Social Housing: Right to Buy

The Government do not intend to abolish the right to buy, either nationally or by giving local areas discretion to do so. We want to ensure that council tenants who have lived in and paid rent on their social homes for many years can retain the opportunity to own their home. We are, however, progressing fundamental reform of the scheme to better protect much-needed social housing stock, boost council capacity and ensure that more social homes are built than lost.

My Somerset councillor colleagues have for decades steadfastly protected and managed our stock of council houses, which has declined through right to buy from tens of thousands a number of years ago to only 6,000 now. While I welcome the recent attention to this issue by the Deputy Prime Minister and the Minister, is it not time that communities decide for themselves whether to sell off council houses at all?

Although I respect the hon. Gentleman and his views, we have a principled difference of opinion on this matter. As I have made clear, the Government’s considered view is that long-standing council tenants should be able to buy the homes that they have lived in for many years. I hope, however, that the right-to-buy reforms that we have made and announced today—reduced maximum cash discounts, allowing councils to retain 100% of receipts and exempting newly built social homes from the right to buy for 35 years—will create a fairer and more sustainable scheme.