Housing and Planning Bill — House of Commons, 2016-05-09
Topic: Housing
Thomas Anthony Brake (Liberal Democrats, Centre to centre-left): I want to start by associating myself with the comments made by the hon. Members for Erith and Thamesmead (Teresa Pearce) and for Sheffield South East (Mr Betts), who is the Chair of the Communities and Local Government Committee. I hope the Minister will not seek to portray their views, or indeed mine, as those of people who oppose home ownership. Clearly, that is not the case, and I hope the Government will have learned the lesson that fear tactics—certainly in London—do not work very well for them On Lords amendment 10B, the Government propose a review. From my brief period as a Minister, I know that when Governments look at what they can offer as a sop to the Opposition, it is a review that comes forward. I welcome the fact that a review is on the table. However, given the impact that zero-carbon homes would have and the positive contribution they would make, that is what we need to stick by. The Minister and other Conservative Members have referred to the Lords intervening in this. Of course, Conservative Members had their opportunity to reform the House of the Lords in the previous Parliament, and failed to do so The Minister may also refer to the Conservatives’ manifesto commitment to being the greenest Government ever. I assume that commitment is still in play for them, and hope they would therefore support the idea of zero-carbon homes and the highest possible environmental standards. Last time we discussed this, I asked the Minister how much people would save if these higher standards were introduced. I am afraid that he did not have a response, but he did refer to the fact that people generally keep their homes for seven years. That is another demonstration of a rather short-sighted approach, because these homes will be there not for seven years but for 50 or 100 years—who knows? The zero-carbon measures would have an impact over the duration of the lifetime of these homes—an impact that would benefit all future occupants, not just those who live there for a minimum of seven years In relation to extra costs, last time we discussed this, the figure of £3,000 was deployed, although that was disputed. The hon. Member for Erith and Thamesmead suggested that those costs had gone down to £1,500, and the Minister referred to £15,000; I am not quite sure where he got that from. In any case, long-term savings would clearly be derived from these higher energy standards for homes, and that would benefit everyone who lived in them thereafter It is legitimate for the Government to point out that amendment 10B would place additional burdens on smaller builders. It would therefore be appropriate for the Government to come forward with ideas about how to address that through training, advice and additional support from which those builders could benefit so that they could not only develop the sites that we want to be developed but develop homes to the highest possible standards to ensure that the Government meet their climate change commitments Question put, That this House disagrees with Lords amendment 10B The House proceeded to a Division.