a) supported and (b) opposed the proposal to introduce a duty of care on the owners and managers of all HMOs to ensure the health and safety of their tenants. [166201]

Keith Hill: A total of 579 responses were received on the 1999 consultation paper on Licensing of Houses in Multiple Occupation in England. 363 of them expressed no views on the proposal to introduce a duty of care on the owners and managers of HMOs.

The five who were opposed to the proposal were:

The 211 respondents in favour of the proposal were:


 
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Mr. Hopkins: To ask the Deputy Prime Minister what steps he is taking to help local authorities to rehouse families on the housing waiting list. [166259]

Yvette Cooper: Local authorities are no longer required to hold 'housing waiting lists', and are now required to allocate housing following their published allocation scheme. In November 2002, my right hon. Friend the Deputy Prime Minister issued a revised Code of Guidance on the Allocation of Accommodation; this encourages local authorities to provide housing applicants with a choice of accommodation in their allocation scheme.

The Office of the Deputy Prime Minister announced a major new affordable house building programme worth nearly £3.5 billion over this and next year, and we are allocating £260 million over 2003–04 to 2005–06 to tackle homelessness.

Mr. Betts: To ask the Deputy Prime Minister what the (a) level of housing basic credit approvals (as included in HIP allocations), (b) volume of reserved capital receipts from Right to Buy, (c) volume of usable capital receipts from Right to Buy and (d) capital receipts used by local authorities for housing investment were for (i) each local authority with a housing revenue account and (ii) England for (A) 1990–91, (B) 2000–01, (C) 2001–02, (D) 2002–03 and (E) 2003–04. [166637]

Keith Hill: Information on (a) local authority capital allocations since 1990–91 is available in the Library of the House.

The information requested at (b) , (c) and (d) , with the exception that no information is available yet for the year 2003–04, has been made available in the Library of the House.

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