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30 Apr 2009 : Column 1396W—continued
Grant Shapps: To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government (1) what additional funding will be provided to the Homebuy Direct scheme as a result of the Budget 2009; and how many additional homes it is expected to purchase; [271379]
(2) how many homes she expects to be purchased under the Homebuy Direct scheme in each of the next three years. [271380]
Margaret Beckett: I announced in December 2008 that sufficient funding had been made available to help up to 18,000 first-time buyers enter affordable home ownership through the HomeBuy Direct scheme by the end of 2009-10. The actual number of transactions will depend on take-up.
£400 million of additional funding will be made available as a result of the Budget to unlock currently stalled housing developments, leveraging in private development finance through a combination of reducing up-front costs with equity, gap and infrastructure funding, and additional funding for social and affordable housing. We estimate that this will provide up to 5,000 properties over the next two years to help first-time buyers, including through our HomeBuy Direct and Rent to HomeBuy schemes. The precise amount of additional funding provided to the HomeBuy Direct scheme will depend on the sites that come forward from developers, and ultimately on take-up by buyers.
Grant Shapps: To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government pursuant to the answer of 23 April 2009, Official Report, columns 886-87W, on housing: low incomes, how much of the funding originally intended for allocation to local authorities in 2010-11 has been brought forward for use in (a) 2008-09 and (b) 2009-10. [272109]
Mr. Khan: Communities and Local Government brought forward £1,475 million from 2010-11 as a result of initiatives announced in the September Housing Package and pre-Budget report. £250 million of this had been allocated for the Decent Homes programme. £130 has been brought forward to 2008-09 and £120 million to 2009-10.
In addition, the Department has already allocated £162 million to local authorities from a total pot of up to £175 million brought forward from 2010-11 to 2009-10 to accelerate major repairs to council housing stock.
Grant Shapps: To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government how many new build social homes were built in each (a) region and (b) local authority area in each year since 1997. [272208]
Mr. Iain Wright: A table showing the number of new homes built for social rent by region and local authority for each year from 1997-98 has been deposited in the Library.
The social rent new build figures are from the Homes and Communities Agency Investment Management System (IMS), and Housing Strategy Statistical Appendix (HSSA) returns and P2 house building returns submitted to CLG by local authorities.
Not all social rented housing is provided by new build completions, as some supply can come from acquisitions. For example, an additional 3,980 social rented homes were acquired in England in 2007-08; these are not included in the table.
Housing: Planning Permission
Grant Shapps: To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government how many applications for planning permission to build new dwellings were (a) made and (b) granted in the last 20 quarters for which figures are available. [272100]
Mr. Iain Wright: Information on the number of applications for planning permission to build new dwellings in the last 20 quarters is not held centrally.
The number of planning permissions granted to build new dwellings for the last 20 quarters in England is shown in the following table:
| Period | Number granted (thousand) |
| Source: Communities and Local Government General Development Control Returns PS2/PSF | |
Housing: Prices
Grant Shapps: To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government what the average house price in 2008-09 prices was in each region in each of the last 10 years. [270683]
Mr. Iain Wright: Communities and Local Government currently have house price data up to February 2009. The following table shows regional mix-adjusted house prices at 2008 prices calculated using regional mix-adjusted average purchase prices of domestic dwellings based on data from the Regulated Mortgage Survey and the ONS Retail Prices Index.
| Mix-adjusted house prices by region at 2008 prices | ||||||||||
| North East | North West | Yorkshire and the Humber | East Midlands | West Midlands | East | London | South East | South West | England | |
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