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Government unlocks £25 million to deliver more homes

A new £25 million fund has been launched to help local authorities to deliver the high quality, well designed homes that this country needs.

Housing and Planning Minister Alok Sharma this week announced that the Planning Delivery Fund is now open for bids and will support ambitious local authorities and third sector organisations in areas of high housing need to plan for new homes and infrastructure.

Initially opening up £11 million of the fund, councils will be able to apply to help gain the skills or capacity they need to deliver high quality housing growth at scale, pace and implement wider planning reforms. The fund is aimed at encouraging more innovation in the design quality of new housing developments, as well as provide design advice and support to local authorities.

As part of the government’s plans to raise housing supply to 300,000 per year on average by the mid-2020s, a package of measure has been announced to boost local authority planning capacity, support councils to take a proactive role in planning and encourage ambition and leadership in the delivery of new communities.

Others measures announced along with the £25 million Planning Delivery Fund include:

  • a further £3 million funding to support the delivery of the 14 garden villages that are part of the government’s existing programme
  • publishing a consultation on plans to allow the creation of locally led New Town Development Corporations, and help speed up the delivery of new garden towns

Housing and Planning Minister Alok Sharma said “Locally-led developments have enormous potential to deliver the scale and quality of housing growth that we need. By supporting our local authorities, we will be able to unlock more homes where people want to live.

“These measures including the £25 million of government support which will help develop new communities that will not only help deliver high-quality well-designed homes, but will also bring new jobs and facilities and a boost to local economies.”

Across England, the government is currently supporting 24 locally-led garden cities, towns and villages, which have the potential to deliver around 220,000 homes.

Backed by £16 million funding, a further £3 million has been allocated to 14 garden villages in the programme to fund dedicated staff and studies and assessments that are vital to the delivery of garden villages that are key to successful delivery.

The government’s housing white paper in February 2017 committed to the creation of New Town Development Corporations, which would be overseen by the local authority or authorities covering the area proposed for a new garden community, rather than by Whitehall. Government is now seeking views on this proposal.

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Autumn Budget – industry overview

At 12:30 today Chancellor Philip Hammond delivered his ‘make or break’ autumn budget to the chamber. Touching on key issues such as the housing crisis, skills shortages and planning reform, the latest budget included much for the construction sector to get excited about. But with the Chancellor’s promise of 300,000 new homes a year by mid-2020s, will the range of measures signalled in today’s Budget be enough to achieve that ambitious target? Buildingspecifier.com takes a look at what the industry is saying in response:

Housebuilding increase

A lot has been made in the run-up to the budget of the Government’s expected target to build 300,000 new homes next year. Speaking about this afternoon’s announcement, Bjorn Howard, CEO of Aster Group, said “We welcome the clear-cut push to increase housing stock, but would have liked Mr Hammond to have acknowledged that variety is as much a problem as volume for the sector.
“Housing is increasingly a point of division in society. Remedying this depends on tackling affordability and choice in the market, including greater availability of alternatives to traditional rent and homeownership options, such as shared ownership. This is where housing associations, alongside local councils empowered by greater borrowing freedom, can play an important role in increasing the number of affordable homes across the UK.”

SME builders

The Chancellor Philip Hammond has clearly delivered a ‘budget for builders’ that should allow small builders to deliver more of the new homes Britain so badly needs.

Commenting on the Budget 2017, Brian Berry Chief Executive of the FMB said “The Government has set itself a new target of building 300,000 new homes a year by the mid-2020s. And today the Chancellor has put small and medium-sized builders at the heart of ambitious plans to tackle the growing housing crisis. The Chancellor appears to be putting his money where his mouth is with the announcement of £44 billion of capital funding, loans and guarantees. In particular, a further £1.5 billion for the Home Building Fund to be targeted specifically at SME housebuilders can play a significant role in channelling crucial funding to this sector. A £630 million fund to prepare small sites for development and proposals to require councils to deliver more new housing supply from faster-to-build smaller sites will provide opportunities to boost small scale development.”

