Category: Blog Post

Categories
Blog Post

Bricks, Mortar, and the People to Lay Them

Since entering office last summer, the Labour Government has put housing policy front and centre, pledging to deliver 1.5 million new homes this term. While ministers acknowledge that figure may be ambitious, there’s no doubt they’re making progress in the right direction.

But a big sticking point isn’t just land or planning; it’s people. Who’s going to build these homes? And not only that, who’s going to maintain and retrofit the ones we already have? We don’t want to fill one side of the housing bookshelf with shiny new homes while watching the other side, our existing stock, crumble through neglect and a lack of people to maintain them. We need a skilled, future-ready workforce to support both ends of the spectrum. This is where organisations like PfP Thrive can support the sector and government on its shared vision for change.

Untapped potential

While economic inactivity has fallen slightly over the past year, over 9 million people in the UK remain out of the labour market. That’s a substantial, untapped pool of talent. With targeted support and the right partnerships, like the programmes we deliver at PfP Thrive, many of these individuals can be supported into meaningful, sustained employment.

But simply offering opportunities is not enough. We must understand what’s preventing people from accessing them. Our own research – conducted across 3000 customers in 2024 – shows that bespoke, barrier-conscious training programmes are essential. For example, within our own customer base, 44% live with three or more conditions that affect their daily lives, while 76% report at least one. These individuals are ready and willing to work – and with the right support, they can thrive.

And it’s not just about training the bricklayers, electricians, and engineers of the future – it’s also about backing today’s workforce. That means investing in upskilling, embracing modern methods of construction, and supporting the shift to new materials and techniques. We’re here to help drive that change – and deliver the homes Britain urgently needs.

sign up to red brick’s free newsletter

Challenges ahead

The government’s £600 million investment in skills is welcome and offers an opportunity for organisations like ours to play a greater role in delivering high-quality training. We’re encouraged by the focus on bootcamps and foundation apprenticeships and are already working with partners to unlock better use of the Apprenticeship Levy.

Yet challenges remain. The recent rise in National Insurance contributions could dissuade employers, particularly SMEs, from investing in apprenticeships and training. For businesses already grappling with rising costs, this could be the tipping point. If we are truly serious about closing the construction skills gap, government policy must reflect the realities faced by employers – and make investment in people not just possible, but irresistible.

Championing Diversity in Housing

There are however other underlying issues that continue to exacerbate the sector’s skills shortage. Construction continues to face cultural challenges; be that poor gender representation – with 90% of construction apprenticeships still taken up by men – or discrimination against LGBTQ+ workers or people of colour. Age is another issue-  one in five workers in construction is over 55 – as is the resistance to helping those who have additional needs or barriers to work.

A strong workforce is a diverse one, and this means creating inclusive environments, supporting flexible working, and actively removing barriers to entry.

Collaboration and Debate

These points were echoed during a recent webinar we hosted with the University of Cambridge, featuring sector leaders eager to discuss solutions to the skills crisis. Mushtaq Khan, Chief Executive of the Housing Diversity Network, was clear saying that: “Diversity matters. But under-representation in the sector can be off-putting for those looking to move into construction. There’s a lack of networks, confidence, and a whole cohort of people we could empower with the right support systems.” Debansu Das of Zed Pods added that areas like offsite construction are already making headway – providing safer, more controlled and inclusive working environments that naturally attract a more diverse workforce, including more women.

A Pivotal Moment

Delivering more homes and supporting people into meaningful employment underpins the government’s growth priorities and our future success as a country. This is a defining moment for the sector. If government, industry, employers, educators and organisations like PfP Thrive can come together, we have a real opportunity. Not only to meet the 1.5 million homes promised, but to ensure we have a skilled, inclusive workforce ready to shape the homes and communities of the future.

Tom Arey is director at PfP Thrive, an organisation delivering comprehensive bespoke training programmes for the UK housing and construction sectors, as well as compliance training, trade skills apprenticeships and leadership development to meet evolving workforce needs.  

Categories
Blog Post

Reforming Section 106 is crucial for a generational boost in social housing

Blochairn Road Social Housing, Glasgow by TECU Consulting is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0
Blochairn Road Social Housing, Glasgow by TECU Consulting is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0

The Section 106 (S106) planning obligation system has long been the backbone of affordable housing delivery across England. Yet, far from being the robust solution we need, it has morphed into an inadequate sticking plaster, barely concealing a profound crisis in genuinely affordable, social rented housing. The more reliant we have become on S106 agreements, the fewer homes we’ve actually delivered. It’s high time we confronted the reality: our dependence on developer-led contributions is fundamentally failing to deliver the homes communities desperately need.

First conceived in the 1990 Town and Country Planning Act, S106 was originally intended to mitigate the localised impacts of new developments—addressing pressures on local infrastructure like schools, healthcare, and transport. Generally, there are two ways to fund social and affordable housebuilding: through government spending via grants or loans, or through developers’ contributions. However, over time, as state-backed social housing provision shrank dramatically, S106 evolved far beyond its initial scope, becoming a primary vehicle for affordable housing supply. Today, it accounts for a staggering 38% of social homes and half of all affordable homes delivered annually. But instead of a sign of success, this reliance reveals a deeply flawed approach.

sign up to red brick’s free newsletter

The current mechanism incentivises developers to prioritise ambiguous and often less suitable housing tenures such as shared ownership or ‘affordable rent’—both considerably less beneficial than genuinely affordable social rented homes. Worse yet, developers frequently opt out of construction obligations altogether, preferring financial payments to already overburdened local authorities with little capacity to use this funding to build. Indeed, while the government’s recent pledge to recruit an extra 300 local planning officers is a positive step, it falls significantly short, replacing fewer than one in ten of the planning positions cut throughout the 2010s. This leaves local authorities severely under-resourced to effectively manage and enforce S106 obligations.The result is clear: fewer actual homes and a deepening crisis.

