Social Housing

Part of 2. Questions to the Minister for Housing and Local Government – in the Senedd at 3:01 pm on 10 March 2021.

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Photo of Julie James Julie James Labour 3:01, 10 March 2021

Well, Caroline, I'm a little bit astonished that you can make such a dismal fist of something that we're really proud of here in Wales, and I have to say that I don't agree with virtually anything you said, apart from the two sentences right there at the end.

We're incredibly proud of our record of having made our 20,000 affordable homes. Of course, we were only able to up our council house building in the last two years, once the Conservative Government finally saw sense and took the caps off the housing revenue accounts so that, two years ago, we were able to start ramping up our council house building. We've done incredibly well over that. Our latest provisional statistics show that, in 2019-20, a total of 2,940 additional affordable housing units were delivered across Wales, and I'm delighted that that not only builds on our previous success, but sets a new record. There's an increase of 13 per cent on the previous year and the highest annual total to date since records began.

Of course, because of the impacts of COVID-19, we haven't exceeded the target at the levels we would've liked to have done. I have to say, we're not working towards the 20,000 affordable homes; the official statistics show that we have met that target now. I'm disappointed that, because of the pandemic, it slowed down and we weren't able to go as fast as we would've liked to, but we've also got an incredibly proud record of how we've managed homelessness throughout Wales. I'm incredibly proud of the people in local authorities and third sector organisations, housing support services right across Wales who have absolutely gone the extra mile—5 miles—in making sure that people are housed throughout this pandemic, in stark contrast to the Conservatives across our border. We have not had a pandemic of people sleeping rough on our streets during the crisis, and we are very, very proud indeed of the fact that we have housed over 6,000 people. We've invested over £137 million in social housing grants in 2019-20, and over £25 million in housing finance grants to support the provision of social housing in Wales. And we're investing £71.5 million in revenue funding under the affordable housing grant programme to assist local housing authorities to build new council homes. So, I just do not accept at all the premise that she based her question on. Llywydd, we are very proud indeed of this Government's achievements in the social housing sector, and I very much hope that we will be able to continue that for the next five years.