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Welfare Reform Bill

I thank the hon. Gentleman for his intervention. He is right and he makes the point well; indeed, I shall come to that in a moment. I strongly support the general principles referred to in the Green Paper and agree that we need to get tenants to take more responsibility for their own financial affairs. That said, I shall now outline a few difficulties that I can foresee with the new LHA. Much depends on what constitutes a region or an area and, although it is obvious what is meant from the pathfinder studies in the nine local authorities, it is otherwise by no means clear. There are particular problems in London in setting the level of benefit. What constitutes a decent, normal market or median rent in London, given the huge discrepancies in rent levels in different boroughs across the capital? For example, rents in Barking and Dagenham or Havering are far lower than in Westminster, Kensington and Chelsea or Hammersmith and Fulham. Even within a very small local authority area such as my own, the difference in rent levels between Fulham—around the Hurlingham club—and in Shepherd’s Bush can be huge, so it is very important that we define such areas well. I should be grateful for guidance from the Minister on this issue. If such areas are made too big, the natural reaction may well be for people to move from expensive boroughs to cheaper ones, or from more expensive areas within a given borough to cheaper ones. Some might view that as desirable and say that it is merely tenants following market forces, but I am not so sure. If the different parts of London are to remain sustainable and solid communities, we need a range of people living in each. Pricing the poor out of the centre of London, or out of places such as Fulham, could have consequences that we need to consider carefully before going down that route.