Ministers have announced where more than 70,000 social and affordable homes will be built in England over the next 10 years as part of an initial allocation of almost £10bn in a bid to address the housing crisis.
Funding has been granted to Greater Manchester, the West Midlands, West Yorkshire, South Yorkshire, North East England, and Liverpool. An additional £6bn was previously announced for London.
It is the first part of a wider plan to build 300,000 social and affordable homes, under the government’s £39bn social housebuilding programme.
Housing charities welcomed the news but said it was still not enough to meet demand, while the Conservatives said it was an “unfunded spending commitment”.
Social housing provides affordable homes at a low cost, managed by social landlords. It includes affordable rented properties as well as low-cost home ownership, such as shared ownership, and can be provided by local authorities and housing associations.
Earlier this year, before he became prime minister, Andy Burnham had called for the entire £39bn affordable housing budget for England to be spent on homes for social rent – which means the cost of the unit is about half that of market rents, and there are strict criteria for who can apply for it.
“I would actually devote all of it to social housing,” Burnham told The Social Housing Podcast in May.
But of the new homes announced on Monday, 60% would be for social rent.
Housing Minister Matthew Pennycook told BBC Breakfast he did not accept Burnham had failed to meet his previous commitment, saying the government had taken a “pragmatic approach” and wants to “get money out the door”.
He said the next tranche of funding would be more focused on council houses – which are usually also classed as homes for social rent.
It is understood ministers decided against giving councils more of the funding announced in the first tranche because they did not believe councils would be in a position to build the required number of social homes.
