The Royal College of Psychiatrists, in its recent report, Whole Person Care, describes parity as,
“valuing mental health equally with physical health”.
Equality is certainly the principle which underpins parity. As the noble Baroness, Lady O’Neill, said, equality is not just how we think about mental and physical healthcare but how they are valued. Parity of esteem is not just an abstract concept. It is the subject of an active and ongoing programme between the Department of Health and its system partners, dedicated to closing the gap with physical health services and to translating rhetoric into reality. We made our commitment explicit in the Health and Social Care Act 2012, as my noble friend Lord McColl reminded us, where we enshrined in law the equal importance of mental health alongside physical health. My noble friend Lord Alderdice was right to say that this explicit statement in statute does matter.
The noble Baroness, Lady Warwick, asked how we will improve the skills of GPs and the ability of CCGs to commission mental health services. We have made putting mental health on a par with physical health one of NHS England’s key priorities, as well as ensuring that everyone who needs it has timely access to the best available treatment. The mandate to NHS England is strong on mental health. It makes it clear that everyone who needs it should have that timely access to evidence-based services, and I can tell noble Lords that we are determined that mental health should play a similarly pivotal role in the forthcoming refresh of the mandate for 2014-15. Of course this needs investment, a point which again was made by the noble Baroness,
Lady Warwick. We must remember the role of government here: as she knows, the Government set the outcomes that they expect the NHS to achieve in the NHS outcomes framework. There are a number of outcomes specifically for people with mental health problems and others about the quality of services, and patients’ experience of them, which apply equally to mental health services.
One crucial measure is that of excess mortality. It is up to commissioners to prioritise their resources to meet these outcomes for the population, based on assessments of health need, while taking into account the mandates requirement to make demonstrable progress in achieving parity of esteem for mental health services. We will hold the NHS to account for the quality of services and outcomes for mental health patients through the outcomes framework but it is worth noting that in 2011-12, the total invested in mental health services for working-age adults was £6.629 billion, or £193.30 per head of weighted working-age population.
The noble Lord, Lord Layard, my noble friend Lady Tyler and the noble Lord, Lord Hunt of Kings Heath, raised waiting times for mental health and the noble Baroness, Lady Meacher, was particularly concerned about waiting times for children. We are clear that mental health treatment should be available for those who need it and we have asked NHS England, through the current mandate to the NHS, to look into waiting times for mental health treatments. We will be expecting progress on this and my honourable friend Norman Lamb will be taking a close interest in the progress that is made.
The noble Baroness, Lady Murphy, reminded us that too many people with mental health problems die prematurely. We know that people living with significant or persistent mental illness have significantly reduced health and quality of life. They live on average 16 to 25 years less than the general population. That is why reducing premature death in people with serious mental illness is defined as an improvement area in the NHS outcomes framework and why the NHS operating framework specifically focuses on the physical healthcare of people affected by mental illness for the coming year.
The noble Lord, Lord Adebowale, reminded us of the disproportionate burden of mental illness experienced by people from BME communities. We know that black and African-Caribbean men are more likely to be detained under the Mental Health Act. The reasons for this are complex. I can present him with no simple answers; we recognise that more work needs to be done to establish the causes of higher rates of mental illness in some communities and how communities access early intervention services. We are in discussion with a number of BME leaders and influencers on this. I recognise the concerns about incidents in recent years where someone with a mental health condition has either died or been seriously injured after police contact. I welcome the report of the independent review led by the noble Lord, Lord Adebowale, and I echo his view that it is important to get to the truth of matters with clarity of focus and to remove any excuses for not taking the chance to improve practice.
I listened with care to the noble Baroness, Lady Murphy, who called for more psychiatrists. We are supporting local organisations in taking effective action to improve mental health. Our mental health strategy and implementation framework and our suicide prevention strategy focus on specific actions which specific local organisations can take to improve mental health across the life course in their areas. We are investing more than £400 million to give thousands of people, in all areas of the country, access to NICE-approved psychological therapies. The mandate to NHS England makes it clear, as I have said, that everyone who needs it should have timely access to evidence-based services. This will involve extending and ensuring more open access to the Improving Access to Psychological Therapies programmes, in particular for children and young people and for those out of work. My honourable friend the Minister of State for Care Services will be meeting system partners monthly to ensure that IAPT is being delivered.
My noble friends Lady Tyler and Lord Carlile and the noble Baroness, Lady Meacher, spoke about the importance of parity for children and adolescents. Children’s mental health is a priority for the Government. We are investing £54 million over four years in the Children and Young People’s Improving Access to Psychological Therapies programme, giving children and young people improved and timely access to the best mental health care. It will of course be up to NHS England, working with local commissioners, to decide how to spend this money in the most effective way.
Parity is also core business for the reformed health and care system. Key bodies within the system are addressing this. NHS England is working with national clinical directors and others to develop a programme of work with the dual objectives of delivering parity of esteem across the health and care system and supporting NHS England, as an employer, to promote parity of esteem. The priorities here include: support for people with mental health problems following early diagnosis, particularly through appropriate use of primary care and supporting the roll-out of health checks; ensuring people have access to the right treatment at the right time; and measuring and publicising outcome data for all major services by 2015. In other words, they are making every contact with patients count. There will be a statement very soon from NHS England on this. I obviously cannot pre-empt that here but it will set out the detail of this programme of work.
In that context, I pick up a point made by the noble Lord, Lord Stone, about NICE. NICE clinical guidelines are, I put it to him, in no way inferior products to technology appraisals; they often perform a valuable role in putting NICE’s technology appraisal recommendations into the context of the overall care pathway for patients.
My noble friend Lord Carlile rightly emphasised the importance of attending to the mental health of the elderly, but here again it is right for me to point out that the mental health strategy No Health Without Mental Health is an all-age strategy: that is the approach that it adopts and it means that its focus is equally on all members of the population from the young to the old—all are equally important.
My noble friend Lady Tyler spoke about those with complex needs, particularly those who indulge in alcohol and drug misuse. Improving co-ordination between mental health, drugs and alcohol services is vital for improving outcomes for the most vulnerable and excluded. Practitioners may also be involved in the design, planning and delivery of high quality services and are well placed to help GPs and local partners in commissioning high quality services.
My noble friend Lord Carlile spoke of the need for therapists in the community and I listened with care to what he said. Secondary mental health services have been reorganised to improve care in the community and in hospital and timely care and treatment is increasingly offered in the most suitable and least restrictive environment. Even though there are more people being treated in secondary mental health services, the proportion who needed to be admitted to in-patient psychiatric care fell by 2.9% in 2010-11. Acute beds have got to be there for those who need them, but providers have a responsibility to listen to patients and offer care in the community as well as in hospital.
Public Health England is embedding mental health across its work, including developing a national programme for public health mental health. This will support No Health Without Mental Health, prioritising the promotion of mental well-being, the prevention of mental health problems, the prevention of suicide and the promotion of well-being for people living with and recovering from mental illness. I refer to an issue raised by the noble Lord, Lord Hunt, about a focus on reducing smoking. Public Health England’s work plan in relation to mental health and well-being will include a specific part on smoking cessation.
The noble Baroness, Lady Murphy, and my noble friend Lord Alderdice spoke about suicides. Suicide rates in England are low compared to those in other European countries but we are not complacent about these figures, which is why we launched the new suicide prevention strategy in September of last year. The strategy can help sustain and reduce further the relatively low rates. As well as targeting high-risk groups, improving the mental health of the whole population can, of course, prevent suicide and the mental health strategy has that all-population approach, as I mentioned earlier.
Supporting parity is also a key objective of Health Education England. The Government’s mandate to Health Education England recognises the importance of professional culture to achieving parity. It tasks them with ensuring that the mental health workforce has the skills and values to improve services and to promote a culture of recovery and aspiration for their patients. It also notes the importance of mental health awareness in the wider health workforce. My noble friend Lady Tyler argued that maternity services need to look for early signs of mental ill health; I do, of course, agree with that. Mental health is a matter for all health professionals including midwives and health visitors. The Government’s mandate to Health Education England includes the commitment to ensure that all healthcare staff are equipped to treat mental and physical conditions with equal priority.
The noble Lord, Lord Layard, referred to the need for research. As a prerequisite for parity of esteem, ensuring that we have the right data, the right measures, is absolutely essential. One of the most important roles the centre can play is gathering and distributing information about mental health in order to inform evidence-based commissioning and service delivery and that is why NHS England and Public Health England are jointly working to establish a national mental health intelligence network which will be a key driver of continuous improvement in mental health intelligence and information. The noble Lord, Lord Hunt, asked whether the Government are discontinuing the adult psychiatric morbidity survey. The department and the Health & Social Care Information Centre are currently discussing plans for the next survey which should take place in 2014.
My noble friend Lord Carlile spoke about stigma. True parity also requires a shift in attitudes, not just in service providers but across society as a whole. That is why we are investing up to £16 million in the Time to Change programme, supplemented by a further £4 million from Comic Relief. This ground-breaking programme works to empower people to talk about mental health problems and to tackle the discrimination that they face. We aim to make Time to Change reach 29 million people and increase the confidence of 100,000 people with mental health problems to challenge stigma and discrimination.
I say to the noble Lord, Lord Bragg, that the mental health needs of people in the workplace have not been overlooked. Helping people with mental illness find and sustain work is a priority across the health and care system. A measure of employment for people with mental health problems features in all three outcomes frameworks. We are also challenging the stigma and discrimination experienced by people with mental health problems, as I mentioned, in the Time to Change programme and I regard that programme as very much aimed at employers and those whom they employ.
The noble Lord, Lord Layard, suggested that there should be a Cabinet Minister for mental health. While there is not a Cabinet Minister whose sole responsibility is mental health, this does form an important part of the portfolio of the Minister for Care and Support, my colleague Norman Lamb, and I know that this is also one of his personal priorities. We are actively encouraging every government department to pledge its support for the Time to Change campaign and ensure that mental health issues are taken into consideration in policy-making and planning across government.
I hope that the noble Lord, Lord Layard, will think I am right to celebrate some of the achievements to date, but the scale of the challenge ahead should not be underestimated. It will require significant changes to the way mental health services are delivered locally, based on a clear understanding of local needs and with the accent firmly on delivering better outcomes for users. There are exceptional services that others can learn from, but as we move forward a focal point must be more effective collaboration between public services, to enable early identification of mental health problems and to provide more co-ordinated care.
In that context, I pick up a point raised by the noble Lord, Lord Stone, about the police and their interactions with those with mental health issues. I referred to this briefly earlier. We know that we have to have an effective emergency mental health response system in place and we have asked all the relevant organisations, including the Home Office and the Association of Chief Police Officers, to draw up an agreed plan to tackle this problem. Street triage teams, currently being piloted around the country, partner mental health clinicians with police officers to attend emergency responses involving those with suspected mental health problems.
Of course, more needs to be done for acute and crisis care, a point made by the noble Lord, Lord Adebowale. Improving acute mental health services is a key priority for the Government, as identified in the first mandate to NHS England and underpinned by the outcomes framework. As I have said, we are clear that where someone needs an acute bed, it has to be there for them and there has been significant capital investment in the mental health in-patient environment in the past decade.
All of this matters, because achieving parity is a challenge which extends far beyond health and social care. It requires a genuinely cross-government approach, involving all aspects of public service delivery as well as many partners across the voluntary sector. Momentum is gathering and over the months to come I am confident that we will progress further and faster towards our end goal.
