Social Housing Bill [HL]

My Lords, I have a number of amendments in this group, some of which I have co-signed with the noble Lord, Lord Stoneham of Droxford. I think we were probably both approached by the same organisation. There is one I have tabled which he has not co-signed, but I will not steal his thunder, apart from on the one that is in my name, Amendment 39. If necessary, I will come back to other amendments later, as I do not want to talk over what the noble Lord may have already prepared. I will start straightaway. In the previous debate, I said that rural people should have the right to buy, disagreeing with some of the proposals in the Bill and some of the arguments made by other noble Lords. Amendment 36 is basically saying that housing associations and local housing authorities should not be allowed to sell properties in rural areas. If somebody cannot buy it, why is it that a housing association should be able to sell it to the private market directly? The reason I say this is that, if we are concerned about the housing stock, and that is the reason to not allow a property to be sold to those already living in it and paying rent on it, then I do not understand why other private providers or private buyers should be able to come in, just because they have the money. Noble Lords may wonder why a housing association would want to sell in a rural area. My experience is that, as housing associations have got larger and larger, people are starting to come from further away. Principally, they have discovered a need to try to build homes quite some distance away. I referred to this at Second Reading, so I will not labour the point, but I have seen it happen in places such as Aldeburgh and Orford, in Suffolk. What has ended up happening is that homes are being built in Essex or in Cambridgeshire, not in the local area. It does not feel right to me that we can now, through this legislation, ban somebody who has been living in a home from buying it but we are not stopping the provider that owns it from selling it. That links strongly to my Amendment 48B, on the supplementary list, which says let us not have cash purchases; these properties cannot be sold for cash. My experience is that, quite often, a local housing association will try to sell off a dwelling, and there are two ways you can sell in an auction. You can sell for the unconditional auction approach, where you give up 10% of the price straightaway and then have to provide the 90% within 28 days, or you can go for the modern market auction, where you can potentially get a mortgage and you have 56 days to come up with the money. I do not know how many people would necessarily be able to come up with a spare £250,000—as happened in a recent sale—for the initial deposit or be able to come up with the rest of the money within 28 days, but that is the basis on which housing associations are selling property around the country. I do not think that is right. How is it that some wealthy person—a developer or entrepreneur—can buy such properties? The property I am thinking of could probably have had two or three houses built on it, with the size of the garden, and yet local people and the local council were not in the position to be able to buy that property. My amendment is quite blunt in seeking to prohibit cash purchases. It is done deliberately to provoke a discussion about who is buying when there is this big sell-off. I can visualise another property: a block of flats traditionally used by older people. Four years after the sale, again as a cash purchase, it is, surprisingly, still sat there; nothing has happened to the property and it is starting to look downgraded. I wonder if the real strategy is that the property becomes so bad that the purchasers end up getting permission to knock it down. The Minister will recall that, in previous legislation, I tried to encourage noble Lords to get to a situation where we could compel the council—this was for assets of community value, which is a slightly different matter—to use its powers to make sure that properties are kept in good nick. In this case, that has not necessarily been the case. I am trying to stop such behaviour and see what can be done with rural housing, if we are not going to allow people who live there to buy it. I have a series of other amendments. I have already explained that I have co-signed those which the Local Councils Network suggested. They merit debate and, although I do not agree with every single one of them, I thought it was important to discuss some of the wider points. As I said, I will leave that to the noble Lord, Lord Stoneham of Droxford. Straightforwardly, Amendment 39 would extend the notification period to eight weeks. The Local Councils Network has suggested that four weeks is simply not enough time for a council or housing association to make a financial decision to purchase a property, which typically requires a formal cabinet decision. It suggests that eight weeks is the minimum needed and that, during that period, if the council or another housing association submits an offer, on the existing use value for social housing, the selling housing association must accept it; if no offer is received, the property could proceed to open market sale, as it does now. I do not know the motive for four weeks, but the case has been reasonably well made for why, if this is intended to allow councils to step in and purchase those properties, eight weeks is more sensible, giving them more time to get their act together. On Amendment 47, I appreciate we have covered this issue in previous debates. I forgot to mention it earlier, but I had not tabled amendments to those amendments. If I think about areas with populations of about 3,000, for house occupation we are talking, on average, about 1,400 houses. What most people would consider to be rural is probably quite a bit smaller than that, so I have proposed the figure of 1,000, so that we can think that through. I am conscious that we have already had the debate on what rural is, so I do not expect the Minister to respond on Amendment 47. Amendment 46 is still there, and I hope that the noble Lord, Lord Cameron of Dillington, will not be upset by my tabling an amendment to his amendment. Having moved Amendment 36, I may come back to some of the other amendments to which the noble Lord, Lord Stoneham of Droxford, will speak.