The viability assessment process, designed to test whether developers can meet planning obligations without compromising profits, has further exacerbated the problem. Despite high-profile cases—like the infamous Battersea Power Station development—raising awareness of exploitation, the truth is that these viability assessments routinely undermine local authorities. Too often, developers reduce or even eliminate their affordable housing commitments entirely by claiming financial unfeasibility. This opaque and subjective process means fewer social homes are built, and crucial opportunities for alleviating housing pressures are lost, often permanently.

Ironically, the reliance on S106 has only deepened since government funding for social housebuilding was drastically cut post-2010. With austerity measures stripping away substantial grant-funding streams, we increasingly looked to developers’ contributions as a makeshift replacement. But the numbers don’t lie. While government targets aim for 300,000 new homes annually, just 7,500 social homes were built in England in 2022/23, down alarmingly from nearly 40,000 a decade ago. Even more starkly, Right to Buy alone axed more than 14,000 social homes out of circulation in the same period, meaning we have had a net loss in social housing stock. Clearly, our existing approach is broken, underlined by the fact that the more we’ve depended on developer contributions, the fewer genuinely affordable homes we’ve managed to produce.

But diagnosing the problem is just the first step. We must urgently pursue substantial reforms to the S106 framework, starting by prioritising the construction of genuinely affordable social rented homes within all agreements. Introducing a mandatory minimum percentage of 15% for social rent tenures within S106 obligations would directly counter developers’ preference for less socially beneficial tenures or financial opt-outs. This simple measure would clarify obligations, remove ambiguity, and most importantly, deliver the genuinely affordable homes that communities across the country desperately need.

Additionally, we must reform the viability assessment process fundamentally. Transparency must become mandatory, and local authorities need enhanced powers and resources to scrutinise developers’ claims effectively. A revised, robust viability framework would prevent abuse, accelerate negotiations, and ensure that developments truly contribute to local housing needs rather than merely inflating developers’ bottom lines.

These immediate reforms are essential but insufficient on their own. Ultimately, the underlying crisis in social housing demands a significant increase in direct government investment. We must look to the next phase of the Affordable Homes Programme, as well as the new £2bn boost, as an opportunity to refocus explicitly on social rented housing. A clear national target backed by meaningful public investment could not only reduce reliance on developers but would restore the stability and predictability required to deliver social housing at scale.

The stakes could hardly be higher. Without these reforms, the government’s ambitious housing targets will remain forever out of reach, and our housing crisis will only deepen. The reliance on a failing S106 system is simply unsustainable. It’s time we embraced a more ambitious, government-backed strategy for social housing delivery—a strategy that prioritises homes over profits, transparency over obfuscation, and genuine affordability over sticking plasters. Only then can we build the future our communities truly deserve.

Categories
10-year plan for housing Blog Post

How can we address the current crisis in temporary accommodation?

Image licensed under the Centre for Homelessness Impact

The number of households in temporary accommodation in England is at the highest it’s ever been. 126,040 households and 164,040 children were living in temporary accommodation as of September last year. And as this number grows, the length of time people are expected to stay in temporary accommodation, has grown alongside it – making it anything but temporary. More than a fifth of all families in temporary accommodation have been there for five years or more. And new research published by Crisis, the National Housing Federation and Shelter this week show in some parts of England, families needing a home with three bedrooms or more can expect to wait more than a hundred years.

This means more and more people are stuck in unsuitable accommodation, without the facilities they need to cook, look after themselves and their children, without privacy or room for children to play – and with no end in sight. People’s health and wellbeing are suffering, and most shockingly of all it can also be life threatening – living in temporary accommodation was found to have contributed to the deaths of 74 children in the UK in the last 5 years.

sign up to red brick’s free newsletter

As well as ruining lives, local government spending on temporary accommodation is at a record high and is driving councils to bankruptcy. Last year alone, councils spent £2.29 billion on temporary accommodation, an increase of 29% on the previous year. And we’re also seeing a rise in spending on the least suitable forms of temporary accommodation (nightly paid, hostels and B&Bs) which increased more than fivefold from 2017-18 to 2023-24, from £135 million to £732 million. Analysis by LSE suggests that if the use of this type of emergency accommodation continues its current trajectory, net expenditure on this alone is projected to reach £1.2 billion by 2026-27.

However, the Government now has a once in a generation opportunity to turn the tide on temporary accommodation as part of its broader strategy to address homelessness. The forthcoming cross-government strategy on ending homelessness has the power and potential to shift the focus away from the use of emergency accommodation as a short-term sticking plaster, and to invest in a longer-term approach to homelessness prevention that prioritises providing people with settled homes as quickly as possible.

To help provide a roadmap for how Government should do this, we’ve spent the last few months developing policy recommendations in collaboration with our frontline services, people with lived experience, local government and learning from best practise in the sector. Our report outlines the steps Government should take to ensure its strategy is as ambitious and impactful as it can be.

Making temporary accommodation genuinely temporary and reducing its use is essential if the Government wants its strategy on ending homelessness to succeed. To make this a reality, we need to see significantly increased investment in building more social rented homes at the upcoming Spending Review. Alongside this, the Government must make sure that these homes are accessible to the people who need them most – making ending homelessness an outcome of its long-term housing plan would help to ensure the two strategies are aligned and an increase in social rented homes leads to an end to homelessness.

A housing led approach is now the norm in many European countries, as recommended by the OECD, and we have seen this approach in Finland and Denmark as well central to strategies in Wales and Scotland. It is a long overdue paradigm shift in England.

There are steps that councils in England can start to take now to reduce the use of the most costly and unsuitable forms of temporary accommodation. We are already seeing examples of councils proactively seeking out new approaches to achieve this.