David Gray, Bid Development Director at AM Bid, added “The Chancellor’s announcement of £1.5bn of new money for the Home Builders Fund will be welcome news for SME housebuilders looking to bid for construction contracts across the UK.

“Moreover, the commitment to provide at least £44bn capital funding, loans and guarantees to support the housing market over the next five years, should result in a marked increase in construction contract opportunities. These contracts will be necessary to help support the delivery of the 300,000 new homes per year the Government is aiming to deliver by the mid-2020s, which would represent the highest level of new housebuilding seen in the UK since the 1970s.”

Borrowing caps

On Housing Revenue Account borrowing caps being lifted for councils in high-demand areas, Gavin Smart, deputy chief executive at the Chartered Institute of Housing (CIH), said “We have long argued that if we are going to build the homes we need councils will have to play a major part and we welcome measures to support this. The government has made a series of announcements in recent months which lay the foundation for housing associations to commit to developing many more new homes and we must do the same for councils. Relaxing borrowing caps for councils in high demand areas is very positive – we hope to see the government build on this move so that we see a return to the levels of council house building we need.”

Modern methods of construction

As part of his budget speech, Chancellor Philip Hammonds indicated that the government would release more funding to the education sector to alleviate overall financial pressures on schools. However, the Chancellor failed to mention the potential of both offsite construction and energy efficient retrofitting practices as potential areas where savings can be made.

Commenting, Neil Smith, Chief Executive Officer at Net Zero Buildings, said “While we welcome the extra funding, the evidence shows that the government could also ease the funding pressures that schools are facing in different ways. We cannot afford to waste this new funding on inefficient new buildings that are not fit for purpose for teachers or pupils.

“As 60% of school buildings were built before 1976, many head teachers are having to consider how to fund new buildings against a tight budgetary backdrop. A new report we have commissioned with the Centre for Economics and Business Research (Cebr) has found that modern building technologies could meet the growing demand for new school buildings while saving the Department for Education (DfE) billions of pounds. It also concluded that if all schools in England were as efficient and economical to maintain as the UK’s most energy efficient school buildings it would save the DfE £2.6bn a year.

“Across the country, millions of pounds can be saved every year on school lifecycle and maintenance costs if head teachers are prepared to think differently in how we create new buildings.”

Build to Rent

The Government’s push for longer-term tenancies is very welcome news for the build to rent sector and for UK renters.

Dominic Martin, Head of Operations at Atlas Residential said “Providing the customer with greater flexibility and security through long-term tenancies is a positive step forward for the rental market and an acknowledgement that the customer should remain firmly at the heart of everything we do – these are people’s homes.”

Materials

The Brick Development Association, representing brick manufacturers in the UK, welcomed the Chancellor’s target for new homes, announced in the budget today, stating with confidence that the brick industry is ready.

The number of new homes delivered in the last financial year – at 217,350 – is 12% up on the previous year, with brick deliveries also rising at 12% over the same period, suggesting that supply and demand are in balance.

Today’s speech presented an ambition to deliver an annual total of 300,000 new homes each year by the mid-2020s – approximately eight years from now. This represents a 38% increase. Brick manufacturing output is increasing year on year with growing investment in plant and equipment. The brick industry is unusually adaptable and in the last eight years production output has risen 38.5%.

Supplying a very volatile housing market is never easy for manufacturing suppliers, but the brick industry has proved itself particularly able to scale up demand as required and is currently well able to meet demand from new house building.

“We are delighted at the focus on housebuilding in the budget” commented Tom Farmer of the BDA. “It is time for the country to face up to the economic and practical challenges and actually build enough homes for the people that live and work in the UK. I am delighted to be working in an industry that is keeping pace with this fast-moving sector and which is ready to gear up to meet increased demand.”

Skills shortage

Although the budget contained many impressive statements related to getting Britain building, it didn’t say much in the way of alleviating the skills shortage to ensure that we have the right people working within the industry to make it happen.