My Lords, my name is on Amendments 37, 38 and 44 in this group, all relating to the disposal of social housing to other buyers—which is quite separate from the right to buy for existing tenants, as they are sales to other purchasers. I have a good deal of sympathy with the comments made by the noble Baroness, Lady Coffey. Amendment 37 is supported by the noble Lord, Lord Stoneham of Droxford, and would require notification of the proposed sale, by a housing association selling social housing, to the regulator of social housing—as well as to the local authority, as is already in the Bill. Amendment 38 would require the notification to be submitted not four weeks in advance of a disposal, as the Bill specifies, but eight weeks in most areas and 12 weeks in a designated rural area, which I will come back to. I support Amendment 41 in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Stoneham, which he will explain in a moment. Finally, Amendment 44 in my name relates to adaptations made to properties that are going to be sold. Disposals—sales to any buyer—of social housing have become a bone of contention in a number of places. They mean a loss of accommodation at social rents at a time when there is such a desperate shortage of affordable accommodation. Selling the family silver—even if it needs a good polish—is a short-term solution to the problem of social providers needing to balance the books. Some existing stock is in poor condition, requiring expensive repairs, while some is in places that are at an inconvenient distance from the organisation’s management and maintenance services. Sometimes the social landlord is simply taking the opportunity to sell valuable assets to fund development or major repairs elsewhere. The Bill’s response to this phenomenon, which has become surprisingly extensive, is to require notification of the plan to sell to be given to the local authority and to local social housing providers. The housing association would be prevented from selling the home for four weeks after it had served notice of its intention. This is a very modest step to discourage loss of stock, which may then be acquired by less scrupulous landlords. Disposals are particularly undesirable where the same local authority may see the property relet by a private landlord at a much higher rent, not least as temporary accommodation. This is not good value for money. The Chartered Institute of Housing makes the additional point that housing associations need to notify local authorities of a planned sale so that councils’ strategic plans for future development can be determined on the basis of what is happening to the existing stock. But the four-week notice period to be given of a sale presents a very tight timetable for local authorities to find another housing association to purchase the home, to do so themselves or to find funding for the same association to repair and improve the property it owns. Amendment 37 would require notification to the social housing regulator, as well as to the local authorities, and would enable the social housing regulator to keep a record of what is going on, assess the impact and decide whether changes in its own policy are worth while. The housing associations are complaining that the reason they need to sell property that would otherwise have a decent life is that the regulator is imposing upon them all kinds of additional burdens that they then have to fund: regulatory measures, minimum energy-efficiency standards, building safety costs following the ghastly Grenfell Tower tragedy, and Awaab’s law where housing associations must now complete works on cold and mould in fixed timescales. All these measures are requiring and pressurising housing associations to spend more on their existing stock of property, and that is given as a reason for needing to sell to make up the balances they need. Notifying the social housing regulator is important in informing the regulator of what these pressures mean in real life to the housing associations.

