The following amendment has been selected: amendment 1 in the name of Lesley Griffiths.

Item 7 is next, and that's the Welsh Conservatives debate on housing, and I call on Janet Finch-Saunders to move the motion.

Motion NDM7946 Darren Millar

To propose that the Senedd:

1. Acknowledges that Wales requires up to 12,000 new dwellings per year.

2. Expresses serious concern that during the last year the number of new dwellings commenced fell by 30 per cent to 4,314 and the number of homes completed fell by 23 per cent to 4,616.

3. Believes that the failure to build more homes in Wales is having a detrimental impact on property availability.

4. Calls on the Welsh Government to:

a) facilitate the building of 12,000 homes per year;

b) restore the right-to-buy in Wales, reinvesting sale proceeds into more social housing and protecting homes from sale for 10 years;

c) work with planning authorities to see more land allocated in communities facing local affordability difficulties, including making more land available for self-build projects;

d) scrap plans for a national construction company and support the growth of the private home-building sector.

Motion moved.

Diolch. And I wish to remind Members of my own declaration of interest in terms of property ownership—second homes, holiday let. Owning your own home is one of the major bulwarks of individual freedom and choice. Home ownership provides you with the security and confidence to develop local roots, to become part of your local community, safe in the knowledge that your home is your own. For many years, it has been a main aspiration for the many across our society, an ambition that, sadly, this Labour Government has failed to recognise or support; rather, their efforts have been focused on creating a generation of rent. They would rather see our constituents paying rent out and not having the opportunity to invest their hard-earned funds to build equity in the property they call home. I have to say that there is also the fact too, though, that owning your own home isn't for everyone, and we as Welsh Conservatives recognise that.

But it is absolutely shocking in this day and age to see the number of our families and children who are living in temporary accommodation such as hotel rooms, bed and breakfasts or homes on temporary bases, with no security of tenure, leaving many living a life in limbo, with no foreseeable prospect and, as many described to me, a feeling of helplessness and despair. Therefore, we seek to address this crisis on a whole-scale approach, using a varied and wide selection of policies and initiatives.

Now, let us look at the last 22 years of devolution, with Welsh Labour propped up by Plaid Cymru and the Lib Dems. Over the past two years, new dwellings commenced have fallen by 30 per cent; new dwellings completed down by 23 per cent. Last year, we needed 12,000 new dwellings, yet the Welsh Government oversaw a shortfall of 7,384. Now, since Holmans' report was published in 2015, the lack of delivery here has deprived our nation of 30,074 new homes. These are so badly needed by our young people and families in communities right across Wales, and you cannot blame the pandemic.

The shortfalls you've identified mirrors the same problem that's happening in England. So, she's blamed devolution here; what does she blame the problem in England on?

The Deputy Presiding Officer took the Chair.

It isn't the same problem. Targets have actually been reached a lot easier in England than they have here. Approximately 67,000 people—I'll say it again: 67,000 people—in Wales languish on a social-housing waiting list, equivalent to around 20,000 households. Four of our local authorities saw a cumulative total of 14,240 young people in the 20 to 29 age group leave Wales between 2012 and 2016, meaning that these young people have not only lost the opportunity to own a home in Wales, but we have lost the opportunity to have these young people contributing to our economy and our society.

However, the biggest gamble for me is to learn that the local authority spend associated with temporary accommodation and homelessness is simply spiralling out of control. In my own authority, we've seen this spend balloon from £1.2 million in 2019-20 to £2.5 million in 2020-21, and it's perceived to be around £4 million next time. While, in Wales, between 2019-20 and 20-21, spending has more than doubled, from just over £7 million to over £15.5 million. This spending is a symptom of the fact that more and more individuals and families are having to live in B&Bs, hotel rooms and temporary accommodation. 

Now, according to the Welsh Government's most recent figures, there are over 7,000 people that have been pushed into homelessness and living in temporary accommodation, and nearly 100 people forced to sleep rough. We have thousands of empty properties across Wales laying vacant—22,140, in fact—and what does the Welsh Government go and do? The empty homes loan saw only four properties in the constituency of the Minister for housing brought back into use in 2020-21, just two in Cardiff and only one in Neath Port Talbot. Other figures obtained show that the Welsh Government simply does not have a grip on our local authorities and any initiative to see empty properties brought back into use.

The Minister will know that I've also raised the prospect of bringing into use some of the land and buildings owned by the public sector in Wales. Our local authorities, our health boards and other public bodies are sitting on swathes of land and buildings and brownfield sites that could be turned around into liveable homes. I raised this with the Minister in the cross-party group, and this was a cross-party group that was arranged so that we could actually face the housing crisis down, cross-party political. It seems that, I'm afraid, we seem to have been dropped from that agenda. Our plans would be to bring empty homes back into housing stock, to build more homes, using public sector-owned land and brownfield sites to develop into homes. Sadly, after us setting off on this journey on a cross-party basis, you've allowed your co-operation agreement with Plaid Cymru to dictate this agenda. Your intention to single out second home owners and to target holiday home owners is only going to succeed in punishing the aspiration, ambition and achievement of these individuals, who actually contribute widely to our local economy.

Now, as I said earlier, we have almost the same number of empty homes as we do second homes in Wales. So, to simply target second home owners with a punitive council tax increase, potentially up to a 300 per cent increase, is unfair, disproportionate and prejudicial. Even in your own report commissioned on second homes, Dr Brooks stated that:

'If there were fewer second homes, this would not change the fact that local buyers would have to compete with buyers from outside the area'.

