Lee Rowley has been reappointed housing minister as Rachel Maclean was sacked after 9 months within the job.
The revolving door of housing ministers spun as soon as once more this week, as prime minister Rishi Sunak made the 16th appointment to the housing minister job because the Conservatives took energy in 2010.
Rowley returns to a job that he held for simply 48 days in 2022 in the course of the doomed tenure of former prime minister Liz Truss. He replaces Maclean, who in February turned the sixth housing minister in a single yr.
Rowley, MP for North East Derbyshire, was already working as a parliamentary undersecretary of state within the Division for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities however has now been promoted to minister of state.
Maclean introduced she was sacked on Monday afternoon (13 November), saying on X, previously Twitter, that she was “disillusioned” that she had been requested to step down as a part of Sunak’s cupboard reshuffle.
She stated she had been “trying ahead to introducing the Renter Reform Invoice to committee tomorrow and later the Leasehold and Freehold Invoice”, including: “It has been a privilege to carry the place and I want my successor nicely”.
Maclean was the longest-serving housing minister since Christopher Pincher, who left the function in February 2022 after slightly below two years. She served for longer than every of the previous 4 housing ministers: Lucy Frazer, Lee Rowley, Marcus Jones and Stuart Andrew.
It’s not but recognized whether or not Michael Gove will stay because the secretary of state for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, nor whether or not enterprise secretary Kemi Badenoch and enterprise minister and de facto building minister Nusrat Ghani will keep in place.
Rowley takes over as housing minister at a time when non-public housebuilding is sharply reducing amid strain brought on by excessive rates of interest.
In September, consultancy PwC said it expected housebuilding output to drop by 21 per cent this yr, whereas a contraction in building exercise in the identical month was largely brought on by a fall in non-public housebuilding, according to the S&P Global/CIPS UK Purchasing Managers’ Index for October.
The UK’s largest housebuilders are amongst these to slash output: Barratt Developments said in September that it might full between 17 and 23 per cent fewer properties this yr, whereas Taylor Wimpey said last week it might full 26 to 36 per cent fewer properties this yr.
Rowley will decide up the Renters Reform Invoice, which was launched in Might this yr and would see the top to “no-fault” evictions; in addition to the Leasehold and Freehold Invoice, which was confirmed within the King’s Speech final week and goals to finish punitive service costs and make it simpler for leaseholders to purchase their freeholds.