2.34 pm
Lord Layard: My Lords, I thank everyone who has spoken in this substantial debate. We have had 15 excellent contributions and somehow, miraculously, they have been almost entirely complementary to each other, so in some way we have written a pretty good textbook on the subject in these three hours. As everyone has said, this issue is a massive problem, which is why we are all extremely grateful to the Minister for taking this problem seriously today, and indeed I know that he takes it seriously on all occasions.
I am grateful for what people have said and I agreed with almost everything, including most of what the noble Baroness, Lady Murphy, said, on which I, too, would like to comment. It is quite misleading to suppose that there is something called the mental health budget, which is then allocated between psychotic illness and common mental health problems. We have never argued for more expenditure on anxiety and depression at the expense of severe mental illness. What we have pointed out is the remarkable fact that a mentally ill person with a physical illness of given severity costs the NHS 50% more in physical healthcare than someone without mental illness in the same physical condition. If we can cure the mental illness or alleviate it, there is an awful lot to be saved on unnecessary physical healthcare.
Most commissioners should be able to fund the extra psychological therapy out of the savings that they can expect from their physical healthcare bills, particularly their references to the secondary sector. One could document how those are affected immediately
when someone’s mental health improves. There is a huge amount of evidence on all that. On top of that, of course, taking the Government as a whole, there are the savings on benefits and lost taxes. When we can say that it certainly costs the Government—and probably costs local commissioners—nothing to expand treatment for people with depression and anxiety disorders, which are extremely serious problems, it makes no sense to say that we should be concentrating only on people with even more serious problems. Both groups must be helped.
As I said, there have been many wonderful speeches. I thought that the letter read out by the noble Baroness, Lady O’Neill, really says it all; it caught the basic point that everyone is making. I was also delighted when the noble Lord, Lord Alderdice, raised the issue of the comparative suffering from mental and physical pain. I have been trying to look into that topic and have found quite a lot of research on it. Many studies show that when people are asked how happy they are with their lives and then record the different dimensions of their health situation, it is found that mental pain reduces happiness more on average than physical illness. In a way, we have to justify our argument for parity of esteem, and I think that that is the justification: these are extremely serious conditions affecting the well-being of the people affected. Many people have made that point, and it is a central argument for parity.
I think that if in decades hence we look back on where we are today, we shall be able to see a lot of progress. I think that people will be amazed when they look at how mentally ill people were treated, even now, and they will find it quite difficult, just like we find it difficult to believe how slaves and so on were treated, to believe that we treated mentally ill people with as much blindness and cruelty as we have been up till recently.
Housing: Co-operative Housing
Motion to Take Note
2.34 pm
Moved by Lord Kennedy of Southwark
That this House takes note of the development of the co-operative housing sector in the United Kingdom.
Lord Kennedy of Southwark (Lab): My Lords, it is with great pleasure that I open this debate on the co-operative housing sector in the United Kingdom. I congratulate the noble Baroness, Lady Stowell of Beeston, on her appointment as Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State at the Department for Communities and Local Government. In her time in this House she has proved herself to be an able communicator at the Dispatch Box, and I wish her well in her new job and the great responsibilities that it brings.
It is also a great pleasure for me to speak in this House as a Labour and Co-operative Member of the House of Lords. The Labour Party and the Co-operative Party have an electoral agreement going back to 1927, and today there are 32 Labour and Co-operative MPs
and 17 Labour and Co-operative Lords. The Co-operative Party can quite rightly claim to be the fourth largest party in Parliament.
I have been a co-operator all my adult life, and I firmly believe that co-operation and co-operative values and principles are playing an increasingly important part in the economy, business and the community and have a really important role to play in the social housing sector. I grew up in social housing in the 1960s and 1970s, and as a family we were very lucky: we always lived in a home that was warm, safe and dry. Southwark Council, as the biggest social landlord in London and one of the biggest in the country, always sought to deliver for its residents in often very challenging circumstances.
I believe that everyone should have access to a home that is decent, safe and affordable to buy or rent and to maintain or run. I am delighted at the commitment that Mr Ed Miliband made to build more homes by 2020. Homes are desperately needed by young families, older people and key workers. The present situation is desperate, with demand far outstripping supply. House building is at its lowest ebb since the 1920s. Struggling families are being squeezed by house prices beyond their means, rising rents, housing benefit cuts and inaccessible mortgages.
The crisis in the supply of and access to affordable housing is a major political and social issue facing the country. It is of particular concern to the many squeezed households for whom the only housing option is high-cost, low quality, insecure private rented housing. A growing number of people are worried about the ability of their children to afford a decent home. Increasing numbers of newly formed households are stuck in the high-cost private rented sector, and do not consider that they will ever be able to buy a home of their own.
There has been a decline in the number of first-time buyers. Saving the now typical 20% deposit required for first-time buyers to buy their first home is currently impossible for many working households. Statutory homelessness is increasing, and ever greater numbers of people are being forced into substandard housing. Poor housing is linked to poor health and poor educational outcomes, leading to increased costs to the state.
The post-crisis landscape presents all concerned with affordable housing supply with new challenges that demand new solutions. The role of co-operative housing models in meeting those challenges has not been recognised. Co-operative housing could be making a contribution to achieving a housing supply that was more stable and sustainable. Around 10% of Europeans live in housing co-operatives, compared to 0.6% in the UK. This alone shows the contribution that housing co-operatives can make.
There are different models of co-operative housing available, giving the opportunity to deliver housing tailored to local need, be it developing market-value mutual retirement co-operatives specifically designed for the changing needs of older people or to meet the housing needs of students and young people, or limited equity co-operatives for squeezed families priced out of the housing market. The work to achieve this needs to be inspired and kick-started by government action,
better access to finance and local authorities supporting co-operative housing projects to deliver solutions in each of these areas.
There are three types of housing co-operatives that the Government should seek to support: market-value co-operatives, where members are free to trade their legal right of occupation at a free market price, subject to the rules of the co-operative, giving older people the opportunity to release capital and move into a home that can be adapted to their changing needs while also gaining assistance from other members of their co-operative community; limited-equity co-operatives, such as mutual home ownership, where members own a limited equity stake, allowing squeezed families currently stuck in the private rented sector unable to get on to the housing ladder a chance to build property equity; and rental co-operatives in which members rent their home, having democratic control over service budgets and how their homes are managed, but do not have an equity stake, which offer an affordable alternative to those who wish to have greater freedom and control over their housing.
In the UK, the role of community land trusts has emerged with the potential to provide a better balance of housing supply. They work in rural and urban areas and are a flexible tool to meet a variety of community needs. They offer not only a number of options for rent and low-cost home ownership, but also provide a mechanism for generating an income stream for reinvestment by the community. In areas where a rising population, economic investment and limited stocks of affordable homes threaten to exclude people from the areas in which they live and work, community land trusts could ensure a supply of affordable housing through the control of housing costs and resale prices.
This model can make a significant contribution to the supply of homes. It separates the cost of the land from the purchase price by taking it out of the market place through a community land trust. It ensures affordability through flexible monthly payments that are based on an affordable percentage of income. Any public subsidy is locked in and preserved for future generations due to the structure of equity arrangements.
Unlike individual home ownership, where residents have a personal mortgage loan to buy a home, homes in this case are financed by a corporate loan borrowed by the co-operative. The value of the buildings is divided into shares. When members leave the co-operative they are entitled to take the equity that they have built up with them. The net value of the shares is calculated by reference to a fair valuation formula set out in the departing members’ occupancy agreement or lease, which is the same for all members. The valuation formula in the lease requires resident members to look on property ownership in a new and different way. Mutual home owners will be at far less risk of falling into negative equity, where their houses are worth less than the outstanding mortgage loan. They will also have the benefit of lower transaction costs when they move into and out of their home.
There needs to be greater understanding by national and local government of the role that these models can play in bringing balance back into meeting the goal of everyone being able to find and afford a decent
home in a good neighbourhood. There is a growing body of evidence to show that housing co-operatives are good for people and society. In particular, studies show that co-operatives outperform all other types of social landlord on all measures of performance. They create housing in neighbourhoods that are socially, economically and environmentally sustainable. Housing remains community-owned and affordable for future generations. Their grassroots nature helps co-operatives to create community buy-in. They help to maintain the independence of older residents through mutual aid and support, reducing the demand on the state.
With community support, co-operatives can achieve more for less by helping to bring into use public land assets that would otherwise not be developed for housing. Co-operatives have the capacity to increase the supply of housing that is genuinely affordable for working households, enabling the Government to deliver greater numbers of affordable homes.
Co-operatives contributing an average of 25,000 additional new affordable homes per year over the next two Parliaments is a realistic and achievable vision if it is given the support needed. Given the right framework for success and proper support from the Government, people could have the opportunity to participate in creating co-operatives to help meet local housing needs. Through their active involvement they will be committed to making their locality the best that it can be.
Co-operatives and mutual forms of ownership can ensure that homes remain permanently affordable and give residents an equity stake. Instead of paying increasingly high rents for housing over which they have little control, people could enjoy housing that benefits them and wider society. Through housing co-operatives and other mutual organisations, tenants and residents have taken control over decisions that affect their lives and created strong and cohesive communities.
All the available evidence shows that co-operative forms of housing perform well in terms of value for money compared to housing association and local authority provision of housing. Additionally, they have proved themselves to be a successful model of genuine community empowerment, providing a range of social and community benefits due to the large framework of mutual support that they create.
Lack of secure tenure has emerged as a big issue with the growth of the buy-to-let market. In a co-operative, the members are in control and have the security of their democratic rights and the security of the contract, which currently has to be a tenancy because of a lack of appropriate co-op housing legislation. In a co-op, a long-term, enduring right of occupation of a member’s home is always granted. This can be ended only if the member is in breach of its terms and the co-op has obtained an order for possession from the court. This is a very secure form of occupancy. Although not protected by statute, it has the protection of a member’s democratic rights.
Local authorities have a vital role to play in restoring balance to the supply of housing in their areas. The strengths and weaknesses of the housing supply situation vary from authority to authority, and across the country
and in different localities. There is a marked difference between the north and the south of England, and in Scotland and Wales.
Co-op housing is a model of community housing to which people will aspire because of the significant benefits it brings. Councils need to develop an understanding of the different ways in which co-operative housing models can help them fulfil their responsibility to ensure a balance in the mix of housing available in their areas and to achieve strong communities. Local councils have the power to help, through ensuring that their local development frameworks include references to the development of community land trusts and co-operative mutual housing models as a means of increasing affordable housing.
Where local authorities hold ballots on stock transfers, residents should have the option to vote for community-led stock transfers under a co-operative model, such as the community mutual, which was developed by the think tank Mutuo, is endorsed by the Welsh Assembly and offers active membership opportunities to all tenants, the community gateway model, which was developed by the Confederation of Co-operative Housing and Co-operatives UK—there are currently community gateway housing mutuals in Preston, Watford, Lewisham and Braintree—or a hybrid mutual scheme such as has been developed in Rochdale.
Local authorities, housing associations and housing mutuals can also convert to a mixed-tenure version. Residents in this type of mutual home-ownership development would be able to start on a standard rented tenancy with the right to buy equity shares as and when their income permitted them to do so. They would have the right to participate in the democratic governance of their home just like any other member of the mutual. The right to buy equity would mean that the home would not become unaffordable for future generations of occupants.
In some areas, tenants will prefer their housing to remain under local authority control. Where this is the case, tenants could be encouraged and assisted to form tenant management co-operatives to take control of the management of the council-owned housing in their neighbourhood. The right to manage could be extended to housing- association tenants, who could also be given the support and encouragement to take over control and management of their homes through management co-operatives.
