Mr Frank Field – 2014 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Work and Pensions

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Mr Frank Field on 2014-03-11.

To ask the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions, if he will make an assessment of the potential effect on the housing benefit budget of limiting all rents to local authority rent levels.

Steve Webb

It is not possible to make a meaningful assessment. Limiting all rents to local authority rent levels would be a dramatic change to the housing market. It is therefore not possible to reliably predict what would happen to the supply and demand for accommodation, especially in the private rented sector, and the impacts on housing benefit expenditure.