06 DEC 2024
As housing supply falls, will the Housing Minister's 'Plan-Led Approach' succeed in boosting housebuilding?
The Housing Minister, Matthew Pennycook MP, recently appeared before the Housing, Communities and Local Government Select Committee. Under its new chair, Florence Eshalomi MP, the session provided important information about the new Government's approach to housing delivery this Parliament. There were four key take-aways:
(1) No Annual Housing Targets:
The Minister confirmed the overall housing target of 1.5 million homes this Parliament but said that there would be no annual or interim targets. Delivery will be back-ended over the course of this Parliament and the full five years is needed to meet the target. He confirmed that 'net additional dwellings' is the measure being applied, rather than housebuilding. This is the measurement that has been used by recent governments in relation to housing targets.
(2) Housing Minister plans to increase developer section 106 contributions:
The Minister intends to end the net outflow of socially rented stock. He said the ambition for the numbers of social and affordable housing will depend on the public finance allocations, which he expects to be set out in the Spring Budget.
The Minister also wants to increase the developer contributions to social and affordable housing through the section 106 process. He told the committee that Section 106 currently accounts for about half of the social and affordable homes delivered.
(3) New Towns additional to local plan allocations:
New Towns locations will be chosen by Ministers from a shortlist prepared by the New Towns Taskforce and imposed over and above any Local Plan allocations.
The Minister confirmed that development "that will come forward through the new towns programme will be separate to and in addition to LHN [Local Housing Need] as defined in the revised standard method." They would not be taken into account in local housing numbers as they meet a separate national need. The new towns will be a minimum of 10,000 homes and may be urban extensions as well as traditional stand-alone green field sites.
(4) The Government's Housing Delivery Plan:
The Minister's housing delivery approach is 'plan-led'. That involves creating a 'oversupply' (in the Minister's words) of 370,000 planning allocations a year in order to encourage more market activity. The Minister seeks to achieve 'oversupply' by enforcing the requirement for a Local Plan (so-called comprehensive coverage) combined with higher compulsory housing targets.
He is also seeking to increase planning capacity. In addition, measures to unlock stalled developments are said to have "unlocked" 4700 homes. A new Housing and Infrastructure bill is planned next year and will aim to speed up infrastructure delivery.
Diagram: The Government's plan for the 1.5 million homes target
March 2025 Housing Delivery Snapshot
January 2025 Housing Delivery Snapshot
December 2024