The Government have an important role. Among other things, it includes recognising co-operative housing in law and placing a duty on local councils and the Homes and Communities Agency to promote mutual housing and report annually on how they are doing. It is important to ensure that new co-operative homes are as affordable as possible for squeezed working households.
I could go on. We are in a housing crisis. Co-operative housing has an important role to play in helping to solve the crisis. It is for both local and national government to recognise the important role that they can play, and to provide support and the tools to do the job. I look forward to contributions from all noble Lords in this debate, to which we will come back again and again. I beg to move.
2.47 pm
Baroness Eaton (Con): My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Kennedy of Southwark, for initiating this debate. I also warmly welcome my noble friend Lady Stowell to the Dispatch Box.
In the past 25 years the co-operative housing movement has demonstrated that the application of the co-operative principles to the provision and management of housing delivers cost-effective housing services and creates sustainable communities. As the noble Lord, Lord Kennedy, has said, in spite of its proven benefits the housing co-operative sector remains small.
Housing co-operatives are concerned to ensure that members are educated and informed about the principles and practices of co-operation. This can be demonstrated in a concrete way. One example of the success of a tenant management co-operative is in Glasgow. It dramatically illustrates the benefits of housing co-operatives. The Speirs Housing Management Co-operative has successfully managed its council-owned housing at the end of one street for 20 years. It is a vibrant community contributing to the wider regeneration of the neighbourhood. At the other end of the street, council-managed housing, which has received the same capital investment as that managed by Speirs, has been vandalised, abandoned and ultimately demolished. This is a classic demonstration of best value being delivered by a housing co-operative.
The various types and models of co-operative and mutual housing operate across a range of tenures. The various forms of co-operative and community-led housing are united by having a democratic community membership that has control over their housing in some way. It is from this community membership that the benefits derive.
There are many social and community benefits to providing homes through co-operative and mutual housing, including: the development of community self-responsibility and self-help; much higher levels of satisfaction compared to other housing providers; good, if not better, management, quicker repairs, and so on; provision of forms of intermediate housing that could be attractive to those who would formerly have been first-time buyers; development of local care and community support networks that combat loneliness and help to support active, independent living; and the development of local community vision and of entrepreneurialism, which often inspire people who would not otherwise have been motivated to make local change.
There are a number of models of co-operative housing, some of which have already been mentioned by the noble Lord. Ownership housing co-operatives are co-ops that are owned, managed and controlled democratically by their members and tenants, and usually all tenants are members of the co-op. The majority of ownership co-ops are, at least partially, funded through the government organisation the Housing Corporation, which monitors them in the same way as housing associations. Ownership co-ops are traditionally quite small, but they give the greatest amount of control of any of the housing co-op models. Research carried out in 1996 found that they were the most successful housing providers in the country. We have
tenant management organisations—TMOs—which are democratic organisations that are formed by tenants to take on the management of their homes. Council tenants have a legal right—the right to manage—and access to specific funding that enables them to set up a co-op. These regulations were simplified for everyone’s benefit in 2012.
A management co-op has a management agreement with their landlord—the council or housing association, or in some cases both—and receives a management allowance that enables it to run the co-op. Self-build co-operatives are housing organisations where the tenants have been involved in the building of the properties. The labour that they put into the building of the properties gives them equity, and they pay rent for the rest. We also have short-life co-operatives. These take over properties that are in some way unlettable, for a fixed period of time that can sometimes extend for many years. The co-op does not own the properties but has a lease with the landlords. Tenant-controlled housing associations also have a major contribution to make. There are a small number of housing associations registered with the Housing Corporation which are tenant-controlled, having a majority of tenants on the board of the association alongside other representatives.
If your Lordships are particularly interested in specific examples of co-operative housing, Redditch Co-operative Homes provides new-build affordable housing through a co-operative. Winyates Co-operative, one of the self-managed neighbourhoods in Redditch, won an award for innovation and excellence in 2010 and currently manages 57 properties in an area that is home to approximately 14,650 people. Kensington and Chelsea TMO manages around 10,000 properties on behalf of the council and is also an ALMO, which was set up in 1996. Rochdale Boroughwide Housing, formed in 2012, took over housing formerly run by the council. It is a membership organisation owned by staff and tenants and is a charitable registered provider of social housing. The organisation owns and acts as landlord for 13,700 homes in the borough.
The Government are particularly interested in and concerned about tenant involvement in housing, and the Homes and Communities Agency has issued a regulatory framework that places a focus on co-regulation. This means that landlords are responsible for the delivery of housing in line with regulatory standards. It also means that tenants should have opportunities to shape service delivery and to hold the responsible boards and councillors to account. There is a standard on tenant involvement. The HCA is responsible for enforcing proactively against all standards for registered providers. Local authorities are required to meet the consumer standards set out in the framework. However, the HCA will intervene only in cases of serious detriment.
To support the establishment of tenant involvement and tenant panels, the Local Government Association, of which I am a vice-president, worked with the Tenant Participation Advisory Service and other housing bodies on the publication Tenant Panels: Options for Accountability, which sets out the role tenant panels can play to ensure that tenants are provided with a meaningful route to shape service delivery, as well as resolving complaints locally under the new democratic filter set out in the Localism Act.
As we as a society anticipate the need for suitable housing for older people, co-operative and mutual housing for older people could be a more suitable alterative to some of the more current models. If the housing demand in this country is to be satisfied, there will need to be a plural approach to the housing provision, using a variety of approaches to provide homes. There is a need for a greater diversity of supply and for people and communities to be able to innovate, both in tenure and products, to give people more options and flexibility. There is a particular need for greater supply for non-profit driven housebuilding models that enable communities to determine how many houses are needed and for them to be built.
2.56 pm
Lord Shipley (LD): My Lords, I, too, welcome the debate initiated by the noble Lord, Lord Kennedy of Southwark, which is a welcome opportunity to discuss what might be done by developing co-operative housing in the context of our overall housing policy. I also welcome the new Minister, the noble Baroness, Lady Stowell of Beeston; I am sure that she recognises the importance of housing and in particular affordable housing, and how important it is to social inclusion. I wish her every success in her new ministerial position. Since my noble friend Lady Hanham is sitting on the Benches, I thank her enormously for her contribution as a Minister of DCLG for a number of years. It has been hugely appreciated by all of us.
It is clear from opinion research that housing is moving up the list of concerns of the general public; in a recent poll I saw it had entered the top five. It is some years since that was the case. That reflects a growing realisation on the part of the general public that we do not have enough homes to meet need or demand; that owner occupation has been in decline in recent years; that house prices are very expensive; that it is very hard for young people to get on to the housing ladder right across the UK; and that building for social rent has been inadequate for many years, with a million social homes lost since 1977.
I am therefore grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Kennedy of Southwark, for reminding us of a number of things. One is the amount of co-operative housing in Scandinavia—some 18% of homes in Sweden and some 15% of homes in Norway—and the potential that might, therefore, exist in the United Kingdom, where the figure is below 1%. There are also the statutory issues that affect the expansion of the co-operative model here, together with the variations possible under a co-operative model, which I do not seek to repeat.
First, I will put this debate into its context. House prices are rising again and we seem to be at the start of yet another housing bubble. The underlying problem is lack of supply. Housebuilding is less than half of what it needs to be to match the rate of household formation and this imbalance now seems likely to continue for three years at least. Last year saw the lowest house completion rate since 1923. However, since 1990, annual housing completions have never exceeded 170,000 and have averaged 140,000, of which four out of five homes have been for owner-occupation.
At present the Government expect to increase the rate of building to 170,000 new homes in 2015, but even if they achieve that, we need to go much further.
Important as Help to Buy is, unless supply is increased prices will rise, putting further pressure on young people and putting the potential of home ownership out of reach for even more of them. Demand will then continue to grow in the private rented sector, pushing up rents to unaffordable levels for many. Despite the 22% increase in private housing starts this year, and despite the many initiatives the Government have taken, which are certainly helping to increase demand, there remains an urgent need for more social housing for rent.
There are 1.8 million families on social housing waiting lists. In addition, many people who are on low incomes and subject to the new under-occupancy rules want to move to a smaller home but they cannot because the smaller homes do not exist. We simply must build more homes for social rent, and if part of the solution is the co-operative housing sector, that is a very good thing, as would be raising the borrowing cap on local authorities, which would also increase the pool of rented homes.
Around a third of households will need to rent for the foreseeable future despite Help to Buy, with its mortgage indemnity or shared equity requiring 75% of a property’s value to be in the form of a mortgage. Inevitably, Help to Buy will reach only those who can afford to pay a mortgage.
The shared ownership proposals recently published by Shelter should be commended, because they would help buyers to take out the maximum share that they could afford on a mortgage, with the remainder rented, so that their share of ownership might be as low as one-eighth, or 12.5%.
We should welcome last month’s announcement on self-build, under which more people who want to start a building project, including affordable home projects, will receive support. It will prove an important element of the Government’s drive to increase affordable housing, with new grants from a budget worth £65 million, and with redundant public sector land available for self-build projects. I understand that some 50 councils are already coming forward with sites. In the past year some 11,000 homes were self-built. This could double within a decade. Presumably many of these self-build homes could be constructed on the co-operative principle.
The Government have done a lot to promote localism, and co-operative housing should be seen as part of their localist agenda. Devolution comes in many forms. In housing, owner occupation is the purest form of devolution from the state because it empowers the individual. Being a tenant dependent on a landlord is not empowering, despite a variety of legal protections. Co-operative housing, too, should be seen as empowering for tenants, because those tenants would exercise control, not a landlord.
There are three reasons why I hope the Government will consider further support for this sector. First, it could increase housebuilding. Secondly, it would exist for the benefit of its members, not of somebody else. As we have heard, a fully mutual housing co-operative has all its tenants as members, and all its members as
tenants. They decide equally and together how the co-op is to be run. The third reason is that the sector is a success. As we have also heard, it performs well in terms of member and tenant satisfaction.
However, I understand from the noble Lord, Lord Kennedy, and from some of my reading, that there is not full recognition of co-operative housing in law, because tenure is based on landlord and tenant law, which limits the ability of true co-operative principles to work. In law, repairs lie with landlords because members are legally defined as tenants. That does not seem right. A dedicated new form of tenure would help to create a truly co-operative environment, building on the successes of a wide variety of existing co-ops, tenant management schemes, trusts and mutuals.
There are currently some 200 housing co-operatives registered with the Homes and Communities Agency to provide affordable homes and, as we have heard from the noble Lord, Lord Kennedy, they are building around 25,000 a year. There are 200 housing co-operatives registered, but it strikes me that there could be many more. Just think what that might mean for the potential for an increased housebuilding programme. If there were many more housing co-operatives, think of the gain in terms of sustainable communities—because we would be building social capital, with all that that implies for the strength of our neighbourhoods.
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Lord Graham of Edmonton (Lab): My Lords, it is a joy and a pleasure to take part in this debate—and, of course, to pay a warm tribute to the noble Baroness, Lady Hanham, for all that she has done in local government and here, on the Front Bench and on the Back Benches, over many years. I am grateful to be able to pay that tribute to her, and also of course to welcome the noble Baroness, Lady Stowell—who is always known to me as Beeston.
I have been bowled over by the tenor of what the earlier speakers have said, and by their knowledge of the problems. I can go back to 1939—a long time ago—when I worked for the Newcastle Co-operative Society. One of our departments was the mortgage department, in Newgate street, where the headquarters of the society were. At that time the co-ops in Newcastle were involved in encouraging their members to take out mortgages, under proper safeguards. I remind the House that the Nationwide Building Society was emerging out of the Co-operative Permanent Building Society in the 1950s and 1960s, when for their own good reasons they changed the name. The Co-operative movement, which is well known to me and to many others, has long been involved in dealing with what I would simply call the desperate need of people to be well housed.
