Edward Argar

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1. 29 Oct 2026·Parliament·Edward Argar

   Social Housing Bill (Third sitting)

   I rise to speak in support of new clause 34, which stands in the name of my hon. Friend the Member for Orpington. I have listened very carefully to hon. Members’ exchanges, and I have to say that I do not see what is particularly contentious about my hon. Friend’s proposal. It is not unreasonable to focus on the development of brownfield land first, as the previous Government did. We should therefore have a strategy to draw the strands together as we look towards the future. However many more years of this Government we have, the power is in their hands to do this. I do not see what is contentious about doing what my hon. Friend’s new clause proposes. I listened carefully to the hon. Member for Rugby, but I have a counterpoint to his point about development on brownfield sites. My constituency has a couple of towns in it and is right on the edge of Leicester, but it goes way up into rural north-east Leicestershire. The reality is that the developments on the edges of the towns or nearer the city often work most effectively, because there are bus routes and there is access to more schools, shops, businesses and employment opportunities. The challenge that we face locally is that in Leicester city, which has a Labour mayor and which I go through on my way from the station to my constituency, there are undeveloped, unmodernised and un-utilised brownfield sites or commercial sites that have fallen into disuse. Nevertheless, the mayor says that he cannot meet his housing targets and has therefore farmed them out to the rural areas in the county. That means a significant amount of development on the edges of villages—often with no bus route or only a sparse service, a full village primary school and a GP practice serving a whole range of rural communities—that are unable to meet the needs of the additional development. The pressure on local services is a real challenge. I have been pushing for a long time to see whether, when these applications are <span id="111" class="column-number" data-column-number="111"></span>brought forward, there is a way of having “i” before “e”—infrastructure before expansion—so that at least we know the services are there. There is one big challenge that previous Governments I served in did not solve, and which I suspect this Government will struggle to solve, because it comes down to the viability of development. We can, and local authorities do, ask developers for capital contributions for those services, but often the problem is the ongoing revenue cost of running them. That means that we can get an extra room in a surgery, but will the local NHS integrated care board be willing to fund the salary costs and commission extra GP practice services?

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2. 29 Oct 2026·Parliament·Edward Argar

   Social Housing Bill (Third sitting)

   I hesitate to disagree with the hon. Gentleman, for whom I have a lot of time, but no, they are not doing that, certainly not in my constituency. There is a Mayor of Leicester, but there is no mayor of Leicestershire, so we do not get any of the benefits. The Minister’s colleague—the Under-Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, the hon. Member for Oldham West, Chadderton and Royton (Jim McMahon)—will make a statement in the Chamber in about 20 minutes, so he may be about to change the position, but currently we do not have those benefits. A lot of the challenges around service provision are not addressed by what the Chancellor set out yesterday. Take the NHS funding model, for example: in my area, the Leicester, Leicestershire and Rutland integrated care board is having to make in-year savings to live within its financial envelope. We have GP practices that are full—one practice in Melton Mowbray has 37,000 patients on its books—and yet the ICB says it sees no reason to expand to meet the need. The development has not happened yet in Melton, so it will not expand until the need is demonstrably there, by which time a whole range of people will have moved into the new development but will not be able to get on the list for the surgery, or will be waiting a very long time. I am not saying that this is a challenge that suddenly appeared in July 2024. Governments of all political complexions have grappled with it. I have a lot of time for the Minister; I hope this issue is on his radar.<span id="112" class="column-number" data-column-number="112"></span> On brownfield sites, the proposal from my hon. Friend the Member for Orpington should not be contentious; it is a sensible approach to draw together all the different strands of work that the previous Government did to push the development of brownfield sites. Let me give a few examples. The national policy planning framework had a clear focus on the issue. We required local authorities to publish reports and registers of available brownfield sites for development. We reviewed permitted development rights and changes in use class rules to make it easier for commercial sites to be repurposed for development into housing. Alongside that, we put £4.3 billion into the housing infrastructure fund and £550 million into the brownfield housing fund. That is tangible investment to persuade and support local authorities to prioritise brownfield first. The problem in my patch is that the Labour Mayor of Leicester simply did not do it. We can see the brownfield sites everywhere, and we can see the development being pushed out into the county because the city has failed to do what it needs to do. My hon. Friend’s modest amendment would compel the Government to draw together all the strands of work that the previous Government did, and that this Government are also doing, into a clear and coherent strategy that would prioritise brownfield sites much, much more and would give local authorities and others the means, the support and the policy back-up to make this work a genuine reality on the ground. I will finish by simply emphasising my support for my hon. Friend.

