My Lords, I thank the noble Lord for his amendment, although I am not sure that I should. I appreciate the considered thoughts from your Lordships’ House on ways in which we can improve the Bill but I fear that the amendment would compromise the ability of the Government to meet our manifesto commitment, which clearly states that receipts from the sale of local authority housing will be used to fund right-to-buy discounts for housing association tenants, as well as supporting the delivery of additional homes. The amendment would prevent us from meeting this clear manifesto commitment, and as a result housing association tenants would be unable to realise their dream of owning their own home.
We know that there is £200 billion of value locked up in housing in this country. We also know that some of that could be used to increase housing supply, something that noble Lords from across the House have expressed a wish to do. We also know that in many places the value has not been used for that purpose. That is why this Government are bringing forward this legislation. I make it clear that we also want to increase housing supply with these receipts and through the voluntary deal with housing associations that will see more homes built for each right-to-buy sale.
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We have already discussed the suggestion from the noble Lord, Lord Kerslake, for an amendment to reflect the need for one-for-one in the Bill, and the commitment that I gave in that respect. That seems the right approach when considering the provision of additional homes.
The noble Lord asked when we might see some of the data. There are a lot of data from 165 local authorities, and I made it clear at the beginning that it would take some time to analyse them. I assure noble Lords that we will take decisions on this as soon as possible, but I do not want to rush into those decisions. I hope that on that basis the noble Lord will feel able to withdraw his amendment.