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Labour brands social housing commitment ‘long-term aspiration’ after it does not appear in key policy document
The Labour Party has said its commitment to restoring social housing as the second biggest tenure is now a “long-term aspiration”, after it did not appear in its internal policy framework.
The commitment was made last year by then-shadow housing minister Lisa Nandy at the Labour Party Conference in Liverpool in September 2022.
She told delegates that if the party is elected to government, it will ensure that social housing overtakes the private rented sector as the second largest tenure by building a “new generation of council housing”.
The pledge would have meant that under a Labour government, the country would need to deliver more than 400,000 social homes to make up the deficit.
However, Inside Housing has seen a copy of the party’s National Policy Forum (NPF) document ahead of this year’s conference next month.
The NPF offers Labour a chance to set its stall on policy ahead of a general election and present a manifesto it believes will appeal to voters.
The document does not mention the previous pledge to make social housing the second-largest tenure.
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In response, a Labour spokesperson said: “Making social housing the second largest tenure remains our long-term aspiration.
"Labour is committed to delivering an increase in social and affordable homes and we’ll be setting out our plans in more detail as the general election approaches.”
The NPF does refer to putting “social and genuinely affordable housing at the very heart of our plans to jump-start the housebuilding industry”, as stated in June by Ms Nandy at the Housing 2023 conference.
In a shadow cabinet shake-up earlier this month, Angela Rayner, MP for Ashton-under-Lyne, replaced Ms Nandy as shadow housing secretary.
Councils that do not currently have any housing stock will be “supported to start building homes”, In addition, there will be support for “new co-operative and community led housing provision, including developing adequate tenure".
There is also a commitment to “act decisively” to improve standards across the sector and ensuring leaseholders are protected from the cost of remediating fire safety defects, alongside ending the leasehold system in England and Wales all together.
The NPF points out several areas where the party feels reform will help deliver on its plans, including compulsory purchase, planning and through a repurposing of Homes England.
Shadow housing minister Matthew Pennycook alluded to this earlier this month when he told the National Housing Federation Summit in Birmingham that the party would rework the Affordable Homes Programme to go “net positive on social housing numbers”.
Over the past 12 years, the government has delivered 162,000 social rent homes, while 332,000 were sold off or demolished – a net loss of over 14,000 a year.
A total of 7,644 new social rent homes were built last year, while 21,638 were sold off or demolished.
The Labour Party’s policy document also reiterated a previously stated commitment to decrease the number of social homes being rapidly sold off through the Right to Buy without like-for-like new social housing being built to replace them.
In August, the party said it is currently reviewing the higher level of Right to Buy discounts imposed in 2012, but is yet to make a decision on whether to reduce them.
