The Conservatives, in their amendment, appear to agree with the general theme of our motion, but have also diverged from us on some of the specific proposals, notably the need for the housing development corporation. They favour incentivising local councils and other public bodies that already exist, rather than creating something new. I will examine that specific issue later on in the debate.

One thing that we probably can all agree with is the need to build more homes in Wales. On the actual need for housing in Wales, there was some significant recent research by the late Dr Alan Holmans. He was the head of the Cambridge university's Cambridge Centre for Housing and Planning Research, he was a former senior adviser to the UK Government, and he was regarded by many as the pre-eminent expert in projecting future housing needs and demand. A report by Dr Holmans was published just after his death in 2015 stating that Wales could need as many as 12,000 affordable new homes a year. This is due to a variety of factors, including an unexpected increase in the number of single-person households. Just to recap, we have stated a variety of factors, of which immigration is only one. So, although in UKIP we will always point to the effect of uncontrolled mass immigration on the housing market, we by no means say that it is the only one.

I've used the term 'affordable housing', so I better explain what I mean by it. It refers to social housing or housing in the private rented sector that is affordable to people whose needs are not being met by the normal private housing market. The monthly rent of affordable homes should not cost more than 80 per cent of the average local market rent. Dr Holmans's figure was 12,000 new affordable homes a year; the Welsh Government have come up with a target of 20,000 affordable homes, but this is spread over an entire Assembly term. This will effectively mean 4,000 per year, which is a long way short of Dr Holmans's figure; in fact, it's only a third of the projected need.

In 2014-15, just over 6,000 new homes were built in Wales, and we have to put this figure into some context. Fifty years ago, in the 1960s, the construction industry was building around 20,000 homes a year in Wales. So, we are now building much smaller numbers of houses, and the balance between private and council houses has also changed. In 1955, over 70 per cent of all new homes were built by the public sector in the form of council houses. Today, that situation has reversed, and we now have over 80 per cent of new homes being built by private developers.

Many councils have large waiting lists, and many people would state that this means that we face a housing shortage, perhaps even a housing crisis. Of course, we've had housing shortages before in the UK, and we have come up with innovative means of tackling those shortages. There was a shortage of decent-quality homes immediately after the first world war and again immediately after world war two. On the latter occasion, the solution was prefabricated houses, or, as we all knew them, prefabs.

In the six years after the war, 150,000 prefabs were built. They were only designed as a temporary solution, with an intended lifespan of only 10-15 years. Many of these prefabs lasted a lot longer than their intended life; there are some still standing and still occupied that must be at least 65 years old. Many people who lived in prefabs swore by them and proclaim that they were just as good as any other form of housing.