My Lords, I am most grateful to the Local Councils Network for its help with the amendments in this group in which I am involved. I am also grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Coffey, for her support for a number of them. I am pleased to support the amendments put forward by the noble Lord, Lord Best. Basically, the thinking behind all these amendments is that with social housing units that are sold off and disposed of, we are always in danger of losing a valuable social asset. So it is important that whenever a social housing unit is coming up for sale, everything is done to make sure that it is used as a unit for social housing, if it can be, and that we do not lose that in the community. I am not dealing with rural areas in my remarks, but I understand the importance of social housing units disappearing in rural areas. There is also an issue with housing associations becoming larger and across wider geographical areas; they sometimes lose their connection with the localities because of their spread. Therefore, it is essential that where these sales and disposals take place, they are held to account. I obviously support the amendment from the noble Lord, Lord Best. The noble Baroness, Lady Coffey, made the same point about extending the one month to two months so that the regulator can be informed and there is a proper period of time for whoever could purchase this social housing unit to look at how they can do it. In Amendment 45, we have put in some requirements for information about the housing unit, as to whether it is decent homes-compliant and on its energy performance. It is about getting all the details of the property together at the same time, so that the process does not become overbureaucratic and prolonged and can instead be quite straightforward. The main amendments I have put forward in this group are Amendments 38, 41 and 42. These go further than just informing the local authority or other local housing association that a property is being disposed of, and would actually put a right to refuse in the hands of a local authority or the local registered provider to obtain the property at existing use value. It would strengthen the mechanism and the incentive for somebody to step in to save this property for social use, rather than allowing it to go out into the private market. That is why these amendments are important: they would give the right of first refusal both to local authorities and to local housing associations to buy the properties. Social housing is very valuable, and we must keep it as much as we can. Obviously, there will be circumstances where it might not be appropriate, but these amendments are intended to put safeguards in and to give every incentive for a local authority or a housing association to participate and acquire these properties so we do not lose them as social housing units. I hope that the Minister will give very close consideration to accepting some of these improvements.

My Lords, I rise to support Amendment 46, and I start by thanking the noble Lord, Lord Best, and the noble Baroness, Lady Thornhill, for their support. As I explained at Second Reading and as we have heard already today, the shortage of affordable housing in rural areas has had, and continues to have, long-term social and economic consequences for our rural communities. It has led to school, shop and pub closures and reductions in transport and other services, quite apart from the effect on the viability of local businesses. Traditional social networks have also collapsed, and recent evidence now suggests—as the noble Lord, Lord Best, said—that the lack of supply caused by low levels of new provision of affordable housing to rent is being exacerbated by registered providers disposing of their rural stock. Very often, this rural stock is old and in need of expensive modernising, particularly the need to achieve energy efficiency and modern EPC targets. Furthermore, to make matters worse, they are often high market value rural homes, whose sale receipts could possibly help pay for larger housing projects in more accessible locations that offer economies of scale without the extra costs and complexities of small rural schemes. The business case for these disposal decisions is irrefutable, but the evidence suggests that these decisions are not recognising the important role that an affordable home plays in a rural community. The evidence shows that there has been a significant increase in rural disposals over the last five years, particularly by the larger registered providers. Once sold, it is difficult to replace these homes in the affected rural community, as opportunities for new affordable developments are scarce, particularly in high-value landscapes or areas affected by ecological constraints or in coastal areas. There is a need for both our amendment and the Government’s existing Clause 11. The Bill’s current amendment to the Housing and Regeneration Act simply requires registered providers to notify local authorities of a disposal, but with very short notice, as has been noted. It would not prevent such disposals, nor open the opportunity for the registered provider and the local authority to explore other options that would avoid the disposals in rural communities, where these may be the last social housing in a rural area. My amendment would give the rural local authority early visibility of stock conditions, asset plans and disposal strategies and would enable local authorities to plan for likely losses as well as new supply. It would open opportunities to consider purchase, retrofit, renovation, rural regeneration or other interventions before homes and land are lost permanently. Could local authority funding be available to fund replacements in the communities concerned? Could local authority funding help modernise the property or properties, making a sale unnecessary? Perhaps a package of rural sales and rebuilds could attract Homes England regeneration funding. Or, given the large plots of some of these homes, could everyone get together to redevelop the site to provide more homes? In effect, this would be a pre-emptive stage before any decision to sell is taken. I hope that this kind of information sharing would also lead to a better partnership working between registered providers, local authorities and community stakeholders. However, I should say that to find the right solutions takes time—hence the need in our amendment for a 12-month notice. As it stands, the current amendment in Clause 11 is more suited to non-rural areas, where there is more social housing and there are more opportunities for replacement. A disposal in these locations would not be as catastrophic as losing the last affordable home in a village or undermine the local authority’s strategy priority to support rural affordable housing delivery and sustainable communities. The notification of a proposed sale will still be important, giving the local authority some time to consider repurchase or using resources to bring a home up to standard. However, I am very concerned that four weeks is a totally inadequate period for local authorities to master the necessary resources for these actions; even 12 weeks would be pushing it. In rural areas, where a long-term strategic approach is necessary, I believe that constant communication and at least 12 months’ notice of an intention to sell will be the least amount of notice necessary.

