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.