Tag: Council housing

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Social rent council housing should be the Government’s first housing priority

The first tranche of funding for the Government’s Social & Affordable Homes Programme (SAHP) has been announced. Of 73,617 “affordable homes” to be built by “Strategic Partners”, funded by the programme, only 3.8% are to be built by councils.

On X, the Labour Party said that “Labour is funding more than 70,000 new homes across England, putting councils at the heart of house building”. Another post said, “This is the biggest council house building revival in decades.” In his first speech in Parliament Andy Burnham referred to “the biggest council house building programme since the post-war period”. What seems clear to us at the Labour Campaign for Council Housing is that this aspiration on council housing cannot possibly be achieved by the SAHP as currently constituted.

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The stark reality is this:

  • £9.58 billion (outside of London) is being given to 33 “Strategic Partners” for multi-year programmes up to 2039;
  • Just three of them are councils (Cambridge, Eastleigh and Newcastle), with a combined funding of £392.2 million, supporting 2,811 homes;
  • The other 30 “Strategic Partners” are Housing Associations, save for two ‘for profit registered providers’, Sage and Park Properties Housing Association, and the large volume builder Vistry;
  • Sage and Vistry will receive almost as much as the councils combined; £350 million each.

Given that only 2,811 of the 73,617 homes will be built by councils, this cannot possibly represent “putting councils at the heart of house building”. Nor can it be described as “the biggest council house building revival in decades”.

The Government has said that “future stages of the programme will be tilted more towards councils”. Yet there is, currently, no funding ring-fenced for councils. They have to bid in the “Continuous Market Engagement” process, competing for grant with Housing Associations, “for profit registered providers”, developers and builders.

In London the funding is under the control of the Mayor rather than Homes England. Tom Copley, Deputy Mayor for Housing and Residential Development, announced that “60% of the funding from the first round of the mayor’s new SAHP will go to London boroughs to deliver even more new council homes.” Even so, if 60% was applied nationally, it would still only equate to 10,800 council homes a year. Demolitions and Right to Buy sales will reduce the net number. (Red Brick editor note: The Government is currently progressing reforms to restrict the Right to Buy through the Social Housing Bill ).

SAHP: “a flawed programme”

For us at the Labour Campaign for Council Housing, it was clear when it was first announced that the SAHP was “a flawed programme which would not solve the housing crisis”. The £39 billion pledged over a decade was never going to be sufficient. The 300,000 “affordable homes” it will fund equates to an average of 30,000 a year. Of those, 18,000 will be social rent homes, comprising just 6% of the Government’s annual target for overall housing supply. In no sense can this be described as ‘historic’.

There have only been six years in England when 300,000 or more homes have been built. In those, council housing made up an average of 41%; 135,000 a year.

On the last two occasions when Labour conferences have discussed housing, in 2019 and 2021, overwhelmingly the delegates voted for a Labour government to fund 150,000 social rent homes a year, including 100,000 council homes. Shelter and other organisations have said that as an absolute minimum 90,000 social rent homes a year are necessary. This would require far more funding than £39 billion.

The SAHP average grant is around £130,000 per unit (£39 billion for 300,000 homes). In its recent report for Shelter, Savills estimated an average grant per social rent unit of £177,000. That would add up to £15.9 billion a year; £159 billion for a decade. The Centre for Cities estimated that £16.6 billion a year would be needed to replicate the level of council house building from 1956 to 1979.

Is this unrealistic? No. We should remember that the Attlee Government, despite facing far worse economic circumstances than we do today (the debt to GDP ratio was 250%, compared to under 100% today), funded around 800,000 council homes. It is a question of priorities.

Investment today saves money in the future. Investment in social rent council homes will save money on the housing benefit bill by taking households out of the expensive private rental sector. It will save money for the NHS by taking households out of homes which will ruin their health. It will save councils the exorbitant cost of Temporary Accommodation.

“Affordable housing”

The scale of funding isn’t the only issue, though. The Government has kept the Tory definition of “Affordable Housing”. For instance, “Affordable Rent”, an austerity measure, was introduced by the Coalition Government to facilitate a 60% cut in grant funding. At up to 80% of market rents, it is unaffordable for many. It is £60 a week more than social rent in England, £90 a week in London. As well as impoverishing tenants, it simply drives up the housing benefit bill. Why does the Government propose to continue funding it through SAHP?

If the record numbers of 135,580 households in Temporary Accommodation and 1.3 million households on the social housing waiting lists are to be driven down, the Government needs to make social rent council housing its first priority, on at least the scale that Shelter has called for. If the gulf between the Government’s rhetoric and the actual content of its housing programme is not closed, there will be a political price to be paid.