My Lords, I will say something about disposals, but as this is the first time I have spoken in the debate, I will make some general comments in support of the Bill. Social homes are a vital resource for low-income families, and the current system has depleted that stock for decades. I therefore welcome measures in this legislation to protect social housing stock by reforming right to buy. With over 170,000 children currently living in temporary accommodation, it is essential that social homes are protected so that housing associations and councils have the confidence they need to build more social homes at pace. Measures to increase the minimum qualifying period for right to buy to a period of 10 years, reform right to buy discounts and introduce a new 35-year exemption for newly constructed social housing will boost councils’ confidence to build while ensuring that right to buy is more sustainable and better value for taxpayers’ money. The proposed reforms to right to buy in this legislation have been broadly welcomed by the social housing sector. That is because the current system is not sustainable; it has led to a depletion of social housing stock that is desperately needed, as several others have said. Councils in particular have been unwilling to invest in new social homes that may be quickly sold at a discount. Amendment 4, tabled by my noble friend Lady Taylor, seeks to remove right-to-buy eligibility from residents who own other residential property. It is a sensible measure to ensure that a new, reformed right-to-buy system is fair, proportionate and offers value for money.

I wonder if the noble Baroness realises that we covered Amendment 4 earlier.

I did realise that, which is why I made the point that I just wanted to make some general references because it is the first time that I have spoken. I will continue on to my point. I had wanted also to say something about the impact on rural affordable housing, but I echo so much of what others have said. I will move on to the point about disposals. Given our acute shortage of social housing, concerns about any social housing being sold by registered providers is understandable. However, a nuanced approach to the issue of disposals and stock management is needed as far as housing associations are concerned. It is also important to put a limited number of social housing disposals in a wider context. The number of social homes owned by housing associations has consistently grown in recent years, increasing by over 26,000 per year for the last three years, so the sale of housing association homes out of the social rented sector has not resulted in any net loss of social homes. Some housing associations have a proactive strategy to sell a limited proportion of their homes. It is standard practice as part of wider stock management planning, where the proceeds of sale enable the landlords to invest in building more new, higher-quality homes. One sale often funds the development of more than one home, so a flexible approach to disposals enables housing associations to contribute to the Government’s target of building 1.5 million new homes over the course of this Parliament. For example, one mid-sized housing association has a 3:2 disposals programme, where three social homes are built for every two sold. Importantly, all five of these homes are subsequently part of the overall housing mix. Disposals can be a proportionate, effective and constructive tool used by housing associations as part of their long-term stewardship of social housing. The National Housing Federation has argued that requirements under new Section 171A strike an appropriate balance between a line for effective collaboration between housing associations and local authorities without placing undue restrictions on effective stock management. However, housing associations have emphasised the importance of retaining flexibility to make the best decision for individual properties. Anything which limits this choice risks having a detrimental effect on housing associations’ ability to make prudent decisions about the best way to manage their homes in the long term. A right of first refusal to local authorities, as set out in Amendments 41 and 42, would impose restrictions on this flexibility.

