The deputy prime minister has stated that while she is in favour of continuing the government’s Right to Buy housing programme, changes need to be made to ensure it is “fairer” to the taxpayer. Angela Rayner emphasised the importance of allowing social tenants the opportunity to purchase their long-term homes, but argued that “huge discounts” previously provided by the Tory government enabled the sites to be relinquished at an excessive rate. Rayner is seeking to balance the need for “fairness” to the buyer against the importance of replacing the stock.
The previous government’s alterations to the Right to Buy scheme have made it easier for social housing to be sold, leading Labour to argue that it is likely to do severe harm to the social housing system. Housing campaigner Kwajo Tweneboa has called it “the most damaging policy introduced in respect to social housing”. The need to build social stock will necessitate government intervention. Labour’s mayor for Greater Manchester, Andy Burnham, has asked for the suspension of the Right to Buy scheme for new houses, claiming that its continuation impedes progress.
Rayner has initiated a consultation on the matter and seeks to make the scheme more beneficial for taxpayers who fund social housing to prevent the loss of sites at an expedited rate. Council tenants have been able to purchase their homes at a discount since 1980 under Right to Buy, which now gives them a limit of 70 percent, depending on the length of their tenancy, or up to £80,900 in England and £108,000 in London boroughs (whichever is lower).
During an interview with the BBC’s Laura Kuenssberg programme, Rayner reiterated a Labour promise to construct 1.5 million homes by the conclusion of the present parliament, emphasising that she wishes to establish the most extensive wave of council housing in generations. She claimed that a new bill on workers’ rights, which will be introduced to parliament next month, would be a piece of “historic legislation”, with “a genuine living wage and sick pay for the lowest earners” and a ban on “exploitative zero-hour contracts and unpaid internships.”
Rayner’s conference speech centred on her personal experience as a single mother, stating her ambition to establish secure work, decent homes, and thriving communities. As part of its endeavours to build more houses, the government plans to introduce planning passports to speed up development. Rayner additionally applauded the government’s recent devolution agreements, which will result in the appointment of new mayors for areas like Lincolnshire and Hull and East Yorkshire
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