Crisis is working with Calderdale Council to develop a fresh approach to managing the challenge of recent increases in temporary accommodation use and particularly B&B’s. The project aimed to decrease the cost of nightly B&B accommodation, with a focus on supporting people leaving prison, people leaving asylum accommodation, survivors of domestic abuse and young people. It uses the Built for Zero model, with a focus on improved data collection, identifying opportunities for prevention and increasing use of the private rented sector. The project has reduced the amount of time households spend in temporary accommodation and reduced the cost of nightly B&B accommodation by 56%. Over a full year, this means £1.5 million in savings for the local authority. Calderdale’s focus on moving people out of temporary accommodation into suitable long-term housing, particularly in the private rented sector, has been key to its success.

Faced with an ever-growing temporary accommodation bill, Greenwich council embarked on its Temporary Accommodation Cost Reduction Programme in 2024. Working closely with people in a person centred way, the council used new social housing stock to make 100 direct offers to people who had been stuck in temporary accommodation long term. This, coupled with incentives to help PRS tenants retain their tenancies, increasing the supply of council owned temporary accommodation and speeding up homelessness assessments, has helped the council to reduce its use of unsuitable temporary accommodation, save money and provide settled permanent housing for more people facing homelessness. It’s now on track to eliminate hotel use by March 2026, down from a peak of 280 rooms in April 2024.

Whilst this shows that positive changes can start to reduce the numbers of people stuck in unsuitable temporary accommodation, this will not be enough on its own to create the systems rethink we desperately need. To bring about real change, more homes for social rent need to be built and we need a homelessness system that invests in prevention and helps people get a settled home as quickly as possible.

Too many families are languishing in temporary accommodation for months and years, whilst their lives are put on hold. This situation can’t be allowed to continue. That’s why we’ve launched a new campaign to call for a strategy that makes sure everyone has a safe, affordable home, proper support when they need it, and a system that prevents homelessness before it starts. It’s time for the Government to take action and build a future free from homelessness.

Categories
Blog Post

A plan to boost skills in the construction industry to deliver 1.5m homes

The Current Skills Problem

The UK construction industry has faced a longstanding skills deficit, and this is expected to worsen as it prepares for one of the largest build programs since the post-war era. Demand for construction work has risen, but there are not enough entrants to meet this demand. An estimated 24,400 newly qualified apprentices are needed each year, with subcontractor trades particularly struggling to attract young talent. According to the UK Trade Skills Index 2024, the industry needs 1,265,000 new recruits over the next decade.

An additional 251,500 workers will be required to meet UK construction output by 2028. However, more people are leaving the industry than joining it, according to the Construction Industry Training Board (CITB).

To support the ambitious goal of building 1.5 million homes, a plan to boost skills is essential. Without this, all other aspects of the strategy are at risk of failing.

sign up to red brick’s free newsletter

Fixing the Skills Problem with a Plan to Boost Skills

The government must collaborate with key sectors in construction to develop a Skills Plan that supports its large-scale homebuilding program. This plan should address the root causes of the skills shortage, starting with areas of consensus, including the following:

1. Engage the Younger Generation

To attract more young talent to the construction sector, employers can offer flexible working options such as job sharing, part-time hours, and better work-life balance. Expanding high-quality apprenticeships, traineeships, and upskilling initiatives will help retain a younger workforce.

A supportive approach, including positive messaging and targeted promotion on social media platforms, can also help attract young people. The government, working with the CITB, trade bodies, and unions, could establish a coordinated social media strategy to counter negative perceptions. Research from YouGov shows that 69% of adults would not consider a construction career, associating the industry with being “dirty, stressful, and unsafe.” By highlighting the sector’s digital innovations, quality engineering, new technology, and the benefits of skilled careers, these perceptions could be challenged.

Increasing initiatives like Apprenticeship Week, job fairs, and school visit programs, led by professional institutions and associations, would further engage young people. Institutes such as the Institute of Civil Engineers and the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors already promote high-quality professional apprenticeships, which can serve as models for other sectors.

2. Upskilling Existing Workforce

Instead of relying on migrant workers, the construction industry should focus on upskilling the existing UK workforce, particularly at the trade level. Since it takes time to train and upskill workers, it is this area that requires the most transformational change to train British workers for roles in high demand.

The CITB plays a central role in skills training, particularly for trade roles. However, it has faced criticism from industry bodies and major contractors, leading to reforms in 2017. The government’s most recent review of the CITB’s effectiveness is awaited, and any recommendations from this review should be implemented to ensure it is fit for purpose in delivering this necessary transformation.

3. Worker Retention Strategies

Employee retention in the construction industry is low for various reasons. Employers must prioritise existing employees by offering competitive benefits, wellbeing policies, and attractive remuneration packages to prevent turnover. Becoming an “Employer of Choice” means creating a supportive work environment, offering benefits and culture that attract new talent while retaining experienced workers.

This strategy should be complemented by robust training programs for graduates, supported by educational institutions. Additionally, ongoing opportunities for upskilling and staff development should be part of the retention plan.

Typical Traits of an Employer of Choice are:

  • Competitive salaries and benefits
  • Positive, supportive culture
  • Pleasant work environment
  • Opportunities for training and development
  • Feedback-driven culture
  • Trust and transparency
  • Professional growth and capacity building
Join the red brick team! Fill in our EOI form for interest in volunteering with us

What Educators, Trainers, and Employers Need from a Plan

To support skills development, the infrastructure, including Skills Centres, Technical Colleges, and universities offering construction-related courses, needs significant expansion and funding. The government has proposed progressive plans, including the creation of a new training body, Skills England, reforms to the training levy, and updates to apprenticeships.

Given the multi-year duration of degree courses and apprenticeships, implementing these reforms urgently is critical. The government’s plan should include consultations with construction industry bodies to identify priorities and quick wins to align the education sector with the industry’s needs.

The UK’s current construction labour shortages will worsen as approximately a quarter of the workforce plans to retire in the next decade. Therefore, a steady influx of trainees is essential, regardless of the large-scale homebuilding programme.