My Lords, this has been a thoughtful and wide-ranging debate. I thank noble Lords who have taken the time to table these amendments. In particular, I thank my noble friend Lady Coffey for her diligent work. On Amendment 36, we need to look at where social housing is most effective, but we must also consider legitimate reasons why a sale could be beneficial. With regard to Amendment 47 in her name, and Amendment 46 in the name of the noble Lords, Lord Cameron of Dillington and Lord Best, and the noble Baroness, Lady Thornhill, we stated our position in the last group. Defining what counts as a rural area is beyond the scope of this debate and deserves much more scrutiny. That said, we recognise that local authorities and private registered providers should try to work together more closely in the interests of local communities. Amendments 40 and 41, tabled by the noble Lord, Lord Stoneham of Droxford, and my noble friend Lady Coffey seek to give registered providers a right of first refusal to acquire social rented dwellings and dwellings previously transferred from local authorities as existing use value for social housing. Noble Lords have made an interesting case and we need to look at this proposal further. Certainly, I could add some fruity stories from Bexley: the frustration of losing nomination rights and an elderly person’s block being sold at auction and turned into a cannabis factory that was then set light to. There are some things out there that we should be aware of. Amendment 37 seeks to extend the notification of a proposed sale to cover the regulator of social housing. I look forward to hearing the Minister’s response on the appropriateness of this. Amendment 45 adds details to what must be included in a sale notice and Amendment 44, in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Best, seeks to add to this list information regarding the accessibility of a dwelling to wheelchair users and people with mobility problems. These are important considerations and it is right that these sale notices are comprehensive, to provide a full picture. Turning to Amendment 43 in my name and that of my noble friend Lord Jamieson, we felt it important to draw the House’s attention to the operational and financial independence of private registered providers. We must be careful not to infringe on their independence or on property rights to ensure that relationships between private providers and local authorities are based on genuine co-operation and partnerships to deliver better outcomes. Finally, we welcome the Government’s amendments in this group. We do not want uncertainty on the statute book over which resolution procedure applies, and we are pleased that the Government have sought to fix this issue. I once again thank noble Lords for the issues they have raised, and I look forward to hearing from the Minister.

My Lords, I thank noble Lords who have taken part in the debate on this group of amendments, which consider a range of issues relating to the operation of the disposals measures in the Bill. The Bill is about supporting the supply of new social housing and to achieve this we must ensure that we are taking steps to protect the existing housing stock. In addition to the right-to-buy reforms we have discussed, the Bill’s new disposal notification requirement will ensure that councils and other social housing providers in the local area are notified before social homes are sold. That will improve transparency and provide earlier visibility where homes may be lost from the social housing sector, maximising opportunities for social housing providers to buy and retain social homes. It is important that this new requirement is balanced against the need to ensure that private registered providers are still free to take their own responsible decisions about how they manage their assets, so they can keep their homes safe and decent and continue to invest for the long term. In some cases, this means selling homes, as we have heard from my noble friend Lady Warwick, which we do not seek to inhibit or restrict with this measure. Rather, this measure aims to strike the right balance, maximising opportunities to keep housing in the social sector while ensuring that registered providers can determine their own responsible approach to asset management. Amendments 37 and 40 from the noble Lords, Lord Best and Lord Stoneham, would add the regulator of social housing to those bodies that must be notified prior to a disposal. The regulator plays a vital role in ensuring that our social landlords deliver the quality homes and services their tenants deserve. As part of the regulatory framework, private registered providers must be able to demonstrate a strategic rationale for disposals and understand the implications for their total social housing stock. I am not persuaded that requiring private registered providers to notify the regulator of a future disposal would enable them to better regulate against the standards that they set. The regulator plays no role in approving such disposals and that decision properly rests with the landlord. The regulator is already notified once a disposal has occurred, so that gives them an overview of the numbers and types of disposals that are occurring. The amendment from the noble Lord, Lord Best, would increase the period between notification and when a sale can occur from four weeks to eight weeks generally, and to 12 weeks in designated rural areas. Amendment 39 from the noble Baroness, Lady Coffey, also seeks an extension to eight weeks. I hope noble Lords will appreciate there is no right or wrong period here for the time that must elapse before sale. It is a balance that seeks to ensure that enough time is provided as a minimum for the local authority, or any interested private registered provider, to ask questions and engage in dialogue but avoids unduly delaying the many sales that will continue to proceed. I should also emphasise that this is the minimum period that must elapse. Where there is serious and active interest from other landlords, I would expect that a private registered provider would wish to engage and be flexible beyond that four-week minimum. However, I absolutely understand the noble Baroness’s point about the short length of time if decisions have to be taken, for example, through a democratic approval process or sometimes through other processes, so I shall reflect on this further. I thank the noble Baroness, Lady O’Neill, for Amendment 43, which seeks to ensure that, when exercising the regulation-making power in new