Government urged to spend billions on social housing

The government has been urged to spend more than £12bn over the next 10 years to support the delivery of 90,000 social rent homes a year.

According to the Chartered Institute for Housing (CIH), the increased investment was desperately required as part of a response to the economic slump caused by the coronavirus pandemic and the previously-existing need to deliver 145,000 affordable homes a year for the next 10 years.

Ministers were also urged increase grants for new social housing in England, after CIH research discovered levels of such funding had fallen “dangerously low”.

Grants had risen slightly in the past two years, according to the CIH’s UK Housing Review 2020, but still only covered 11% of housing associations’ development costs, leaving the rest to be met by borrowing and surpluses.

One-third of homes built in England by housing associations are being delivered without any grant, said the report.

Even accounting for newly-built homes, England has lost 181,000 social rented homes since 2012 as a result of Right to Buy and other factors, according to the review, which also showed that only 11% of new homes built in England had genuinely affordable social rents, compared with nearly 70% in Scotland and more than 80% in Wales.

CIH chief executive Gavin Smart said: “It’s clear that one outcome from the coronavirus-related economic crisis, after household incomes and savings have been decimated, will be an even greater need for homes that are genuinely affordable.

“Social landlords’ finances will also be depleted, and higher levels of investment and levels of grant will be vital to build the new homes that will be required.”