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Housing

My Lords, I congratulate the Government, the Minister and her ministerial colleagues on the range of policies that are contained in the Green Paper. She ought not to be put off by the critics who say, with hindsight, what has not been achieved. In my view, the Government are wise to acknowledge that much more could be done, but, at the same time, the House should recognise that a great deal has been done and that what has been said promises even more, especially on affordable housing. Will the Minister look at that situation? When the right-to-buy policy came in in 1979, it was very popular, not least because those who already had the largesse of a tenancy from a local authority had the additional bonus, if they sold the property¸ of receiving large cash sums. In Edmonton, where I was Member of Parliament, we found over the years that properties that were bought for £7,000 or £8,000 were changing hands for over £100,000 in a very short space of time. The greatest boon that the Government can give, through agencies and directly, is tenancies to those who are desperate for a house. That ought not to include a hidden bonus that, at some time in the future, they will be able to sell it and get hundreds of thousands of pounds. Is the Minister aware of that aggravation and can she say something about readjustments to the present policy? It was a bribe then and it is a bribe now.