Luciana Berger – 2016 Parliamentary Question to the Department for Communities and Local Government

The below Parliamentary question was asked by Luciana Berger on 2016-09-06.

To ask the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government, what steps he is taking to ensure access to social housing for people in Liverpool, Wavertree constituency who require such housing.

Gavin Barwell

Through the Spending Review the Government has committed to investing £8 billion to deliver 400,000 affordable housing starts, doubling our investment from 2018/19. This includes £1.6 billion towards delivering 100,000 affordable homes for rent by 2021.

Since April 2010, we have delivered over 293,000 affordable homes. Between 1997 and 2010 the stock of rented affordable homes fell by 420,000. Between 2010 and 2015, the stock of rented affordable homes rented increased by 64,000.

Alongside increasing supply, the Localism act 2011 has maintained the statutory ‘reasonable preference’ criteria which ensure that overall priority for social housing is given to those who need it most.

The introduction of fixed term tenancies in the Housing and Planning Act 2016 will ensure councils get the best use out of their social housing stock by focusing it on those who need it the most for as long as they need it.