Brian Berry, FMB said “A major challenge to getting new homes built is the skills crisis we face. In the long run, the only real solution to chronic skills shortages will be a major increase in the training of new entrants into our industry. We are therefore pleased to hear the Chancellor has today committed extra resourcing to training for construction skills. With Brexit round the corner the next few years will bring unprecedented challenges to the construction sector. The Government will need to make sure that the sector continues to have access to skilled EU workers, but we are pleased that the Chancellor has today listened to the needs of SME builders.”

In summary

It was dubbed as Hammond’s ‘make-or-break’ budget; there were three key challenges facing the Chancellor today in a budget which was delivered against a background of Brexit and a substantial decline in growth forecasts which threatened his tenure. Housing, infrastructure and productivity announcements were the Holy Trinity designed to save his job.

Whilst the industry appears to welcome the government’s ambitious new target to deliver 300,000 new homes a year overall, concerns still remain about how we will build the right homes in the right places. And how will we ensure that they are affordable?

Abolishing stamp duty for first time buyers is welcomed, as is some form of planning reform but there was a meagre sum mentioned for training and throwing money at the housing crisis will not solve the labour shortage or skills crisis. Infrastructure investment is also welcome but we need concrete timelines rather than further hollow promises. Productivity is a complex issue and his comments on the role of digital enablement underlined that, as an industry, we need to help ourselves but again, short term improvement is linked to a guaranteed labour pool and Brexit has caused a stampede of trades out of the UK, something this government has exacerbated through their dithering. So the overall impression from the sector seems to be that it was a stalwart attempt but not enough to instil confidence as we crash out of Europe.

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Pre-Budget briefing from industry experts

Housing is set to dominate tomorrow’s Autumn Budget, but it is not yet clear what type of Budget the Chancellor will deliver. Industry experts The Housing & Finance Institute have today published their pre-Budget briefing. The Housing & Finance Institute has laid down a marker for the government in identifying six potential budget themes – and some of the key policies we should look out for in the Chancellor’s statement.

What type of budget will it be?

1. The Big Build Budget: this budget would focus on the largest peacetime building programme since Bevan/Macmillan. Key policy changes would need to open up large land holdings and financial measures would need to substantially increase direct government funding as well as unlock manufacturing at scale, boost skills and boost all tenures from social rent to home purchase.

2. Next Generation Budget: this budget would focus on quality of life, quality of renting and cost of living issues for the ‘generation rent’. It could include wealth distribution support from older to younger generations.

3. Industrial Strategy & Growth Budget: while a ‘big build’ budget would be primarily about housing and be widespread across cities and county areas alike, an industrial strategy & growth budget would be about focusing resources on specific growth areas, such as the Oxford-Cambridge corridor, the Northern Powerhouse, London and the Midlands Engine.

4. Brexit Budget: housing within the Brexit context would be a greater focus on accelerating the application of large scale manufacturing and the build up of skills to meet the needs of housebuilding. It would also need to look at materials within a post Brexit customs and trade context, as well as energy and utilities innovation.

5. ‘Steady as she goes’ Budget: this is not the budget that is expected but it is possible. There is a something to be said for carrying on with an even tiller while everything else is being decided.

6. ‘Care & Repair’ Budget: against the backdrop of the Grenfell tragedy and challenges around elderly care and supported housing for vulnerable groups together with new homelessness duties coming into force and concerns about poor quality landlords, it can be expected that there will be packages of ‘care & repair’ around affordable and social housing, supported housing and remediation, alongside big build and growth commitments.

Industry & Sectors: Winners and Winners?

There are four broad areas that the Budget and supporting documents should cover from an industry and sector perspective: National Government, Councils, Housing Associations and Housebuilders.

To help you navigate the policy announcements we’ve set out what to look out for in relation to housing and housing related infrastructure.

National Government

The main theme of national government is expected to be a strong return to government direct intervention. This has been a dominant theme since Mrs May became Prime Minister, yet it hasn’t translated to large scale intervention. This could be the fiscal event to define what that looks like.

