Reflections on the Conservative Party Conference

Martine Martin, Campaigns and Political Engagement Manager

05.10.2018

In case there was any doubt, the pink and blue signage everywhere declaring 'MORE HOMES' and the accompanying stickers being handed out by party members in the ICC definitely demonstrated that the issue of housing was a key theme of this year's Conservative Conference.

It follows then that the centrepiece announcement was the end of restrictions on Housing Revenue Account borrowing to enable councils to deliver new homes. To remind, the cap was imposed by George Osborne in 2012 as a measure to help drag down the national debt figures, but which has been a factor in preventing some local authorities in England from effectively maintaining or replenishing their social housing stock.

The removal of this cap is big news.

In our recently published plan, Everybody In: How to End Homelessness in Great Britain, we have evidenced the need to build 90,000 social homes annually in England to fully cope with the demand and prevent homelessness. This announcement is a key measure in the process of making this critical measure a reality.

It also very much reopens the debate on Right to Buy, which Crisis has recommend be suspended for a period until social housing stock figures are improved.

Crisis ran a morning fringe session, asking what it would take to build political and public support for ending homelessness. Our panel was Chaired by our Chief Executive, Jon Sparkes, with four prominent Conservatives on our panel; the interim Minister for Housing and Homelessness, Nigel Adams MP, Ealing Councillor and recent Conservative Mayoral Candidate for London, Joy Morrissey, the Conservative Chair of the All Party Parliamentary Group for Ending Homelessness, Will Quince MP, and the architect of the Homelessness Reduction Act, Bob Blackman MP.

We had a really excellent debate on the policies which were needed. There were some great audience questions for the panel and Jon also invited all of them to give a one minute pitch on how to end homelessness. Here are some tweets from my colleagues which I think demonstrate that there were a range of excellent points made by our panel:

Glad to hear @nadams say housing benefit does need looking at in relation to homelessness, esp. the shared room rate. #cpc18 @crisis_uk

— Matt Downie (@matthew_downie) October 2, 2018

‘The aim should be to lift the duty to refer to a duty on all public agencies to prevent homelessness, and it has to be both about a changing a law and changing practice’ says @BobBlackman in the @crisis_uk #cpc18 fringe to #endhomelessness pic.twitter.com/fiEg8TsQUt

— maeve mcgoldrick (@MaeveMcGoldrick) October 2, 2018

Strong calls from @willquince & @joymorrissey for national roll out of Housing First as quickly as possible to end rough sleeping and wider forms of homelessness #CPC18 #endhomelessness @crisis_uk

— Hannah Gousy (@HannahGousy) October 2, 2018

Everyone I spoke to at the end said it could easily have gone on for much longer, the discussion was so interesting.

I’m glad to be able to say that the issue of homelessness was also firmly on the agenda on the main stage as well. Not to be outdone by the Labour proposal of a national levy on second homes to fund homeless services, to raise up to £560m a year for homeless families living in temporary accommodation, as announced the prior week, the first announcement from the Conservatives was the creation of a higher rate of stamp duty for non-doms to fund schemes to help end rough sleeping. While a specific figure wasn't given, a mere three per cent levy could raise £120m for rough sleeping services.

This announcement was also highlighted in the Prime Minister's speech, as she said, "This week, we have announced that we will charge a higher rate of stamp duty on those buying homes who do not live and pay taxes in the UK, to help level the playing field for British buyers. The money raised will go towards tackling the scourge of rough sleeping." She added that the only way to fix the broken housing market was to build more homes; a clear acknowledgement of the unavoidable linkage of the two policy areas. The Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, James Brokenshire, kept to the housing theme when he declared the creation of a New Homes Ombudsman, but also added, "Our rough sleeping strategy and rough sleeping initiative are focusing efforts to drive change to give support to those most in need."

So while we have not yet seen a full blooded commitment to end homelessness altogether, there is recognition of the need for action, at least on the most visible forms of homelessness.

It’s not enough.

Sadly, it just isn’t. We need all of the political parties to go further and commit to a plan of action to end homelessness, in all its forms, in a 10 year timeframe. Nothing less will do it.

But we do know it can be done. Almost 20,000 people have now joined our ‘Everybody In’ campaign to end homelessness once and for all – and many have also gone on to email their Member of Parliament to tell them that they need to act.

If you believe that homelessness can be ended in Great Britain and want the politicians to act, please get involved. And maybe next year’s big announcement will be the commitment to a safe and stable home for everyone in Great Britain.