London will make less than half as much progress against its social housing waiting list as rural England under the government’s £39bn Social and Affordable Homes Programme
According to new analysis by Centre for Cities, the amount of social housing built by 2036 will be equivalent to just 18% of London’s priority housing waiting list, compared with 46% in rural areas and 26% in England’s established mayoral areas.
“London’s acute housing shortage is holding back economic growth. Historically, London has been Britain’s engine of growth. That is less true in recent years, and housing is one of the capital’s biggest constraints,” stated Ant Breach, director of policy and research at Centre for Cities.
The government’s social housing programme must do more to reach cities
In its report published on Thursday, ‘Rewiring council housebuilding’, Centre for Cities says the £39bn fund should be much more targeted towards cities, where housing need is most concentrated and where there is the greatest potential for economic growth.
The report sets out how the government can better target its existing grant commitment by increasing London’s share of the existing funding pot by around a third, alongside giving metro mayors greater control over social and affordable housing funding.
“Across England, mayors should be given much greater control over social and affordable housebuilding,” said Breach.
“Housing markets don’t stop at council boundaries, and mayors are better placed to coordinate where homes are built, where infrastructure is needed and how funding is spent.”
Ensuring the grant benefits as many communities as possible
Prime minister Andy Burnham came into office promising the “biggest council housebuilding programme” since the post-war building boom ended in the 1970s, and the government has already committed to the biggest funding pot since the 1990s.
While additional funding would increase the maximum potential of a new council housebuilding programme, the report identifies further actions across all levels of government to ensure any grant goes as far as possible.
They include:
- Giving mayors control over social and affordable housing funding in their areas, as is already the case in London
- Giving councils flexibility to use market-rate development to help fund more council housebuilding
- Supporting councils to deliver houses both inside and outside of Housing Revenue Accounts
- Reforming measures that add unnecessary costs to each new home, for example by reducing minimum space requirements for single-person one-bedroom flats and raising height limits on single-staircase buildings
Breach concluded: “The government has rightly committed serious money to social and affordable housing, and this is in an incredibly tight fiscal context.
“It now needs to make sure that money is targeted where housing need is greatest and where new homes can do most to support economic growth.”
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