Section 171B(6), the Secretary of State “has regard to the operational and financial independence of private registered providers”. I hope I can reassure, and already have reassured, the noble Baroness that the Government fully appreciate that private registered providers are just that: private bodies that should be left to make the decisions that deliver the best outcomes for them and their tenants. Clause 11 is a light-touch measure to improve transparency and reflect good practice. The measure does not prevent disposal or restrict the means of disposal or to whom a property can be sold. It therefore does not cut across how private registered providers operate or how they legitimately manage their assets. New Section 171B sets out the type of sales that will be exempt from the notification requirement. These include sales to another registered provider and sales of shared ownership homes to the tenant. The regulation-making power that the amendment relates to enables categories of sales that are exempt from the notification provision to be extended. Imposing a constraint on the regulation-making power, as proposed by the amendment, would therefore achieve no benefit for providers. I also reassure the noble Baroness we have no imminent intention of using this regulation-making power. The power future-proofs the provision in Clause 11, allowing other categories of sale to be added in future if necessary—for example, should a new model of affordable housing be developed. Amendment 44 in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Best, would require that a notice included information as to whether it was a property that had been adapted to make it accessible for wheelchair users or others with mobility issues. The noble Lord may have predicted that I am sympathetic to what lies behind the amendment; losing properties from the social sector that have already been adapted to meet particular needs is particularly concerning. I will further consider this issue with the sector and whether that can be achieved without any unintended consequences, and I will work with the noble Lord on that. Amendment 45 in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Stoneham, would extend further the information that must be required in all notices to include, for example, whether a property complied with the decent homes standard and its EPC rating. Amendment 48A would also require the private registered provider to inform the local authority and the regulator of the outcome of the proposed disposal. However, the particulars that must be included in the notice and contained in new Section 171C(1) are those that will be relevant and always of interest to other providers, such as the address and type of dwelling. Again, we have tried to strike a balance here about what legislation needs to identify as a statutory minimum to minimise burdens on landlords, recognising the ability of individual providers to make further inquiries on matters that might be of particular interest to them. Similarly, we do not wish to impose additional requirements on providers for further notifications post sale. Amendment 46 in the name of the noble Lord, Lord Cameron, would add additional requirements for disposals in designated rural areas, while Amendment 47 in the name of the noble Baroness, Lady Coffey, would restrict the number of areas caught by this measure by reducing the threshold to areas of 1,000 people or fewer—I think she agreed that we debated that part earlier on today. Again, I am sympathetic to what lies behind the amendment. As the noble Lord has set out, it is intended to ensure that a private registered provider and the relevant local authority discuss appropriate solutions to the possible disposal of affordable housing in sensitive rural communities well before a disposal has taken place. However, I am not entirely persuaded that the best way to achieve that outcome is by requiring annual reports on stock condition and statutory consultation on options for the regeneration of social housing prior to disposal. The provision in the Bill will ensure that a local authority is aware of a potential disposal, and I hope that will provide a local authority, particularly perhaps in rural areas, an opportunity to ensure that there is an effective dialogue about particular disposals and, perhaps more strategically, where it is aware of more than one. Requiring statutory consultation on the regeneration of social housing would likely place significant time and administrative costs on both local authority and registered provider and would materially impact the ability of registered providers to make the necessary commercial decisions required to manage their assets effectively and safely. More broadly, through information published by the Regulator of Social Housing, local authorities can already access information about private registered provider-owned social housing stock within their local authority area, including information relating to whether stock meets the decent homes standard. An annual report on stock condition would be duplicative of these existing rigorous requirements and an unnecessary additional burden on providers. Therefore, while I am entirely sympathetic to what lies behind the amendment, I am not sure that legislating in this way is the best way to achieve that goal.

My Lords, I thank everybody who has contributed to this important debate. As has been said, the main reason for the Government bringing forward this Bill is to try to stop the reduction in social housing stocks. I was genuinely surprised that the Government are happy that, basically, if you are in a rural area and you are poor, you cannot buy the house you have been living in, but if you are rich and have the cash, you can buy somebody else’s house that they have been living in—if the housing association decides to sell it. I am genuinely surprised to hear that coming from a Labour Government. Going forward, I will think carefully about a number of the amendments. I am sure I will not be the only person considering what to bring back on Report. I think there is some practicality here, and I am glad the Minister said she would reflect on the four weeks to eight weeks idea, thinking of democratic processes. Of course, we all want to make sure people have good housing. We need to be careful about the freedoms we give to social housing providers: that they can sell a property in one place and build 100 miles further afield rather than thinking about the local community. With that, I beg leave to withdraw Amendment 36.