And let's be honest, Members, the fact remains that the average median wage in Wales is considerably less than in England, so it is therefore simply no contest. 

Now, another issue that I and my colleagues has raised is phosphate regulations, the fact that there are 10,000 homes ripe for development simply being held up by planning guidelines introduced by Natural Resources Wales for special areas of conservation near rivers. My colleague James Evans MS and I have met with council leaders, planners, and I have met with housing providers, who genuinely believe there is some merit to the spirit of the guidelines, but, in reality, they are seeing the obstruction of these 10,000 properties coming forward for development. This situation has dragged on for over a year and definitely needs addressing. So, I would ask the Minister, wherever the Minister is—[Interruption.] Oh, okay. [Laughter.] Okay.

The Deputy Minister is on the screen via Zoom.

Would you work with these local authorities to overcome these challenges?

Now, additionally, we're all aware that there are communities facing local affordability difficulties, and I see this myself in Aberconwy. But I do believe that we need a balanced, proportionate and fair approach when seeking to address the problems facing us. I'll say it again: seeking to target second home owners with punitive taxes and trying to over-regulate the private sector will massively backfire, as will burdening our private landlords with even more regulatory bureaucracy. 

Now, as many Members know here, I would like to see the right to buy scheme reintroduced, where, in England, we have seen that, for every house sold, three units can be built. It is a no-brainer. Additionally—[Interruption.] Well, what went wrong here is they sold the houses but they didn't reinvest the money in housing stock. [Interruption.] Additionally, I would like to see the scrapping of the land transaction tax for first-time buyers and raising the threshold to £250,000 to help more families and hard-working people benefit from the security of home ownership. It is regrettable that first-time buyers in England pay no stamp duty up to £300,000, whilst, here in Wales, there is no actual first-time buyer support. In fact, as a result of your lack of support, first-time buyers can pay up to nearly £5,000 more in tax in Wales than they would do in England.

Finally, Minister, we know that the Welsh Government has declared Wales as a safe nation and, indeed, a sanctuary for Ukrainian refugees fleeing a brutal, horrific and unjustifiable conflict. Given the clear housing crisis that we see here in Wales, I suppose I have to ask the question: what assurances can we now provide that the families and individuals that we would all want to welcome into Wales will be provided with safe and appropriate housing so that they too have the opportunity to rebuild their shattered lives and put down roots in our local communities and contribute to our society?

Like it or not, the Welsh Conservatives have a strong and fiscally responsible plan to help people across Wales experience the individual freedom of property ownership. For those forced to live in B&Bs and hotel rooms, for young people unable to get a foot on the ladder, for the developers who simply want to build more homes in Wales, for the construction industry that would like to restore empty properties into liveable homes, I ask you all to support this motion. Diolch yn fawr.

I have selected the amendment to the motion, and I call on the Deputy Minister for Climate Change, Lee Waters, to formally move amendment 1, tabled in the name of Lesley Griffiths.

Amendment 1—Lesley Griffiths

Delete all and replace with:

1. Acknowledges the challenges being faced by the housing sector which are having a detrimental impact on housing supply across Wales.

2. Welcomes the investment being made in housing by Welsh Government.

3. Notes the Welsh Government’s commitment to deliver 20,000 low carbon, social homes during this term of Government.

4. Notes the commitment to establish a National Construction Company, Unnos, to support our councils and social landlords to improve the supply of social and affordable housing.

Amendment 1 moved.

Formally.

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.

I just wanted to comment on your opening comment about the law, and, you're quite right, the housing revenue account system was exactly as you described. Of course, the post-2010 Government then scrapped that in England so councils were able to come to an arrangement on their debt levels and start reinvesting the proceeds. But the Welsh Government took years to implement the same measures that had been available to them from that point. Is that not a matter of concern?

Well, the Welsh Government bought it out, didn't they? It is a matter of concern that we had a system that stopped councils building houses and where council houses were going to be sold and you only got 50 per cent of the value of that house. And despite Janet Finch-Saunders's assertion that for every one house you could build three, for every two houses, you could build one at most.

But, returning to empty houses, there are far too many of them, they're a potential source of housing. We need to get those houses back into use. They're not always in areas that people don't want to live in. In some of the most sought-after areas in my constituency, you can walk down roads and find three or four empty properties. But if we just try and get the empty properties back, that will not solve all the problems. There are two ways of increasing the building of new houses in Wales. One is to abandon all planning control and let the market decide where houses can be built, which effectively happened before the Town and Country Planning Act 1947. This would lead to building in areas that are currently protected, including green belt and areas of agricultural land. The other way of doing it is to build large-scale council housing, which is what happened between 1945 and 1979, and that worked. And can I just say that I think the second method is far, far superior to the first? 

There's a shortage of affordable rented accommodation, especially in the cities. The private sector has filled some of the gap due to the shortage of social housing. And we've come full circle from the 1950s and early 1960s, when there were lots of privately rented accommodation, and then the council housing came along, that privately rented accommodation became owner-occupied, and you go to areas like the area I'm from in Plasmarl, and Plasmarl has gone through the full circle. It used to be nearly all privately rented; now it is all privately rented again. But, in the middle bit, it was nearly all owner-occupied. It was a place for first-time buyers. The buying up of houses and renting them out is removing the opportunity for first-time buyers to enter the housing market.