What to look out for:

  • Direct Central Government delivery of housing on public sector land. To be delivered through a powered up Homes & Communities Agency/ Homes England.
  • Immediately before the Budget government action has seen the Communities Secretary start to intervene directly in local plans. A more muscular state has been in the making since the Housing White Paper. This latest move is the first serious flexing of those state muscles, and more of this is expected.
  • One area where the state and local communities could find themselves in direct conflict is the role of a beefed-up Homes England using its dormant new towns powers for land assembly and to grant itself planning for large settlements.
  • In addition, we can expect announcements on measures to speed up the planning process and reduce post approval conditions. This could include a review on substantial changes within the current planning system, for example around assumed development rights and revised guidance on height, tenure mix, affordable housing definitions or density.

All of this will need a lot more money. The adjustment of housing associations out of the public accounts again gives a one-shot multi-billion pound room for manoeuvre for housing. The big question: will it see large central borrowing for a national housing & infrastructure fund to underpin the new muscular state or a huge extension of existing programmes delivered by housebuilders, councils and housing associations.

The runes say that this will be a ‘something for everyone’ budget – that could either be a crowd pleaser or fail to meet expectations that have seen the stakes raised around the £50 billion mark. Certainly, significant new funding in housing and related infrastructure is expected.

Councils

The Councils have made their strongest play for serious investment and a loosening of controls than for many years. In recent days, one reading of Lord Gary Porter’s media rounds suggests that the battle has been in full cry right up to the final clang of the Budget Red Box. Will councils be the victors – with off balance sheet treatment of council funding, billions of pounds of extra investment and extended borrowing and other powers?

What to look out for:

  • More help for those councils who can and are delivering homes and growth with individual deals and extended powers and money for the councils that have housing growth opportunities and that can deliver homes. Perhaps an extended role for Local Enterprise Partnerships too. However, with the tragedy of Grenfell looming large, social care and welfare changes, supported housing, housing market based deprivation and new homelessness laws coming into force, councils may see a more dominant focus on financial support for those areas within their ‘Care & Repair’ responsibilities.
  • The one area where councils may well see a greater housing delivery focus is around new obligations to meet local housing demand. It remains to be seen whether that will be matched by new housing and infrastructure investment and additional powers to allow councils, regions and others to plan, finance and delivery their own local homes and local infrastructure.

Housebuilders

For the housebuilders, this may be a budget of sticks as well as carrots. The Communities Secretary has land banking firmly in his sights.

What to look out for:

  • First and foremost we should expect to see the Government more fully utilising public sector body land. The Land Value capture approach has been tempting Government for many months, but these are not easy ideas to put into practice without causing other market distortions. Even so, it should be expected that a preferred option for capturing more value from the development of public sector land will be announced soon. The thrust of policy is likely to be one of collaborative working across public, private and third sectors together with community engagement for planning, local building trusts and regeneration.
  • In the private sector there are a range of possible policy measures. Some of these include build out directions, planning powers and forms of compulsory acquisition.
  • One effective way to encourage land into use is incentivising the market to use the land more quickly and gain earlier profits from it. This could include tax breaks for purchasers (such as stamp duty holidays), tax breaks for business (such as REITS or large landlords/ investors), short dated additional funding support for infrastructure and off take guarantees for sales or rent.
  • With an industrial strategy focus there is a sharp need to increase skills, Small and Medium Sized (SME) builders, so something around skills, innovation hubs, innovation funds and a step-change in support for manufactured housing are all areas to look out for.

Housing Associations

Housing Associations have had so much praise in recent days from the Government that either there is a great big deal about to be announced or the warmth of the words reflects a view that Housing Associations have what they need to deliver more homes.

Recent days have seen a change in emphasis in the role of the Housing Association not simply as a good manager of homes but as a substantial builder and developer of new homes for rent and for sale. This does indeed go back to the very re-birth of the Housing Associations under Sir Keith Joseph where Housing Associations built housing for low cost ownership as well as houses for rent.