Employers, regardless of size, need confidence in long-term workloads in specific regions to justify investing in workforce expansion and training. A successful large-scale housing programme must include strategies for coordinated housing delivery across local authorities, ensuring a steady supply over time. Additionally, responsibility for delivery should be shared across the industry, not just the homebuilding sector, spanning SMEs, larger developers, builders, suppliers, and consultants. Skills training must address the entire industry, as residential developments will also require accompanying infrastructure.

So far the industry has reacted positively to last month’s government announcement of £600m overall for:

  • 10 new technical colleges and assistance for existing colleges to offer more construction courses
  • Support for skills boot camps, support for returner and upskilling
  • Support for partnerships between colleges and construction companies to increase industry experienced teachers
  • Support for the planned new Foundation Apprenticeships, further supported with funding from the planned Growth and Skills Levy .
  • Support for industry placements in coordination with the CITB
  • Support for Construction Skills Mission Board to promote employer collaboration

We will continue to look with interest to further announcements in this area.

Categories
Blog Post

Grey belt: the underestimated game-changer for housing

A recent case in Bagshot in Surrey shows how the Labour Government’s new ‘grey belt’ rules, introduced in late 2024, will likely unlock hundreds of thousands of much-needed homes across the country.

The reform of Green Belt rules has proven to be an underestimated game-changer for housing development. In just a few months since its introduction, councils and inspectors across England have started approving projects on formerly restricted sites. Even councils that were historically opposed to development are now seeing new homes approved on grey belt land, in a transformative shift in the amount of land available for homes. But what is grey belt, how does it differ from regular Green Belt rules, and why could it have such a huge impact?

What is grey belt?

Grey belt land refers to parts of the Green Belt that are previously developed or that don’t strongly contribute to three of the Green Belt’s original purposes: to prevent the ‘unrestricted sprawl of large built-up areas’, to stop ‘neighbouring towns from merging into one’, and to ‘preserve the setting and special character of historic towns’.

The original idea of ‘grey belt’ covered disused quarries, old industrial sites, scrubland – but we have moved far beyond that. Recognising that blanket Green Belt protections were imposing tight limits on greenfield development, the Government’s December 2024 update to the National Planning Policy Framework carved out this new ‘grey belt’ category​.

Crucially, developing grey belt sites is no longer automatically considered ‘inappropriate’ development under planning rules. This marks a huge shift: such proposals no longer need to prove ‘very special circumstances’ to justify building on Green Belt, and instead enjoy a presumption in favour of approval if certain criteria (like providing affordable housing) are met​. In short, the default for qualifying grey belt land has flipped from ‘no, you can’t build’ to ‘yes, you probably can’ – a seismic reversal of decades-old policy​. The core Green Belt protections remain for high-value landscapes and buffers, but this targeted reform frees up many other areas.

sign up to red brick’s free newsletter

When is a town not a town? When it’s a village

One of the first real-world tests came in Bagshot, Surrey, where a planning inspector approved 135 homes on Green Belt land after ruling that nearby settlements were villages, not towns, meaning the development wouldn’t breach the Green Belt’s purpose of preventing towns from merging. Under the old rules, such a scheme would likely have been refused outright. But under the Government’s new policies, land that fails to meet key Green Belt purposes – and offers public benefits like affordable housing – can now be approved without needing ‘very special circumstances’. That quiet shift is already delivering homes to meet the national need for 1.5 million homes.

Bagshot is no isolated case. Across the country, grey belt reform is already turning NIMBY ‘no-go’ sites into housing developments. Even local authorities long resistant to Green Belt release are coming around when a site is shown to meet the grey belt criteria. In St Albans – which hadn’t adopted a new local plan in decades – council members recently approved a 550-home scheme on land that officers identified as grey belt​. Basildon Borough Council likewise gave the nod to 250 homes on a grey belt site that wouldn’t have happened a year ago. Planning inspectors, too, are applying the new policy at a rapid clip: by February 2025, at least 86 appeal decisions had already cited ‘grey belt’ in their reasoning, and by March, that figure had grown to over 100​. From a large data centre outside London to new housing estates in the Home Counties, dozens of developments that once faced near-certain rejection are moving forward under these updated rules. This surge in planning activity suggests grey belt reform is quickly lowering barriers to development on underused land.

Join the red brick team! Fill in our EOI form for intersest in volunteering with us

Economic impact and housing potential

The expected impact of grey belt policy is backed by economic forecasts from the Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR), which factored the new planning reforms into its Spring 2025 outlook and concluded that housebuilding will reach levels not seen in 40 years​. 

The OBR projects that, by 2029/30, these reforms will enable roughly 170,000 additional homes to be built beyond what would have happened otherwise. In that year alone, housing supply is expected to be 30% higher than previously forecast, helping move the country closer to the Government’s goal of 1.5 million homes this parliament. Crucially, this isn’t just about hitting numbers – it will translate into stronger economic growth. By the end of the decade, the increased housing development is expected to make the UK’s GDP 0.2% larger, equivalent to about £6.8 billion in today’s money​. That gain could double to over 0.4% of GDP by the mid-2030s if momentum continues​. For a zero-cost policy change, it’s one of the most impactful growth boosts the OBR has ever scored. Getting more homes built thus isn’t just housing policy – it’s economic policy, with the potential to improve productivity and living standards by making housing more affordable where it’s needed most.

The Government’s ‘golden rules’ for green belt and grey belt building means that development brings more than just economic growth. Those rules require developers to include affordable housing, improve green space, and build new infrastructure such as GPs or schools. We are already seeing the benefits in areas that have failed the most to build new homes. St Albans has struggled to build enough homes for a growing population, but a scheme in Harpenden has recently passed because of the new reforms. The proposal is for 420 homes, half of which will be affordable housing tenures, 130 retirement homes and a £9.5 million contribution to local schools.   