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3. 27 Oct 2026·Parliament·Edward Argar

   Social Housing Bill (First sitting)

   I support the amendments in the name of my hon. Friend the Member for Orpington. They involve a perfectly reasonable and proportionate request for this House to have a role in scrutinising what is put forward by the Government and recommended by the Secretary of State. I spent six years as a Minister. I took countless statutory instruments through Delegated Legislation Committees. By and large, it is not a complex process; it requires a bit of time on the part of officials to get the <span id="29" class="column-number" data-column-number="29"></span>drafting right, but the process in this House is not complicated. It ensures that a Minister is directly accountable: they have to be on their brief, and they have to be able to clearly articulate the rationale behind what they are doing and, quite rightly, to be challenged by right hon. and hon. Members. That is so important in maintaining or even in creating trust from our communities—the transparency that that democratic accountability brings to what, as my hon. Friend clearly set out, will on occasion undoubtedly be relatively, if not significantly, contentious decisions relating to significant sums of money. My hon. Friend set out the case for amendment 95 very clearly. The powers in clause 10, when exercised, may well see some local authorities feeling that they are losing out, to the benefit of other local authorities. Without getting into what those decisions may be or where the money may go, in terms of process and democratic accountability, it is not unreasonable that both Houses should have the opportunity to scrutinise the powers in clause 10.

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4. 27 Oct 2026·Parliament·Edward Argar

   Social Housing Bill (First sitting)

   The hon. Lady appears to be making a point that I was not actually making in my remarks. My point is about the process. As I said before she intervened, I am not making a judgment on the decisions the Secretary of State may or may not make about those capital receipts; I am making a point about democratic accountability and transparency. Going back to the earlier group of amendments praised by my hon. Friend the Member for Orpington, the procedure that is used when legislation comes before Delegated Legislation Committees in this House is not complex. It does not engender lengthy delay; it just ensures that our constituents can see that we are considering that legislation, that we are debating it and that the Minister can answer the questions put to him. I have no doubt, in the case of this Minister, that he will be able to answer them; sadly, it has not always been the case that every Minister, on both sides of the House, has been capable of doing that. However, I am sure this Minister would have no challenges in coming before a Delegated Legislation Committee and answering the questions put to him. Amendment 98, tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Orpington and supported by my hon. Friend the Member for Broxbourne, would require consultation before determinations were made on capital receipts. Again, consultations do not have to be overly complex or lengthy. If Members go on gov.uk, they will see that there are myriad Government consultations out there at any one time on very significant issues, down to issues such as, for example, the methodology used for reporting land use statistics in the country. The Government routinely consult on a whole range of things, whether <span id="30" class="column-number" data-column-number="30"></span>that be a significant, detailed and lengthy consultation on something complex or, often, a very short and sharp consultation. They give people the opportunity to have their say, and those who genuinely have something in the way of expert knowledge to contribute.

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5. 27 Oct 2026·Parliament·Edward Argar

   Social Housing Bill (First sitting)

   Over many years, I have found that consultation done properly leaves very limited legal risk. Where Governments get it wrong—I do not want to overly speculate on what has happened with the Government’s consultations and process around local government reorganisation—the hon. Member is right that there is a potential for JRs, although I would highlight that a judicial review can focus only on process, not on whether the decision should be relitigated. If consultation is done well—I would have thought that consultation on this issue should be fairly simple—I believe it can enhance the transparency that is important in bringing our constituents with us and in ensuring that the Government are directly accountable to hon. and right hon. Members in this House. When the legislation is introduced, under our amendments as a regulation, that consultation is there to be drawn on. I genuinely believe—I have seen it for myself—that when a Government are willing to listen to a consultation response, they can, if they do things openly, often come up with a slightly better or tweaked outcome.

