You are viewing 1 of your 1 free articles
Wales safeguards social housebuilding budget
The Welsh government has protected its social housebuilding grant for 2024-25, but frozen a grant for homelessness prevention services.
Wales’ budget for 2024-25, published on Tuesday 19 December, protected the social housing grant, with the government saying it would provide £356m in 2024-25 to help develop 20,000 new social rent homes.
The funding was consistent with a spending plan first announced in December 2021, when the Welsh government said it would spend £1bn on building new social housing between 2022 and 2025.
Elsewhere, the Housing Support Grant (HSG), a fund for homelessness prevention services, will be maintained at the current level for another year.
Housing associations argued that this amounts to a real-terms cut when factoring in inflation.
The Welsh government had promised a £5m increase to the wider homelessness prevention budget for 2024-25. However, this increase has now been reduced to £2m.
READ MORE
A total of £92m will be allocated to support the decarbonisation of existing social housing, while £127m will be set aside for capital investment in building safety for the year.
The provision of grant for housebuilding was welcomed by Matt Dicks, national director of the Chartered Institute of Housing Cymru.
However, he added: “We are in the depths of a sustained and systemic housing emergency.”
Currently, 139,000 people, including 34,000 children, are waiting for social housing in Wales, while 11,200 people are living in temporary accommodation.
Mr Dicks continued: “We need to ensure that we support some of the most vulnerable within our communities maintain their tenancies.
“Therefore, effectively cutting support for homelessness prevention means that we are likely to see the homelessness figures in Wales go in the wrong direction, particularly at a time when many are suffering the severe impacts of the cost of living crisis.”
He acknowledged that the Welsh government had been dealt a £1.3bn real-terms cut from central government, but said: “Unless we make providing everyone in Wales with a safe, sustainable and affordable home a foundation mission… it will cost us billions further down the track, and that’s on top of the very real human misery caused by not having a place to call home.”
Stuart Ropke, chief executive of Community Housing Cymru, said he was pleased that the Welsh government has protected the social housing grant.
However, he added: “Simply building the safe, warm, affordable homes our communities need is not enough.”
On the freeze of the housing support grant, Mr Ropke said: “A cash-flat settlement is a real-terms cut. Our research shows that in the event of a freeze, more than three-quarters of service providers that rely on the HSG are likely to reduce capacity, meaning they will not be able to reach as many people who need support.
“40 per cent of providers are also likely to hand back contracts and 48% are likely to make staff redundant. This will impact some of the most vulnerable people in Wales, the dedicated people who work for these crucial organisations, and other services, like the NHS, which are already overstretched.”
A Welsh government spokesperson said: “We recognise the immense pressures facing frontline housing support services and the importance of their work.
“This is why we have protected the housing support grant in this week’s draft budget so that it remains at £166.7m, despite the extraordinarily difficult budgetary position.
“Ministers faced an incredibly difficult task in setting a budget for next year. Dialogue continues with key stakeholders to consider how we can work collaboratively to deliver our shared ambition to end homelessness in Wales.”
On Monday, the Scottish government cut its affordable housebuilding programme by £200m for 2024-25, a reduction of 26%.
Sign up for our Wales newsletter
New to Inside Housing? Click here to register and receive our Wales round-up straight to your inbox
Already have an account? Click here to manage your newsletters
