Church of England's new commission looks to help solve housing crisis

The Church of England has established a commission to look at how it can contribute to increasing the amount of social housing across the UK.

The 10-member commission comprises housing experts, academics and theologians and will meet over the next 18 months to examine, in the church’s words, “how it can build on its own work in housing and contribute to the national debate on policy”.

Justin Welby (pictured), the archbishop of Canterbury, said the UK’s housing crisis was “one of the major challenges facing this country and it is hitting the poorest the hardest”.

Welby said that through work helping the homeless across the UK the church believed the way forward “must involve building communities, not just houses”.

The bishop of Kensington, Graham Tomlin, who sits on the new commission and has been involved in helping survivors of the Grenfell fire, said: “We hear regularly of the housing crisis in the UK. Many people cannot afford the rent on their homes, live in poor-quality housing or find themselves unable to stay in the communities to which they belong.

“Our hope is that by exploring a Christian vision of housing, home and community we can make a contribution to solving some of these longstanding issues that our society has struggled to resolve over many years.”

And in a new report the church highlighted a number of housing schemes using land that it owns, including redeveloping between 12 and 16 church sites in the London boroughs of Waltham Forest, Barking and Dagenham, Redbridge and Havering. 

These aim to deliver around 600 affordable homes priced at London living rent, approximately 65% of market rent.