What to look out for:

    • A number of the settlements for Housing Associations have already been announced: rent certainty, extra freedoms and flexibilities, extra affordable housing programme funding. Is there more to come? Probably around supported housing, perhaps on low cost home ownership, shared ownership and rent to buy, perhaps on social rent.
    • But from a Treasury perspective the advantage that the Housing Associations have is that they can leverage their balance sheets using private finance. With the new freedoms and rent certainty, perhaps together with changes of treatment for historic grants, the Housing Associations have a tremendous opportunity to unlock billions extra from their own balance sheets. Perhaps that will be some of the £50 Billion that the Communities Secretary is looking for.

Commenting in advance of the Budget, HFI chief executive Natalie Elphicke said “Housing is a political hot topic. There is an opportunity to capture the public mood and deliver the housing that the public want and need. We can therefore expect housing to dominate the budget, but the tone is vitally important. This budget needs to address ‘care & repair’ issues for housing, such as tower block safety and homelessness, as well as simply building more homes.

“The Chancellor can choose one of six options, or a mix of them. What is clear is that this is an opportunity for the Chancellor to be radical.

“The expectation is that this will be a ‘something for everyone’ housing budget – that could either be a crowd pleaser or fail to meet expectations. The stakes have been raised for housing commitments to be at an all-time high at around the £50 billion mark. With more than £20 billion already committed to housing over this Parliament, it is certain that we should see significant funding commitments for housing and related infrastructure.”

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Could a quarter of a million homes be built above rail lines?

Is it possible to develop around a quarter of a million new homes in London by building apartments above rail lines? The answer is yes, according to a new report published today.

The report, entitled ‘Out of Thin Air’, says there is the potential to provide all the new homes London needs if existing engineering techniques were used to construct apartment blocks directly above rail, Overground and Underground lines.

Research from the report identified all rail tracks in Transport for London’s (TfL) fare zones 1-6 where there were no breaks in the track made by tunnels, roads or bridges and where there was ten metres of available land on both sides. This would allow for the development of 100m² apartments in buildings rising to 12 storeys. If a conservative 10% of this total was delivered it would provide 250,969 new homes.

The London boroughs of Brent, Ealing and Croydon and TfL Zones 2, 3 and 4 provided the most ‘overbuild’ development potential.

Rail lines with development potential:

Available rail lines for development

Number of hectares available by borough:

Available land by borough

Bill Price, WSP director, said “We have to be more creative in using existing space in what remains a relatively low-rise city. The air rights above rail tracks present an unrealised but significant opportunity to build more new homes on brownfield land. It’s important to emphasise the engineering is absolutely possible and not new. We have been working on projects of this nature in New York for decades. Right now in London we are working on a variety of projects that rise above rail lines including a 50-storey residential tower, homes above a new Crossrail station and even a Premier League stadium.”

“There is a wider point about how we can better connect communities and unlock new homes not just above rail lines but adjacent to them as well. In some parts of London rail lines act as accidental segregators. By ‘decking’ over these lines, such as the proposed regeneration west of Earls Court underground station, we can join together sites to unlock an even higher number of new homes and create new vibrant communities.”

The thinking behind the report emerged after Network Rail appointed WSP in 2012 to study the feasibility of building above rail lines. The study’s conclusions, which focused on the type of decking and noise and vibration issues are detailed in the new report. CGI designs are also provided of what rail overbuild might look like if implemented near a major rail terminal in Central London, above a rail line in West London, and above a station in North London.

Out of Thin Air follows a previous WSP report, ‘Building Our Way Out of a Crisis’, which argued that up to 630,000 new homes in London could be found by building apartments above public buildings such as hospitals and schools.

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Theresa’s £2bn announcement – in figures

To the critical acclaim of the construction industry, the government confirmed plans for a new generation of council and housing association homes yesterday. Funding for affordable homes will be increased by a further £2 billion to more than £9 billion. But how exactly will this money be used to boost housing? Buildingspecifier investigates:

The numbers of homes will be determined on type and location of housing, and bids received for funding. With a typical £80,000 subsidy, this £2 billion investment can supply around 25,000 more homes at rents affordable for local people.

Ministers also confirmed plans to create a stable financial environment by setting a long term rent deal for councils and housing associations in England from 2020.

