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Conservatives pledge extension of housing association Right to Buy pilot in manifesto
The Conservative Party has promised to extend the Right to Buy for housing association tenants to further regions of the country in its election manifesto.
However, the document neglects to mention plans to offer housing association tenants a ‘shared ownership’ Right to Buy – suggesting that the party may have already gone cold on the idea, which was announced last month.
Published yesterday afternoon, the manifesto confirms a number of housing policies that had been revealed last week and commits the party to continue with several ongoing housing policies.
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On the Right to Buy extension – dubbed the Voluntary Right to Buy – the manifesto says: “We will… maintain the Voluntary Right to Buy scheme agreed with housing associations. Following the successful voluntary pilot scheme in the Midlands, we will evaluate new pilot areas in order to spread the dream of homeownership to even more people.”
The pilot in the Midlands has so far seen just 529 sales agreed with the ‘portability’ element, which requires those in an exempt home to be offered an alternative – a particular sticking point.
🏘️Discounts for local first time buye
— Robert Jenrick (@Robert
|>🏡Longer term fixed rate mortgages
🏠Beautiful, high-quality, eco-friendly homes
🏘️Extension of Help to Buy scheme to 2023
🏡Better deal for renters
🏠Reforms to unfair leasehold arrangements
🇬🇧#ConservativeManifesto📘2019\uD83C\uDFD8️Discounts for local first time buyers
— Robert Jenrick (@RobertJenrick) November 24, 2019
\uD83C\uDFE1Longer term fixed rate mortgages
\uD83C\uDFE0Beautiful, high-quality, eco-friendly homes
\uD83C\uDFD8️Extension of Help to Buy scheme to 2023
\uD83C\uDFE1Better deal for renters
\uD83C\uDFE0Reforms to unfair leasehold arrangements
\uD83C\uDDEC\uD83C\uDDE7#ConservativeManifesto\uD83D\uDCD8
The pledge to extend the Right to Buy to housing association tenants dates back to David Cameron’s 2015 manifesto, but plans to fund the discounts through selling council homes have now been dropped, meaning it has to be funded centrally.
However, the new plan to give housing association tenants the right to buy a share of as little as 10% in their home – announced by housing secretary Robert Jenrick at the Conservative Party Conference in October – was entirely absent from the policy document.
This is despite weeks of speculation about its impact in the sector – ultimately resulting in the delay of new ‘strategic partner’ funding bids to take account of its impact.
The manifesto also features a commitment to build infrastructure (such as GP surgeries and schools) before new homes, and said that every community would be asked to “decide its own design standards” for new development.
Regarding Grenfell Tower and issues of building safety, the manifesto pledges to “support high-rise residential residents with the removal of unsafe cladding, and continue with our rigorous process of materials testing”.
The government is currently refusing to test a number of dangerous cladding products, such as polystyrene and non-fire-retardant high pressure laminate cladding, and has not released most of the results from the materials testing carried out in the summer.
Inside Housing’s End Our Cladding Scandal campaign calls for a building safety fund to help pay for remediation work and a national taskforce, with the involvement of residents, to oversee it.
The manifesto also confirmed plans to streamline shared ownership, renew the Affordable Homes Programme and publish the Social Housing White Paper – the belated follow-up to the Social Housing Green Paper published last year and originally promised in September 2017.
The manifesto maintains a commitment to end “the blight” of rough sleeping over the life of the parliament “by expanding successful pilots and programmes such as the Rough Sleeping Initiative and Housing First”.
Elsewhere, the manifesto confirms the pledges trailed last week including new ‘First Homes’, which will be sold at 30% discounts to first-time buyers, and lifetime fixed-term mortgages to make buying a house more affordable.
There is no specific target for affordable housebuilding – in contrast to Labour’s £75bn plan to reach 150,000 affordable homes by the end of the next parliament – but a target of one million homes of any tenure is set for 2025.
This would entail an average of 200,000 homes a year – an effective downgrading of the government’s existing target of 300,000 homes by the mid-2020s and 41,000 below current housebuilding rates. However, the Conservative manifesto says that it "continue to progress towards our target of 300,000 homes a year by the mid-2020s" and build "at least a million more homes" by that point.
On Twitter, shadow housing secretary John Healey said: “This must be the most dispiriting housing section of a manifesto from any major political party in recent history. If you’re happy with the status quo on housing this Conservative Manifesto is for you. If you want a plan to fix the country’s housing crisis, vote Labour.”
General election 2019: Conservative housing pledges
- To build at least a million homes over the next five years
- To extend the housing association Right to Buy pilot currently being run in the Midlands to other areas
- To renew the Affordable Homes Programme in the Spring Statement
- New “First Homes”, which will be sold at a 30% discount to first-time buyers – apparently modelled on David Cameron’s Starter Homes pledge from 2015
- Continue the roll-out of Universal Credit, but "do more make sure that it works for the most vulnerable"
- To ensure infrastructure, such as GPs and schools, is provided before new housing is built
- To give local communities the power to write design standards
- A continued commitment to Theresa May’s promise to end ‘no-fault’ evictions
- A new market for “lifetime” fixed-rate mortgages, which will come with 5% deposits
- “Lifetime” deposits for the private rented sector, allowing renters to move the same deposit to a new tenancy when moving home
- A Social Housing White Paper, which was originally due in Spring 2019
- To simplify shared ownership by setting a single standard for all housing associations
- An “accelerated” green paper on planning, aimed at speeding up the planning process
- Reforming the Housing Infrastructure Fund to provide greater flexibility to Homes England