We need more social housing, and affordable housing to me means council housing. And I think that housing associations can be thrown in there as well, but council housing is by far the best and most affordable housing. We need to build enough affordable homes to meet Wales's projected housing needs, but the needs are not on an all-Wales basis. If you build them in bits of James Evans's constituency of Powys, you will not be much use to those people living in Cardiff. So, you need to build them where there is a housing shortage. I mean, what we need also is housing associations and councils to have a common waiting list, so people can move between the two.

We need to increase skills. And we were talking about building houses, we haven't got enough skilled tradespeople for building these houses. It's all integrated. We need to improve the skills, and then we need the commitment to build houses and the funding for council houses, which can be done by using prudential borrowing—. Yes.

Do you agree with me, then, Mike, it should be a priority for this Welsh Government to make sure that we have more apprenticeships for people who are going to do your bricklaying, your carpentry and your electronics, to make sure we have that skilled workforce to be able to build these houses as we go forward?

I agree with you. I would say 'electrical' rather than 'electronics'. [Laughter.] But, yes, I think you do. I mean, far too often, we've seen crafts being considered second best, and we all need the benefits of plumbers and electricians and builders.

Councils need to commit to the funding of, as I said, council houses, using prudential borrowing, and we need the political will to tackle it. It's up to us to make it a reality, and I would urge the Welsh Government to set about a strategy that gets people into houses. The building of council houses has one other effect: it brings, as I said earlier, those houses that were privately rented back into owner-occupation. That's a win-win-win for everybody. The private sector won't do it, and I don't blame the private sector for this, because they're out to make a profit, and they don't want to build surplus houses. If you visit Ireland or Spain, when there was a housing problem of being able to sell, they just stopped houses mid development, because they couldn't sell them at a profit. They wanted to keep the prices up. So, I think it really is important that we end up with council housing and a decent home for everybody, and that, in 1945, was something a Labour Government got elected on.

Housing is something really close to my heart, as a previous cabinet member for housing who delivered over 250 homes in Powys. It is something I'm very, very keen to talk about. So, since the election here 10 months ago, we have frequently debated housing in this Chamber. But today, I don't think we are any further forward with any practical solutions to the current housing crisis. But it's the younger generations who are suffering the most. They're the ones who are struggling to get the housing that they need. There's a lack of good-quality affordable homes, and it continues to be a major issue for this Senedd.

I will hear the Minister say that you are building more homes. Yes, but is this actually keeping up with demand? The simple answer is 'no'. It's nowhere near the huge demand for housing that there is in this country. The most recent statistics show that the dwellings built last year were 4,314. That's 30 per cent lower than last year, and that's just simply not good enough. The average house price in my constituency has risen massively to £270,000, and it's only going to get worse with the lack of supply and the mass migration of people out of cities to rural Wales.

In Brecon and Radnorshire, the figures for new builds are significantly worse than in south Wales. And why is that, you ask. Because we have the Natural Resources Wales phosphates regulations, which, as my colleague Janet Finch-Saunders said, were well intentioned, but they are having the result of stalled house building. Planning is log-jammed, applications are at a standstill. That's affecting commercial and residential applications and harming the rural economy. This over-regulation and bureaucracy, introduced by Government, is bringing development in my area and across rural Wales and others to a complete standstill, and is keeping many young people locked out of the housing market for a generation.

Housing supply is not keeping up with demand. This is not just a private sector issue. The social housing sector is suffering as well. There are millions of pounds of Welsh Government grants stuck in limbo due to the inability to get building. The local authority local development plans are no longer worth the paper they're written on. They're in disarray, and housing targets are going to be missed again and again.

We have a situation in Powys where the council are having to use B&Bs and temporary accommodation, not just in the short term, but as long-term solutions to address homelessness. This is against Welsh Government policies, but they have to do that because there simply aren't enough properties being built or available to house the homeless people and the most vulnerable people in our society.

We are seeing young people being forced out of our area, out of the communities that they call home, as they cannot afford to rent and they cannot afford to buy. If houses do come on the market, they're put on for sky-rocketing prices and then a bidding war breaks out, with houses going for thousands and thousands of pounds over the asking price. Whilst I do welcome people moving into Wales from cities such as London, seeking that better Welsh life, this cannot be at the expense of local people or the younger generations who have no way to compete with these people due to the lower wages we see here in Wales.

I know, Minister, that mid Wales is probably not the top of your priority list, but surely you have to see that there needs to be a fresh look at how to tackle our housing crisis. For a start, the phosphate regulations need to be looked at, a solution found and development allowed to occur. I would welcome the abolition of land transaction tax, to bring us in line with other areas of the United Kingdom to give young people saving for a deposit a chance. I would also like to see an increase in the rent-to-buy threshold, so that more properties would be eligible and more tenants would be able to rent a home with the end goal of purchasing that property if they want to.

We need to look at our existing housing stock in Wales. How do we upgrade these properties? How do we comply with the Welsh housing standard? How do we incentivise home owners and landlords to carry out improvement works to make these homes fit for the future when no funding is coming forward? I would like to see, as Mike Hedges, Janet and, I'm sure, other people would say, more empty dwellings being brought back into use, and this Government must launch radical schemes to bring those properties back into use and not just talk about it.

Everyone across this Chamber, including myself, is in favour of taking in Ukrainian refugees, and supporting their fight against an imperialist Russian dictator, but when these people come here, who are fleeing persecution, they must be able to go into good-quality homes. There is a chance—

You need to conclude now.

—for this Government to call for radical action. So, I ask the Ministers and Welsh Government: instead of talking the talk, it's about time you walked the walk.