I cannot imagine that there is anyone in this Chamber today who would not say that, on the whole, they are well housed. But I recall, twice in the 10 years for which I was the Member of Parliament for Edmonton, going out to my car after my surgery and crying. I cried because of the tales told to me by my constituents about their desperate need for better housing—or indeed for any housing. That memory has always
stayed with me. We in this Chamber are fortunate to have the kind of largesse that we have enjoyed for many years.
The illustration of co-operative housing that I want to give to the House comes from an organisation called CDS—the Co-operative Development Society. It has just had a change of chief officer. For 33 years its chief officer was David Rodgers, who was a power in the land for co-operative housing—and not just in this land but internationally, because he was the chairman of the International Co-operative Alliance housing division. The new chief officer is a lady called Linda Wallace. I welcome her. She has a good record, having been a managing director of the Notting Hill Housing Trust and a great many other things. I look forward to the CDS continuing to do its good work.
Although there are politics in housing, this is not a political debate. It is a debate in which attention is drawn to a provision that could be improved and extended within the limits. We all know what the limits are, and I will not bore the House by going through them all. By Ministers and civil servants, the difference between a co-operative and non-co-operative entity has yet to be fully grasped and understood. The Co-operative movement, as everyone here knows, has a fine record in most communities, where they change their names and allegiance. I say to the Minister that I am not here with a stick to beat her good self—and I know what would happen to me; she would fight me back. I am here to support the idea that many things can and should be done to extend the principle of co-operative housing.
Most people gravitate towards the idea of becoming, and hope that they can become, an owner-occupier. As the leader of the Enfield Council 50 years ago, I remember the interest and the place that good housing played in people’s lives. Then we had the sale of council houses, and how welcome that was to those who were able to buy their council house. But the whirlwind sown by that has now been reaped by their children and grandchildren. Inevitably, the council house that has been sold has then been sold on and on, and one that was bought for £6,000 or £7,000 in Edmonton is now retailing for £200,000. That is not a good idea.
A co-operative ethos is something that we ought to encourage. The Minister will see this in Hansard, but I ask her and her colleagues to reflect on what we see in the Co-operative movement and the ways in which the Government could become more involved in stimulating the co-operative aspect. I shall have to rattle through these ideas. We want legislation to create co-operative housing tenure as a distinct form of tenure in UK property and housing law. We want to enable the creation of a financial intermediary to raise and manage institutional investment in developing co-operatives in mutual housing and operate an insurance fund to reduce investment risk.
One problem in co-operative housing and in other areas is the excitement that people have when they get a little power and involvement. Very often their heart rules their head. There needs to be some thought given by the Government to make it possible for education, guidance or stimulation—call it what you will—on the structures. Very few housing co-operatives to my
knowledge go out of existence because of bad management, but there are some. We need to avoid the waste of public money and other money in that way.
I am very heartened by the debate so far. A small but select band of parliamentarians are simply trailing their coat in front of the Minister and the civil servants, who play a vital part in priorities, simply to say that we have a good record in co-operative housing, and there is better to come. The democracy of co-operative housing is very important indeed, with one member, one vote. There is democracy in the CDS, which I mentioned; it has a management committee of 15 members, and half of them are actual occupants of the properties, not just committee members, and are involved in giving their ideas and making suggestions.
A point that I have raised in other debates is about the assistance to make land available for communities wanting to develop co-operative homes. That is something that we should encourage. The profit that is made from the sale of land is obscene; no matter how you look at it, it is awful. At the end of the day, the people who pay for that will be either tenants or owner-occupiers. If it is possible to have land gifted to a community on the basis that it is theirs in perpetuity, I think that that is one of the ways in which we should go. I know which way I should go—my time is up.
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Lord McKenzie of Luton (Lab): My Lords, like other noble Lords I start by welcoming the noble Baroness, Lady Stowell, to her new role, and offering our congratulations on a promotion thoroughly deserved. Like other noble Lords, I also say that we on these Benches will miss the good humour and engagement of the noble Baroness, Lady Hanham, on the Front Bench, but I have no doubt that she will continue to play a role and deploy her expertise—born of many years of local government service—in the cause of her party. Let me also thank my noble friend Lord Kennedy for initiating this debate, which has been short but excellent. It is wonderful to hear from my noble friend Lord Graham of Edmonton, a lifelong supporter of the co-operative movement, and somebody who has been an integral part of its rich history.
All families deserve a safe, secure and affordable home. Debate around any aspect of housing is important given the undoubted crisis we face at the present time. It is timely to focus on co-operative housing, to examine its current contribution and what further contribution it might make to alleviate that crisis. We know that the number of households in England is projected to increase to 5.8 million by 2033, an increase of 232,000 each year. Yet in the year to 31 March 2013, this Government’s policies led to only 108,000 completions, just matching a similar dismal output in 2010-11. This is significantly below the 170,000 completions achieved by the previous Government in 2007-08, which was still too low, as I think was intimated by the noble Lord, Lord Shipley. Moreover, a report last year identified that English local authorities are planning some 270,000 fewer homes than were provided for under the 2010 regional spatial strategies; a worrying prospect indeed.
The lack of new houses being built combined with the biggest squeeze on living standards in a generation have meant that home ownership has moved out of
the reach of many families. It is difficult to see the Help to Buy scheme—details of the second phase of which were announced earlier this week and greeted with underwhelming enthusiasm—doing much to help, other than to push up prices in the housing bubble referred to by the noble Lord, Lord Shipley, so we have the rise of generation rent, with more and more people living in the private rented sector, which is now bigger than the social sector, where too many lack security, have to pay ever increasing rents and suffer poor-quality accommodation.
The inevitable consequence is that homelessness is on the rise, as are rough sleeping and the number of families living in temporary accommodation. Nearly a third of privately renting households are families with children, almost half are over 35 and for many of them the sector does not provide the stability they need. It is inevitable that for the foreseeable future the private rental sector will grow and will play an important part in meeting housing need. However, there must be a system of a national register of landlords, with powers provided to local councils to drive up standards.
Of course, on coming to office the Government cut the budget for new affordable homes by 60%, leading to the collapse in affordable housing starts. They fell to under 16,000 in 2010-11. Funding from an 80% of market rent programme has exacerbated housing benefit numbers, but is a formulation which is simply not affordable in many parts of the country. As the Co-operative Party points out, the housing crisis is particularly acute in London, with the added dimension of overseas buyers pushing up the cost of buying and renting. It says that the majority of Londoners are being squeezed out because house prices and rents are increasing faster than incomes, and not enough houses are being built. With high rents in the private sector and so-called affordable rents for new homes and re-lets in the social housing sector, a growing number of working households depend on housing benefit to meet their rent. This is of course at a time when such benefits are being cut, and the horrors of the bedroom tax are played out on a daily basis.
It did not have to be like this. We have set out how an enhanced affordable homes programme could be funded, and Labour councils are now leading the way in building new council houses for rent, providing not only homes but jobs. The crisis in the supply of and access to affordable housing is a major political and social issue facing our country. I think the noble Lord, Lord Shipley, referred specifically to it moving up to number five on the list of public concerns. The reality is that it will require action on a number of fronts, and we are strongly supportive of the approach which embraces co-operative housing models. As my noble friend Lord Kennedy explained, we are of course instinctively supportive of co-operative principles. The Co-operative Party is our sister party, and we share its values and its commitment to social justice as well as its history.
We have been greatly helped for this debate by information from the Co-operative Party itself and by the House of Lords briefing material. The latter in particular contains key extracts from the independent Commission on Co-operative and Mutual Housing,
which was launched in 2008 to research the English co-operative and mutual housing sector and to draw conclusions about its relevance to national housing strategy. This research showed that the sector in England is tiny—less than 1% of housing supply—in stark contrast to a number of other European countries. This is attributed, among other things, to the dearth of information and support for those who would be minded to adopt a co-operative model.
There are of course different models of co-operative and mutual housing, about which my noble friend Lord Kennedy and others, including the noble Baroness, Lady Eaton, have spoken knowledgeably. However, the common factor is that they are democratically and legally owned and controlled by a service-user membership. This has a fundamental benefit: by taking responsibility, people develop a sense of belonging and identity, as well as ownership, and this leads to high levels of satisfaction. The co-operative model gives residents democratic control of the property in which they live and a greater say over its management and maintenance. The noble Baroness, Lady Eaton, spoke strongly about the benefit of that ethos. It is acknowledged that the Government see this approach as in tune with their localism agenda, with powers being returned to communities and local neighbourhoods. However, like so much of that agenda, we need to see it working in practice.
Like the commission, we do not consider that co-operation and mutuality are the only routes to a community-based approach, but we acknowledge the powerful opportunity that they present. Other benefits which it brings include stimulating individual and community resilience through active and democratic citizenship, and enabling collective influence over what happens beyond the immediate boundary of an individual while supporting the individual household interest in housing.
What seems clear is that the proposition that housing policy can develop only along one of three routes—ownership, social rented housing or private sector renting—is too restrictive in the current environment. Where people are priced out of ownership and cannot afford escalating private rents, and where the wait for social rented housing can be interminable, there needs to be another way.
What has to happen to enable a co-operative and mutual housing sector to play a greater role? It certainly needs the co-operative movement itself to be more focused on housing possibilities. The commission refers to housing remaining the poor relation of the co-operative family, and it looks that way. There is a strong English co-operative and mutual sector, with nearly 5,000 businesses democratically controlled and owned by some 11 million people, but this strength has not yet manifested itself in the housing sector. Perhaps more can be done by the movement to use its financial, organisational and political strength to encourage the development of co-operative housing.
That should obviously entail embracing new developments, be they community gateway associations developed in response to the large-scale voluntary
transfer of local authority housing stock, community land trusts or mutual home ownership, as well as the existing models of rental housing co-ops and co-ownership associations. As well as support from the co-operative movement itself, it requires national and local government to develop supportive frameworks. It is particularly suggested that it requires legislative change to create a co-operative housing tenure as a distinct form of tenure in UK property and housing law. Several noble Lords referred to this.
The Minister will be aware of the debate initiated in the other place by Jonathan Reynolds MP following his unsuccessful introduction of a 10-minute rule Bill. That debate, in July last year, focused on the consequences of the Berrisford decision, which, it was suggested, undermined the type of tenancies commonly available in housing co-operatives. The problem arises because co-operatives cannot grant secure or assured tenancies, and the Supreme Court determined that the periodic tenancies could in fact be treated as tenancies for life. In responding to that debate, the Minister in another place put forward the view that legislative change was unnecessary and advised that, if the guidance of the Confederation of Co-operative Housing were followed, tenancies could be structured in such a way that they could be brought to an end. Can the Minister give us an update and say whether this is still the Government’s view?
Can the Minister also confirm the position with regard to housing benefit? Is this in principle available, assuming of course that other criteria are satisfied, for what were assumed to be periodic tenancies pre the Berrisford decision?
Funding will always be an issue, and we acknowledge that funding opportunities remain available from the HCA through various funding streams, including the affordable homes guarantee. Perhaps the Minister can say something about the emphasis that the HCA currently places on inculcating co-operative housing strategies in its support for affordable housing and whether the Government would wish to see more done in this regard.
More generally, if it is the Government’s declared aim to support the spread of strong, financially robust and democratically accountable housing co-operatives—an aim that we would share—can the Minister spell out for us the details of that support?
Given the huge challenges that we face in tackling the country’s housing crisis, it is more important than ever that we grasp the opportunities for a greater contribution from co-operative housing. My noble friend Lord Kennedy is right to focus our attention on this and we give him our thanks.
