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Gove vows to explore ways to increase number of social rent homes

The housing secretary said he is exploring ways to increase government support for building social rent homes after admitting that his party has previously focused funding on products “that are not truly affordable”.

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Michael Gove at Shelter’s event at Westminster yesterday (picture: Garry Jones)
Michael Gove at Shelter’s event at Westminster yesterday (picture: Garry Jones)
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Michael Gove admitted that previous ministers had focused on products “that are not truly affordable” at an event hosted by Shelter #UKhousing

Speaking at a conference hosted by Shelter at Westminster yesterday, Michael Gove said that previous Conservative governments’ spending priorities on affordable housing had been “tilted more towards a particular set of products that are not truly affordable and have not enabled housing associations and others to generate the housing at the social rent that they need”. 

He pledged to look at the government’s own land supply and how it can “provide the plots on which we can, in partnership, create the space for new social housing to be built”.

He also said his department was looking at the rules that have meant homes for social rent could only be provided where there was a particular gap in affordability.

Under the previous Affordable Homes Programme, which ran from 2016 to 2021, the government would only provide grant to build homes for social rent in areas of high affordability pressure, which tend to be in London and the South East.

Under the current programme, the government will provide grant to develop social rent outside of these areas, but only if the level of grant required is not higher than it would be for social rent. 


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Mr Gove said: “That gap and affordability and the way it’s been defined has meant that it’s been easier to provide social rent in London and the South East and not elsewhere. I want to look at those rules in order to ensure the housing associations and councils across the country can find it easier to build homes for social rent.”

The housing minister also took aim at developers that renegotiate Section 106 agreements as he discussed his plans to replace Section 106 with an Infrastructure Levy

He said he was concerned about the inequality that allows local authorities to be “held hostage” by major developers who can renegotiate such agreements to reduce their infrastructure and affordable homes commitments. 

“I think that a well-designed levy can secure from the developer, or from the promotion of the development at the right time and in the right way, money that can be given to local authorities and to others to contribute to a more ambitious and a more sustainable social housing programme,” he added. 

Plans for a new Infrastructure Levy, which were announced in 2020, have attracted strong criticism from the social housing sector. The National Housing Federation previously said it could see a return to the era of ‘bolt-on estates’

Earlier in the conference, former prime minister Theresa May said that the government needed to build on the borrowing capacity granted to local authorities. During her time as prime minister, Ms May scrapped the cap on the amount of money councils could borrow against their Housing Revenue Account in a bid to increase council housebuilding.

Ms May also said the government should explore new ways for councils to spend the money from homes sold under Right to Buy and not require them to sell off vacant higher-value stock.

Ministers should also consider “the benefits of providing funding certainty to some housing associations over a longer period” to help boost the supply of new affordable homes, she added. 

Attendees also heard from two panel discussions on how the housing crisis got to where it is and the barriers to building new homes.

On the second panel, journalist and author Liam Halligan chaired the discussion alongside Osama Bhutta, director of campaigns, policy and communications at Shelter; Izzi Seccombe from the Local Government Association; Ben Murphy, estate director for the Duchy of Cornwall; and James Rowlands, senior policy and public affairs manager at Nationwide Building Society.

The panellists agreed that the acquisition and price of land is a much bigger barrier to development than the need for planning reform.

Kwajo Tweneboa, social housing activist, told panellists in an earlier session that associations had “dropped the ball” on maintaining older properties and looking after tenants in pursuit of building new homes, while journalist Vicky Spratt said that the housing crisis should “come with a great sense of national shame”. 

Polly Neate, chief executive of Shelter, said: “A long line of governments have focused on homeownership schemes that are only for the better-off, rather than what most local families need – a secure home they can afford.

“Good social housing is as vital as education or healthcare, but it has been de-prioritised for decades. If we try to level up without social housing, we will only push people out.”

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