The funding will further support councils and housing associations in areas of acute affordability pressure, and where working families are struggling with the costs of rent and some are at risk of homelessness.

This complements recent announcements on supporting tenants in the private rented sector and on extending Help to Buy.

The government’s Affordable Homes Programme will increase from £7.1 billion of public funding to £9.1 billion, and the £2 billion additional funding for affordable housing could lever in total investment by housing associations and councils of up to £5 billion.

Since April 2010, around 333,000 affordable homes have been delivered, including 240,000 for rent. More than twice as much council housing has been built since 2010 than in the previous 13 years.

As set out in the Housing White Paper, to help encourage more investment in social housing, government will create a stable financial environment by setting a long term rent deal for councils and housing associations in England.

Under the proposal set out this week, increases to social housing rents will be limited to the Consumer Price Index (CPI) plus 1% for 5 years from 2020. This will give social tenants, councils and housing associations the security and certainty they need.

Previously, the government’s affordable housing policy primarily supported ‘affordable rent’ – rents of up to 80% of local market level – and low-cost home ownership. This announcement now extends support for ‘social rent’ – which are lower rents, set according to national guidelines.

These latest measures reinforce this government’s approach to back housing of all tenures – with more social housing; extra security for those in the private rented sector; and helping people get onto the housing ladder.

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Theresa May speech – the view from construction

At an eventful Conservative Conference today PM Theresa May has announced an extra £2bn will be allocated to aid delivery of affordable housing in areas “where need is greatest.” She also confirmed an energy cap in a bid to alleviate fuel poverty. Buildingspecifier reports:

Affordable housing

At an eventful Conservative Conference today PM Theresa May has announced an extra £2bn will be allocated to aid delivery of affordable housing in areas “where need is greatest.”

“We simply haven’t built enough homes,” admitted May said, although she reassures that “help is on the way.”

“It won’t be quick or easy – but as Prime Minister’s I’m going to make this my mission.”

The Prime Minister highlighted that there will now be “almost £9bn” available for affordable housing which both councils and housing associations can bid for.

“We will invest an additional £2bn in affordable housing, taking the government’s affordable housing budget to £9bn. We will encourage councils as well as housing associations and provide certainty over future rent levels.

“In those parts of the country where need is greatest we will allow social rented housing to be built, at well below market levels, getting the government back into the business of building houses.”

Energy cap

The Prime Minister also revealed that caps on energy prices would be imposed under planned legislation. She gave a stark warning to energy firms that they faced a price cap on their “rip-off” bills under her new plans.

Draft legislation for the measure will be published next week, Mrs May revealed, as she accused firms of punishing loyal customers.

May commented “While we are in favour of free markets we will always take action to fix them when they are broken. We will always take on monopolies and vested interests when they are holding people back. One of the greatest examples in Britain today is the broken energy market. The energy market punishes loyalty with higher prices and the most loyal customers are often those with lower incomes, the elderly, people with lower qualifications and people who rent their homes.”

Industry reaction

Chief Executive of the National Housing Federation, David Orr said “In the aftermath of the tragic fire at Grenfell Tower, the prime minister said that we as a nation have not paid enough attention to social housing. Today, she is right to make a bold break with the past and commit to building the homes we need most – genuinely affordable homes for those on the lowest incomes.

“The additional £2bn will make a real difference to those let down by a broken housing market. Building homes for social rent will make work pay and help bring down the housing benefit bill in the long run by moving people out of costly private lets.”

Brian Berry, Chief Executive of the FMB, said “Despite the Prime Minister’s precarious political position since the General Election, Theresa May has today managed to take a braver and bolder stance on house building than any Prime Minister of recent years. The private sector will continue to expand the number of new homes it builds, particularly so if the Government succeeds in its aim of removing barriers that hold back small scale house builders. However, in the house building heyday of the 1950/60s, a healthy private sector was always complemented by significant levels of social house building. Indeed, we have only ever built at the level we need to keep pace with demand when both the private and public house building sectors have been firing on all fronts. In the 1960s, for example, we were building around 400,000 homes per year and half of those were social housing.”