Well, the United Kingdom is amongst the most unequal states in the world. That isn't a political statement to cast aspersions on others, but a declaration of fact, according to the research undertaken by, amongst others, the OECD. Poverty is now endemic in some communities, and a large proportion of that is the huge cost that people have to pay towards a place to live, be that a mortgage or rent. Look at the child poverty statistics in Wales and how the numbers in poverty increase significantly after factoring in housing costs.

So, rather than ranting and criticising from the sidelines, are we truly going to do something about this poverty? Are we going to take tangible steps with regard to the housing crisis that is contributing towards this poverty? I can stand and preach until the day of judgment. After all, I've been a lay preacher, I'm very comfortable in a pulpit, but does that achieve anything at the end of the day in political terms? I feel, sometimes, as a new Member of the Senedd, that the only thing that backbenchers can do is to preach from the back benches.

But, every now and again, there's an opportunity that comes forward to make a difference—a genuine opportunity to make a real difference. After all, isn't that why we put ourselves forward to be elected to this place? Isn't it all about making a tangible difference to people's lives? That's our purpose here in the Senedd. Isn't that what drives us? Then, at the end of last summer, there arose one of those rare opportunities—a rare opportunity for us in this party, anyway—to make a difference, by coming to an agreement with the Government on some specific policy areas.

Now, what drives us on these benches is the need to improve the quality of people's lives, the desire to tackle poverty and to ensure that everyone has the same opportunity to fulfil their potential in life and to contribute to a better society. Some might say that that's an impossible ideal, but one that we do have to work towards.

So, if we are truly to get to grips with poverty, if we're serious about ensuring that everyone has a roof over their heads, living a dignified life, then we have to first of all acknowledge that the current regime isn't working. Once one accepts that the current regime is broken, then it stands to reason that we need to develop something anew, and that's what we have in Unnos.

The Conservative motion talks about the need to support the growth of the private construction sector, suggesting that Unnos is going to be a threat to it. Of course we need to support our small constructors, but Unnos isn't the threat. In order to have a small percentage of social homes and affordable homes, the housing associations have to make an application to have a percentage of the housing developments of the major constructors, more often than not, with those major constructors building luxury homes, not to meet community demand, but to fill the pockets of their shareholders—Redrow, Persimmon, Barratt Homes, and so on. These are who the Conservatives are trying to protect. Why? Well, this is a headline from the Financial Times from last summer:

'Property donors—'

Can you see that there?

'—provide one-quarter of funds given to Tory party'.

'UK governing party has received nearly £18m from donors with property interests in the past two years'.

I think the Member can put his phone down now.

I have done that. But the point stands: it's these major corporations that are pushing the smaller developers, who are building to meet local demand, out of the market. Whatever form Unnos takes, I'm convinced that it will benefit our local constructors, but this will ensure a programme of significant home building in collaboration with the public sector to ensure that we have quality homes that are beneficial for the environment, that are built with local produce, and that meet the demand in our communities, putting a roof over the heads of people and cutting costs for families in poverty. It's a vision, a dream, radical, ambitious—call it whatever you will, but it's certain to be better than the current failing system.

Can I remind Members that the use of such gadgets is not really normal practice within the Chamber in debate, for future reference? Okay. Gareth Davies.

Thank you very much, Deputy Llywydd. I think the Member for Dwyfor Meirionnydd should maybe have a lie down and check his blood pressure and spend a bit less time on Twitter. 

It's an absolute pleasure to take part in this important debate tonight, or this afternoon. So, we currently have a housing crisis in Wales, a crisis that was totally unavoidable—avoidable; I should say 'avoidable'—but because the Welsh Government have failed in their duty to provide a sufficient supply of affordable housing, some of my constituents are living in hotels and B&Bs in Rhyl, mainly the Westminster Hotel. My constituents who are lucky enough not to be in temporary accommodation are far too often forced to live in accommodation totally unsuitable for their needs.

One of my constituents, who I've been dealing with since the elections last May, with disabled children, has been waiting years for a suitable property, one that is adapted for the needs of her children. This is totally unacceptable, and the failure to address shortages in social housing since the advent of devolution has compounded the misery of so many families across my constituency and across Wales. 

The failure to build the 12,000 homes a year that Wales needed has consigned so many families to inferior housing, to expensive housing, or to no housing at all. Not only has the Welsh Government failed to build new homes, they have also failed to tackle the scourge of empty homes, which the Member for Aberconwy highlighted in opening the debate. How disheartening it must be for people struggling to raise their families in cramped accommodation or from a hotel room to see scores of empty houses—houses that sit idle, year after year, falling into disrepair when they could provide shelter for a family, a place where children can play in a garden and bring life into empty streets.

But it's not just the lack of investment in new builds or returning empty properties into homes that's the issue—it's also the lack of futureproofing. Much of our housing stock is still reliant upon fossil fuel for heating and cooking. Not only is this an issue for meeting our net-zero obligations, but it also leaves tenants at the mercy of volatile fuel prices. Putin's putsch in Ukraine has taught us that it is misguided to rely upon fuel sources from geopolitically unstable regions. This year, it is war on our doorstep in Europe, but next year it could be the middle east threatening our fuel security. Fuel prices are expected to treble this year a result of Putin's attack on Ukraine.

Do you now regret the fact that the Conservative Government did not fund the tidal lagoon in Swansea?

I don't think it's terribly relevant to a housing debate, Mike. As a north Wales Member, I can't profess to be too much of an expert on the Swansea lagoon, but what I do know is that a north Wales lagoon may be beneficial at some point in the future.