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6. 27 Oct 2026·Parliament·Edward Argar

   Social Housing Bill (First sitting)

   I am grateful to the hon. Gentleman for that point, but he makes the same point, in a sense, as the hon. Member for Cities of London and Westminster, and it is not what I am speaking about, which is the process. I do not believe that a consultation would tie councils up in knots or delay things inordinately, or indeed that introducing these changes through regulations rather than by diktat of the Secretary of State would cause unnecessary delays.<span id="31" class="column-number" data-column-number="31"></span> This process is about transparency and accountability. We have done it before in Government; indeed, this Government have done it with regulations. I have sat on a number of DLs; maybe I have upset the Whips at some point, because I sit on a DL almost every week, when I am not sitting in a Bill Committee—such is the fate of a former Cabinet Minister on the Back Benches. However, the point I am making is that this Government and other Governments have used the delegated legislation system to get things through quickly but none the less with democratic accountability to this House. That is the point being made by my hon. Friend the Member for Orpington in these amendments. It is about giving our constituents the confidence to trust that this House has debated what the Secretary of State recommends. Knowing the majority in the House at the moment, I have no doubt that the Minister would easily win any votes in a DL on matters such as this.

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7. 27 Oct 2026·Parliament·Edward Argar

   Social Housing Bill (First sitting)

   The very simple fact that there would be no vote on it by Members of this House, regardless of whether that was in a Committee, which is of course a subset of the House where we can debate and raise issues. I have a lot of time for the hon. Lady. I spent almost 10 years sitting on her local council before I was elected to this place, and I still closely follow Westminster politics. Consequently, I know that she is a hard-working and diligent Member who engages with all these issues particularly closely. However, the simple answer to her question is that Members would not have a vote on the Secretary of State’s determination. With that, I will conclude by again reiterating my support for the intent behind the amendments that my hon. Friend the Member for Orpington has tabled.

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8. 27 Oct 2026·Parliament·Edward Argar

   Social Housing Bill (Second sitting)

   As always, Mr Western, it is a great pleasure to serve under your chairmanship. I rise to support clause 13 remaining part of the Bill. With his typical eloquence, the Minister set out both the opportunities and challenges presented to those with shared ownership, including the regulatory challenges sitting around it. He also described the very real impact that it can have on those individuals—who are often starting off on the path to home ownership—when it does not work well.<span id="61" class="column-number" data-column-number="61"></span> I therefore think that clause 13 is important. I do not in any way want to gainsay the important work that the Minister is doing. As I said this morning, I have a lot of respect for the Minister; he is extremely able and I know that he will be pursuing this work with vigour. However, I believe that a statutory review offers the opportunity for a much broader look at this issue in the round, and actions such as those that the Minister has outlined can sit under such a review perfectly reasonably. The two things are not in contradiction. A statutory review would not stop the Minister from continuing to pursue some of the immediate actions that he has already set out. It just provides an opportunity to take a step back and look at this important sector of home ownership to assess whether it is working well. Where there are things that the Government or the Minister may have missed—as diligent as I know him to be— it gives that extra opportunity. I know that the Minister has been very clear in his determination to continue pursuing shared ownership, as he set out in his written statement and in his announcement. However, I have to say that this Minister, in whom I have a lot of confidence, may not always be in this post. When he inevitably ascends to higher office, his successor may not be as focused on this issue as him. Therefore, I think that a statutory review as set out in clause 13 offers the opportunity to publish something that has been considered carefully, which Members of this House and future Ministers can then refer back to when considering the way forward. I do not think that it trammels the Minister’s freedom in deciding what to announce or his discretion in any way; it would just be a very important addition.

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9. 27 Oct 2026·Parliament·Edward Argar

   Social Housing Bill (Second sitting)

   The hon. Lady amplifies what I have already said about the Minister. Before I do his political career too much harm by being too nice about him in front of his Whip, I have been very clear in my respect for the Minister and the work he is doing. However, as we have seen in previous Governments—not only Conservative but Labour Governments since 2024—Ministers come and go with an alarming rapidity. When something is as important as this is to so many people, there must be something underpinning it. Whether Ministers move—in this Minister’s case, I hope he ascends—or whether they leave Government, it is important that whoever succeeds that office and its responsibilities has something on which they can hang their hat and plan their strategy. That is why I think that a review would not be a hindrance to any Minister or Government. Actually, it could be of great help, not least in potentially giving the opportunity to objectively consider some of the issues that the hon. Lady has just raised further.

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10. 27 Oct 2026·Parliament·Edward Argar

    Social Housing Bill (Second sitting)

    It is always a pleasure to give way to the hon. Gentleman. I am seeking to make the point that this review has the potential to underpin a much longer-term approach to this important sector. That is why the clause is important. I do not see the new clauses tabled by my hon. Friend the Member for Orpington as in contradiction to that, but rather as complementary to it. There may be a question about phasing and how it works, but I do not believe that that is a reason not to retain the clause for what it seeks to do. The Minister is always a reflective man, so I hope that he will reflect on that carefully.

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