Inquiry into social and affordable housing launched

A cross-party group of MPs has warned the building of new social and affordable rented homes has ‘stagnated’ as it launches a new inquiry.

The communities and local government select committee launched an inquiry into the government’s ability to deliver more social and affordable rented homes over the next 10 years.

The inquiry will focus on how the government can ensure the sustainable delivery of social and affordable rented housing and what levels of funding will be required to support this delivery over the next 10 years.

Ministers have set a target of delivering 300,000 new homes per year by mid-2020. However only 3% of this target would be social homes built by local authorities.

But the housing charity Shelter has warned that over 3 million new social home would need to be built over a 20-year period to address social housing need.

Amounting to 150,000 new social homes per year this is significantly higher than the Government’s current plans.

The inquiry will also look at what role local authorities, Homes England and housing associations can play in building more social and affordable rented homes.

It will also examine how can the government’s approach to delivery can best meet the different needs of individual regions and areas.

‘Over the last decade the construction of new social and affordable rented homes has stagnated,’ said committee chair, Clive Betts.

‘The number of new homes built in this sector has slowed to a trickle of a few thousand a year, while at the same time demand becomes greater and greater.

‘The government has accepted that there needs to be much more new housing built each year, but it is possible that only 3% of its target of 300,000 new homes a year will be social homes built by local authorities,’ added Mr Betts.`

‘We have launched this new inquiry to understand how effective the government’s current housing strategy will be in meeting demand for social housing in the long term. We will examine how far current funding levels will promote new building projects, and what more can be done to encourage local authorities and housing associations to increase provision. Social housing has been left to drift for too long and we must ensure that there are coherent long-term strategies to remedy this.’

The deadline for submissions to the inquiry is 12 July.

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