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• Question by: Stephen Knight
• Meeting date: 17 December 2014

Stephen Knight AM: Just one quick point and that is, is it legally possible to spend Section 106 or CIL money outside the boundary of a planning authority?

• Question by: Murad Qureshi
• Meeting date: 17 December 2014

Murad Qureshi AM: Can I raise two or three issues. The first one, Eddie, I am grateful that you mentioned the canals at the outset. It is just unfortunate they do not show up on the maps. I have no doubts that residential developers will be eying those canal sides very eagerly, because I suspect they can enhance the values of the developments by up to 40%. That is the residential side. However, I am more concerned that they are used during the works construction on the site. I think this is going to be a huge development site, over...

• Question by: Jennette Arnold OBE
• Meeting date: 17 December 2014

Jenette Arnold OBE (Deputy Chair): I have a couple of questions, one for Sir Eddie, and one for Victoria Hills. Sir Eddie, in your introduction you mentioned that the Old Oak and Park Royal Development Corporation (OPDC) master plan was similar to the blueprint adopted by the LLDC. I know, as one of the three Assembly Members for the area covered by the LLDC, and was heavily involved in the consultation and now I keep a very strong watching brief on what is going on, that many aspects of the LLDC’s vision has changed. For instance, the LLDC plan started...

• Question by: Richard Tracey
• Meeting date: 17 December 2014

Richard Tracey AM: Thank you, Mr Chairman. Edward, can I first of all thank you for organising for the letter to Kit Malthouse [AM] about Wormwood Scrubs, which of course has been circulated to all of us. All of us on this side have received emails from many people who certainly were not constituents of ours but had some concerns, so I think it has helped very much to clarify, and I am grateful to Kit for writing to the Mayor about it. First of all though, I was going to say there is a lot of experience in this...

• Reference: 2013/0005-1
• Question by: Stephen Knight
• Meeting date: 13 March 2013

What do you perceive will be the impact on London of housing related welfare reforms - including linking the uprating of Local Housing Allowance to the Consumer Price Index rather than rent inflation and introducing under-occupation penalties - given London's existing shortages of affordable rented accommodation and overcrowding problems?

• Reference: 2013/0006-1
• Question by: Fiona Twycross
• Meeting date: 13 March 2013

London is about to experience the largest change to the welfare system since the 1940's, due to take effect on 1 April. These changes include the overall benefit cap, uprating Local Housing Allowance by CPI, bedroom tax (under-occupancy penalties), localisation of the discretionary social fund, localisation of council tax benefit, and replacement of Disability Allowance with the Personal Independence Payment. Can you provide a very general picture of the impact these changes will have on the people of London?

• Reference: 2013/0007-1
• Question by: Darren Johnson
• Meeting date: 13 March 2013

There have already been many significant and cross-cutting changes to the welfare system, and there are even bigger changes planned for the coming year. Is there adequate monitoring and publicly available information about the cumulative impacts on Londoners, councils and support agencies?

• Reference: 2013/0008-1
• Question by: Len Duvall OBE
• Meeting date: 13 March 2013

The 'bedroom tax' will result in an immediate cut in Housing Benefit of 14% for those deemed to have one extra bedroom and 25% for two or more extra bedrooms. However, the extent to which such penalties will make a difference is questionable, as there is a significant mismatch between under-occupying and over-occupying households - with 80,000 households in London under-occupancy, against 260,000 over-crowded households. Will the bedroom tax help address overcrowding in London in any substantive way, and what impact do you believe it will have on established communities and social cohesion in the capital?

• Question by: Nicky Gavron
• Meeting date: 13 March 2013

I want to follow up from Stephen Knight's questioning on the CPI. Perhaps I could ask Kate, because she did not get a chance to answer. Have I got it right that the CPI is going to mean that rents are now going to be tagged to the CPI, rather than to rent inflation? Further, as the CPI has always risen at a much lower rate than rents, the 30th percentile which the LHA is tagged to will drop to perhaps 20th or 10th percentile available? Have I got this right?

• Question by: Richard Tracey
• Meeting date: 13 March 2013

Can we look at the cost. We all understand the principles of trying to help people that are truly in need but it is right, is it not, that Housing Benefit costs have gone up by £10 billion since the beginning of the decade? It was about £11 billion in 2000/01 and it is now £21 billion, and if it were to go on then it would be £25 billion in the coming year if the reforms were not brought in. Jules Pipe, do you want to comment on that?