Housing minister brands government’s annual target of 300,000 homes as ‘mythical’

The government’s goal of building 300,000 homes a year from the mid-2020s appeared to be thrown into doubt after housing minister Kit Malthouse referred to it as a “mythical target”.

Speaking yesterday at an event in London to launch the Distinctively Local report on how to build better housing, Malthouse said factors such as demand, the need for better design and the introduction of new technologies including modular housing and modern methods of construction meant the UK stood on the “brink of a golden age for housing”.

But in what may have been a throwaway remark, he described the target of building 300,000 homes annually from halfway through the next decade as “mythical”.

He said such was the need for new homes that communities across the UK had to get used to the idea of houses being built near where they lived.

“If we are to deliver that number of homes a year there will need to be a million being built at any one time. That means there will be no part of the UK that will be untouched. That means the developments we put up have to be good.

“Our job is to ornament the country [with good buildings]. We should be building things that will become the conservation area of 50 years’ time.”

And while he said the industry should be delivering better-quality and better-designed housing in line with the ambitions of the government’s Building Better, Building Beautiful commission, Malthouse also warned there was a growing divergence between those who desperately want housing – any sort of housing – and those communities that essentially reject new housing developments.

“Younger people say ‘We don’t care what it looks like, just build it’ while older people are more aspirational about such schemes. Or they reject them outright. We have to find the stuff that works [for both communities].”

A spokesman for the Ministry for Housing, Communities and Local Government said the government was “still committed” to the target of 300,000 homes being built annually from the mid-2020s.

“Yes, it’s an ambitious target, but we believe it’s achievable and recent figures confirm we’re heading in the right direction,” he added.

Also speaking at the launch of the Distinctively Local report, Andrew Beharrell, senior partner at Pollard Thomas Edwards, said targets were “useful, up to a point”.

Beharrell acknowledged “significant progress” was being made, with delivery figures having crept up recently.

“But it’s not just about delivering numbers; it’s also about creating decent places for people to live in,” he added.

And Trisha Patel, also of Pollard Thomas Edwards, said avoiding what she called “protectionist” attitudes among local communities required them being more involved when a new housing scheme was being planned.

“We need to bring people along with us in the conversation around developments,” she added.

The Distinctively Local document, authored by HTA Design, Pollard Thomas Edwards, Proctor & Matthews and PRP – argued that boosting housing supply and building attractive homes required new developments to be rooted in their local context.

The 118-page report said greater choice includes offering a wider range of pre-designed homes and programmes of custom build, self-build and micro-development, while there should be a “balance between variety and uniformity”.