Ministers commit £443m to house building
The government has announced the second group of projects to receive money from its £925 million Kickstart fund, and the allocation of £392 million of grant.
The £392 million comes from the National Affordable Housing Programme, and was allocated during September to fund 6,120 homes in all English regions.
The Homes and Communities Agency has also released £51 million from Kickstart, which be used to restart work on 27 stalled developments containing 2,068 homes.
The Kickstart allocation is the second from the first phase of the scheme. In September, housing minister John Healey announced that 10 projects would share £10 million to deliver 740 homes.
In July, he announced that 270 projects had been shortlisted for the scheme, taking the full funding allocation to deliver up to 22,398 homes. Not all of these are expected to be approved initially, and the excess funding will be used in a second round of the scheme.
The government said today’s announcements mean it has put £1 billion into support for house building since June.
Mr Healey said: ‘This power of government is helping to build the homes we need and support the construction industry during the recession. And crucially it’s also creating jobs and apprenticeships – meaning we will get the most for every taxpayer’s pound.’
A condition of all future Kickstart bids is that the developers must run apprenticeships and local employment schemes. 18 of the 27 projects to receive the latest allocation of funding run apprenticeships.
September NAHP allocations
| Region | Total £m funding through NAHP | Number of homes |
|---|---|---|
| Yorkshire and Humber | 10,746,687 | 296 |
| West Midlands | 23,929,575 | 402 |
| South West | 32,131,813 | 587 |
| South East | 67,630,992 | 1,459 |
| North West | 13,600,252 | 320 |
| North East | 1,424,389 | 65 |
| London | 214,303,401 | 2,252 |
| East Midlands | 5,939,139 | 135 |
| East of England | 22,362,822 | 604 |
| Grand Total | 392,069,070 | 6,120 |
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