Andy Burnham, whilst Mayor of Manchester, was right when he said, “The Government should make building hundreds of thousands of council homes its defining purpose. No other policy, achievable within a Parliament, would have greater social and economic benefits.”

That requires significantly more funding and the abandonment of the Tory definition of “Affordable Housing” (see our Letter to Angela Rayner). All the funding should go to social rent homes, the only genuinely affordable tenure for tenants. The Government cannot fend off the threat of a very right wing government, whatever its composition, without beginning to resolve the housing crisis. Council housing remains the key to that.

Martin Wicks

Labour Campaign for Council Housing

Details of membership and affiliation to the campaign can be found here.

Postscript

The 2026 Labour Party Conference voted through a UNITE resolution, as part of a composite motion. The conference voted for:

  • 90,000 social rent homes a year;
  • Ending Right to Buy;
  • Cancelling council housing debt;
  • A publicly funded retrofit programme.
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More council homes, lower bills, stronger communities: Cambridge’s approach to building better

When people talk about sustainable housing, they generally focus on the physical structures. During my career as an architect, and now as part of Cambridge City Council’s Labour administration following the May 2026 elections, I have developed a broader vision of what counts as sustainable, looking beyond the building itself to ask how it works within the wider social setting, as a home and not just a house, and as part of a neighbourhood that meets people’s wider needs.

This means taking account of both the built and social environment, providing more than just basic housing, and understanding how a house contributes to the surrounding streetscape. When we build, we are not just assembling structures but weaving new threads into the existing community, and we need to make sure that everyone has the facilities and spaces they need to live sustainable, good lives.

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So while my focus in Cambridge is on the quality of our council housing, our planning always takes account of that wider perspective, so that we build homes people want to live in, in attractive neighbourhoods with the amenities they need and good transport links.

We have built many council homes in Cambridge in the last eight years. Initially we had support from a £70 million funding package from our devolution deal with the Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Combined Authority, through which we committed to building 500 new council homes. In those early days, the Council’s focus was almost exclusively on quantity as we worked to hit our target. While we built to standards that were slightly better than national building regulations, the volume of delivery was our primary driver. We completed our 500th council home a year ahead of schedule, and have now built more than 850 new council homes.

We have evolved our approach in recent years. We still want to build at pace, but we also want to build to the highest possible quality. Investing in the fabric of the building was a strategic choice. Although it can increase upfront costs, it directly helps our tenants by bringing down utility bills and improving the comfort of their homes. This is only growing in importance as we experience the consequences of the climate emergency.

As the executive councillor for planning, I was proud to help bring forward our sustainable construction Supplementary Planning Document (SPD). Alongside this, we introduced a sustainable housing guide for our council house programme that aimed for certified Passivhaus standards. This was a highly significant moment, making it clear that we were aiming to build the most energy-efficient homes possible in Cambridge.

Yet, as any local authority knows, we have to constantly balance environmental ambitions with financial reality. We discovered that strict Passivhaus certification was incredibly expensive and financially demanding. Furthermore, Passivhaus design is heavily reliant on orienting and positioning buildings in particular ways. That’s not always possible when you are working with complex, irregular, or difficult urban “infill” sites – the sort we rely on to deliver the density of homes our city  desperately needs.  Recent schemes including Arbury Road and Kings Hedges in North Cambridge relied on the Cam Standard to make them viable.

We have not let this curtail our ambitions. In 2024 we created the “Cam Standard.” This bespoke standard acts as a robust baseline that maintains our commitment to energy efficiency and climate-change resilience, while offering the practical flexibility required for complex urban sites. It is a realistic, scalable stepping stone that ensures all our developments prioritise lowering energy use, with the explicit goal that all proposed council homes will target Net Zero Carbon by 2030.

And now we have the next stage to look forward to. as Cambridge is one of three councils to have secured long-term funding as a strategic partner under the government’s Social and Affordable Housing Programme (SAHP). This funding gives us the certainty we need to plan over a longer horizon and develop the pipeline for building another 1,400 high-quality council homes across our city, with the aim of ensuring 60% of those are available at social rent.

This funding is especially vital given the massive development pressures facing Cambridge. The government is planning major expansions, with a Development Corporation set to oversee significant growth. Our position as a Labour council is clear: we must protect the integrity of council house building and ensure there are genuinely affordable homes for our residents. Through our joint venture with The Hill Group, the Cambridge Investment Partnership (CIP), we aim for 50% of the homes built on our schemes across the city to be council homes. We will be engaging robustly with the incoming Development Corporation to ensure they recognise how vital this 50% target is in a city with such highly priced market homes.

