Matthew Pennycook MP: speeches 2026

Speeches

• 17 Jun 2026 · Draft Planning and Infrastructure Act 2025 (Consequential Amendments) Regulations 2026 · Hansard source

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  I thank right hon. and hon. Members for their considered contributions and questions, which I will try to address in turn. It is first worth making clear that the two minor and consequential amendments before us do not implement the new strategic plan-making system. We will bring forward a package of statutory instruments in the autumn to switch on the main provisions of that system. As I made clear in my speech, the two minor and consequential amendments do two very simple things. One provides for the Lord Chancellor to make examination rules. The final content will be clear when we lay those rules, which we intend to do in the autumn; they will be largely technical and procedural in nature. The other simply requires marine plan authorities to notify strategic planning authorities as well as local planning authorities that they intend to make a marine plan. I hope that that clarifies what the two amendments are about. On the points made by the shadow Minister, the hon. Member for Orpington, I do not want to relitigate all the debates we had in Bill Committee; I well understand the concerns expressed by Opposition Members about local input. It is important to reiterate a couple of things. Spatial development strategies will not allocate individual sites. As I said, they are high-level frameworks for housing growth and investment—they are not big local plans. Local plans will have to conform with them, but local planning authorities still have to develop local development plans. That is where decisions about which sites are appropriate come within the context of national planning policy—a “brownfield first” national planning policy. As the shadow Minister knows, we strengthened the policy requirements on previously developed land in our December 2024 update to the national planning policy framework. We have gone even further in the new NPPF, on which we have just consulted, and we will respond in due course to that. These are very high-level spatial development strategies. We do not want them all to be London plans; if they were, that would not represent success. London has very particular development needs. The legislative basis for SDSs is the London framework, but as I have said these plans are much more high-level. We are not aiming to replicate the London plan across the country.

• 15 Jun 2026 · New Social and Affordable Homes: Blaydon and Consett · Hansard source

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  My hon. Friend is right. I would go further than she did: I think the previous Government deliberately set out to engineer the decline of social rented housing, not least through the reforms that they made to the right to buy, which we are reversing through the Social Housing Bill. As I made clear, we received ambitious bids from affordable housing providers across the country, including in the north-east. That will allow councils and housing associations to start using the grant to build at scale once again.

• 15 Jun 2026 · New Social and Affordable Homes: Blaydon and Consett · Hansard source

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  Me again, Mr Speaker. We remain focused on implementing the five-step plan we published in July last year to deliver a decade of social and affordable housing renewal. We received incredibly ambitious bids for our £39 billion social and affordable homes programme and are in the process of assessing them with a view to a timely announcement of allocations. As Members will know, our Social Housing Bill, which will give affordable housing providers the clarity and confidence they need to build more social homes, is also making good progress in the other place.

• 15 Jun 2026 · Acoustic Design Planning Requirements: Workplaces · Hansard source

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  National planning policy makes clear that planning decisions should minimise potential adverse impacts resulting from noise. Associated planning practice guidance sets out that good acoustic design needs to be considered early in the planning process.

• 15 Jun 2026 · Acoustic Design Planning Requirements: Workplaces · Hansard source

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  Building regulations already require protection against sound or reverberation in houses, flats, buildings that have residential rooms and schools, but I am always open to considering how sound insulation standards might be improved in new builds. I would work on any further information my hon. Friend might send to me about the referenced projects in her constituency, including the Oscar Acoustics innovation centre.

• 15 Jun 2026 · Leasehold Reform · Hansard source

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  I thank my hon. Friend for her advocacy on this issue. Homeowners should not be subject to unfair management charges or poor standards of service at the hands of managing agents, and I commend her for bringing this case to the House’s attention. Our recent consultation on enhanced protections for homeowners on freehold estates closed on 12 March, and we are analysing the feedback received alongside continuing to develop plans to strengthen the regulation of managing agents.

• 15 Jun 2026 · Leasehold Reform · Hansard source

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  As the hon. Lady is—hopefully—aware, the last Government asked Lord Best to chair a working group to look at the regulation of property agents in the round. We are giving careful consideration to the recommendations in its report, with a view to strengthening the regulation of managing agents. If the hon. Lady will write to me with more details about that specific case, I will look into it.

• 15 Jun 2026 · Leasehold Reform · Hansard source

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  As you will recall, Mr Speaker, this is not the first occasion on which I have had to mention FirstPort at the Dispatch Box. We need to drive up standards across all managing agents. I shall be more than happy to meet the hon. Lady and a group of other Members, as she suggests, to discuss this particular provider in more detail.

• 15 Jun 2026 · Leasehold Reform · Hansard source

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  As I have said to the hon. Gentleman on previous occasions, I have a great deal of respect for him, but he has some front in standing up and accusing this Government of dithering when it comes to leasehold reform. The Conservative party had 14 years in which to end the system, and did not do it. It raised expectations, and let leaseholders down. We are going to end the system within a Parliament. We are going to strengthen the regulation of managing agents. We will respond to the Select Committee, and will set out further details in the near future.

• 15 Jun 2026 · Leasehold Reform · Hansard source

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  The Government continue to implement those leasehold reforms that are already in statute and to progress the wider set of reforms necessary to end the feudal leasehold system for good. In respect of the latter, the King’s Speech confirmed our intention to introduce the substantive commonhold and leasehold reform Bill, which will include fixes to the small number of specific but serious flaws in the previous Government’s Leasehold and Freehold Reform Act 2024.

• 15 Jun 2026 · Leasehold Reform · Hansard source

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  My hon. Friend has considerable expertise on leasehold reform, and he is right to press for clarity on this important matter. To commence the Leasehold and Freehold Reform Act’s enfranchisement provisions, we unfortunately do need to fix the flaws he refers to through new primary legislation, and we will do so in this Session. In the interim, we will need to establish what capitalisation and deferment rates to set, and I am pleased to tell him that I am aiming to launch a consultation on those in the coming weeks.

