My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Shipley, for his Amendment 89A, which was spoken to by the noble Baroness, Lady Bakewell. It seeks to introduce a new use class for affordable housing, and I acknowledge that it is important that affordable housing is maintained for present and future generations. I believe that our reforms will achieve this.
Use classes are an important deregulatory tool that group together uses with very similar land-use impacts. They remove the need for planning permission for change within the use class. While I understand the intent of the noble Lord and the noble Baroness in proposing this amendment, introducing a new use class for affordable housing would add unnecessary bureaucracy and cost to the planning process and added burdens on local planning authorities.
For example, when a property changes from affordable to private, a planning application would be required. Tenants who exercised their right to buy their property would be required to submit a planning application before being able to do so, slowing down the application process, adding burdens on local authorities and unfair restrictions on tenants. Where someone is staircasing to full ownership of a shared-ownership property, the same would apply.
We believe, therefore, that our approach to affordable housing will help those who aspire to home ownership to realise their ambitions, and strikes the right balance—it is a balance—between maintaining the affordable housing stock and providing opportunities for those who want to access or move up the property ladder. Our reforms will help to ensure that affordable housing continues to be provided in the future. Substantial further funding will go into the system from right-to-buy receipts and the sale of vacant high-value assets and will generate additional homes for every one sold, thereby increasing the overall supply of housing.
With this brief assurance, I hope that the noble Lord and noble Baroness will withdraw the amendment.