Localism Bill

My Lords, I thank noble Lords for their contributions. I understand that this is an important aspect for those who have moved the amendments. I point out at the start that the noble Lord, Lord Best, made a powerful intervention over the welfare Bill and as a result—or, perhaps, we fully intended this anyway—the Department for Work and Pensions will carry out extensive research into the impact of the changes to the local housing allowance that are being introduced in 2011. That will go a long way towards dealing with the matters that are raised in this amendment. The department intends to monitor the impact of the changes on claimants, landlords and local authorities over a two-year period and will be publishing an interim report in 2012, with a final report due in 2013. We do not want to trudge along this path twice. Not only should the report being carried out by the DWP address the impact of its changes but it will pick up some of the points that the noble Lord has made in his intervention today. I am not much wedded to having yet another report on what is virtually the same subject, although we might ensure that the report being produced by the DWP picks up on some of the points that have been made. I am not making any promises on that right now but I promise to raise the issue and see if we are at a stage where that could be done. We believe that requiring the homelessness clauses to expire three years after commencement, which is what the noble Lord’s amendment is about, would undermine the intention of our reforms. Allowing people under the main homelessness duty to turn down offers of suitable accommodation in the private rented sector and wait for an offer of social housing would be unfair. I do not think that that point was raised particularly but I want to lay it down at the moment. The changes that we are making are part of the reforms to social housing and we need to ensure that all this is fair, not only to the people who are homeless but to those who are on the waiting list and looking for good, affordable housing. We need to ensure that we get the best from our 4 million socially rented homes. It is not necessary for us to require Parliament to look at a wealth of information on homelessness. There is already a report on homelessness to be laid before Parliament and local authorities collect a wealth of statistics on the subject. I asked what this meant but no one seems to know: the P1E form, which is published quarterly, shows the trends in homelessness and how many households accept private rented sector accommodation. Between all this, we are in fact addressing most of the areas that the noble Lord has raised and the requirements to ensure that people understand the nature and effect of homelessness and the impact of the measures taken by the DWP. I hope that the noble Lord will feel that this is satisfactory and that enough is going to be carried out, particularly, as I say, if I ensure that the DWP covers all the aspects that have been raised. I hope that the noble Lord will feel able to withdraw his amendment.