What scale of housing will grey belt reform ultimately deliver? Early analyses suggest the numbers could be very substantial. One study estimates that roughly 300,000 new homes might be built on grey belt land across England in the coming years​ – effectively an entire year’s worth of housebuilding generated by reclassifying portions of Green Belt. Another estimated a potential capacity of 3.4 million homes! These figures are speculative, but they underscore the enormous potential of these sites. Grey belt policy is starting to deliver housing in some of the nation’s most constrained housing markets. 

It’s still early days, and local authorities and developers are feeling their way through the new rules. There will be plenty of litigation over what counts as grey belt, and the rules are sufficiently imprecise that someone will have to make a judgment on each site. 

But the initial results are clear. A policy that many assumed would be minor or symbolic is already making a real difference. The Government has proven that England can rapidly start to add tens of thousands of homes. This under-the-radar policy tweak will soon be having a major impact, which will be noticed across the country. The grey belt, once underestimated, is proving to be a game-changer for delivering new homes.

Categories
Blog Post

Despite its hefty price tag, Carbon Capture and Storage is needed but why are we ignoring a ‘free’ equivalent?

There is a growing awareness that using more timber in construction would be good for the climate. Using wood substitutes for materials with much larger climate footprints i.e. concrete, steel, brick and block[1]. At the same time wood stores carbon that has been removed from the atmosphere via photosynthesis while the tree was growing in the forest. After the tree is harvested a new one is planted.

Technically this process is not Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) rather it is a Greenhouse Gas Removal (GGR). However both processes are removing carbon from the atmosphere and storing it: the former, theoretically, for centuries[2]; the latter for decades. In the battle to avert climate breakdown both are needed.

Sign up to red brick’s free newsletter

Talk of CCS can elicit strong emotions. Its detractors, particularly amongst the green NGOs, point out that to date it has proved expensive and unreliable resulting in its development being slow. On the other hand its advocates, all big players – the UN, the Committee on Climate Change and the Labour Government – insist it is a key part of the architecture that will deliver net zero.

CCS’s UK champion, Energy Secretary Ed Miliband, has secured nearly £22 billion of government funding to subsidise three projects on Teesside and Merseyside that will carry captured carbon to geological storage in Liverpool Bay and the North Sea resulting in the removal of 8.5 Mt CO2e each year from the atmosphere.

How does GGR via carbon stored in timber construction compare to CCS in the amount of carbon it can remove from the atmosphere? The answer comes from adding together four GGR categories delivered by using more wood in buildings.

Want to work with us? Fill out our EOI form to volunteer with red brick

First, we have timber framed 2 or 3 storey family homes. Currently 92% of family homes built in Scotland have timber frames. England is now following, albeit from a low starting base of 9%. This change is happening for two main reasons: timber framed homes have a lower level of embodied carbon than a brick and block equivalent and they can be erected more quickly which financially benefits the housebuilder. The timber frame is also storing carbon at a rate of 4.6 tonnes per home. Consequently if 45% of the 300,000 family homes planned to be built each year had a timber frame this would store 0.6 Mt CO2e annually.

Second, we have carbon storing wood fibre insulation of which little is currently used in the UK unlike in Germany and Poland where figures are approaching 10% of new homes. If 20% of new homes in the UK used it this would store 0.2 Mt CO2e annually.

[Wood fibre insulation has the potential to be a major carbon store in both new and existing buildings – picture Steico]

Third, is mass timber which delivers much larger GGR figures. Mass timber is a bigger version of plywood where layers of wood are stuck together at right angles to produce a material which has the same structural strength of steel and concrete. With it we can construct big buildings – stations, mosques, offices, apartment blocks, schools. A recent study, by architects dRMM, focused on five case studies which concluded that each mass timber building stored on average 1,032 tonnes of carbon. If 300 cities and towns were to use mass timber to build 20 new buildings per year this would deliver removals of 6.2 Mt CO2e.

[Architects dRMM have studied five mass timber builds in the UK revealing them as major carbon stores as well as healthy buildings]

Fourth, if each of these mass timber buildings used wood fibre insulation we would have a GGR of 1.5 Mt CO2e per year.

In total this would deliver an annual carbon removal of 8.5 Mt CO2e – equivalent to the UK’s proposed CCS programme – and at no financial cost to the Treasury!

Sweden is leading the way with a steady increase in the number of mid-rise apartments built for timber – picture author

[Sweden is leading the way with a steady increase in the number of mid-rise apartments built for timber – picture author]

Quite why such a massive carbon removal opportunity remains essentially unrecognised by the government is a mystery. Is the technology not exciting enough? Is it because it cuts across three departmental silos (Housing, Energy and Environment) and isn’t seen as ‘belonging’ to any of them? Is it – oddly – because it doesn’t come with a significant price tag?

The government’s Timber in Construction Roadmap 2025 is its first step towards addressing the housing crisis in a sustainable way. While the government don’t need to finance GGR via more timber in buildings they do need to:

  1. Acknowledge publicly at cabinet level that timber buildings store carbon and that such GGRs are good for the climate.
  2. Use government procurement to boost timber construction as is in France and Japan.
  3. Include biogenic carbon in the embodied carbon assessment within net zero whole life carbon policy in the construction sector.

When it comes to Greenhouse Gas Removal technology now is the time to see the wood from the trees.

[1] This is because their manufacture involves high levels of heat, in most cases derived from a fossil fuel energy source.

[2] Off the coast of Norway two CCS operations at Sleipner and Snohvit have been capturing a million tonnes of CO2 annually for 27 years and 15 years respectively, so not yet centuries.

Categories
10-year plan for housing Blog Post

Why this Labour government must learn lessons from Attlee as it embarks on its regeneration journey 

London, United Kingdom - Saturday 04 December 2021, Harca - Aberfeldy Festival of Lights.