• 15 Jun 2026 · Leasehold Reform · Hansard source

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  I commend my hon. Friend, the other members of her Committee and its officials for the thorough piece of work that they have done in scrutinising the draft Bill: that will make for a better Bill when it is introduced. My hon. Friend will forgive me if I do not comment on press speculation but merely build on what I said in my letter to her of 8 June, namely that the Committee and the Government are of one mind when it comes to the necessity of making progress with the substantive Bill as quickly as possible so that we can transform the lives of leaseholders. While I remain committed to ensuring that any Bill put forward is robust so that we do not have to fix problems in primary legislation, as we had to in the case of the 2024 Act, I am seized of the urgency of both presenting the Bill and commencing the ground rent provisions as quickly as possible.

• 15 Jun 2026 · Leasehold Reform · Hansard source

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  The hon. Gentleman is as charming as ever, but all I can say to him is what I say in respect of this and many other issues: I am more than happy to help our counterparts in Northern Ireland to learn from the very good work that this Government are doing in relation to leasehold reform.

• 15 Jun 2026 · Road Adoption · Hansard source

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  We will do better than that. As part of our consultation on ending the prevalence of those arrangements, we specifically consulted on what more we can do on common adoptable standards, and we are exploring mandatory adoption for certain public amenities in certain circumstances. If the hon. Gentleman has read the Competition and Markets Authority report into the issue, he will know that the two are essential; we cannot mandate local authorities until we have common adoptable standards. If that is the route we go down, we have to do them at the same time.

• 15 Jun 2026 · Road Adoption · Hansard source

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  My Department is working closely with the Department for Transport to consider reforms to adoption and highways frameworks. We also recently consulted on reducing the prevalence of private estate management arrangements, including proposals to increase the adoption of estate amenities such as roads on new developments. That consultation closed on 12 March and we are analysing the feedback received.

• 15 Jun 2026 · Road Adoption · Hansard source

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  Those cases sound particularly egregious, and I am sorry to hear about them. My hon. Friend is right to highlight the detrimental consequences of declining road adoption rates. The Department for Transport is reviewing barriers to adoption, with a view to identifying improvements and informing future reforms, alongside the consultation that I referenced. When it comes to individual local authorities, to put it mildly, some are better than others—we know that—and Central Bedfordshire obviously has some ground to make up. That is one of the issues we are considering as part of the policy development process in respect of that consultation.

• 15 Jun 2026 · Short-term Lets: Licensing · Hansard source

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  Ministers in the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government engage regularly with ministerial colleagues across Government in relation to a range of housing policy matters. We continue to consider what additional powers we might give local authorities to enable them to respond to the pressures created by short-term lets, as well as second homes.

• 15 Jun 2026 · Short-term Lets: Licensing · Hansard source

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  My Department is not responsible for the national registration scheme for short-term lets. The Department for Culture, Media and Sport is responsible for that and is committed to implementing it as soon as possible. When it is implemented, the scheme will capture any property used as short-term rental accommodation, importantly including second homes that operate as short-term lets.

• 15 Jun 2026 · Short-term Lets: Licensing · Hansard source

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  To be clear, there is no credible solution to the housing crisis that does not involve significantly boosting housing supply, but my hon. Friend is absolutely right to argue that the distribution of homes in any given area has a significant bearing on housing availability and affordability. As she knows, the Government have already made changes to the tax system to reorientate the housing markets away from second-home owners and investors and towards local people looking for homes to live in. While I cannot commit to future legislation, I assure her that we continue to consider how best to ensure that local planning authorities have the full set of tools they need to manage challenges of the kind described by my hon. Friend.

• 15 Jun 2026 · Topical Questions · Hansard source

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  I thank my hon. Friend for raising this matter. I appreciate fully his concern about the potential mass eviction of his constituents. It is precisely so that private tenants can enjoy greater security, including the growing number of older people who now rent their homes, that we abolished section 21 no-fault evictions. I am happy to meet him to discuss the case further and what more support we might provide.

• 15 Jun 2026 · Topical Questions · Hansard source

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  We think it is right that developers can use site-by-site viability assessments, as the alternative where viability challenges are acute is that we get no homes coming forward at all. We have consulted, in the recent consultation on the NPPF, on standardised inputs to viability, and we will set out further steps in due course.

• 15 Jun 2026 · Topical Questions · Hansard source

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  I am grateful to my hon. Friend for his constructive engagement on the new towns programme, and on Tempsford in particular. It helped to inform our approach, including to the decision that new town proposals will contribute to meeting the identified housing need of relevant authorities in all instances. We are assessing options for delivery vehicles across the proposed sites, with a view to ensuring that each is best placed to drive delivery and secure essential infrastructure in a timely manner.

• 15 Jun 2026 · Topical Questions · Hansard source

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  I do not intend to reverse the decision; I made the decision. The hon. Member’s local authority is one of nine that have been designated for poor performance, just as the previous Government designated local authorities when they fell below the required standards in their planning processes.

• 15 Jun 2026 · Topical Questions · Hansard source

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  I am aware of my hon. Friend’s robust views on this matter. There are a range of views about the right geographies for spatial development strategies. The Under-Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, my hon. Friend the hon. Member for Barking (Nesil Caliskan), and I are looking at all the consultation responses we have received, and we will make decisions on the full basis of having those fed in.

• 15 Jun 2026 · Topical Questions · Hansard source

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  We continue to target a win-win for both development and nature. I am more than happy to sit down with my hon. Friend to discuss how the NPPF contributes to that objective.