Item 4 on our agenda is the Stage 4 debate on the Abolition of the Right to Buy and Associated Rights (Wales) Bill. I call on the Minister for Housing and Regeneration to move the motion—Rebecca Evans.

Motion NDM6607 Rebecca Evans

To propose that the National Assembly for Wales in accordance with Standing Order 26.47:

Approves the Abolition of the Right to Buy and Associated Rights (Wales) Bill.

Motion moved.

Thank you, Deputy Llywydd. I formally move the motion. I am pleased to introduce the fourth and final stage of the Abolition of the Right to Buy and Associated Rights (Wales) Bill before the Assembly today. I'd like to start by thanking Assembly Members for their robust scrutiny of the Bill and for their support, which has ensured its passage through to Stage 4. In particular, I'd like to thanks members of the Equality, Local Government and Communities Committee, the Constitutional and Legislative Affairs Committee and the Finance Committee for their thorough and considered scrutiny of the Bill through stages 1 and 2. I'd also like to acknowledge all stakeholders who provided evidence during the scrutiny process and thank them for their contribution to the legislative process. My thanks also to Assembly Commission staff and Welsh Government officials for their support throughout the Bill process. I'd also like to say how pleased Carl Sargeant would have been to see the Bill reach the final stage. He believed passionately in protecting our social housing stock for those who need it most, and he worked extremely hard to bring this legislation forward. I'm delighted to be able to steer it through its final stages and onto the Welsh statute book.

This Bill forms a key part of the Government's housing policy, and was a manifesto commitment in 2016. This Government is committed to ending the right to buy and to protecting our social housing for those in the greatest need. Ending the right to buy will give local authorities and housing associations the confidence to invest in new developments to help to meet the need for quality affordable housing in Wales. The right to buy has been a feature of social housing for many years in Wales, and this has resulted in the loss of a significant number of homes—more than 139,000 between 1981 and 2016. In recent years, although sales of social housing have slowed, social housing stock is still being lost at a time of considerable housing supply pressure. Measures taken by the previous Welsh Government to address the impact of homes lost through the right to buy, and the continued pressure on social housing, included introducing the Housing (Wales) Measure 2011. This enabled a local authority to apply to suspend the right to buy and the right to acquire in its area. While the right to buy has been suspended in some parts of Wales, significant housing pressure still continues across the country.

This Bill was introduced last March following a White Paper consultation in 2015 to address the continued housing pressure and ensure that social housing is protected throughout Wales on a permanent basis. The Bill abolishes all variations of the right to buy, including the preserved right to buy and the right to acquire. Provisions in the Bill also allow at least a year after Royal Assent before final abolition on existing properties, but, to encourage investment in new homes, the rights will end for homes that are new to the social housing stock, and, therefore, have no existing tenants, two months after Royal Assent. One year is a fair and reasonable amount of time for tenants to decide whether they wish to exercise their rights and to take appropriate financial and legal advice. The Bill contains provisions to ensure that all tenants are given information within two months of Royal Assent, and that this information is supplied in the most appropriate format to meet their needs. This provision ensures that all tenants will be fully aware of the impact of the legislation before it comes into force.

This Government remains committed to enabling home ownership for those who want to enter the property market. We are well on our way to delivering our manifesto commitment of an extra 20,000 homes during this Assembly term. Government schemes, such as Help to Buy, homebuy and rent to own, are designed to help people on modest incomes into home ownership, but not at the expense of reducing the social housing stock. Ending the right to buy ensures that we safeguard the investment made in social housing over many generations for Welsh families now and in the future, and I ask Members to support the motion.

The right-to-buy policy has been extremely successful across the UK, and especially in Wales, because it responded to the aspirations of those on lower incomes to purchase their own homes. As I have consistently argued, the problems with the housing market have arisen due to a lack of housing supply, and especially in Wales—not because of the 300 or 400 homes that are now annually sold under the right-to-buy schemes. Some 139,000 council and housing association homes in Wales have been sold since the right to buy was introduced in 1980 under Margaret Thatcher's Conservative Government—139,000 homes in Wales; a remarkably successful policy. How could you have a better test of a policy's relevance and success?

The Welsh Conservatives, Deputy Llywydd, have tried to offer sensible ideas of reform for this popular policy so that abolition could be avoided. The Welsh Government has not been prepared to listen, and we regret this. We then attempted to make this right to buy abolition Bill fairer. We tried to provide a fairer outcome for those tenants in the currently suspended areas so that they, too, could get one last chance to purchase their property—denied to them.

We also offered an amendment with the intention of limiting the Act's operation to 10 years, following which the Welsh Ministers may lay regulations proposing that the abolition is made permanent. We did this because the Welsh Government made it clear in committee that it was not against the right to buy in principle. So, I tested this point—but alas, again, denied. No response.