My Lords, I will speak to Amendment 48 and all other amendments in my name in this group. All the amendments in this group, whether they concern AI, data or interoperable systems, are predicated on a number of straightforward questions. Do we believe that, when it comes to social housing, for those providing and maintaining social housing, and for those tenants living in social housing, the considered and thoughtful deployment of AI, data and new technologies could be assistive in those endeavours? If we believe that there is something in that then we should look to the Bill, as currently drafted, and see that it is curiously silent on all these new technologies and data possibilities. That is important, not just because there is currently nothing in the Bill on those matters but because the Government’s stated position on artificial intelligence is to not have cross-sector AI legislation. There is nothing unusual or party political in this; it is exactly the same position that the previous Government adopted. However, I believe that both Governments have taken a suboptimal and unfortunate approach to AI regulation and legislation in this respect. If we accept the position of the current Government—no cross-sector AI legislation and a domain-by-domain approach—here we have such a domain, social housing, so where are the domain-specific AI provisions in the Bill? In looking at the amendments I have set out, it is helpful to take a purposive rather than literal approach to their interpretation. This is always a far more productive approach, whether one is doing statutory analysis or Bill consideration. To that effect, on Amendment 48, we can take out the technology blockchain and simply ask whether it would be beneficial to have a system of audit trail in these circumstances that is tamper-proof and immutable, and a record of which everybody has the same view in real time, at any time. Would that be a positive thing to have? Similarly, when it comes to using data, having the right mechanisms and frameworks for sharing data across agencies and departments for the benefit of housing associations, landlords and tenants, with all the right privacies and consents put in place, is at least worth considering. Amendment 60 is about zero-knowledge proofs. Would it not be worth the Government at least considering whether they could provide—and through their action enable housing associations, landlords and other interested parties to have—a far safer and more secure means of supporting and assisting tenants, particularly vulnerable tenants, who are often at the sharpest end of horrific situations in our society? Would not zero-knowledge proofs be worth considering and potentially piloting? We could have credentials which could enable support and assistance to be provided for those vulnerable tenants without any sense of being able to identify who they were. If we suggest that AI may be of benefit, it would make sense to experiment and look to proof cases across the social housing landscape. If that were the case, would it not be helpful for government to offer flexible support and guidance—not prescriptive but certainly principles-based—to further enable and empower housing associations and landlords to have greater comfort and confidence when they seek to procure and deploy AI and algorithmic systems across their operations? All these amendments have the potential to support and assist the underlying approaches set out in the Bill and the landlords and housing associations that seek to do best by their tenants, and indeed to empower and enable tenants themselves—yes, to have greater safety, security, privacy and protection, but also to have more empowerment through the considered development, proof case and deployment of certain technologies, including AI, in this space. If the Government are not going to have cross-sector AI legislation, which they are not, what will the approach be to AI use for social housing, so that tenants can be protected and so that, through the deployment and use of predictive analytics, for example, potential horrific harm situations can be avoided before they even occur? Similarly, predictive analytics could produce a repair schedule that kicks in before the need for any of those repairs becomes acute. Those are but two examples—there are hundreds and thousands more. How will tenants, landlords, and anyone else across the social housing ecosystem be enabled, empowered and supported, and have the comfort and the confidence to use and to be alongside these new technologies, not least AI, if the Bill stays silent on these important matters?

My Lords, in this group I have Amendment 114, which is about freedom of information. I start by commending my noble friend for being forward-thinking in his consideration of AI and the impact it will have. I particularly like his Amendment 99. I appreciate that his explanatory statement says: “Compliance with the standard is a precondition for any AI deployment in connection with functions under the Act”. However, the broader point made is simple and straightforward, and would help not only central government but local government and those involved in more regional planning, as is anticipated, with Acts already passed in this Parliament, to have a better grip of what is going on. Having said that, I am surprised by quite how many Answers come back from Ministers—not necessarily the Minister answering today—saying that it would cost too much money to work out an answer to a Question tabled by a Peer. Let us get AI, or indeed data, to help us in this regard.