Meeting the New Ministers

17 June 2010 |

Both The Housing Forum Chair, Barry Munday and Chief Executive, Shelagh Grant, have continued to engage regularly with the Department for Communities and Local Government officials and a wide range of housing centred organisations to discuss development and delivery of policies. With the new Government many policies are under review and we are keen to keep up with developments as they emerge.

We have been fortunate to be invited to Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government Eric Pickle MP's reception on 3rd June and to Minister for Housing and Planning Grant Shapps MP's first policy speech on acceding to office, held on 8th June. From this we can begin to take a view on the likely direction of housing policy under the new Government:

  • uppermost in our minds is the scaling back of the £781m Housing pledge and its on-going vulnerability. We have also been concerned about the impact on continuing regeneration programmes and would urge for a full economic impact assessment if funding is to be reduced.
  • we have heard the key themes in the Queen's speech given greater depth and the future direction for decentralisation of planning has been emphasised. We remain concerned about how this can work in practice and our members views, emphasised also at our National Conference is that we want to see stability, rather than wholesale change, within the planning system, particularly when operating in the current market.
  • we have heard that reducing regulation and the number of quangos will be vigorously pursued and, although legislation will be required, Regional Spatial Strategies will certainly be abolished.
  • Local Housing Trusts could be expanded and encouraged and the government are committed to greater emphasis on the existing stock - but expect to see this through retail initiatives rather than regulation.

CLG have advised us they are committed to working with us and other housing organisations as policies are developed and we will ensure we keep our members briefed.

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