Part of the debate – in the Senedd at 5:27 pm on 9 March 2022.
Can I start by saying that the money from the sale of council houses was not able to be used to build more council houses, it had to be kept in a separate account? That was the law; it was a law brought in by the Conservative Government, but that was the law.
Can I just say that housing represents one of our greatest domestic challenges? Our housing system has been in crisis since the 1980s. It remains in crisis. The fundamental foundational system has been broken. A home is a human right. It's not something that is a means by which some people can make money, it's there because we need to put everybody into a decent home, and the pursuit of profit should not stop people having a decent home. Far too many houses are empty—I agree with Janet Finch-Saunders on that—and we need to get those back into use. The number empty—numbers vary; I've heard all sorts of numbers—in 2018, it was 43,000, with 18,000 for more than six months. That figure sounds about right. But they're not only—. Sorry.