2026 will see the 75th anniversary of 1951’s Festival of Britain.  A stone’s throw from Poplar HARCA offices, the Lansbury estate in Poplar, east London (named after former Labour leader George Lansbury) was featured in the Festival’s live architecture exhibition as an exemplar of post-war neighbourhoods.  A model for modern housing solutions that would improve the quality of life for residents, while addressing the acute housing shortages caused by World War II.   

The estate became a symbol of government-led urban renewal and the blueprint for many of the New Towns that followed under Clement Atlee’s mass housing programme. Atlee’s government oversaw the delivery of over 1million homes in 6 years.  As MP for neighbouring Limehouse, he would have well understood the relationship between housing and people’s life chances, and the potential for decent homes and places to improve these.

Sounds familiar, doesn’t it?  The government’s ambitions to get Britain building today clearly aim to meet comparable challenges to those the country faced three quarters of a century ago. Their new housing plan offers remarkably similar solutions.  We face the twin challenges of a housing crisis and regional inequalities.  This government has a vital opportunity to address these issues through a long-term regeneration strategy that meets demand for new homes, empowers communities and fosters inclusive growth.  Places like Poplar present a unique opportunity for the government to apply the lessons learned from history to today’s setting.  

Sign up to red brick’s free newsletter

Unlocking new homes in the capital

The proposed New Towns programme will go a long way to deliver places where land is available, but in already densely populated urban areas like London, unlocking estate regeneration must be an important component. Inequalities are not just regional, and much of London faces the same challenges as other areas. Better quality, mixed-tenure housing as part of rejuvenated urban neighbourhoods is a vital part of creating vibrant, sustainable communities where residents feel empowered, valued and able to thrive.  

Local, community driven estate regeneration

Poplar HARCA has been developing a successful model of community-driven, locally delivered estate regeneration since our inception in 1998.  Operating within a square mile, we manage more than 10,000 homes alongside community facilities, green spaces, workspaces and shops.  Nearly one third of our staff live locally and residents are active participants in shaping our services. The benefits of our local model were reflected recently in Poplar HARCA achieving the highest tenant satisfaction scores in London.   

We empower communities to stay, grow and thrive.  Regeneration here is not an imposed external process but one shaped and led by people who live here. It delivers on both housing needs and community health and well-being.  This approach unlocks sustainable regeneration that benefits everyone.   

Want to volunteer with red brick? Fill out our Expression of interest form here

Lessons we’re learning

We’re learning lessons along the way, which could help this government’s thinking as it develops its turbocharged housing and regeneration programme.

Put residents at the heart of regeneration  

We create opportunity, enabling residents to stay, grow and thrive. Our generous landlord offer includes ‘one move’, avoiding disruption to people’s lives.  We shape places where long-standing and new residents contribute to their neighbourhoods – as civic leaders, business owners, in local jobs, as volunteers or in education.  Our St Paul’s Way scheme includes a new primary school, nursery, mosque. play facilities and a district heating approach.

Empower communities to shape regeneration

Our schemes are steered by communities.  Listening campaigns, co-design, resident steering groups and ballots, alongside day-to-day conversations, ensure that what we build reflects the needs and aspirations of those who live, work and study here.  For our plans on the Aberfeldy estate, 93% of residents voted in favour of regeneration and our approach gained national recognition.

Work in partnership to deliver infrastructure

Effective regeneration is about building strong, collaborative partnerships.  The value of our joint ventures with development partners, higher education institutions, community organisations, businesses, local and national government has delivered new housing, health services, education, youth services, workspace, faith centres, green spaces, transport connectivity, community facilities and employment services.    

Like Atlee’s government, we understand the inherent link between housing and life outcomes, so we take a holistic approach to regeneration, one that focuses on people having access to the services and amenities they need to live fulfilling lives.

Mixed communities thrive

Our model provides housing for genuinely mixed communities, offering a mix of social and private rent, shared ownership and private sale.  It includes retrofit of existing alongside new homes. This tenure-blind approach ensures that neighbourhoods are accessible to people from all walks of life, preventing the displacement of existing residents and fostering inclusive communities.

Build civic and business capacity

Successful regeneration builds capacity in local communities.  Initiatives such as fashion workspace Poplar Works and our Aberfeldy Street meanwhile programme demonstrate how regeneration can create new local business opportunities. In Teviot, our social value commitments has invested over £400,000 in the community, before the scheme has been considered for planning permission, fostering civic pride and community engagement.    

So, what is needed to unlock new housing through estate regeneration?  

Alongside community-driven regeneration the government could focus on new financial models and embed a commitment to community empowerment.

Successive governments have rightly provided funding to deliver affordable housing. But in tight economic conditions, the long-term sustainability of regeneration projects relies on attracting private investment, especially from institutional investors.   

Strong governmental policies that encourage institutional investors to back regeneration projects in high-demand areas are crucial.  Providing incentives for investment in affordable housing, community-led development projects and placeshaping efforts that prioritise the needs of residents while delivering financial returns for investors.     

The English Devolution White Paper sets out a commitment to empowerment for local government. This is now needed for housing.  The people who live in neighbourhoods should have a direct voice in shaping their places.  We know that when communities are at the heart of regeneration, the results are more sustainable, more equitable and more impactful in people’s lives.   

This government has, like Atlee’s, made delivering new homes at vast scale a cornerstone of its agenda. It must be bold, inclusive and driven by a clear vision of sustainable, community-focused growth.  By embracing a model of regeneration that is built on hyper-local delivery, community empowerment, institutional investment and a commitment to social infrastructure alongside new homes, this government will deliver 1.5million new homes it has promised to the nation.  

Categories
10-year plan for housing Blog Post

Devolution will determine the success of the 10 year housing plan

For many years we’ve advocated for greater devolution – it was a key recommendation from the Commission for Housing in the North nearly ten years ago. In the North, we do not have a homogeneous housing market – there is much diversity, with pockets of deprivation sitting alongside areas of wealth, post-industrial towns, large urban areas, coastal communities and rural areas – including four of England’s national parks. One-size-fits-all solutions do not work for the North!