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The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Communities and Local Government (Baroness Stowell of Beeston) (Con): My Lords, I am very grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Kennedy, for initiating this debate. I will say straight away to him, and to all noble Lords, that the Government support the co-operative housing sector. I will speak in more detail about how we support it and why in a moment.
Some noble Lords have raised matters in their contributions that I plan to address in the next debate and I will try not to steal the thunder of that debate by addressing them now. However, if there is any matter that I do not come to in my responses today, I will follow up in writing.
Before I get stuck in to all of that, I thank all noble Lords for their very warm welcome to me in my new responsibilities as Minister at the Department for Communities and Local Government. I also echo the very warm tributes that have been paid to my noble friend Lady Hanham. I saw her slip away very quietly just a few moments ago, but that will not deter me from putting on record just how fantastic she has been as the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State whom I have the great pleasure to follow. She has been in that position, as we know, for three years, since the Government were first elected. She has been on the Front Bench in opposition since 2000—I think that most of her time in the House so far has been on the Front Bench. As other noble Lords have acknowledged, she brought to her role at the DCLG a huge amount of experience, both leading and serving on Kensington and Chelsea council. I am grateful to her for her personal support to me and for her ongoing involvement in these areas—as the fact that she was here for most of the debate today indicates—which is of great benefit to your Lordships’ House. I am delighted that she was here and able to keep her eye on this matter and we look forward to her contributions in the future.
She leaves very big shoes to fill and I might lack some detail today in responding to this debate. If I do, that responsibility is all mine. I have a lot to learn but I have already been briefed on the Government’s housing strategy and the impact of it. As this was raised by the noble Lord, Lord McKenzie, and my noble friend Lord Shipley in their contributions, I would like first of all to offer some headlines about the Government’s work on housing, as I take exception to some of the doom and gloom that has been put forward by the noble Lord, Lord McKenzie.
On the supply side—to be clear, we are talking about housing in general—334,000 new homes have been built over the past three years. Housing starts are actually up by 33% on last year—I think that the noble Lord, Lord McKenzie, suggested the opposite. The Chartered Institute of Purchasing and Supply has stated that homes are now being built at the fastest rate for 10 years. More homes are being approved through planning. The latest quarterly figures show a 45% year-on-year increase in the number of planning approvals for new homes. In saying all that, as my noble friend said, the fact that we are making great headway is to be welcomed, but I recognise that there is always more to be done.
On the demand side, the Help to Buy equity loan so far has helped more than 15,000 families to reserve a new-build home. The Help to Buy mortgage guarantee was brought forward and launched only this week and has been warmly welcomed, contrary to what the noble Lord, Lord McKenzie, said. The number of first-time buyers is at a five-year high and there is no evidence of a housing bubble across the country, as
transactions remain 40% below pre-crunch average and in many places prices went up by less than inflation last year.
In the context of this debate, my intention has been to find out what this Government are doing to help provide housing in the social sector and homes for those who, for various reasons and in different ways, need assistance to make them affordable. I always enjoy listening to the noble Lord, Lord Graham of Edmonton. I am pleased that he calls me “Beeston” because, as he knows, I like to fly the flag for Beeston, so I am grateful to him for that. Contrary to what he said—I know that this is not something of which the opposition Front Bench want to be reminded—under the previous Labour Government, the number of affordable rented homes fell by 420,000, whereas, and in stark contrast to what the noble Lord, Lord McKenzie, has said, since this Government came to office, 150,000 new affordable homes have been delivered.
Investment of £19.5 billion of public and private funds will deliver 170,000 new affordable homes by 2015. In the next spending period, a further £3.3 billion of government investment and £20 billion of private finance will deliver 165,000 more new homes over three years from 2015. We plan to start construction on 200,000 new affordable homes over the four years from 2014-15, which is the highest number of new-build homes in any four-year period for the past 20 years.
However, this issue is not about just building. In terms of the changes that this Government have brought in, local communities are getting greater control over what happens where they live, which will mean that people are able to build the houses that the community needs and not what someone else dictates. Just over a year ago, the Localism Act gave communities access to a number of new rights: the right to challenge, the right to bid, the right to manage and the right to build. The combination of these new rights and access to funding has led more than 700 communities to get together to start neighbourhood planning and to make decisions on what gets built and where.
As we have heard, those who take this initiative are committed people who know what development they want and they want to retain control over that development. Under the umbrella of what we are referring to as community-led housing, the co-operative housing movement has never had a greater opportunity to show what it can do and to make its contribution.
The noble Lord, Lord Kennedy, gave a comprehensive summary of how co-operative housing groups operate, and their value to their local communities and to their members who are living in co-operative housing. That was echoed by all noble Lords who contributed to today’s debate. My noble friend Lady Eaton drew a comparison with housing run by local authorities and that run by co-operative housing groups. She gave a stark illustration of one in Scotland. Noble Lords have put forward a compelling case about co-operative housing. As I have said, this Government really do support co-operative housing. We want it to make as much of a contribution as it can to affordable housing and the housing sector generally in this country.
My department, DCLG, has a good relationship with the Confederation of Co-operative Housing and Nic Bliss.
Lord Graham of Edmonton: I know him.
Baroness Stowell of Beeston: I am very sure that Nic Bliss knows the noble Lord. He is chair of the Confederation of Co-operative Housing and was moved to set out his experience of working with this Government in a statement to my noble friend and predecessor. He said that,
“we are pleased that the Coalition Government has worked with our sector to demonstrate its ongoing support for community-led housing”.
I am happy to share his statement in full by placing a copy in the Library.
Perhaps I may highlight two points that he made. He made the specific point that by working with this Government, along with others, and because of new initiatives, the co-operative housing sector will meet and hopefully exceed its own targets for new homes by 2017. He referred positively to a recent meeting with the former Housing Minister, Mark Prisk. Basically, I am trying to make the point that we are working with the co-operative housing movement and that we support it very much.
Indeed, the noble Lord, Lord Kennedy, referred specifically to community land trusts. I welcome the support for community land trusts. My honourable friend Nick Boles, the Minister for Planning, has recently visited the St Clements CLT in Bow and Dittisham in Devon.
In order to realise their ambitions, community-led groups were able to access the initial affordable housing programme, which I have already mentioned. However, in starting that programme and making it accessible to community-led groups, we knew that not all such groups would be able to put in a bid at that time, so we set aside £25 million for them to bid when they were ready. Some community-led housing schemes have already taken advantage of this. One such group is the Bomarsund Co-op, which started a scheme this year in Seghill, Northumberland, providing 12 new two-bedroom apartments. Another is Queen Camel Community Land Trust in Somerset, which has funding to develop 20 affordable homes. These are communities that have identified that they need more homes. They have worked together to develop a scheme that meets their needs, and their hard work and commitment are now being rewarded with delivery on the ground.
There is also £17 million available to support these groups in the hard task of getting their proposals to planning permission. I would encourage co-operatives to apply for that funding so that they can get to the point where they are in a strong position to move to the next stage. I would also encourage groups that are interested in pursuing their ambitions more generally to note the latest fund which was launched in the summer, the Affordable Homes Guarantees Programme, which provides £65 million for new housing. The Homes and Communities Agency is available and ready to help and assist in that area.
Noble Lords raised some very specific points in the debate. The noble Lord, Lord Kennedy, and others raised the issue of a new legal tenure for co-operatives. This is something that others have argued for—indeed, they believe their arguments have been strengthened by the Supreme Court’s decision in the case of Berrisford v Mexfield. The noble Lord, Lord McKenzie, asked specifically what the Government’s position is. We have no current plans to introduce a new legal tenure. It is worth making two points. First, any change to tenure could not be applied retrospectively so would not assist co-operatives in resolving issues that may have been raised by the decision in the case that I have just mentioned. It is worth being clear about that because there is a tendency to think that a new legal tenure would be able to address any historic issues, when that would not be the case.
I am also aware that the idea of a new legal tenure has been raised by the Law Commission as a possible matter for review. I am not in a position to comment on that at all. The Government’s position has not changed, but this is clearly of ongoing interest to people and I am aware of that.
The noble Lord, Lord Kennedy, asked about allowing communities to vote for community-led organisations on a stock transfer. All stock transfers require a majority of tenants in favour. We will shortly introduce a new statutory right for council tenants to take forward transfer from a local authority landlord.
The noble Lord, Lord Graham, raised a number of points on which I will reflect carefully, but I am able to respond to a couple of them now. He asked about the proposal for an investment fund. Officials at the Homes and Communities Agency have been working closely with the Mutual Housing Group on the proposal for an investment fund. That group is chaired by Nic Bliss, whom the noble Lord, Lord Graham, says that he already knows.
The noble Lord, Lord Graham, also raised the issue of access to public land for building purposes by the co-operative housing groups. We have identified land with capacity for more than 100,000 homes and to date we have released land with capacity for more than 58,000 homes. Ministers have met with community-led affordable housing groups to discuss how they can access land from this source. Basically, the noble Lord raises an important point, which we are live to. We are already trying to take steps to release land where possible.
My noble friend Lord Shipley talked about local authority borrowing and lifting the cap. He ventured into an area which has a level of detail that is currently beyond my day-three-in-the-job capacity. But I can tell him that the 167 stock-holding authorities have just under £3 billion borrowing headroom. As I am sure he knows, the Government’s first priority is to reduce the national deficit. That is why borrowing arising from self-financing must be affordable within national fiscal policies as well as locally, which the prudential borrowing rules do not address. Additional local authority borrowing could have broader macroeconomic implications for the Government’s deficit reduction programme. Some councils that are subject to the cap are building new homes now and obviously we welcome that. We all acknowledge that the building of new homes is important and something that we want to continue to increase.
This Government have recognised that the co-operative housing movement can play a part in meeting housing need. We have a strong record in working with the housing sector to ensure that communities, including co-operatives, can access funding. The funding is there. Support in getting planning permission is there and I know from all noble Lords’ contributions today that the enthusiasm is most certainly there. The challenge now is to get the houses built. Indeed, in doing so, co-operative housing has the Government’s full support.
3.47 pm
Lord Kennedy of Southwark: My Lords, first, I join in the tributes to the noble Baroness, Lady Hanham, that were made in the House. I should have said that in my earlier remarks. I thank all noble Lords for speaking in the debate today. I agree with many of the comments made by noble Lords on all sides of the House. I am delighted that the Government support co-operative housing. I look forward to seeing the sector grow, in that case, which would be good. Co-operative housing has an important role to play and if the Government support it and create the conditions in which it can flourish, it can make a positive difference to many people’s lives.
Some of the statistics put forward by the noble Baroness, Lady Stowell, are interesting and only time will tell on these things. Lots of people living in social housing do not particularly believe that the Government are on their side at the moment. We need only look at the decisions that have been taken in the three years that they have been in office. Having said that, I thank all noble Lords for their contributions to the debate today, which have been very useful. I will certainly come back again and again on this issue.
Housing: Impact on Child Development
Question for Short Debate
3.48 pm
Tabled by Baroness King of Bow
To ask Her Majesty’s Government what assessment they have made of the impact of low-quality housing on child development.
Lord Kennedy of Southwark: (Lab) My Lords, with the leave of the House, I will open the debate on behalf of my noble friend Lady King of Bow. Her surrogate is presently in labour so she cannot be in the House this afternoon.
When my noble friend was first elected to the other place 15 years ago, she was inundated with pamphlets and reports from her constituency and beyond. One grabbed her attention. It was called, I Mustn’t Laugh Too Much.
