Ex-minister calls for end to housing policy ‘tinkering’

Solving the country’s housing crisis won’t be achieved by government “tinkering” or the latest wheeze from a new housing minister, a former senior Labour MP has warned. 

Speaking at Savills’ annual housing conference earlier this week in London, Nick Raynsford – a former housing minister in Tony Blair’s government – warned the task of building the right number of homes in the UK would require “a sustained commitment and a coordinated response from all the agencies that are able to contribute, all of them operating to their maximum output”.

He went on: “What we don’t need is anymore tinkering and instant new policies from new housing ministers who think they’ve got the answer. We need a sustained programme over a period of years.”

Esther McVey, the ninth housing minister in as many years, recently threw her weight behind modular and offsite manufacturing as a way of delivering more homes, proposing a new hub promoting modern methods of construction in the north of England.

Raynsford (pictured) told the Savills conference: “When I introduced the Decent Homes programme I knew it was something I couldn’t deliver during my time as housing minister, but the programme was sustained over a 10-year period and it did make an impact. And we need a similar view now of consistency in policy application.”

A comprehensive programme of housebuilding would require “provision coming from others, including a social rented programme from local authorities and housing associations – both have an important contribution to make and both should be encouraged. The private rented sector has a key part to play, but its role should not be confused with that of providing social housing,” he added.

Raynsford said the skills shortage was causing “a very serious drag” on the country’s ability deliver enough homes, modular and offsite manufacturing would have a “big role” in boosting supply, and in the aftermath of Grenfell better site supervision and more effective control “must be very much part of the agenda”.

Meanwhile representatives from the housing association industry echoed Bob Kerslake’s warning regarding the impact around the cost of bringing their stock up to safety standards after Grenfell and the sector’s ability to build more new homes.

Helen Evans, chair of the G15 group of housing associations and chief executive of Network Homes, said the cost of remediation across the sector was likely to come in at anywhere between £1bn and £7bn. “That is bound to have an impact on capacity for supply and we need to acknowledge that. And safety for existing residents will always trump other obligations. Supply is third in our hierarchy, behind safety and stock [quality] and [tenant] satisfaction.”

And Nick Murphy, chief executive of Nottingham City Homes, which runs 27,000 homes for the Midlands city, said councils were being much more creative around the use of available land, but the resulting homes had to be “good places to live. Design, space standards, energy efficiency, fire safety. We’ve got to get those things right. We are pulling down homes that we built in the 1960s and 1970s because we got these things wrong back then.

“Let’s make sure we get it right today and that the new homes we do build are fit for the future,” he added.