We've seen only today that petrol and diesel prices have gone up to £1.59 per litre or costing £90 to fill a car with diesel, and it's my constituents living in social housing who will suffer the most as a result of these fuel price increases.

Not only must the Welsh Government ensure that there is sufficient housing stock to meet future housing need, they must also accelerate the decarbonisation of our housing stock in order to protect social housing tenants from volatile heating costs. We also have to factor in changing demographics into our housing projections. An ageing population will place differing demands on housing. We have to ensure that the housing stock we provide is adaptable. I would like to congratulate Grŵp Cynefin in my constituency for their extra-care housing development, Awel y Dyffryn in Denbigh, which integrates housing and care, reducing the demand for care homes and ensuring elderly and disabled people can life in their own homes and remain active members of their community, yet receive any additional support they require. This is the type of thinking we need when it comes to developing our housing policies. We have to have a plan for the future whilst meeting the demands of today. Only then will we get a true grip on our housing crisis. Diolch yn fawr iawn.

My first speech I made in this Chamber in 2016 was on housing, and I fear I'm going to make exactly the same speech again. But I'm not, actually—that's not quite true. I've checked the Record, and it is going to be different, although I often check the Record to find out what I've just said when I speak in the Chamber anyway. One of the things that a veteran Member came up to me and said after that speech was, 'Please make sure you're not making the same speech in the next Senedd term should you be re-elected.' That was David Melding. I felt David Melding often brought a lot of common sense to this debate, and perhaps a less partisan approach than is being taken by Janet Finch-Saunders today, who is brilliant in her way, but is not afraid to engage in those kinds of party political attacks.

Let's take that comparison with England, then. Oliver Letwin, the Conservative MP, undertook a piece of work for the UK Government into house building, which he published in 2019. He said in his report that house builders protect profits by constructing homes at a pace that matches the market's capacity to absorb these homes at prices determined by reference to the local second-hand market. That means that as prices rise, so house building slows. That is one of the problems, and this is why Oliver Letwin said house building happens at a stately pace. It's not to do with not allowing the free market to function, as has been suggested by some of the Conservative Members; it is to do with the fact that the free market is flawed. That is where the problem lies—the fact that the free market must have very strong interventions in order to deliver the housing that we need.

What I spoke about in 2016 was the fact that Caerphilly had had a local development plan that was published and ready to go and then was flatly rejected by the community who lived in the north of Caerphilly. I had 35 per cent of the share of the vote at my election in 2016. I'm glad to say it went up by 10 per cent this time around. But one of the reasons I did so badly is that I was attacked by all parties, including Conservatives, because of the local development plan that Caerphilly had produced to meet housing demand. The problem with the local development plan is it focused all the development, all the housing, in the south of the constituency bordering Cardiff North. What that housing did is it took pressure off Cardiff and brought the housing that would be relatively cheap to Cardiff citizens to the south of Caerphilly. It was deeply unpopular. It met housing demand for Cardiff; it didn’t meet housing demand for Caerphilly. Nothing in that plan you could say was affordable. If you let the free market do its job, you get more of that. You get more of that. You get the Redrows, the Persimmons, the Barratts throwing up their houses and getting out of there as fast as they can.

I recently found a speech I gave to a housing audience externally—I'd been invited as somebody who used to work in the sector, I emphasise in the mutual sector and the housing association sector. But I quoted a letter I'd received from the Principality Building Society, which stated that high house prices are being driven by a lack of supply of both private and social housing. I also quoted the fact that the Welsh social housing grant was 45 per cent lower than in 1996-97, which happened to be the last year of the old Conservative Government. That was in 2004, 18 years ago. Do you share my regret that, whenever I brought forward a motion, sometimes jointly with Plaid Cymru at that time, referring to the housing crisis, all the Welsh Government did was put down an amendment to remove the word 'crisis' from the motion and then force through the vote?

I fear you've just made a speech. I think if you want to make a point to the Government, then I think you should address it to the Government. I'm a backbencher expressing my views. My feeling is that there has been a failure across the UK to address this, and I also feel that the motion that's been put forward by your party does not address the problem because it highlights the private sector. It does the opposite of what you just said—it highlights the private sector role in delivering housing, and all you will see is continued development for the wealthiest in areas that are next to those wealthiest areas, which just happens to be the south of Caerphilly.

There's not, in fact, a shortage of land in Caerphilly. There is not a shortage of land in Caerphilly. There is enough land in my constituency to meet housing demand without building on greenfield sites. The problem is that land requires remediation, and the remediation of that land will not be paid for by the likes of Redrow or Persimmon; it has to be paid for by the public sector. So, I'm glad to say—and I'm sure the Deputy Minister will mention this in his response—they are looking at developing a brownfield site in Caerphilly for the purposes of house building. There are concerns amongst some of the people who live in Caerphilly that that will open up greenfield land at Nant y Calch farm for development, and that is where we need reassurances, because that should not be built on.

I fear, partly because of the longer intervention I took—

I'll give you some more time, but not much. 

