My hon. Friend will know that I spend a lot of time visiting all 32 London boroughs. This morning I was in Camden, where people think that more than 40% of their family homes could be sold off as a consequence of this Government’s Bill.
Nobody is against the aspiration of home ownership, but changes to the Bill are required, even at this late stage, to minimise the impact on London. That is why I have tabled and supported amendments all of which, to date, the Government have opposed. I hope, for the sake of Londoners, that that changes today. Amendment 89 is the “like-for-like replacement” amendment. It would say to housing associations across the country, “If you’re going to go ahead with right to buy, you have to spend the money raised from the sale locally on replacement affordable housing.” It has been estimated that the sell-off could lead to over £800 million a year being lost from London unless there are proper guarantees put in place to keep these receipts in the city.
The House should be wary of imitations, because other hon. Members are trying to fool Londoners by saying that their amendment will protect the city’s affordable homes. I refer, of course, to amendment 112, which is in the name of the Secretary of State, but which, rather cosily, the Prime Minister and the hon. Member for Richmond Park (Zac Goldsmith) announced last week. Let me pause to congratulate the hon. Member for Richmond Park on, as I said, becoming a father again this week. I am sure that the whole House sends him and his family our very best wishes.
I say this to hon. Members and to Londoners outside this Chamber: do not be tricked by the spin and hot air coming from the hon. Member for Richmond Park and the Government; do not allow the wool to be pulled over your eyes, because all is not as the Tories would have you believe. It is a con. For a start, amendment 112 tries to make palatable the Government’s plan to sell off council homes in London. The editorial in the Evening Standard set out three useful tests to judge the impact of this Bill. Let us look at how both amendments measure up to those tests. Under the first test,
“it is absolutely necessary to keep money raised by the sale of London council houses in London.”
The amendment announced with great fanfare last week clearly fails on this front. It fails to ring-fence the money for London, which means that money raised by selling off London’s council homes will still flood out of the capital to subsidise the Government’s national right-to-buy scheme. This contrasts with my amendment 89, which would ring-fence all the money from London housing association homes sold under right to buy for new affordable homes.
On the second test, the Evening Standard stated:
“It could be a mixed blessing if some central London boroughs lost most of their housing-association stock even if it meant more council houses being built in outer London.”
Again, amendment 112 fails on that front. It opens the door for homes to be replaced outside the borough where they are sold off. If there is any doubt that that is the case, the hon. Member for Richmond Park admitted to the Camden New Journal just last week the truth about the Government’s and his own amendment. He owned up to the fact that inner London would be hollowed out under his amendment. He said that, under his proposals, it was a “mathematical obstacle” to replace social housing in Camden and other inner London boroughs such as Westminster and Kensington and Chelsea. There we have it: an admission that the hon. Gentleman’s amendment will let London be hollowed out.
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By comparison, amendment 89 guarantees a replacement, like-for-like home in the borough where the original home is sold, before the rest of the money is spent on more affordable housing across the capital. My amendment will do exactly what it says on the tin.
The third test set out by the Evening Standard reads:
“A healthy housing sector is a mix of private ownership, private rentals and social housing: the Government, in its attempt to promote home-ownership, should not forget the rest.”
Under amendment 112, the reality is that the so-called affordable homes the Government promise to build could all be for sale for nearly £500,000. I politely tell the hon. Gentleman that in few people’s eyes are homes that cost £450,000 affordable.
We know just how interested the Prime Minister is in getting hung up on what is and what is not truly affordable. His response last week to those who dared to suggest that £450,000 was not really affordable was remarkable. He said that
“people get too hung up on these definitions…the definition of affordable housing is a house that someone can afford to buy or afford to rent”.
Let us think about that for a moment. On that measure, some of the most expensive homes in London, such as the £26.5 million Holland Park mansion sold last year,
are affordable, because someone has been able to buy them. That shows just how far from reality and out of touch the hon. Member for Richmond Park and this Government are with the housing crisis. Last week, the hon. Member for Richmond Park told the Camden New Journal that the term “affordable” has become “elastic and misleading”.