Speeches by Reed.

“Yes, all of that is right. It is very important to have housing targets for local authorities across the country, if we are going to meet our own target. We should be making it easier for councils to meet those targets. The changes in planning are intended to achieve that. We also have 21 major infrastructure projects …”

“That last point will be one for the Education Secretary. My own view is that we should be educating young people about civic participation, including the importance of voting. It is an important reform to extend voting to 16 and 17-year-olds, and I am looking forward to young people being able to have their say in nati…”

“The elections that are supposed to be going ahead will be going ahead. The planned elections will be going ahead.”

“Yes, but the elections that are intended to go ahead will be going ahead.”

“I am not ruling it in or out at the moment because we are still having the conversations, but it is not entirely up to me.”

“No, not yet.”

“It is in all the areas. Where the elections are intended to go ahead, they will go ahead.”

“It links back somewhat to my previous role as Environment Secretary. I invited Dan Corry to come into DEFRA and look at environmental regulation and environmental regulators. Where it was possible to make reforms that would speed up consenting without legislation, we did that. There were some areas that he pointed to w…”

“Elections are going ahead. In all the areas where they were told, they will be going ahead.”

“When I was a council leader, I used to look at the satisfaction rating. You get any number of performance measures telling you how well or badly this service or that service is doing. I always used to put the greatest weight on the satisfaction statistic, because that told me whether people thought that things were goi…”

“I am going to bring in the Permanent Secretary in a moment, but on environmental regulation Dan Corry’s report, which I am sure the Committee has seen, set out some areas where he thinks further legislative change would be beneficial. That would not just be a decision for me. It would be the Environment Secretary who w…”

“There is more like that that we can do outside Price in Place. As part of our work towards devolution and community empowerment, there is a strong strand of localism, for which local government has been pushing for years but to which Government have not responded. Where we make services directly responsive to the peopl…”

“I have read the same reports in the newspapers that you will have read. The truth is that we have not put any pitches in yet for what would be in a future King’s Speech. No decisions have been taken.”

“We are working towards that. We are not doing enough yet. That is the truth of it. One of the good things about Pride in Place is that it is a board of local people who will decide where it is spent, whether on improving public services and public infrastructure, or securing a building that they may need for some purpo…”

“Social and community cohesion are issues that have really come up the political agenda. A lot of people will describe to you that they feel that, over recent years, the country has started pulling apart. There are no hard measures for that, but we know that it is a growing feeling because people will be saying that to …”

“When will we extend Awaab’s law from social to private rented? It is our intention to do that. We will do it as quickly as we can, but we are currently having to consult with all parties to make sure that everyone can understand what the requirements will be and can meet them before they are brought into force.”

“I have huge confidence in Andy. I want to give him his time to deal with the issues on the ground. I asked him directly, “Is the problem the legislation and the regulation around building safety?” and he said to me, “No, the issues are much more cultural. They are to do with the Building Safety Regulator and the way th…”

“Private tenants?”

“That will be subject to the roadmap as well.”

“Yes, you have zoomed in on one of the biggest problems that we have had so far. Since coming into post I have spoken with developers and the GLA. We have been consulting widely on the London stimulus package. The performance of the BSR is raised by all of them as a major problem. My predecessor appointed Andy Rowe as t…”