Latest news with #MinistryforHousing
BBC News
02-04-2025
- Entertainment
- BBC News
Tamworth arts event hopes to bring community together
A new arts festival is being organised to bring residents together in a Staffordshire town where rioting broke out last Kaleidoscope of Dreams will involve 22 schools in Tamworth borough, and culminate in an event at the Castle Grounds on 5 festival will include music and dance performances, as well as an art trail produced by local trail will lead participants to locations in the town centre, including the Assembly Rooms, library, St Editha's Church, and bandstand. "We're very privileged in Tamworth to have a fantastic community and voluntary sector," said council chief executive Stephen Gabriel."Since the dreadful events last summer we've been overwhelmed by how people have come together to support Tamworth communities."The festival aimed to encourage unity, equality and diversity, he added."We will continue to work collaboratively as we move forward, enhancing community cohesion for all."The event is funded by part of a community recovery grant of £600,000, awarded to the town after the disorder on 4 August that followed the murder of three girls in money, from the Ministry for Housing, Communities and Local Government, has been provided to help the local authority improve community unity and social trust. Follow BBC Stoke & Staffordshire on BBC Sounds, Facebook, X and Instagram.
BBC News
31-03-2025
- Politics
- BBC News
Birmingham bin strike: Tories call for government intervention
Senior Conservative politicians have called for government intervention over the "escalating emergency" of Birmingham's ongoing bin strikes. In a letter to Deputy Prime Minister and Local Government Secretary Angela Rayner, they called for action to "tackle the chaos" and said the all-out strikes, which started on 11 March, had left streets "covered in rat-infested rubbish".They called for "urgent steps", including cutting councillors' pay to put funds towards refuse collection and other Ministry for Housing, Communities and Local Government (MHCLG) has been contacted for a response. Talks between the city council and Unite union aimed at resolving the dispute are set to resume on Monday. Negotiations collapsed on Thursday and the local authority has threatened compulsory redundancies. But Unite said it was determined to reach a resolution. The row centres around the loss of a job role the union claims would mean about 50 staff losing up to £8,000 a year - a figure disputed by the local authority. Birmingham City Council said it had made a "very fair" offer that would mean no worker would need to lose any money, and that offer remained on the the letter to Rayner, shadow chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster Alex Burghart and shadow local government secretary Kevin Hollinrake said the "risk of disease" in the city was "rising by the day" and the Labour government should send in private sector rubbish collectors to "bust" the strikes. They also called for it to hold a Cobra meeting to bring together different groups, including national and local government officials and public health officials. In 2023, commissioners were brought in for five years to run the council after it effectively went bankrupt, and the letter called for them to be told to slash councillors' pay after they "shamefully awarded themselves a 5.7% pay rise".The city council told the BBC the pay rise "was the recommendation of an independent panel and had cross-party agreement" but said the politicians' letter was for the government to respond to. Follow BBC Birmingham on BBC Sounds, Facebook, X and Instagram.
Yahoo
25-03-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Cladding tax on new homes delayed for a year
Ministers have delayed a tax to fund the removal of unsafe cladding from homes after developers warned it could hamper the government's housebuilding plans. The Ministry for Housing said on Monday the Building Safety Levy would be introduced from autumn 2026, rather than this year. The tax on new homes is expected to raise £3.4bn to be spent on building safety, including efforts to take down dangerous cladding. The delay comes after developers said the tax could increase building costs and result in the government missing its target to build 1.5 million homes by 2030. Housing Minister Matthew Pennycook told LBC the government was still committed to the tax and insisted the delay would not slow down the pace of improving building safety. "The previous government left us with an unpalatable inheritance in that respect," Pennycook said. "We've got to increase ther pace of works being done. Leaseholders are still trapped in these buildings." Neil Jefferson, chief executive of the Home Builders Federation, welcomed the delay as "recognition from government that these additional costs will inevitably constrain housing supply". But he suggested the "grossly unfair" tax on housing developers should be scrapped altogether. He said: "As proposed it will add thousands of pounds to the cost of new homes, threatening the viability of sites across swathes of the country at a time when industry is striving to reverse the decline in homebuilding numbers that we have seen in recent years." Cladding removal plan not ambitious enough, say MPs New deadlines set for fixing dangerous cladding The tax was first announced in 2021 by the then-Conservative government. Some of the money raised from the tax will go towards the removal of dangerous cladding from buildings, following the deadly fire at Grenfell Tower. Ministers have set aside £5.1bn to resolve the cladding crisis, expecting developers, building owners and social housing providers to pay the rest. Thousands of homes have been made safe, but as of December last year, work had yet to start on a quarter of the 1,323 tall buildings requiring attention. Up to 12,000 buildings and three million people could be affected. The lengthy process of identifying what work needs to be done and who should pay for it has left many residents living in fear of fires or with worries over costly repair bills. In its general election manifesto, Labour pledged to "take decisive action to improve building safety" and to "put a renewed focus on ensuring those responsible for the building safety crisis pay to put it right". Last year, Deputy Prime Minister Angela Rayner said the government was planning to introduce the Building Safety Levy in September this year. But in a letter to Rayner, dozens of developers said "the ability of the industry to invest in increasing the supply of new homes to meet the government's 1.5 million target is being threatened by the imposition of new taxes". Housebuilders say they are already paying £6.5bn towards improving building safety through corporation tax and argue makers of unsafe cladding should bear more of the costs. Home Builders Federation estimates the tax could add £1,580 to the cost of building a home and lead to the loss of about 70,000 affordable homes over 10 years. A Ministry for Housing, Communities and Local Government spokesperson said: "This government is determined to make Britain's homes safer by making developers pay their fair share to fix unsafe buildings through the Building Safety Levy. "We have extended the timeline to give developers more time to factor levy costs into their plans while continuing to support them to build safe homes, and at the same time we are continuing to work quickly to fix buildings with unsafe cladding through our Remediation Acceleration Plan."