“The Prime Minister’s plan is also an opportunity to help shape a stronger local house building industry. If councils can start to engage with smaller, local builders to deliver this new generation of council housing, it could further help to diversify the industry. This would also boost the capacity of the private sector through the provision of more public sector work. Indeed, the increased use of small and medium-sized building firms will limit the problem of land banking, as this is something small builders simply don’t do.

“There do remain however, some significant roadblocks to the Prime Minister’s vision. Following Brexit, the serious shortage of skilled labour the construction industry is already dealing with will be exacerbated if it becomes much more difficult for EU tradespeople, who have come to play a crucial part in plugging the industry’s chronic skills gap, to move to and work in the UK. Although the industry must seek to overcome this crisis by recruiting and training many more young people than we currently do, the Government must also be mindful and realistic about the continuing need there will be for skilled EU workers as it puts in place its post-Brexit immigration policy. Otherwise it will risk jeopardising the delivery of the bold new house building ambitions the Prime Minister outline today.”

Andy Sommerville, Director of Search Acumen, commented “Our country needs to embark on the greatest housing boom the UK has witnessed in a century. For decades, UK governments have neglected the critical issue of our nation’s housing shortfall and as a result we estimate by 2022 the UK will be short of a million homes.

“Theresa May’s pledge to invest an extra £2bn in affordable housing is the first building block to making up for years of under supply and we can only hope that this is not simply another empty promise to fix our broken housing market. Now that our leaders share the industry’s sense of urgency, we must act to build more homes and we must act quickly. The gulf between supply and demand is widening each day. For the property and construction industry, this is the cue for Britain to start building.”

Chartered Institute of Housing chief executive Terrie Alafat CBE said “We have been calling on the government to invest more in genuinely affordable homes for rent so the Prime Minister’s announcement of an extra £2 billion for affordable housing is very welcome.

“As we have been saying for some time, social rents, which are significantly cheaper than market rents, are the only truly affordable option for many people on lower incomes, so the recognition that we need more of these homes is a vital step forward.

“It’s also encouraging to hear that Theresa May agrees councils have a central role to play in building the homes we need at prices people can afford.

“The details of exactly how these new homes will be funded and just how many will be for the lowest social rents will be crucial. The number of homes for social rent funded by the government collapsed from 36,000 to just over 1,000 between 2010/11 and 2016/17. Reversing this trend will be a significant task – how much of this new funding will be dedicated to building these kinds of homes?

“There is much to welcome in these announcements and they are certainly an important step in the right direction, but we still need to do more if we are to finally build the number of truly affordable homes we need.”

 

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Rumours circulate that Theresa May will build substantial number of council houses

The Conservative Conference 2017 and rumours are rife across the industry this morning that Theresa May will unveil plans for a major council housebuilding programme. If correct, this is a very exciting time for house builders and anybody with a professional interest in the housing sector.

Both The Sun and the BBC have made this a headline story, adding more weight to the argument.

If sources are to be believed, it would be the first time in decades that a prime minister has announced a major council housing boom. Could this be the beginning of the end of the housing crisis?

Buildingspecifier will be reporting. Don’t miss out!

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Grenfell must renew focus on health, safety and wellbeing

Commenting on the formal opening of the Grenfell Tower inquiry today, CIH director for Northern Ireland Nicola McCrudden said: “The tragedy of Grenfell Tower has rightfully created a renewed focus on housing and health, and ensuring that these awful events never happen again. The victims and everyone affected by this tragedy are owed this, and more.”

Ms McCrudden said “We need a UK-wide discussion about the value and the future of social housing.

“For every person who fears for their safety after the tragedy, there are many more who cannot secure a home or who are struggling to keep their home.

“Fundamentally, everyone deserves to live in a safe home. Everyone should be able to close their front door and know that they are out of harm’s way.”

Ms McCrudden was speaking ahead of the CIH annual conference on health and housing today in Belfast. She said ensuring that people were safe and secure in their homes went far beyond physical housing standards as highlighted by Grenfell.

