The Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government (MHCLG) has expanded several programmes related to boosting construction activity
Capacity to Build will see a further £46m invested over three years, building on the success of the £17m investment made in skills and capacity since 2025.
The new programme will be available to councils to help build their construction pipelines, overcome delivery blockers, and build on specialist housing capacity.
Capacity to Build consists of smaller programmes
The objectives of Capacity to Build are:
- Improve their workforce’s capability to deliver social and affordable housing
- Recruit and retain staff to specialist housebuilding positions
- Develop and accelerate bids for grant funding through the Social and Affordable Homes Programme (SAHP)
These will be targeted by the Council Housebuilding Support Service (CHoSS), the Council Housebuilding Support Fund (CHSF), and the Pathways to Planning graduate scheme.
The Local Government Association (LGA) is running CHoSS and will provide up to 225 tailored support packages from April 2026 to March 2029. Councils utilising this service may receive more than one package depending on individual or additional needs.
These packages will not cost the council anything and will aim to strengthen council housebuilding programmes through specialist advice, training, workshops, tools, published guidance, and peer learning.
The CHSF is being delivered in partnership with Homes England and provides targeted revenue funding to councils to support early-stage housing development activity.
Between 2025 and 2026, the fund has helped 44 councils to develop and accelerate bids to the SAHP, assisting in the creation of around 11,500 homes.
Read more about the CHSF here.
Aiding skills and employment as well as finance
The Pathways to Planning programme is also seeing an expansion as part of Capacity to Build. The LGA has delivered the initial form of the programme to help councils recruit and retain recent graduates, and now the expansion will consider more specialist roles such as surveying and project management roles.
This comes by supporting graduates with structured training and accreditation routes, building a pipeline of skilled staff. The two new pathways aim to recruit up to 150 graduates form 2026-2029, with onboarding to begin early next year.
Eligible employers or interested graduates can find out more about the programme via the LGA website here.
Since taking position as prime minister, Andy Burnham has promised to bring “the biggest council house building programme since the post war period”, as well as boosting youth employment with particular focus on the construction industry.
Read what industry leaders had to say about this announcement here.
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