Thank you. Let me close, then, by saying that what I really want to see is housing growing in the north of my constituency, north of Ystrad Mynach. I'm currently looking at somewhere to live in Nelson, which looks a really good place to live. I'd like to live in Bargoed, but there is a shortage there. I'd like to see housing being built there. The answer to that is to connect into planning, economy, infrastructure, town centres and all of those things that we want to see grow to make it attractive in the north, including connecting the Heads of the Valleys road to the midlands seamlessly, and also making sure that people are living and working in those areas, which is why I welcome the Welsh Government's plans, like in England, to keep 30 per cent of people working from their communities and building community hubs in those communities. That way, you get people wanting to live in those communities, and those communities being attractive as places to live. If anybody wants to know, Bargoed is a wonderful place to live, and I strongly recommend it to everyone.

I did wonder, when I saw that I was following Hefin David, whether he was going to make a very similar point to me about how housing can regenerate the Valleys, and that's exactly what he did. Basically, Hefin, I've got five minutes' worth of speeches about Bridgend county borough and you've just talked about Caerphilly, so we'll replace one for the other and I'm very happy to sit down. I'll declare my interest as well as a councillor on Bridgend County Borough Council.

Can I just start by addressing the intervention Mike Hedges made earlier, which I think was probably better directed at me than my colleague Gareth Davies from the Vale of Clwyd? We were asked about the Swansea bay tidal lagoon. Obviously, I don't see the relevance, necessarily, to a debate on housing, but nevertheless, it's important to remind you, Mike, that that tidal lagoon project failed because it was a bad deal not only for taxpayers, but bill payers as well. It would have increased energy costs, and we're looking at the moment at an occasion where we're facing higher energy costs. But thankfully, there is a new privately funded—completely privately funded—lagoon proposed for Swansea bay. I met with DST Innovations on Monday. The project is very exciting and it's about time Welsh Government get behind it. 

My intervention was because we were talking about energy prices within housing, and the tidal lagoon obviously would affect energy prices. It's another time when we can debate the tidal lagoon; I just wanted to make that point. 

I'd more than welcome a debate on the tidal lagoon, and hopefully the Welsh Government will support that new tidal lagoon project set for Swansea bay, which I think is very, very exciting. 

The point I wanted to make—and you'll be very pleased, Dirprwy Lywydd, that it will be very brief—is that it's so clear, hearing from my other colleagues' contributions, that we simply are not building enough houses in Wales. It's really easy to be academic about that and look at it as a figure or a number on a spreadsheet, or even just the latest missed target in a long line of missed targets by the Welsh Labour Government. But the reality of not building enough homes—what does that look like? What does it mean for ordinary people in Wales not to have anywhere near enough new homes being built to keep up with local demand? It's quite literally life changing. 

I'm 30 years old, surprisingly. [Laughter.] I've lived in Wales all my life. I went to university in Swansea and I have a lot of friends in the local area, and when thinking about the people I went to school or university with that are my age, I can only think of a handful that own their home. It's a sad indictment of where we are as a society in Wales at the moment that that dream, or even that right that previous generations had—some of those generations, like my dad's, are represented in the Chamber today—and that aspiration that they had of owning their own home simply doesn't exist for too many people in my generation. But aspiration simply isn't a word that's in the Welsh Labour Government's dictionary. 

I'm not pretending it's a problem that's exclusive to Wales, but when you need 12,000 new homes a year, as our motion calls for, and you barely build a third of that, it's clear that it's a problem that the Welsh Labour Government is only making worse. If the Government doesn't get its act together and build enough new homes here in Wales, we not only run the risk but the reality of an entire generation being shut out of owning their own home. I encourage everyone to back our motion today. Thank you. 

I declare that I'm a Flintshire councillor, and, as such, I'm proud that Flintshire County Council were the first in a generation to build new council houses, building 300 new council houses for rent and 200 affordable houses as well. Speaking recently to our head of housing, there is a shortage of materials—wood, glass—and also skilled workforce since Brexit and the pandemic, causing an issue that is slowing down house building at the moment. I've spoken a number of times on the Thatcherite housing policies that are responsible for the housing crisis this country faces. To see the Welsh Conservatives now calling for a return of the disastrous right-to-buy policy shows they have not learnt any lessons from the failures of the previous Westminster Governments. 

The vast majority of homes sold under the right-to-buy policy were never replaced. It represented a mass sell-off of state assets into the private sector. In north Wales, Grŵp Cynefin have highlighted that one former local authority property had been on the market for a staggering £385,000. It's unsurprising, given their record of selling off public assets while in office, to see the Conservatives calling for even more free-market policies in our housing sector. Perhaps it's something more to do with the fact that so many ex-council properties are now owned by buy-to-let landlords, charging rents far higher than social rent for properties that haven't been repaired since they were bought. These houses have become investments for the already well-off. The right to buy has been a gravy train for many private landlords, and the Tories' concern isn't for council tenants—it's for that gravy train that has been stopped by the Welsh Government. 

The right to buy was coupled with a withdrawal by Thatcher's Government of funding for councils to build social housing. This restricted the supply of homes, driving prices up in order to maximise the profits of those lucky enough to own an asset, and, in doing so, pricing generation after generation out of housing security. We absolutely do not need a return of the right to buy. What I would like to see instead is a right to rent. A right-to-rent scheme would allow home owners to sell their properties to their local councils who would then rent those houses back to them at social rents. This would increase the stock of social housing whilst also protecting people from the threat of mortgage repossession and eviction. A by-product of a right-to-rent scheme would be an increase in mixed developments, with local councils taking ownership of homes in non-council housing estates. Mixed developments are increasingly pursued by councils because they build a sense of social solidarity amongst mixed communities. A right to rent would turbo-charge mixed developments in Wales. 