BBC News
25-03-2025
- Business
- BBC News
Cladding tax on new homes delayed for a year
Ministers have delayed a tax to fund the removal of unsafe cladding from homes after developers warned it could hamper the government's housebuilding Ministry for Housing said on Monday the Building Safety Levy would be introduced from autumn 2026, rather than this tax on new homes is expected to raise £3.4bn to be spent on building safety, including efforts to take down dangerous delay comes after developers said the tax could increase building costs and result in the government missing its target to build 1.5 million homes by 2030. Housing Minister Matthew Pennycook told LBC the government was still committed to the tax and insisted the delay would not slow down the pace of improving building safety."The previous government left us with an unpalatable inheritance in that respect," Pennycook said."We've got to increase ther pace of works being done. Leaseholders are still trapped in these buildings."Neil Jefferson, chief executive of the Home Builders Federation, welcomed the delay as "recognition from government that these additional costs will inevitably constrain housing supply".But he suggested the "grossly unfair" tax on housing developers should be scrapped said: "As proposed it will add thousands of pounds to the cost of new homes, threatening the viability of sites across swathes of the country at a time when industry is striving to reverse the decline in homebuilding numbers that we have seen in recent years." The tax was first announced in 2021 by the then-Conservative of the money raised from the tax will go towards the removal of dangerous cladding from buildings, following the deadly fire at Grenfell have set aside £5.1bn to resolve the cladding crisis, expecting developers, building owners and social housing providers to pay the of homes have been made safe, but as of December last year, work had yet to start on a quarter of the 1,323 tall buildings requiring to 12,000 buildings and three million people could be lengthy process of identifying what work needs to be done and who should pay for it has left many residents living in fear of fires or with worries over costly repair bills. In its general election manifesto, Labour pledged to "take decisive action to improve building safety" and to "put a renewed focus on ensuring those responsible for the building safety crisis pay to put it right".Last year, Deputy Prime Minister Angela Rayner said the government was planning to introduce the Building Safety Levy in September this in a letter to Rayner, dozens of developers said "the ability of the industry to invest in increasing the supply of new homes to meet the government's 1.5 million target is being threatened by the imposition of new taxes".Housebuilders say they are already paying £6.5bn towards improving building safety through corporation tax and argue makers of unsafe cladding should bear more of the Builders Federation estimates the tax could add £1,580 to the cost of building a home and lead to the loss of about 70,000 affordable homes over 10 years.A Ministry for Housing, Communities and Local Government spokesperson said: "This government is determined to make Britain's homes safer by making developers pay their fair share to fix unsafe buildings through the Building Safety Levy."We have extended the timeline to give developers more time to factor levy costs into their plans while continuing to support them to build safe homes, and at the same time we are continuing to work quickly to fix buildings with unsafe cladding through our Remediation Acceleration Plan."
Bloomberg
10-03-2025
- Business
- Bloomberg
UK Pushes Planning Bill to Unblock Infrastructure Projects
The UK's Labour government will introduce long-promised legislation on Tuesday to speed up planning decisions as ministers seek to help stimulate growth through a step-change in housebuilding and by unblocking infrastructure projects from roads to wind farms. The Planning and Infrastructure Bill includes financial rewards worth £2,500 ($3,200) over 10 years for those living within 500 meters (1,600 feet) of new pylons, priority access to grid connections for clean energy projects and a faster approvals regime for infrastructure projects deemed to be of national significance, according to an emailed statement late on Monday from the Ministry for Housing, Communities and Local Government.
