Whatever Theresa May says, social housing is still the victim of a focus on homeownership

Clearly, there have been a number of positives – although many of these were effectively overturning policies pushed by Mr Cameron, a man who pretty much took a wrecking ball approach to social rent.

Truly, he was a disaster for people living on low incomes, who, we should remember, have been the real victims of the assault on social housing.

But yes, it is good news that councils haven’t been forced to sell off high-value homes and that plans to force through fixed-term tenancies were dropped. Another positive is the additional financial freedoms handed to councils last year to enable them to build more homes. Although, clearly there was a demand among delegates at the conference for more action, with TV presenter and architect George Clarke receiving rapturous applause in his session when he called on government to fund 100,000 council homes a year and to suspend the Right to Buy.

So, yes, progress has been made but these have been baby steps. Our survey of the 50 biggest developing housing associations this week reveals quite how far there is to go.

The number of social rented properties being delivered by these big players did increase between 2017/18 and 2018/19 – but this was still lower than the numbers built for market sale, for example.

At the end of the day, this is down to policy decisions made centrally. The fact that Scotland’s Wheatley Group is the UK’s top builder of homes for social rent hammers homes the impact that a different approach could have.

We’ll be looking further into this in weeks to come.

In years to come, we might remember Ms May for having made a number of moves in the right direction when it comes to the building of homes for social rent – but if we ever have cause to look back at her tenure as halcyon days for their delivery, then we really are in trouble.

Martin Hilditch, editor, Inside Housing