Steve Reed MP: speeches 2026

Speeches

• 12 Jan 2026 · Topical Questions · Hansard source

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  Of course high streets are vital to local communities. That is why it was so sad to see high streets up and down the country fall into severe decline in the 14 years in which the Conservatives were in power, during which the right hon. Gentleman served in the Cabinet. Units closed down; their shutters were pulled down, and the graffiti and litter in front of buildings deterred people from going to the high street. This Government are committed to restoring our high streets and protecting the businesses that operate there.

• 12 Jan 2026 · Topical Questions · Hansard source

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  Landlords will face the full force of the law if they fail to comply with regulations that have now come into force thanks to Awaab’s law. We expect social housing to get a lot better than tenants have seen over recent decades.

• 12 Jan 2026 · Local House Building Targets: Affordability Assessment · Hansard source

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  I am always happy to listen to suggestions from the right hon. Gentleman and ensure that he gets a response. I reassure him that housing targets reflect the baseline of local housing stock, but I will ensure that he gets the letter he has requested.

• 12 Jan 2026 · Local House Building Targets: Affordability Assessment · Hansard source

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  The Government are committed to building the new homes people need so that we can end the housing crisis that we inherited. The method for calculating local housing need aligns with the Government’s ambition for 1.5 million new homes over the course of this Parliament. That reflects affordability, and there are no plans to change it.

• 12 Jan 2026 · House Building: London · Hansard source

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  As the hon. Gentleman should know, changes to the London plan were part of the package that I announced with the Mayor of London, because this Government are prepared to work with the Mayor of London to get the homes built. The previous Government wanted to hobble the Mayor of London so that he could not get the homes built, in order that they could score silly little political points rather than giving people the homes that they need to live in. The previous Government were happy to sit back and watch homelessness double over 14 years. We are not: we are going to build the homes that this country needs, including in London.

• 12 Jan 2026 · House Building: London · Hansard source

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  Of course it is not the Mayor of London who can change planning legislation but the Government, and despite knowing the problems, the previous Government did nothing for 14 years. It has taken this Government to make those changes, even though we have been in power for barely a year and a half. The hon. Gentleman mentioned Bromley; the figures for Bromley show that it managed just 70 housing starts last year across the entire borough. That is entirely inadequate and it needs to do better.

• 12 Jan 2026 · House Building: London · Hansard source

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  The Mayor of London and I discussed the rate of house building in London as soon as I came into office at the beginning of September last year. House building in London is flatlining because the previous Government failed to take action when it was clear that it was happening from 2023 right across the country. Last October, the mayor and I launched a joint stimulus package to increase house building in London, and we and our teams remain in regular contact to ensure that we can get on and build the new housing that Londoners need.

• 12 Jan 2026 · House Building: London · Hansard source

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  I am more than happy to add my congratulations to those of my hon. Friend to Wandsworth council on ensuring that it is increasing the supply of affordable housing around Battersea power station, where we desperately need more. There is a fantastic development there, but on the Wandsworth side there were inadequate levels of social housing under the previous Conservative Administration.

• 12 Jan 2026 · House Building: London · Hansard source

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  Because of the time it takes between submitting an application and getting spades in the ground, we are seeing the tail-end of what was going on under the previous Government. We have already changed planning legislation and passed the Planning and Infrastructure Act 2025, which will dramatically speed up the planning process to get more housing through the system faster, lowering the cost for developers of getting those homes built. We have made changes to the national planning policy framework to speed up house building in and around London and across the rest of the country, and we expect to see that upturn over coming months.