You are viewing 1 of your 1 free articles
Councils must be allowed to borrow to build
Local authorities will only be able to provide the affordable homes the country needs if the next government allows them to borrow more, says John Bibby
The current housing crisis has been decades in the making and housing has rightly featured high in the public debate ahead of the general election and in the manifestos of all the main political parties.
“To end the housing crisis, the next government must unlock the potential to invest in council housing.”
Stock retained councils are eager to play their part in building the homes that the country needs and I welcome the emphasis the main parties have placed on housing policy in their manifestos.
The record of housebuilding in this country shows that we have only ever come close to building the number of new homes we need when local authorities have been actively involved and supported to build new homes alongside private developers and other social housing providers.
READ MORE
The Conservative Party manifesto sums it up nicely by stating: “We will never achieve the number of new houses we require without the active participation of social and municipal housing providers.”
However it goes on to have a swipe at the quality of housing provided in the past, claiming that “councils have been among the worst offenders in failing to build sustainable, integrated communities” and “in some instances have built for political gain rather than social purpose”.
Given that councils have not built municipal housing on any significant scale since the 1980s when local authorities became housing “enablers”, working with housing associations rather than being direct “providers”, this criticism of local authorities is somewhat unjustified.
While it is true that some estates – particularly mid and high-rise developments and deck access flats and maisonettes built in the 1960s and 1970s – have not stood the test of time, the vast majority of homes provided by councils have provided excellent accommodation – illustrated by their popularity in the first-time buyer and buy-to-let market as former Right to Buy properties come up for sale.
"Councils are ready to build the right homes, to the right standards, in the right places."
Of course, providing council housing in a decent place to live is not simply about bricks and mortar or the quality of the architectural design and planning layout.
It is also about the management and maintenance of those homes and for too long, until investment was made to bring homes up to the Decent Homes Standard by 2010 followed by the introduction of the self-financing regime in 2012, councils were starved of the resources necessary to maintain their housing assets, refurbish older stock and address any failings in the original design and planning of the housing.
Since 2012 we have seen a small renaissance in council housebuilding and the quality of this new housing has been excellent, much of it built to the Code for Sustainable Homes and ‘secured by design’ principles within and complementary to existing communities.
To end the housing crisis, the next government must unlock the potential to invest in council housing by reinstating the principles of self-financing introduced with all-party support under the Localism Act 2011.
With the right encouragement and support from government, councils are ready to build the right homes, to the right standards, in the right places – and which the nation so desperately needs.
John Bibby, chief executive, Association of Retained Council Housing