“We have an ageing population that wants to stay in their homes and communities. We need to adapt existing homes to meet their needs and ensure their wellbeing. We also need robust planning for more housing options for older people.

“Housing with care options can help people to regain independence and skills to care for themselves, including when they are discharged from hospital.

“Delays in discharging patients is one of the factors that prevents hospital beds being freed up, and increases pressure on A&E departments.

“Every waiting-list target in health is being missed in Northern Ireland. Housing can play a central role in relieving pressures on our health service, reducing demand for costly health and social care interventions.”

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New clean energy projects set to power 3.6 million homes

Eleven new energy projects worth up to £176m per year have been successful in the latest competitive auction for renewable technologies, the government has announced this week.

The projects, which are set to generate over 3GW of electricity, enough to power 3.6 million homes, demonstrate that the UK continues to be an attractive place to invest in clean energy.

The government is committed to investing in clean technology and driving economic growth as set out in our ambitious Industrial Strategy and upcoming Clean Growth Plan.

The competitive approach is continuing to drive cost reductions in the renewable energy industry – the cost of new offshore wind projects starting to generate electricity from 2022-23 are now 50% lower than the first auction held in 2015. The other successful technologies, Advanced Conversion Technologies and Dedicated Biomass with Combined Heat and Power, also achieved significant savings.

Competition has also driven down the costs for consumers. The capacity delivered in this auction cost up to £528m per year less than it would have in the absence of competition.

Projects are to be delivered across Great Britain from Wales to the Scottish Highlands and the West Midlands from 2021.

Minister for Energy and Industry, Richard Harrington, said “We’ve placed clean growth at the heart of the Industrial Strategy to unlock opportunities across the country, while cutting carbon emissions.

“The offshore wind sector alone will invest £17.5bn in the UK up to 2021 and thousands of new jobs in British businesses will be created by the projects announced. This government will continue to seize these opportunities as the world moves towards a low carbon future, and will set out ambitious proposals in the upcoming Clean Growth Plan.”

This investment will help the UK meet its climate targets while supporting jobs in Britain’s growing renewable industry. The UK has the largest offshore wind capacity in the world and low carbon businesses have a combined turnover of £43 billion, employing 234,000 people.

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Mayor’s focus on small construction sites can help solve London’s housing crisis

The London Housing Strategy’s strong focus on bringing forward more small sites will help solve the housing crisis by opening up the market to SME house builders, according to the Federation of Master Builders (FMB).

Commenting on the draft London Housing Strategy, Barry Mortimer, Director of FMB London, said “If we’re to build the number of new homes Londoners need, we must urgently make much better use of the many existing small sites that are dotted all over London. In doing so, we will the strengthen the capacity of SME house builders to build more new homes and perhaps even attract some new SME firms into the market. FMB research has consistently shown that a lack of available and viable land is the main factor stunting the ability of small builders to deliver more homes. Indeed, over half of SME house builders believe that the number of small site opportunities is, if anything, decreasing.

“We therefore welcome strongly the Strategy’s proposal for a presumption in favour of appropriate residential development on small sites, which goes further than proposed changes to national policy as laid out in the Government’s Housing White Paper. The ‘Small Sites, Small Builders’ programme will also link up public land owners with small builders, which could make accessing public land easier for small firms. We also welcome moves which will mean that less of the Community Infrastructure Levy is payable upfront on small sites. This will really help with cash flow for smaller builders and make the economics of small scale development slightly easier.

“The London Housing Strategy therefore marks a step forward in empowering smaller house builders in London. In order to reach the 50,000 new homes London needs to build each year, this renewed emphasis on small sites is vital. However, all such progress could be undermined if the Mayor fails to protect small sites from onerous levels of developer contributions. National planning guidance states that planning obligations should not be sought from developments of ten units or fewer, but implementation of this policy in London is patchy at best. Unless the Mayor, and London Boroughs, recognise the need to minimise burdens on the very smallest developments, SME builders will continue to struggle to enter the market.”

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