Question
The Minister wants to talk about the OBR, so let us do that. Last week, the OBR was damning in its assessment of the viability of house building in England. It highlighted how regulatory and fiscal burdens are crushing viability. The Chancellor promised no new building regulations, but that is not enough. The Minister knows that viability—or, rather, the lack of it—is killing the house building sector. The existing environmental and net zero regulations and taxes are causing the viability crisis, so will the Minister join me in supporting the shadow Secretary of State, my hon. Friend the Member for Weald of Kent (Katie Lam), with her plan to cut £50,000 of regulation and taxes from the cost of building new homes to make sites viable again?
Answer
There is no doubt that viability pressures are acute across the country, but I draw the shadow Minister’s attention—I know he agrees with me on this—to the fact that many of the regulations highlighted by the OBR in its recent assessment were introduced by the Conservatives during the last Parliament, and they included measures on building safety and biodiversity net gain. We know that the Conservatives would now scrap the future homes standard, ensuring that customers pay higher bills and that we have to retrofit even more homes in the future. Perhaps the shadow Minister could tell us what other safety, decency or environmental requirements the they now plan to slash.57% point-scoring
Verdict: AMBER (58/100)
The reply partly answers the question. It accepts that viability pressures on developers are serious and names specific environmental and building rules, but it blames the previous Conservative government for introducing them and never says whether the Minister believes these rules are causing the viability problem. The second part is answered clearly: the reply rejects removing requirements from new homes and gives reasons, namely higher future bills and the cost of retrofitting later. The asker would likely need to return for the Minister's position on the first part.
How we got there
| Question item | Coverage | Specificity | Rationale |
|---|---|---|---|
| What is the Minister's view on whether existing environmental and net zero regulations and taxes are causing a viability crisis in house building? | Partially Addressed | Direct | The reply concedes that viability pressures are acute and names specific regulations (building safety, biodiversity net gain) and blames the Conservatives for introducing them, but it never states the Minister's view on whether environmental and net zero rules are causing the viability crisis. |
| Whether the Minister will support the shadow Secretary of State's plan to cut £50,000 of regulation and taxes from the cost of building new homes to make sites viable again. | Addressed | Direct | The reply clearly rejects the proposal to strip requirements from new homes, arguing that scrapping the Future Homes Standard would mean higher bills and more retrofitting later, which gives a stated reason for not supporting the plan. |