Now I, like my noble friend, like to laugh a lot. She wanted to understand why anyone would post such silly advice to people. As she read the report, she discovered that the title was based on advice given by a doctor to a young woman in a cold, damp and
overcrowded flat at the top of a tower block on the Ocean estate in Stepney. The report went on to detail the housing conditions that the family was living in. Despite the heating being on constantly, everyone suffered from the cold in the winter and frequently fell ill. There were no drying facilities and clothes had to be dried in the bathroom and hallway. There was severe damp which produced black mould and the windows were always dripping wet. The three eldest children had asthma and used inhalers; the youngest boy had heart trouble and had suffered from persistent colds and coughs since birth. The doctor warned the family that asthma attacks could be precipitated by fits of laughing—hence the doctorly advice.
My noble friend grew up in north London. She had already seen plenty of run-down housing before becoming Labour’s candidate in Bethnal Green and Bow in 1997. Families on low incomes are as proud as anyone else and always tried to put on a good show when visited during that first election campaign. The intense and grinding daily impact of living in such conditions was really only truly brought home to her for the first time on reading that report. In surveys of 100 families on the Ocean and Limehouse Fields estates, it calculated the number of days lost in work or school through sickness and described the extent of damp throughout badly constructed and poorly maintained tower blocks. It revealed that many buildings were running alive with mice and cockroaches; exposed that the lifts were constantly broken and took weeks to repair; and showed that the stairwells of those blocks were plagued by drug users. Most of all, it painted a vivid picture of how bad housing affected the health, education and well-being of children and undermined their long-term life chances. At that moment my noble friend became a complete convert to the central importance of decent, secure and affordable housing in ending child poverty.
In the years that followed 1997, the blocks in which the young woman and her neighbours lived were demolished and replaced by excellent, family-sized social housing built by Bethnal Green & Victoria Park Housing Association under the single regeneration budget programme—the kind of homes Nye Bevan would have been proud to be associated with.
In 2000, my noble friend received a follow-up research report,A Drop in the Ocean, which showed that the health gain of the families who had moved into the first new homes on those estates was already dramatic. Finding and staying in work continued to be a problem, but the children were healthier and doing much better in school. Its most important recommendation was that that the SRB needed to be extended to benefit families in the rest of Stepney too.
My noble friend was delighted when the Ocean estate was included in the New Deal for Communities programme, with a £55 million budget to transform the area. Thanks to that initiative and much extra schools funding besides, the exam results at Stepney Green and Sir John Cass secondary schools are now well above the national average. Those children have a real chance to fulfil their potential.
The ideas behind the single regeneration budget and the New Deal for Communities programme were not new or even very innovative. The East End is the
birthplace of council housing; many of you will have heard of the Boundary estate. Some of you even may have read Arthur Morrison’s novel
A Child of the Jago
, which was based around life in the Old Nichol slum on which the estate was built. The London County Council built the Boundary estate out of its desire to improve the squalid and overcrowded housing conditions in which children were growing up. The challenge then, as now, was how to roll that out borough-wide, city-wide and nation-wide. Our predecessors in central and local government determined that a decent, secure and affordable home was essential for children to fulfil their potential. The funding followed that political priority.
At some point in the 1980s or 1990s, however, those governing our country—and some local authorities—lost sight of that objective. Investment was salami-sliced away and councils stopped building. I would be the first to admit that it took the Labour Government whom I supported far too long to rediscover that objective. However, rediscover it they did, especially after the 2004 spending review, to the extent that almost 50,000 new social homes were completed in England in 2010-11 —more than 1,000 of them in Tower Hamlets alone. Tower Hamlets Council was granted a further £43 million to complete the physical regeneration of the Ocean estate and was promised £222 million to bring its remaining council homes up to a decent standard.
My noble friend tells me of the Liberal Democrat MPs who stood alongside her in many debates, calling for Labour’s Ministers to increase investment in housing. All that makes the housing policy and budgetary decisions taken by this coalition Government the more dispiriting. There has been a two-thirds cut in the Homes and Communities Agency’s budget; a benefit cap that punishes tenants for the greed of their landlords; “affordable” rents at 80% of market levels, which most of my noble friend’s former constituents who are working cannot afford to pay and so do not bid for; and an end to proper security of tenure in social housing.
There are clearly individuals in this Government who recognise the value of building social housing to give children the home they need to succeed in life. But the Deputy Prime Minister’s hopelessly inadequate announcement last year of just £300 million—a fig leaf for tearing up Section 106 agreements for social homes—shows that he is not one of them.
This country urgently needs a proper housebuilding programme. I am delighted that the leader of the Opposition, in his excellent speech to the Labour Party conference last month, promised that we will deliver it. Two hundred thousand new homes a year is double the number achieved by the coalition in any of its years in power.
The report to which I referred at the beginning of my speech was written by Professor Peter Ambrose. Some of your Lordships may know Peter through his tireless work and support for the Zacchaeus 2000 Trust campaign on behalf of families in poverty. Sadly, Peter passed away last summer. His passion and compassion are sadly missed, especially in Stepney, but I and my noble friend are confident that his work
will continue to inspire a new generation campaigning on behalf of homeless and overcrowded families. Over the summer, my noble friend received a briefing note from the Zacchaeus Trust reminding us that 2 million children still live in bad housing. They live in cold, damp homes that result in their missing far too many school days off sick and falling behind in their studies, or growing up in overcrowded conditions of three or four children to a bedroom, with no quiet place in which to study. For those children who go on to secondary school, the overcrowding at home will make it almost impossible for them to find the quiet space that they need to concentrate on their homework properly and study for exams.
The cuts to housing benefit mean that homeless families are again spending months on end in totally unsuitable bed-and-breakfast accommodation, cooped up in single rooms where babies do not have even the space to learn to crawl and toddlers are at risk from all sorts of hazards in the communal areas, as well as inside the room. The previous Labour Government banned that practice for a reason, but the coalition Government allow it to arise again and again. Mr Pickles’s offer of £1.9 million to all councils struggling with the pressures of increased homelessness was totally inadequate. It was no surprise that Ministers gave Tower Hamlets not a penny, while Westminster Council got another big wodge of cash.
I am very grateful for the chance to initiate this debate on behalf on my noble friend and look forward to the contributions of others. I urge Ministers to think again about the devastating cuts to the Home and Communities Agency budget and to start building the homes that our children need so that the next generation of children does not have to worry about laughing too much.
3.56 pm
Baroness Eaton (Con): Again, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Kennedy, for introducing this important debate today.
The quality of the home has a substantial impact on health. A warm, dry and secure home is associated with better health. In addition to basic housing requirements, other factors that help to improve well-being include the neighbourhood, security of tenure and modifications for those with disabilities. Poor quality housing, which could include overcrowding, dilapidation or dampness, can impact on children’s development in a range of ways—on their physical and mental health and educational attainment—and can have a knock-on effect in adulthood as well as causing them problems in childhood.
The list of health conditions associated with bad, damp housing is indeed distressing, and a reason why we should all be committed to the provision of good housing stock. Poor housing conditions increase the risk of severe ill health or disability by up to 25% during childhood and early adulthood. Children in overcrowded housing are up to 10 times more likely to contract meningitis than children in general. Children living in overcrowded and unfit conditions are more likely to experience respiratory problems such as asthma and wheezing. Overcrowded conditions have been linked
to slow growth in childhood, which is associated with an increase in coronary heart disease in later life. Almost half of all childhood accidents are associated with physical conditions in the home. Mental health issues such as anxiety and depression have been linked to overcrowding and unfit housing. Children living in bad housing are more susceptible to developing behavioural problems such as hyperactivity and aggression.
Bad housing affects children’s ability to learn at school and study at home. Children in unfit and overcrowded homes miss school more frequently due to illness and infection. The lower educational attainment and health problems associated with bad housing in childhood impact on opportunities in adulthood, including increasing the likelihood of unemployment or working in low-paid jobs.
In 1997, there were 2.1 million houses owned by local authorities and housing associations which did not meet the decent homes standard. By the end of 2010, 92% of social housing met the standards of being warm and weatherproof with reasonably modern facilities. The Local Government Association, working with ARCH and other housing providers, surveyed local authorities with their own stock last year. Councils reported that their top priority was investment in their existing stock to ensure that it meets and maintains the decent homes standard. In many cases, local authorities are going beyond this standard. In the private rented sector, energy efficiency has improved in recent years, but 11.4% of properties received F and G ratings for energy efficiency compared to 7.7% across all tenures.
The incidence of homes failing to meet decent homes standards is highest in the private rented sector. HHSRS safety hazards were present in 21% of private rented sector dwellings compared to 7% in the social sector. They also have a high incidence of damp problems, linked to the age of the stock. Where quality standards reach unacceptable levels, local authorities have regulatory and enforcement tools available with regard to the private rented sector. Using these tools is often a last resort with a focus on engagement with good quality landlords through forums, accreditation schemes and training. Councils will seek a dual approach, where good behaviour is encouraged through licensing and support to follow enforcement processes. The other side of this is action against poor behaviour, for example by using powers under the Proceeds of Crime Act.
There are a number of ways that the Government could support local authorities in their work with the private rented sector. They could help reduce the amount of bureaucracy involved in working with the private rented sector to raise standards and free up front-line services. They could be realistic about the scale of the challenge. Any new requirements for local authorities on the private rented sector must be properly resourced and funded, without creating additional burdens. We should help create streamlined and improved enforcement tools so that local authorities can tackle criminal landlords, for example in the rise of illegally rented outbuildings or “beds in sheds”.
It is quite clear from what I have said so far that poor quality bricks and mortar have a detrimental effect on children’s health. What is also of great interest
is the work of John Pitts, Professor of Socio-Legal Studies at the University of Bedfordshire. He has done considerable research into the well-being of children and has come to the very interesting conclusion that the neighbourhood where a child lives has more influence than the family circumstances. A child from a family that works hard to provide a good home with good parenting will develop less well if the neighbourhood is a bad one than where a child from a bad or dysfunctional family lives in a good neighbourhood. Of course, housing conditions are very important. I am in no way understating their importance, but other things seen and observed can be as, if not more, damaging to a child. Bad neighbourhoods where there is a gang culture, low educational attainment, high levels of addiction, a dependency culture, and poor schooling will be equally, if not more, damaging to child development.
There are complex links between housing and education; however, disentangling the relationship between them is difficult. Neither housing nor education operates in discrete ways and each is affected by a range of other cross-cutting areas, such as health, transport, unemployment, crime and anti-social behaviour, as well as the state of the economy, political decisions and allocation of resources. The work established by the current Government, working with troubled families, is showing many ways in which society can help families which have found the provision of a stable and health background for their children difficult. The emphasis in the Localism Act on giving communities more control over their future existence helps to create safer and more suitable environments, with areas and neighbourhoods in which to bring up children.
Housing is a crucial element and while we can argue about the figures—I know that the statistics are always a difficult area—as we have heard, supply is now at its highest in new housing since 2008-09. New orders for housing are at their highest level since September 2013, with £19.5 billion having been invested in affordable housing, creating 160,000 new affordable homes for rent and ownership. There has been £15 billion invested in the voluntary sector and £4.5 billion in the public sector, while more council houses have been built under the present Government than under the 13 years of the previous Government.
Regenerating housing is a critical policy and the present Government recognise that good quality homes in a safe, clean environment provide all children with the best start in life. We have heard from my noble friend Lady Stowell, as the Minister, of a number of ways in which the Government are addressing and are committed to the development of safe, affordable housing. They are rising to the challenge.
