Mike Amesbury – 2020 Comments on the Social Housing White Paper

The comments made by Mike Amesbury, the Shadow Minister for Housing and Planning, on 17 November 2020.

The Government’s response to the Grenfell Tower tragedy has been slow at every stage. They were slow to re-house residents, slow to remove deadly cladding, and slow to come forward with social housing reforms.

Two years late, this white paper appears to water down previous proposals. The Government must do all it can to ensure a disaster like Grenfell can never happen again. That means tackling stigma, putting tenants’ voices centre stage, and ensuring the regulator has real teeth.

Today’s proposals contain nothing to help the thousands struggling in the private rented sector, make up for a lost decade of social housing, or tackle the housing crisis.