Another amendment that would've ensured that the abolition of the right to buy and associated rights may not have come into effect until at least two years after the Bill receives Royal Assent was also denied, despite the fact that this was what happened in Scotland to allow a calm period of transition. These amendments were laid in response to the views of tenants throughout Wales who want more house building and would prefer alternative solutions to permanent abolition. Instead, this Bill intends to take their aspiration of home ownership away from them forever.

Deputy Presiding Officer, should we get the opportunity, the Welsh Conservatives will aim to reintroduce the right-to-buy policy with a reformed structure for the modern housing climate. These reforms would include ring-fencing the right-to-buy receipts so that they are reinvested into new social housing stock and removing the right to buy's applicability to new housing stock until it has been rented to a social tenant for a certain number of years.

In conclusion, this Bill does not serve the people of Wales well. It serves rather a narrow, left-wing ideology, oblivious to all the evidence and decades of success in its application as a policy. We will go on reflecting the aspirations of many tenants. Even at this stage, I urge Members to reject this Bill.

Just a very brief word as the Bill reaches the end of its journey through this Assembly. Plaid Cymru has supported the Bill fully throughout the process, and has assisted in improving it through the scrutiny process. Abolishing the right to buy has been a policy of our party over a period of decades. We were convinced that the right to buy would militate against those who can’t afford to buy their own homes, and militate against those who are reliant on renting in the social sector in order to get a roof above their heads, and unfortunately, that is what has happened. The number of social homes has almost halved in Wales, which has led to lengthy waiting lists, has led to too many people living under the same roof, has led to people living in inappropriate homes, and has led to an increase in homelessness. With the passing of this Bill, it is now time for this Government to focus clearly on the need to build more social housing, and to provide just as clear a focus on the efforts to eradicate poverty and inequality—a focus that is lacking at the moment.

I won't be supporting this legislation. I asked in this Chamber what is wrong with selling a council house as long as all the money is used to build new ones, and I still haven't had a satisfactory answer. I'm not prepared to vote to take away an option for working class people to own their own home without any new ways for them to buy a house being introduced. The legislation is part of an unhealthy trend of keeping people dependent on the state and reinforcing inequality. 

So, here are some suggestions on where the Government would be better off putting its efforts. Between 2012 and 2016, Cardiff council run by Labour didn't build a single council house—not one. That was their choice. Other councils manage it. This legislation does nothing to address that. We should ensure that local people are the absolute priority for housing lists, and social housing stock in Wales should be used to cater for local demands. I hope that's a principle we can all get behind.

We need to build a lot more affordable housing, and that means really affordable. Better planning laws could force building companies to build a higher proportion of genuinely affordable housing, but we're in a situation now where just a few developers dominate the housing sector, leading to bad development plans where green fields are destroyed and local culture ignored. An industry where smaller local house builders build housing based on local need and local characteristics is surely a good thing, but the high cost of land and the complexity of Labour's planning laws prevent this. 

If we really want to do something about the battle against the housing crisis, let's do something about the 23,000 long-term empty properties in Wales. They're sat empty and they're a blot on our communities. If those houses were used with an average of two people then we'd quickly get 50,000 people housed very quickly.  

Now, credit where credit's due, because Torfaen council managed to bring a third of long-term empty properties back into use last year, but Cardiff council managed just 0.8 per cent, but will let rich developers build unaffordable housing all over green fields instead. So, why doesn't the Government get focused on every council in Wales, getting families into these empty houses?

Home ownership is part of the Welsh dream. Some here will say that ownership is just a UK obsession. I see nothing wrong with that. It's part of our culture, and I want to encourage it. That's why I cannot support this Bill. 

Thank you. I call on the Minister for Housing and Regeneration to reply to the debate—Rebecca Evans. 

Thank you. I've welcomed the opportunity to debate the Bill and I thank Members for their contributions. I always look to find common ground where there is some, and I think there is some in terms of the wider ambitions for housing. For example, there's no argument from Welsh Government on the importance of building homes, supporting people to buy a home, increasing affordable housing and turning empty houses into homes as well, but there is a fundamental disagreement between ourselves and the Conservatives and others about whether or not losing 139,000 houses from the social housing stock is actually a cause to celebrate, because on these benches it's certainly not.  

What is a cause to celebrate is the fact that we are taking this important action to protect social housing stock for the future for the people who need it most, and I'd like to thank Siân Gwenllian for explaining why it is important that we're taking this forward, and take this opportunity to put on record my thanks to Plaid Cymru for the constructive way in which you have engaged with us throughout the passing of this Bill. And so, I'd like to ask Members to support the motion to pass the Bill. Thank you. 

Thank you very much. In accordance with Standing Order 26.50C, a recorded vote must be taken on Stage 4 motions, and so I defer voting on this motion until voting time.

Voting deferred until voting time.