The Welsh Government Housing Minister has declined to set a target on the construction of affordable homes after being questioned by Plaid Cymru’s Leanne Wood.
Huw Lewis would not be drawn on the issue despite claims by his party colleague and Pontypridd AM, Mick Antoniw, that the Welsh Government should be building more than 16,000 affordable homes every year.
This demand by Mr Antoniw after the May elections came despite there being no mention of an affordable homes target in the Labour election manifesto.
In what may be interpreted as a rebuke to Mr Antoniw, Mr Lewis replied:
“Targets may come; they will be set if they are useful.”
Ms Wood also raised the issue of families staying in bed and breakfast accommodation during questions to the Minister.
She said:
“Turning to affordable housing, you will be aware that the target set by the One Wales Government to create 6,500 new affordable homes was not only matched, but exceeded. To be clear, I am talking about affordable homes, and not the large executive housing schemes referred to earlier by my colleague Llyr Huws Gruffydd.
“To my knowledge, the Welsh Government did not have a target for building affordable homes before the One Wales Government set one. One of the Government backbenchers, Mick Antoniw, is reported as saying in a recent Morning Star Wales conference that Wales needed 16,000 new homes every year, intimating that the One Wales Government target was unambitious.
“Minister, will a new target for the number of affordable homes be set? If so, when will we know what it is? There is no mention of one in your manifesto, by the way, as far as I can see.
“If you agree with Mick Antoniw, when can we expect to see the details of how 16,000 new affordable homes will be built within the period of this Assembly?”
Paying tribute to the former Deputy Minister for Housing, Plaid Cymru’s Jocelyn Davies, Mr Lewis replied:
“The Member is quite correct in talking about the success of the One Wales Government in this regard. I inherited from the former Deputy Minister a competently-run portfolio.
“This was very competently handled and done well. Targets were exceeded, as you say. You are also quite right to say that that there are no targets in our manifesto.”
He added:
“Targets may come; they will be set if they are useful.”
In response to Ms Wood’s request to monitor the number of families in B&B accommodation, which was initially put at 25 when the statistics came out last month but have since been revised downwards to 10, Mr Lewis said:
“There should not be any children housed in bed-and-breakfast accommodation in Wales. I will be seeking the means, and taking all necessary steps, to ensure that we get that particular figure back down to zero, where it belongs.”