I note that, in the motion, the Welsh Conservatives are also calling to scrap plans for a national-led construction company in favour of supporting the private home building sector. Again, this shows a real misunderstanding of the housing crisis. The prime motive of the private home building sector is to maximise profit for shareholders. This leads to the unacceptable scene that plays out across Wales and the UK regularly today in which private housing companies dispute their obligations to provide adequate affordable homes under the threat of not developing the land. It's the same private companies that then pay out big bonuses to their shareholders and chief executive officers. Another by-product of this system is that the green land itself becomes just another asset to be turned into a quick buck with landowners able to profit from speculative land sales. 

The housing crisis is undoubtedly one of the biggest issues facing the Governments of the United Kingdom. The effects of the crisis are more keenly felt by working people and the young. I am grateful to the Welsh Conservatives for so publicly telling the Welsh electorate today that they have absolutely no answers to that crisis. All they can offer the Welsh public is more privatisation, increases in house prices, landlordism and private profit. I welcome the Welsh Government's commitment to building 20,000—[Interruption.] Sorry, Mark, I'm not taking an intervention from you because I disagree totally with all you've been saying all along—[Interruption.]

I welcome the Welsh Government's commitment to building 20,000 low-carbon social homes and establishing—[Interruption.]

Let the Member speak, please.

I welcome the Welsh Government's commitment to building 20,000 low-carbon social homes and establishing a national construction company to help councils build social housing. I look forward to the implementation of rent controls and hope that the Welsh Government will also investigate the possibility of a right to rent as well as continue to explore a land value tax to replace council tax. Unlike the Welsh Conservatives, Welsh Labour recognise the problems and provide real solutions. Diolch.

Before I call the Minister, can I remind all Members it's up to each Member whether they wish to accept an intervention or not? It is their choice, and if they say 'no', then they do not wish to take the intervention, and that's their decision.

I call on the Deputy Minister for Climate Change, Lee Waters.

Diolch yn fawr. Firstly, let me thank Darren Millar for the opportunity to debate such an important subject today. I thought the last debate in the Senedd this afternoon showed the Welsh Conservatives at their best. I'm sorry to say, I thought that Janet Finch-Saunders's opening showed them at their worst: ideological, contradictory and short sighted.

But let's focus this afternoon on what we do agree on. Each of our manifestos last year identified housing as a key priority, and now more than ever we all appreciate what it means to have a safe and secure roof over our heads and somewhere to call a home. Our experiences of the last two years have focused our minds and made us even more keenly aware of the need for everyone to have access to a safe and affordable home, and this is reflected in our programme for government.

It has, of course, highlighted the huge challenges people face when they don't have a home that best suits their needs. We know that the pandemic has impacted the house building industry right across the UK. The National House Building Council reports that new home registrations fell in every part of the UK in 2020—a 28 per cent drop in the south-east of England and Scotland, and a 38 per cent fall in Northern Ireland. The latest Welsh statistics on new house building in Wales, released just before Christmas, show that the number of dwellings completed in the year 2020 to 2021 decreased by 24 per cent to 4,616. And I want to be clear that, whilst this decrease is disappointing, it does reflect an unprecedented period. We do need some 7,400 new homes every year according to our estimates, and 48 per cent of those need to be affordable housing. 

The number of market homes being built in Wales continues to broadly align with our estimates of housing need and demand. So, this suggests we are building approximately the necessary amount. But we must acknowledge that they're not always being built in the right places, and that is something we are working on. And we undoubtedly need to build more social homes for rent in Wales, and we've made a clear commitment to build 20,000 new low-carbon homes for affordable rent.

Our target goes beyond estimates of housing need, and it's right that it does. It will also build on the strong foundations laid during the last term of our Government, building homes for the future—well-built, climate-secure homes. As a Government, we are proud of the steps we have taken in the previous Senedd term to protect existing social housing stock and to build new homes. We exceeded the target we set to build 20,000 homes, delivering, in fact, 23,061 homes. And unlike in England, we ended the right to buy, to give landlords the confidence to invest in new social housing without the fear it will be sold from under their feet within a short time, and this is not something that we're looking to reinstate. 

But, while social housing is the priority, we will ensure developments deliver genuinely mixed tenure across the whole spectrum of tenures, from owner-occupying housing and shared ownership to social sector homes for rent that people can afford. And we've been clear that our support for market housing is an important part of our toolkit, but that it is in addition to our support for social housing. And this target is challenging, and there are several factors that could impact its delivery. These include increased costs of building materials and a lengthened supply chain for a number of imported construction materials. 

We have worked, I'm pleased to say, and continue to work with registered social landlords, local authorities and contractors to mitigate these risks, and we've provided additional funding to help meet the unprecedented increase in material costs. In fact, we've matched our commitment to deliver 20,000 new low-carbon homes for rent with a record budget of £250 million to the social housing grant for this financial year, doubling the budget from the year before. And our final three-year budget, published on St David's Day, further underpins this with record levels of funding allocations of £310 million in the next financial year, £330 million in 2023-24, and £325 million in 2024-25. Now, we rely on social housing partners to deliver the homes Wales needs, and to the standards we can be proud of, and I want to build on the strong working relationships that have flourished under our joint commitment to deliver social housing in the last two Senedd terms, and discussions are ongoing to finalise a tripartite agreement—the housing pact—with sector-representative bodies to support our ambitious target. 

