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Affordable Housing

The Chancellor has said that social housing needs to be a priority in the comprehensive spending review. I think that we need more shared ownership housing, too. The shared equity task force report, which was published yesterday, sets out better ways in which to bring more private sector investment into shared ownership schemes, which will give us the opportunity to concentrate public sector investment increasingly around social housing. That is an area of contrast between the parties, because, as my hon. Friend may be aware, the shadow Chancellor said in February that increased shared ownership should be funded from some of the Government money that is going into social housing. I disagree with that, because I think that we need more social housing and more shared ownership. We should not reduce social housing in order to deliver the shared ownership that we need. Demand for housing has grown steadily, and the house building industry has failed to respond. Over the last 30 years of the 20th century, the number of households increased by 30 per cent., while the level of new house building fell by 50 per cent. The figures that we have set out for the future suggest that if we continue with the rate of house building over the past few years, the proportion of 30-year-old, two-earner households able to afford their own home on the basis of their earnings will drop from more than 50 per cent. today to nearer 30 per cent. in 20 years’ time, which is simply unsustainable. It would be unfair to deny future generations the opportunity of home ownership, which previous generations have had. In that circumstance, many of those people would still have the chance to get on to the housing ladder, but only because of gifts or inheritance from parents or grandparents, and it would be unfair if someone’s chance of becoming a home owner were to depend on whether their parents or grandparents were home owners before them. That is why the Select Committee report is so important. It is interesting that many hon. Members on both sides of the House have discussed the need to build more homes, which is very new. I remember the debates on the issue 12 or 18 months ago on the Floor of the House and in Westminster Hall. We were arguing for far more houses, but Opposition Members told us that there was no need for new homes and that we did not need the Barker recommendations. I think that we need to build more homes. We have already increased the level of house building from 130,000 new homes four years ago to nearly 170,000 new homes last year.