4.06 pm
Lord Graham of Edmonton (Lab): My Lords, first, I have to say how very sorry I am not to have my noble friend Lady King here with us today. There are obviously reasons but, relatively speaking, I have known her for a very long time. I will leave that pun for your Lordships to ponder.
I want to congratulate the Library of this House which, in preparation for this debate, made available a document that was, substantially, prepared by Shelter.
It is on the impact of bad housing on physical health, mental health and education. It is very timely and while it is a horror story, it is a bestseller and I soundly urge any Member who is interested in this aspect of our work to ask for a copy because it will certainly come in handy.
I referred briefly in the debate earlier this afternoon to background: where we have come from and what we can expect. We are cocooned in this Chamber and we have got where we are, on either side of the House, because we have some substantial attributes. However, during my life as a Member of Parliament for Edmonton many years ago and as a councillor in the same part of the world, I came across situations which are very much reflected in the report from Shelter. I want to quote from it at length and I hope that the House will understand.
As far as physical health is concerned, the report says that:
“25 per cent of children who persistently lived in accommodation in poor state of repair had a long-standing illness or disability compared to 19% who lived in this type of bad housing on a short-term basis … Children living in bad housing are almost twice as likely to suffer from poor health as other children … Children living in unfit and overcrowded accommodation are almost a third more likely to suffer respiratory problems such as chest problems, breathing difficulties, asthma and bronchitis than other children … There is a direct link between childhood tuberculosis and overcrowding … Fifty-eight per cent of respondents to a Shelter survey said their health or their family’s health had suffered as a result of living in temporary accommodation”.
Those are the impacts as far as health is concerned. For mental health there is another grim picture:
“Mothers living in bad housing are almost three times as likely as other mothers to be clinically depressed … Homeless children are three or four times more likely to have mental health problems than other children … More than 60% of respondents to a Shelter survey said that living in temporary accommodation had worsened depression and other mental health problems”.
“Children living in bad housing are nearly twice as likely as other children to leave school without any GCSEs … Children living in acutely bad housing are twice as likely not to attend school as other children … Children who live in bad housing are five times as likely to lack a quiet place to do their homework as other children”.
I shall finish my quoting there. There must be 35 conclusions. It is a brilliant piece of research and quite frankly, until I read it I had not appreciated just how desperate the situation is. The report also tells us that there are 1 million children living in what we might call poverty. My heart bleeds for them. I have a background on Tyneside, where from 1930-39 my father was out of work. I was the eldest of five children. I passed what was called the secondary school exam—I was going to an elementary school then—but could not go because my dad was out of work. I finally made it to a degree through the Open University, for which I say very many thanks. The fact that one is born into poverty or lives in poverty does not exclude you from rising above your poverty, by one means or another, and making an impression in some place or another. All I can say to the Minister, and I am grateful that she is here in her capacity, is that these are not sticks to beat the Government or to beat society. I believe that
the value of this report is that as it is used by politicians and others it should strike a chord somewhere among our communities.
At the end of the day, I know all about resources, priorities, budgets—I have been involved in those all my adult life—but the situation we face is that the generation that is coming through our schools and living in our conditions now, as outlined in that report, have a very steep hill to climb. I hope that the Government have some kind words to say about their priorities and initiatives because our children and grandchildren will need them very badly.
4.13 pm
Lord Touhig (Lab): My Lords, it is a privilege to follow my noble friend. He comes to this House with many years’ experience, but he can talk with passion, understanding and experience of being brought up in poverty, and that enriches our debate and helps us understand the difficulties that many families face.
This debate is of fundamental importance because of the poor standard of housing that thousands of children will return home to this evening, housing that will adversely affect them and society for years to come. The World Health Organisation notes that early childhood development is the most important factor in,
“the quality of health, well-being, learning and behaviour across the life span”.
The impact of low quality housing upon these youngsters in their early years is both severe and lasting. In the short term, it adversely affects their health and well-being and hinders their learning. In the long term, it diminishes their chances and opportunities, causing problems which society must later address. A clear example of this is the disruption that overcrowding causes to children’s education and learning.
The Catholic Children’s Society (Westminster) recently highlighted cases not so very far from this Chamber, where a shortage of adequate social housing for families means that children simply do not have the space to sit and study at a table. In one household, typical of many, the two youngest children share a room with their parents, while the teenaged children have to lie on their beds and do homework in a cramped adjoining room. For any effective studying, they must find space at school early in the morning or before it is locked up in the evening. How can they realistically be expected to keep up with classmates who have the simple benefits of a desk, a work surface or some quiet space in their own home? How can they properly develop the skills and knowledge required to compete in a difficult job market when their physical surroundings obstruct their studies? Children in these circumstances are being dealt an unacceptable blow to their life chances from a young age. However, the true impact is likely to be even wider, as pressure on the education system increases and employment opportunities are hampered.
Overcrowded housing not only causes immediate harm to children but causes long-term societal problems, whether in our schools or, eventually, in our economy. A 2003 study considering the cumulative lost earnings of children growing up in poor quality housing compared to their peers projected that the figure would stand at £14 billion. This figure starkly illustrates how the
childhood impacts of low-quality housing continue into adult life and the hard cost of needlessly diminished life chances and lost opportunities.
The correlation between substandard housing and poor health is indisputable, with the burden more often than not falling upon the National Health Service. I shall give just one example, that of a family in Liverpool who are helped by a charity, Nugent Care. Its report on them shows how problems of poor housing blight the health and well-being of entire families. Over the years this family had reported various problems to their housing officers, from damp and cracked walls to the front door not shutting properly and the windows being smashed by a local gang. The mother, Anne, informed her support worker that she had given up on painting and decorating as she simply could not see the point any more. She had come to despair of her own home, if it could be called a home. Every time she put up new wallpaper or freshly painted, it simply cracked or peeled off due to damp and poor construction. At the age of 17, her daughter Leanne developed severe clinical depression, which, according to the Nugent report, was,
“possibly brought on by her mum’s depression, possibly by her own experiences and certainly not helped by sitting in an unloved house in need of repair”.
Not only is this a tragedy for Leanne and her family, tarnishing what should have been happy and formative teenage years, but it also requires considerable public healthcare provision, otherwise unnecessary if she had simply been given the decent housing that every child deserves.
The impact of low quality housing on the mental health of children and young people is shocking and tragic. The impact on children’s physical health is, sadly, just as shocking. Multiple housing problems increase the risk of illness or disability by up to 25%. Children living in cold homes are more than twice as likely to suffer from a variety of respiratory diseases than those with adequate heating, and children living in damp and mouldy homes are up to three times more prone to coughing and wheezing.
Of course, no one is under any illusion about the scale of the challenge that we face when it comes to ensuring that children grow up in an environment that nurtures their health, education and overall well-being. It is imperative not to make the situation worse, particularly with regard to policies where all the indications point to significant long-term harm. An impact assessment carried out by the Department for Work and Pensions in 2010 on the local housing allowance found that families,
“could be affected by overcrowding, particularly where they downsize to find affordable accommodation. This could have an adverse affect on health and mental well being … For children, particularly those of school age, overcrowded conditions could hamper their ability to do homework and affect educational attainment”.
It went on to warn of particular dangers for the children of younger mothers, stating that,
“Even if their re-housing is managed so they do not become homeless, teenage mothers affected are at risk of mental problems as a result of their isolation in their new location and poorer outcomes for their children”.
In spite of such warnings, the housing allowance changes were implemented and we are now witnessing the consequences, particularly in London, where instances of overcrowding are already worryingly high and the stock of decent, affordable homes is exceptionally low.
Based on a freedom of information request to local councils, the Caritas Social Action Network recently projected that in more than 20,000 households across London whole families are now sharing a single room, with potentially serious implications for their well-being. Beyond the immediate human impact of this, it is a concern that there has been little or no official analysis of the costs that will be incurred by the public services as a result of this. Factoring these in, it is likely that some of the cost-saving measures under way at present may in fact be having precisely the opposite effect.
It is therefore essential that as further changes to housing and welfare policy are considered and undertaken, the full range of short-term and long-term impacts on children are properly accounted for. The impact of low quality housing on the health, well-being and education of children across their entire lives, and for the whole of society, is stark. Proper accounting is morally and economically sound, and I hope that today’s debate will underscore the urgency of taking it into consideration. The Government must do more than take note. They must act.
4.21 pm
Baroness Sherlock (Lab): My Lords, it is a pleasure to respond to this brief but important debate. It is also notable that we are having two debates on housing back to back on a Thursday. This may tell us how important the issue has become, not just in the lives of politicians, but in the country as a whole.
It is a pleasure to engage with the noble Baroness, Lady Stowell of Beeston, on her first day out. She has certainly been put to work on day one of the new brief. I am sorry not be facing her across the Dispatch Box on DWP matters any more, but she has already noticed that although she has moved she has failed to escape the expert and determined ministrations and opposition of my noble friend Lord McKenzie of Luton, who is following her wherever she goes.
I am delighted to respond to this debate put down by my noble friend Lady King of Bow. I know that she will be disappointed not to be here, but she will be assiduously reading Hansard. When she next goes back, she can look her former constituents in the eye, having raised in the House of Lords those issues that she saw so early on in her political career. I pay tribute to my noble friend Lord Kennedy, who is doing double duty by staying on after his own debate on housing to introduce this debate so effectively.
At the heart of this debate is a moral issue. We are a developed country, rich by global standards, whose children should be able to live in homes that are fit for human habitation. It is, or should be, part of the social contract that we have with our citizens that families can expect to have a secure, warm, decent home to call their own is or should be part of the social contract that we have with our citizens. Thinking about this debate, I was reminded of the promise made by Lloyd George, almost 100 years ago, of “homes fit for heroes”, and I am sorry to see the Lib Dem Benches empty today. I was thinking of that coalition a century ago and wondering whether today’s coalition might have aspirations even a fraction as ambitious as those of that coalition Government so long ago.
In 2013, it is sad to think that we are still hearing so many horror stories, as my noble friend Lord Graham of Edmonton put it so well, of children’s home lives. We have heard a compelling case today from all the speakers about the impact of poor quality housing has in damaging outcomes for children. Many speakers have developed the themes that describe graphically the impact on children’s physical and mental health, their educational outcomes and their aspirations for the future. The noble Baroness, Lady Eaton, and my noble friend Lord Touhig were very clear in setting out the impact on a child’s mental as well as physical health. This is something that we need to take very seriously.
My noble friend Lord Graham gave us those very worrying statistics from that rather impressive Shelter report about the risks to children. They are twice as likely to have poor health and asthmatics are twice as likely to live in a damp house. The report looked at the impact on children who live in temporary accommodation and at how much they suffer. The worry must be not just that these illnesses affect these children in childhood, but that these conditions follow them through into adulthood. There is a scarring effect on both the physical and mental health of children, and on their achievement, that goes right through into their adult lives.
We have also heard some horror stories about the impact on parents and children of living in an overcrowded home. I was shocked by the statistic from Caritas shared by my noble friend Lord Touhig. The idea of 20,000 families in London living in single rooms should be genuinely shocking to all of us. The noble Baroness, Lady Eaton, and my noble friend Lord Touhig looked at some of the impacts of living in crowded accommodation: disturbed sleep, poor diet, and we know that children are more likely to have behavioural difficulties such as hyperactivity or aggression. Living in a tight space is stressful; children are more likely to have stress-related problems such as bed-wetting and soiling. Overcrowding affects family relationships as well as the mental health of both parents and children. It is challenging to keep happy and cheerful when your housing is insecure or your home or succession of homes is inadequate, damp or simply inappropriate.
