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Rented Housing

May I begin by saying how much I welcome the Committee's work and how interesting it was? I congratulate both the Chairman of the Committee and other Members who worked on the report. I agree with an awful lot of the report—the vast majority—and it is a good, thoughtful piece of work on the private rented sector. I also welcome the Minister to her new position. It is the first opportunity that we have had properly to debate a housing issue, and I look forward to many other occasions. Indeed, I hope that our debates continue longer than they did with her two predecessors—she is third Housing Minister that I have faced in 2008 alone. I hope that they give the Minister a greater chance to get used to the portfolio. The scope of the review, and the detail in the Government response, means that it is impossible to cover many of the interesting recommendations and responses in the short time that I have available. I therefore thought that I would simply pick out a few things on which there should be greater clarity, particularly on the Government response to the Committee's excellent work. When we look at any area of housing, but especially the private and public rented sectors, we find that the overall supply of housing is the critical thing—it is the driver for everything else that happens in the sector. That was mentioned several times today. I wonder whether, actually, this afternoon is a useful point at which to clear up an area of confusion. Comments by the new Housing Minister last week rather set the cat among the pigeons. She told a recent meeting of the Committee:"““I think the most challenging of the targets was the 3 million””" homes by 2020. There is no doubt about that, but she added:"““but that was an ambition actually””."