Devolution is now high up on the political agenda with the English Devolution White Paper, so there’s the opportunity to maximise the impact of investment in housing through more local control. The Government outlines its Devolution Framework as aiming to deliver ‘more houses, served by the necessary infrastructure, and more social housing’. It sets the ambition for mayors to become responsible for strategic planning and housing growth, so devolution and a ten year housing plan are intrinsically linked.

subscribe to red brick’s free newsletter

This is all very welcome. The North has been leading the way with devolution, and we are already seeing benefits. It has hailed a new era of collaboration between housing associations and local authorities with the launch of Housing Partnerships across the North in areas with current or proposed Mayoral Combined Authorities. The NHC has been working closely with Housing Partnerships across the North and I’ve seen firsthand the difference they are making. Providers are no longer always competing for development sites or funding; they are working more collaboratively in the interests of their local area. They are delivering better value for money by working together on tenders. And they’re reaching out to other sectors with workstreams to address issues such as regeneration, development and placemaking, net zero, employment and health. These regional bodies bring together the experience and expertise of the partnership members and enable them to make a far greater impact than they would be able to alone.

Devolution featured strongly in our research reports Brownfield First and Warm Homes, Green Jobs. We identified that there was a joint challenge of centralised funding models acting as a barrier to delivering the change needed in communities. Both reports called for genuine acts of devolution, and a removal of the conditions, rules and requirements imposed on how Mayoral Combined Authorities deliver funding. Funding for brownfield land remediation and warm homes has now been included in integrated settlements for Greater Manchester and West Midlands Mayoral Combined Authorities, with this to be rolled out further soon. Giving more local control in these areas will increase the impact of funding, although to get maximum benefit, funding must be at the right level. £4.2 billion over ten years would remediate all the North’s brownfield land and unlock land for 320,000 homes, and £500m per year up to 2030 would bring the North’s social housing up to EPC band C. After 2030, £1 billion per year would enable providers to further decarbonise social housing and stimulate the green economy, creating thousands of jobs.

Want to volunteer with red brick? Fill out our Expression of interest form here

Our recent state of the region report the Northern Housing Monitor really brought home to me that there is insufficient social housing in the North and that is driving homelessness and poverty. Our report found that there are nearly 500,000 households on social housing waiting lists in the North – a 13 per cent increase on the previous year.  The number of people forced to live in temporary accommodation is also rising fast with a yearly increase of around 16%, with over 14,000 children in the region living in temporary accommodation. The fact that 600,000 social rent homes in the North have been sold though Right to Buy and only 1 in 7 have been replaced contributes to increasing homelessness and people on the lowest income group being forced to rent in the private sector where rents are higher and quality is lower. The Monitor showed that a quarter of people renting privately in the North fall into the lowest income bracket and 1 in 3 children in the North live in households that are pushed into poverty after housing costs, so it’s critical we build the new homes the North needs.

We can do this in the North, but we need the right support, and the right flexibility in funding streams. The English Devolution White Paper signals that funding for affordable homes will also be devolved. We’ve called for more mayoral influence over affordable housing provision, as combined authorities have a unique oversight of social and economic needs in their area. However, given the urgent need for a new long term Affordable Homes Programme, a pragmatic approach is needed. Local control should be increased, but this must be balanced with utilising the depth of experience and expertise of Homes England, who have the resources and scale to support providers and combined authorities to maximise delivery.

In our response to the Treasury’s call for evidence for the Spending Review, we set out the support our members (housing associations, local authorities and combined authorities) need from government to bring maximum benefits to the communities they serve. One of the key areas of focus was the importance of regeneration in many Northern communities, to both improve existing neighbourhoods and unlock further supply.  The North is disproportionally affected with poor quality homes, with 27 per cent of homes in the private rented sector not meeting decent homes standards. While social housing fares much better in terms of quality, a recent survey with members suggested that over 126,000 social homes were situated in an area in need of regeneration.

To address this, we are calling for a dedicated funding stream of at least £1.37 billion over 5 years to support housing-led neighbourhood regeneration in the North. This would run alongside the recently announced Plan for Neighbourhoods, which supports social regeneration in specific towns.  The Devolution White Paper tentatively raises the prospect of a national level regeneration programme, and it would make sense for this to be devolved to combined authorities as they will have overall responsibility for housing in their area. However, devolution must run deeper than that. Our community engagement project Pride in Place found communities must be involved in shaping plans for their area, as regeneration schemes which do not involve residents are unlikely to be a success.

There should also be increased flexibility in the new Affordable Homes Programme to support housing-led regeneration schemes, so that outdated homes which are not fit for purpose can be replaced by new homes that meet the needs of communities. Members have reported it is difficult to get funding to replace smaller homes, such as bedsits, with larger family homes, even if there is need in the community. I hope more local flexibility will overcome this issue.

Devolution will be an integral part of the Government’s 10 year plan for housing – and at the NHC, we are confident it will be all the stronger for it.  

Categories
10-year plan for housing Blog Post

Addressing the building safety crisis in the 10-year plan for housing

Let’s start with a simple statement of the problem. Around the country, between 9,000 and 12,000 medium or high rise buildings have fire safety problems with their external façade severe enough to pose a risk to life.

Of these, just 1,482 have completed works and just 5,025 have been formally identified. The identified buildings account for 273,000 individual homes, which means there are likely around 500,000 homes overall, which means something like 1.5m people sleep in blocks that might kill them in a fire.

Currently, we’re completing about 10 buildings a month which means that if we don’t speed up, we’ll finish the last building somewhere around 2100 (assuming the sea level rises don’t come for us first).

Sign up to red brick’s free newsletter

And while we have some idea how to pay for these repairs (a messy combination of developers, taxpayers, freeholders and leaseholders), we don’t have anything approaching a financial strategy which matches the estimated £16.6bn price tag of the problem.

