I beg to move, That the Bill be now read the Third time.
I am grateful to the House for its consideration of my Bill. I should point out that there was a technical amendment in Committee to change the long title, but that was merely to bring it into conformity with the published Bill’s aims on Second Reading, which were narrower in scope than the long title I presented on First Reading. For the record, therefore, I feel I should state that the long title now refers to a Bill
“To place a duty on certain public authorities to keep a register of individuals and associations of individuals who wish to acquire serviced plots of land to bring forward self-build and custom housebuilding projects and to place a duty on certain public authorities to have regard to those registers in carrying out planning and other functions. “
I shall be brief, as the Bill has been discussed thoroughly at previous stages. There was support for it from hon. Members on both sides of the House on Second Reading and in Committee. Other than the technical amendment to the long title, no amendments were made.
I am delighted that there is political consensus in favour of the Bill. The Minister responsible for housing and planning, my hon. Friend the Member for Great Yarmouth (Brandon Lewis), who is my parliamentary neighbour, and the shadow housing Minister, the hon. Member for Wolverhampton North East (Emma Reynolds), have spoken in support of the Bill. I am glad to see the hon. Member for West Ham (Lyn Brown) in her place. The shadow housing Minister would have liked to be here, but she has other commitments. However, she has been very supportive of the Bill. If we can agree the Bill today, and it gains a fair wind in the other place and reaches the statute book, we will have done a great deal of good for the prospects of self-build and custom house building in this country.
The Bill will require local planning authorities to maintain a register of individuals, or groups of individuals, who wish to acquire a serviced plot of land on which to build a home of their own. Local authorities will then be required to consider the demand for custom build on the register when they, for instance, develop their local plans, regenerate their town centres or old industrial sites, or dispose of surplus public land. I want the
register, over time, to become an established mechanism for helping to determine local housing need, similar to the affordable housing register. The register will also form the bedrock of the Government’s proposals for a new right to build, which the Department for Communities and Local Government consulted on last year.
The Bill has been drafted to allow flexibility in the detailed operation of the register to take advantage of the Government’s work in testing the right to build. The Government’s consultation and practical experience with 11 right-to-build vanguard local authorities will inform the final statutory framework for local registers through the detail of the regulations set down by the Secretary of State.
The rationale for the Bill is compelling. We all know that there is considerable latent demand for custom and self-build. We also know that many people want to build their own home, but they are unable to do so, or they find their plans obstructed by the unavailability of suitable land. By helping local authorities to have a better understanding of the local demand for custom and self-build, and then to have regard to that demand in exercising their planning, housing and regeneration functions, the Bill will start to encourage more land to be brought forward for custom build, thus unlocking the huge latent demand for custom and self-build that we know exists.
We will be able to put into action some of the lessons available to us from successful projects, such as the new custom-build communities in the Netherlands, and in other European countries where custom build and self-build are much more common than in the UK.
As the founder of the all-party group on self-build, custom and community housebuilding and place-making, I was particularly pleased last summer to lead a delegation to Berlin to see the successful delivery of a wide range of low-cost collective custom-build projects, which show that it is possible at scale to develop highly desirable options for affordable renting using the custom-build approach. Indeed, it was partly as a result of the Berlin visit that our all-party group assumed its current name. We should have no doubt that involving local people much more closely in developing the housing they want has enormous power to help transform communities.
I offer my particular thanks to the team of officials in the Department for Communities and Local Government, who have done so much to help me with the Bill. I offer my personal thanks to the Clerks in the Public Bill Office, who have been enormously helpful. I also thank all the Members of Parliament who served on the Bill Committee and who have taken an interest in my Bill.
I offer special thanks to Ted Stevens and Michael Holmes of the National Custom and Self-build Association and to the television presenters Kevin McCloud and Charlie Luxton, who have all supported the all-party group’s work during the last year and who have helped to create the environment in which the Bill is seen as the natural next step.
The Bill is not an overnight solution for all the challenges we face in our housing market, but it is an important step towards a world in which we routinely treat the building of houses as if customers mattered. By unlocking the latent demand for custom and self-build, my Bill will help to diversify the market. Most fundamentally, custom and self-build have an important role to play in improving the quality of our newly built
environment. We need to build more high-quality homes that are more spacious, that more closely reflect the wishes, hopes and dreams of the people who will live in them, and that are more energy efficient and sustainable. My Bill will help all that to happen, and I commend its Third Reading to the House.
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