Low aspirations are common for children in poor housing. I take the point made by the noble Baroness, Lady Eaton, about how complex it is to understand the inter-relationship of factors. However, the evidence is pretty strong about the connection between housing and aspirations and outcomes. Even if we think about ourselves, how many of us would be confident that we could maintain morale and raise the aspirations of children if we were one of a couple raising two kids in a one-bed flat in a high rise building in a very hostile environment? I was also very glad to hear the comments made by various noble Lords, my noble friends Lord Kennedy and Lord Graham in particular, about the impact on children’s educational development and standards. I was very worried to hear the idea that children are five times more likely to have no quiet space for homework. Has anyone told Mr Gove? This must be rather worrying. We put such an emphasis as a country on the importance of homework and of
children being given homework, and yet some of our own children are unable to do it because they do not have the space.
Children are missing school because of the ill health that is associated with bad housing, as we heard earlier. I also wish to highlight the difficulties caused by children who experience disruption to their schooling caused by moving homes, a point that was touched on by my noble friend. It is a particular problem for the 1.2 million families who live in the private rented sector, where the tenancies tend to be short. Moving repeatedly can cause children to miss more school, and as we heard earlier, parents can become depressed and the children insecure.
We have heard some real horror stories, but I was very moved to hear my noble friend Lord Graham describe how he was unable to go on to secondary school because his father was unemployed. Like my noble friend Lord Touhig, I find it a real privilege to hear him share his experience with us. I can only say to him that if his father is looking down now he must be so proud of what he has done and what he has come to, as indeed we all are to be sharing these Benches and, I am sure, this Chamber with him.
As well as hearing horror stories about specific cases, the truth is that we are living through the biggest housing crisis of a generation. Families are struggling to afford decent homes because of the combination of the crisis in living standards and the simple lack of housing. This debate has surfaced two or three key issues which I will be grateful if the Minister would respond to. First, on the point I just raised about the insecurity for children and families, tenancies in the private sector last on average 19 months. Many of them, of course, as a condition of the mortgages given to those who own them, are limited to a maximum of 12 months. However, families with children now make up a third of renters, so some solution has to be found to enable families with children to have longer tenancies, because the welfare of their children depends upon it. Will the Minister tell the House what the Government propose to do to ensure more secure tenancies for families?
Secondly, all noble Lords raised the issue of the quality of the housing stock, again, especially in the private rented sector. The consequences—the outcomes for children—have been very clear. However, we also know that some landlords are making plenty of money but are failing in their responsibilities to invest in maintaining their properties to a decent level. With so many new people entering the buy-to-let market, what are the Government doing to inform them and to enforce the responsibilities of landlords, and what are they doing to ensure that rogue landlords are tackled properly?
The broader issue of the role of local authorities in this area was raised by the noble Baroness, Lady Eaton. I shall be interested to hear how the Minister responds to her. I also wonder whether she has had the opportunity to look at the work of local authorities such as Newham, which has sought to tackle the problem of rogue landlords and poor quality housing head on, by measures such as establishing licence arrangements, fining unlicensed providers, setting clear expectations and standards and
improving enforcement. Newham has found that families moving into the borough seeking cheaper housing has caused quite a lot of churn, so it has also been trying to find ways of supporting stability in those communities, to improve the quality of life for families. However, those problems cannot be tackled locally, so will the Minister please tell us what the Government are doing at a national level?
Finally, the biggest question is: what are the Government doing about the desperate shortage of housing in this country? I arrived at the end of the previous debate just in time to hear the Minister share a positive barrage of housing statistics, and I am sure that she will not want to repeat them. However, I shall simply put one statistic on the table: the number of households in England is projected to rise by more than 230,000 each year, yet David Cameron has presided over the lowest level of housebuilding of any peacetime Prime Minister since the 1920s.
I know what the next Labour Government will do to turn that round; we have been very clear about this. We are committed to increasing the supply of new homes by 200,000 a year by the end of the next Parliament. We will give councils “use it or lose it” powers to stop land hoarding, we will build the next generation of new towns and we will support communities that want to grow. We have asked Sir Michael Lyons to chair a housing commission to draw up a road map for delivering on these promises. But for the sake of this country, and of all those children we have heard about, I do not want to wait until May 2015 to see some action. I look forward to hearing from the Minister what the Government will do right now.
4.31 pm
The Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State, Department for Communities and Local Government (Baroness Stowell of Beeston) (Con): My Lords, I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Kennedy, for introducing this Question for Short Debate on behalf of the noble Baroness, Lady King of Bow, and I join others in wishing her and her family well. I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Sherlock, for her remarks about my new role, and I welcome her to her leading role on Department for Work and Pensions matters on the Opposition Front Bench.
As I said in the previous debate, I always listen carefully when the noble Lord, Lord Graham of Edmonton, contributes to our debates in this House. He is someone of huge experience and great wisdom, and I shall certainly reflect on the points that he made about those who have experienced poverty but have been able to go on and enjoy great success, and about how we must support people in their escape from poverty and acknowledge their achievements. I can tell the noble Lord that a person who offers me great inspiration in that regard is my own mother. I have someone in my own family whose experiences I am regularly reminded of, and reflect on.
There is no doubt that low-quality housing can have a terrible impact on child development. In 2006 Shelter conducted some powerful research that conclusively demonstrated the links between poor housing and poor outcomes. It is intuitive that that should be
so, but Shelter provided evidence—much of which others have already mentioned, so I shall just mention a couple of points. Children living in damp housing are more likely to develop respiratory conditions, unsafe housing is linked to greater numbers of accidents and injuries, and children who become homeless are more likely to suffer with mental health problems and to struggle at school. None of this has any place in a modern society today. Every child deserves the best possible start in life and the best possible home in which to grow up to help them develop and achieve their potential.
There is much that the Government are doing to address the problems of endemic and intergenerational poverty that forces people to live in poor housing, whether by addressing the factors that trap people on benefits by helping them into work, or by tackling the failures in education that have meant that the children who most need the best schools have instead been let down for too long. There are also steps that we are specifically taking to ensure that every child grows up in suitable housing, and the first and most important is by simply building more homes. The noble Baroness, Lady Sherlock, mentioned the detailed summary that I provided in the last debate about what the Government are doing in this area. We are doing a huge amount to increase the supply of new homes, both in the private sector and in the social housing sector. I shall not take time by going over them all in great detail. But while I take on board what the noble Lord, Lord Graham, said about housing and poverty not being political issues—and I agree with him on that—I still think that, if we are going to trade statistics, as we do in these debates, I have to respond to some of the points that are put to me.
It is worth reminding the House that the numbers for social housing fell under the last Labour Government and that, under this Government, we are taking big steps to reverse that decline. I shall not go through all the numbers and the stats again in detail, but that is an area in which we are reversing the trend substantially and making it a huge priority. As was mentioned in a previous debate, this is something of huge importance and great concern to everybody.
As has also been acknowledged, we do not just have to build new homes—we also have to improve the standard of the existing homes and ensure that all social housing meets a minimum standard of decency. We have invested £2 billion in this spending round to bring the remaining 127,000 of what were rather shockingly 217,000 non-decent homes up to standard. I note that my noble friend Lady Eaton referred to the efforts in this area that the local authorities are making. The funding that has been made available so far has led to more than 58,000 homes being upgraded which means that, outside of London—and London is slightly different—we are now nearly at 100% of council homes meeting the formal standard of decent homes. There is more work to do in London, and we have announced additional funding for London in the next spending round. Clearly, the noble Baroness, Lady King of Bow, if she was here, would be interested in what we are doing in that area, because of her personal history in representing Tower Hamlets.
Addressing supply and the quality of existing stock will not alone address the immediate problems of demand and overcrowding. It is worth noting that overcrowding is quoted extensively in the latest Shelter briefing, to which the noble Lord, Lord Graham, referred. Overcrowding is perhaps referred to more than anything else as one of the main factors for children suffering from a wide range of concerns and conditions. It was highlighted by all noble Lords, especially the noble Lord, Lord Touhig, in his contribution. It is important to recognise the facts here; waiting lists for social housing have doubled since 1998; there are now 1.8 million households on waiting lists. Nearly 250,000 of social homes in England are overcrowded, while nearly 390,000 are underoccupied by two bedrooms or more.
Overcrowding—a very important issue—was behind two important new measures in the Localism Act 2011. The first gives councils more freedom to innovate and develop local solutions, and make the best use of limited stock by using the private rented sector when it makes sense to do so. This gives councils more flexibility. Part of this involves making sure that we get the best use from what is available to us. The second measure gave councils powers to match the length of tenancy to the household need, and made it easier for social tenants to move house as their needs change.
It goes without saying that housing is a complex issue. Clearly, I am discovering this personally, having just taken over responsibility for the DCLG in your Lordships’ House. It is clear that there are no easy solutions, and we need a range of measures. It is fundamental to make the best use of all that is available, and to treat everyone fairly. I must say that, because of noble Lords’ focus on the issue of overcrowding, I am somewhat surprised that as far as I can recall no noble Lords have raised the Government’s decision to remove the spare room subsidy. That decision was very much part of a range of measures to tackle overcrowding, and the Opposition have now committed to reintroducing it.
It is probably worth placing some facts on the record, not least because this is the first time that I have raised this in my new role. The housing benefit bill doubled between 2000 and 2012-13, and we are now spending almost £24 billion per year. There are approaching 1 million extra rooms paid for by housing benefit for working-age social sector tenants. The removal of the spare room subsidy applies only to working-age people in receipt of housing benefit, and it means that the benefit meets the cost of accommodation appropriate to the household’s needs. Removing this subsidy brings estimated average savings of £500 million a year.
In removing the spare room subsidy we bring social sector benefit entitlements into line with long-standing private sector entitlements, which I think is really important. Before making this change there was a
difference in treatment. People receiving housing benefit who live in private rented accommodation have not enjoyed the subsidy that those in the social sector have had for more than 20 years. This has not been tackled before. We believe that it is appropriate to do so, because it will reintroduce the important aspect of fairness between people in different kinds of housing. This must continue if we are to make the best use of the available stock.
In making those changes, there are of course special mitigations in place to safeguard the needs of particularly vulnerable children. There are also measures in place for disabled children. We have a special fund available, £180 million in this year alone, to enable local councils to make discretionary housing payments to ease the transition. This is about making sure that funding is there to deal with those special cases that may need proper attention by the local authorities in that area. We will measure the impact of these changes, and the first report is due next year.
This is an important area. Housing is absolutely essential. Noble Lords have raised several issues to which I have not had an opportunity to respond, and I will do so in writing. Finally, I will make a couple of brief points.
The noble Baroness, Lady Sherlock, raised an important point about the range of housing available and the effect on some families of what she described as insecurity through being housed in private rented accommodation as opposed to social sector accommodation. I would say two things to her on that. First, we recognise that, where possible, people want to own their own home—it provides the security and stability that is so important to families. That is why we are very committed to the right-to-buy scheme. Secondly, we have also introduced a new scheme called the right-to-rent fund, which is about providing £1 billion of investment for the building of specifically designed accommodation for rent. This new accommodation will be for rental and will not be subject to subsequent on-sale. Something that we have not done in this country until now is to create a market that people can take advantage of where renting is the only option for them, or indeed an option that they choose, but we have to make sure that it is done professionally and that it is never seen as second rate compared with owning the property.
All children deserve, as well as need, a safe, secure and loving home. The Government are committed to addressing the causes of child poverty and are doing so by helping parents to get back into work, improving education and building more new affordable homes. We are delivering, although there is still more to do. This issue is very important. I am grateful to all noble Lords and I shall certainly reflect on all the comments that have been made here today.