Mike Reader

Mike Reader

Labour — Northampton South

Speaking in the House of Commons on 13 November 2025

Debate

Planning and Infrastructure Bill

Contribution

I did think that the hon. Member for North Herefordshire (Dr Chowns) was about to slip up in her round-up and say, “Build, baby, build”—we almost had her there. Every single week at my constituency surgeries, people come and talk to me about housing shortages, whether it is people living in overcrowded or temporary accommodation or people facing homelessness, and tomorrow will be no exception. In fact, the impact of the storms in my constituency this weekend will likely mean that hundreds of people—perhaps up to a thousand—will be temporarily removed from their temporary mobile homes in the Billing aquadrome, putting additional pressure on our housing system. It is right that the Government are stepping forward to try to fix this. I have been quite surprised in some of the debates on this Bill that we are not putting more focus on how we deal with homelessness, and that a debate on planning and infrastructure has instead come down in many cases purely to a discussion of nature.

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