Our process of assessing buildings and working out what needs to be done is also deeply flawed, unregulated and currently the subject of predictable scandal.

This is a big problem, and demands a big strategy.

So far, the government has been unwilling to introduce big changes – sticking instead with the basics of the approach the preceding administration set in motion, albeit with some tweaks aimed to make it run faster.

This is not really good enough and represents (in my view) a classic embodiment of the sunken costs fallacy.

The building safety crisis is a complex and multifaceted one which evades a perfect or easy solution. But there are ways of approaching it which are less flawed and easier than the current mess.

The answer is to set up a system which offers three things the current one fails to: consistency, clear funding and control.

The current approach is inconsistent and unpredictable. The use of loose, bespoke guidance same building may be considered in need of remediation by one assessor, and cleared by another. The means of fixing the problem may also be different.

This causes an enormous amount of delay – because different parties fight over exactly what needs to be done to the building instead of just doing it.

A new approach would acknowledge a few simple facts. The first would be that we simply cannot fix every building. A combination of sloppy government guidance and industry malpractice means we have used combustible materials ubiquitously in the built environment for 40 years.

The government’s approach since the very early days of this crisis has been to say that building owners need to work out what to do based on professional assessment, instead of being told what to do by the state.

There is some logic behind this – all buildings are different and prescriptive rules can have messy, imperfect results.

But the reality is that the industry – with all its many conflicts of interest and incompetencies – has proved itself incapable of this task.

It is also true that while all buildings are different, most of them are also quite similar and what is a fire risk in Building A will also be a fire risk in Building B, C, D, E and F.

So we should have a basic, government-mandated system of scoring – with points added for factors like height, building occupancy, cladding material, extent of cladding, presence of combustible balconies and so on and taken off for sprinklers, fire alarms, second staircases and other features which reduce the risk. Score over a certain level, and you would need to bring the numbers down with the addition of risk mitigation – which may or may not involve full building regulation.

The next step is certainty of funding. Building remediation only really gets going when we have agreed how to pay for it. And the current bunfight over responsibility makes that very hard and very slow to define.

The answer is for Rachel Reeves to borrow the cash up front and over a long period of time.

But before someone screams the words “self-imposed fiscal rules” at their screen, she should also create a mechanism for getting it back – a long-term, statutory levy on companies across the various areas of the construction sector which have contributed to the mess.

Thanks to her tweaking of debt rules last autumn, this would actually give the government a pass to write the borrowing off.

And finally, control. In Victoria, Australia, a cladding taskforce has overseen and in some cases directly delivered the works to buildings. A regulator with powers to get a grip on the works, setting timescales and issuing fines for non-compliance, would force those who are delaying unreasonably to pull their fingers out.

Put all of these things together and you would have a system which focuses us on the most dangerous buildings, funds the work for them and gets it done. This does not need to be a process which drags on forever. But unless we take a new approach, it will be. 

Categories
10-year plan for housing Blog Post

It’s time to move away from leasehold in older people’s housing

The Government swept to power with an overwhelming majority last summer and a mandate to deliver change. What better time is there to improve UK housing by reforming leasehold?

An important part of the housing sector in the context of the UK’s ageing population is specialist housing for older people. For example, Integrated Retirement Communities feature comprehensive service offerings such as restaurants, gyms and personal care (as distinct from age-restricted retirement housing with fewer amenities and services). Research from Homes England, published in 2024 and backed by HM Treasury, found that modern housing-with care schemes, such as Integrated Retirement Communities, deliver NHS savings of £1,840 per resident per year given their positive impact on resident health, as well as removing the factors that drive delayed discharges from hospital.

sign up to red brick’s free newsletter

But what is the right tenure of the future for Older People’s Housing? The independent Taskforce on Older People’s Housing’s, whose final report was published last autumn, recommended the UK look at new tenure models used overseas in order to drive growth in provision, affordability and innovation in the sector. Housing Minister Matthew Pennycook MP noted there is “rightly significant national interest in the Taskforce’s findings”.

Tenure reform in Older People’s Housing is needed not only because of the limitations of the current leasehold system, but because the UK is an outlier in its focus on property ownership in Older People’s Housing.

Indeed, the UK is highly unusual in using long leases (which are subsequently resold from one customer to the next) in modern, service-based housing-with-care schemes for older people.

Countries with more developed Integrated Retirement Community sectors have swapped a focus on property ‘ownership’ for a focus on those things that matter most to customers – affordability, cost certainty and consumer protection – all of which are delivered using contracts.

The experience of other countries, such as New Zealand, shows that a move to a bespoke tenure for the sector has massively helped the sector’s growth, as well as enhancing consumer confidence.

ARCO, the main body representing the Integrated Retirement Community (IRC) sector in the UK, has been looking into the viability of a contract model for the IRC sector in the UK since 2020, consulting with stakeholders from around the world, along with lawyers and investors. Our core conclusions to date are that the contract approach could work in the UK and could be used in both new and existing schemes as part of widespread reform to the leasehold system.

We are calling our proposal the ‘Retirement Occupancy Contract’ (ROC). Implementing such a model could be an important achievement of this Labour government.

Why? A key benefit of the model would be improved affordability and access to the sector for older people on average incomes, opening up this option to more households and ensuring that more older people have the option of living in an Integrated Retirement Community.

Implementing a contract approach can be included as part of the government’s leasehold reform agenda. Only minor amendments to primary legislation would be needed.

The leasehold system is commonly described as “archaic”, “feudal” and “outdated”. Although the Integrated Retirement Community sector in the UK has grown using Leasehold as the default tenure for private payers, the time is right to learn from best practice in other countries and provide the sector with a bespoke tenure model.

With a growing ageing population looking for housing that meets their changing needs, there has never been a better time to do away with the outdated leasehold system and create the tenure of the future.