As we all know, housing is a multifaceted area, and we are taking a number of broader actions that will support house building in Wales. Through our co-operation agreement with Plaid Cymru, we have confirmed our ambition to establish a national construction company, Unnos, to support our councils and social landlords to improve the supply of social and affordable housing. And we've also committed to the publication of a White Paper on proposals on fair rents and a right to adequate housing. We recognise there are instances where rent controls have not worked as intended. There's a need to consider, of course, proposals on rent control very carefully and ensure any proposals are consulted upon widely, and we'll be engaging with partners fully on the White Paper later in the Senedd term. 

Fast-paced action has also been taken in line with our three-pronged approach to second homes—taxation, system change and practical support. We've announced the changes we intend to make in the upper limits of discretionary council tax premiums for second homes and long-term empty properties, an area Members rightly highlighted as being of concern to us all, as well as to the thresholds for non-domestic rates. These will help ensure a fair contribution is made through taxation, and for holiday lets—that they make a clear contribution to their local economies.

Our consultation on groundbreaking proposals for the planning system has recently closed, drawing an extremely large response rate, as did the consultation for the Welsh language communities housing plan. And we are also consulting on local variation of land transaction tax—together, a bold and radical package that promises to deliver far-reaching change.

Over the last nine months, Dirprwy Lywydd, I believe that, as a Government, we have demonstrated our appetite to take clear steps to tackle one of the biggest problems we face here in Wales. And while we reject the opposition motion, tabled by the Conservatives, we are open genuinely to work with Members across the Senedd to provide homes that the people of Wales need and deserve. Diolch.

I call on Sam Rowlands to reply to the debate.

Thank you, Deputy Presiding Officer. First of all, I'd like to thank all Members, from across the Chamber today, for contributing to our extremely important debate on housing in Wales—with many different views and possible solutions for dealing with the issues in front of us. I'd also like to thank the Deputy Minister for his response, too. It's clear from the cross-party contributions today that Members in this Chamber are seriously concerned about a number of issues relating to the housing crisis that is in front of us. And I note, in point 1 of the Welsh Government's amendment to our debate today, that they also acknowledge the key challenges being faced by the housing sector that are having a detrimental effect on housing supply across Wales.

Whilst closing this debate today, I'd like first of all to focus on one of the key issues that's been discussed here, which is building enough homes in Wales, and then focus on three areas I believe came out through the debate today in trying to address our current housing crisis. On the first point, as outlined by my colleague Janet Finch-Saunders very eloquently in opening today's debate, over 22 years of successive Welsh Labour Governments have failed on every single metric to build enough houses to meet the rising demand here in Wales. As point 1 of our motion states, and outlined by the Holmans review, which Tom Giffard highlighted, Wales currently requires up to 12,000 new dwellings per year by 2031, to avoid people living in unsatisfactory conditions. And looking closer to home, in my region in north Wales, because I heard James Evans speaking about Brecon and Radnorshire—as he always likes to, of course—an issue I've raised for my region of north Wales with the climate change Minister and the First Minister on many occasions is that there should be around 1,600 homes being built in my region every year for the next 20 years. And we're currently seeing around 1,200 homes being built in my region. There are clear issues around the supply of new housing all across Wales.

Following on from this, one of the issues that Members raised a number of times in this debate is around the issue of private development and private developers. Private developers have a huge role to play in ensuring we have the right number of houses here in Wales. And they also need to have the right environment for them to invest in and ensure those houses are being built. Obviously, one of the key parts of that environment is having the right economy for jobs to be accessible for people, for those houses to be built in those areas. I think it was James Evans who highlighted some of the economic productivity and how it drastically varies all across the country. So, it's clear to me and to colleagues on my side of the benches here that, if we put in place the right environment for our economy and attract that private development and private investment for houses to be built, we could see a significant increase in the number of houses being built here in Wales.

The second issue a number of Members touched on was around the proposal in our motion to restore the right to buy in Wales. Now, there's clearly a difference of opinion from colleagues across the way, particularly from Mike Hedges, and from Carolyn as well. But one of the points I would make, because there were also concerns raised from across the way around security of having your own home—the security of knowing you've got a home to go to every single evening—one of the most secure things you can have is your own house, your own property. So, why not allow people to have their own home, a right to buy their own property that they live in? That is probably the most simple way of creating security of housing for people in Wales.

The third area that Members touched on was the relationship with planning authorities and local authorities, as well. I heard Hefin David mention, from his patch there in Caerphilly, the land allocation in communities—what needs to be put in place to allow people to have affordable housing as well. And we must do more to ensure that empty properties are being brought back into use and a number of Members landed on that point as well.

So, to conclude, Deputy Presiding Officer, our motion today provides real solutions to solve the housing crisis that we face, and we all want to and we are all attempting, to make a difference, in the words of Mabon ap Gwynfor as well. As opposition Members will know, the Welsh Government continue to call for solutions from across the Chamber and it's a shame that today we've brought forward solutions and these are completely ignored and 'delete all' is there once again. 

I thank all Members for their contributions to what's been a, as I say, really helpful debate this afternoon. We've all come together to offer practical solutions to the housing crisis we are facing in Wales. And, as always, I urge all Members from across this Chamber to support our fantastic Conservative motion. Diolch yn fawr iawn. 

The proposal is to agree the motion without amendment. Does any Member object? [Objection.] Yes, I see that there is objection. So, we'll defer voting on the motion until voting time.

Voting deferred until voting time.

In accordance with Standing Order 12.18, I will suspend the meeting before proceeding to voting time.

Plenary was suspended at 18:16.

The Senedd reconvened at 18:21, with the Deputy Presiding Officer in the Chair.