Solicitor Simon (Stilts) Clarke has taken over as Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities.

Appointed by Liz Truss, the six-foot-seven politician replaces Greg Clark, who served in the role for only two months.

Clarke, the MP for Middlesbrough South and East Cleveland was previously the Minister of State for Regional Growth and Local Government before resigning for personal reasons in September 2020. More recently, he has served as Chief Secretary to the Treasury when he had responsibility for scrutinising and departmental requests for more public spending.

In June he told the House of Commons: ’The levelling-up White Paper set out a clear plan to level up every corner of the United Kingdom by 2030. At the spending review last autumn, the Government showed how we would deliver our ambitious plan by delivering over £600bn in gross public sector investment over this Parliament. That includes £4.8bn in increased investment in local communities through the levelling-up fund, £1.6bn for the next generation of the British Business Bank’s regional investment fund, and £2.6bn for the shared prosperity fund’.

The National Residential Landlord’s Association has welcomed his appointment.

‘The new minister will need urgently to address the rental housing supply crisis’, said NRLA chief executive Ben Beadle.

‘Damaging tax hikes and uncertainty over reforms to the private rented sector are leading many landlords to leave the market when demand for rented homes remains high.

All this is doing is increasing rents, making it more difficult for those wanting to become homeowners.

‘The Government needs to look afresh at the rental reform White Paper to ensure the plans in it have the confidence of responsible landlords. This needs to include action to tackle anti-social tenants, scrapping plans that would damage the student housing market, and reforming the courts to ensure legitimate possession cases are dealt with more swiftly’.