Written question WQ100853
- Asked by
- Francesca O'BrienReform
- To be answered by
- Cabinet Minister for Local Government, Housing and Planning
- Tabled
- Due
- Answered
- Time to answer
- 2 days
Question
Has the Welsh Government given any consideration to giving Welsh local housing authorities a power to set qualification criteria for social housing, including residency requirements, comparable to the power available to authorities in England under section 160ZA of the Housing Act 1996; and if not, why?
Answer
Answered by Cabinet Minister for Local Government, Housing and Planning (Siân Gwenllian)
The previous Welsh Government considered providing local housing authorities with powers to determine which applicants would qualify for an allocation of social housing. Such a provision was included in the Homelessness and Social Housing Allocation (Wales) Bill as introduced but was removed following scrutiny by the Senedd where concerns were raised about the potential impact of the provision on access to social housing.
Wales does not operate a qualification framework comparable to that available in England. Instead, social housing allocations continue to be based on housing need within the statutory reasonable preference framework.