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17 Dec 2007 : Column 1141W—continued
Prior to 2006-07, local authorities were provided with SCE for the renewal of private sector housing combined with that for their own stock. In the table
therefore the SCE for private sector renewal is included in the council housing column as it cannot be disaggregated until 2006-07.
For registered social landlords the table includes capital expenditure via Housing Corporation which is for new supply and gap funding for stock transfers. Home ownership schemes are a subset of Housing Corporation capital investment.
Mr. Austin Mitchell: To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government where surpluses accruing nationally from housing revenue accounts have been allocated in each year since 1997; and from which of the departmental budgets national housing revenue accounts have been financed in the same years. [165555]
Yvette Cooper: Until 2004-05, the housing revenue account subsidy system contained two distinct elements; the ‘bricks and mortar’ element where assumed spend and income on local authority housing was used to calculate the authority’s entitlement to this element of subsidy and the rent rebate element.
Prior to 1 April 2004, if the bricks and mortar element of HRA subsidy was in surplus, that surplus was applied to the housing benefit bill of the local authority. This practice was discontinued in 2004-05. Any surplus still remaining was transferred to the authority’s general fund.
The bricks and mortar element of the HRA subsidy system has been in deficit nationally since 2001-02, when this Government was first able to change the local authority housing spending plans it had inherited from the previous administration.
HRA subsidy expenditure is scored in Communities and Local Government against the ‘HRA subsidy programme’ budget, which is classified as annually managed expenditure, reflecting the demand led, volatile nature of HRA subsidy entitlement at a national level.
Housing: Low Incomes
Dr. Gibson: To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government (1) if she will commission research into the accuracy of decisions being made by private companies providing paper-based assessments of the vulnerability of homeless applicants, housing medical assessments and decisions on disabled facilities grant applications; [173763]
(2) if she will issue guidance on the methodology to be adopted by private medical assessors providing paper-based homelessness vulnerability assessments, housing medical assessments and decisions on disabled facilities grant applications. [173765]
Mr. Iain Wright: I refer my hon. Friend to the answer I gave today to Questions 169433 and 169434.
Housing: Solar Power
Mr. Lancaster: To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government when she plans to publish the new planning guidance for the installation of domestic solar panels. [167565]
Yvette Cooper: We published on 30 November the Government response to the consultation on permitted development rights for householder microgeneration. The Government have decided that the main types of microgeneration technology, including solar, will be permitted development subject to certain conditions and limits to reduce impacts on neighbours. Our aim is to deliver these changes through amendments to secondary legislation in April of next year.
Housing: Standards
Grant Shapps: To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government what targets the Government set for house building in each of the last 10 years; how many houses were built in each of the last 10 years; and if she will make a statement.[165777]
Mr. Iain Wright: Detailed housing targets are not directly set by government, but are set out in regional and local plans which are developed through regional and local planning processes.
However, Government do set the overall strategy for housing supply in England, and have announced several targets for supply in recent years. For example, the Government’s response to the 2005 Barker Review of Housing Supply announced an ambition to increase housing supply from around 150,000 to 200,000 per annum by 2016.
Most recently, the Housing Green Paper, published in July, set out a target to increase housing supply to 240,000 additional homes per annum by 2016.
The number of new homes built in each of the last 10 years is set out in the following table. The information is also published on the Communities and Local Government website:
The Housing Green Paper commitment is measured against net additional dwellings (new build plus gains and losses from conversions, change of use and demolitions). The latest figures for 2005-06 show 185,000 net addition dwellings delivered in England.
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