Looking forward, all our new-build sites are fully electric and gas-free, and we want to provide on-site energy generation through PV. At the same time we’re looking at energy storage systems. While current lithium batteries raise environmental and safety concerns, the emergence of sodium batteries offers an exciting, sustainable alternative. Our ultimate goal is to provide “zero-utility-bill” council housing.

They are also designed as “Lifetime Homes” where a young couple can move in and expect to remain for their entire lives. All homes have private outside spaces and are wheelchair accessible, featuring wider doorways and, downstairs toilets. 5% of homes are also built with further adaptations for wheelchair users in mind.

Through our house building programme we have also built five new community centres, seven new parks and play areas, two pre-schools, one library and new shops. We have provided a further £12.2 million of funding to support local schools, parks, sports centres and the NHS.

By building high-quality, adaptable, and community-focused homes, I like to think that we also show private developers what is truly possible. In doing so, we are honouring the deep legacy of our movement. As the great Aneurin Bevan famously observed of post-war housing needs: “While we shall be judged for a year or two by the numbers of houses we built, we shall be judged in ten years by the type of houses we build.”

In Cambridge, as a regular top 10 council house builder, we have delivered on the numbers. Now, through the Cam Standard and our strategic partnership, we are ensuring that the houses we leave behind will stand as a proud legacy of sustainable, inclusive, and fair municipal design for generations to come.

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Building the homes Brent needs: In conversation with Cllr Matt Kelcher

Red Brick: First, what does the housing crisis look like for people in Brent?

Matt Kelcher: We have many of the same challenges as other parts of London and the country: fundamentally, we need more housing of all different kinds.

We have more than 30,000 households on the housing waiting list, but it’s important to understand what that means. Only a proportion of those households are in priority need. People further down the list are extremely unlikely ever to receive a council home, however long they wait.

I think councils have to be honest about that. Being on a waiting list can give people the impression that if they sit tight for long enough, eventually they’ll get a home. The reality is that’s just not the way it works with the levels of social housing we have available today. The wait can be decades, and that uncertainty can affect decisions about new jobs, where children go to school and how people plan for the future. At Brent, we’ve set up our Find a place you can afford programme to give local people help now to find a private tenancy, rather than leaving them on a waiting list.

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The housing crisis in Brent also goes well beyond the waiting list. We’re a young, incredibly diverse borough with strong family and community ties. A lot of people want to live in the borough where they grew up. They don’t want to move miles and miles away from their parents. But often there just aren’t the homes available for them here – whether that’s social housing, private rented housing, shared ownership or housing to buy.

You see young people with decent jobs who can’t move out of their childhood bedroom, young people who want to get on the housing ladder but can’t, and couples living in a one-bedroom flat who want to have children but can’t find somewhere bigger. If you don’t have somewhere secure that you can call your own, it has huge consequences for the way you live the rest of your life. It puts your life on hold. We want to free people from that by delivering secure homes of all types for everyone.

RB: Tell us about your approach to development. What can a Labour-run council actually do to shape development in a borough where much of the building is done by other organisations?

Brent has had a really good reputation for a long time of being somewhere that proactively welcomes development and the regeneration it brings. We are a rare example of a place in London that is managing to exceed our housing and planning targets.

I think being open and positive about development actually allows you to get more out of developers, not less. Development involves risk. If you’re going to spend months or years developing a scheme, but think there’s a significant chance the council will reject it at the end of the process, you either price that risk into the scheme or decide to invest somewhere else.

Brent has built a reputation as somewhere developers can have a constructive conversation with the council and get a fair hearing. That doesn’t mean saying “yes” to everything. It means being clear about what we want and working with developers to see whether they can deliver it.

That certainty makes Brent a more attractive place to invest. And if more developers want to work here, that creates competition for opportunities. If several major developers want to work with us on a regeneration scheme, they have to compete over what they can offer Brent – social housing, shared ownership, social value and other benefits for the community.

So, I push back against the idea we sometimes hear that being pro-development means being soft on developers. If you’re clear about your priorities, create competition and give people confidence that good schemes can actually get built, you can strengthen the council’s hand.

Shillibeer House on the old bus garage in Alperton is a good example. We worked with the private sector on a development of around 450 homes. Three blocks are private, and the fourth has given us 155 council homes. They look exactly the same as the private homes. People who had spent years in temporary accommodation now have a permanent council home. Some of the people who’ve moved in have made videos sharing their stories and the difference a council home has made to them. We couldn’t have delivered that outcome without being prepared to work in partnership with the private sector.

RB: Labour is now running Brent as a minority administration. How do you maintain that confidence when the council’s political position has changed?

There was inevitably some uncertainty among developers after the election. They wanted to know whether Brent’s political direction had changed. My message to them is very simple: it hasn’t.

We’re still the administration and there’s an enormous amount we continue to do. The Leader, the Cabinet and I are completely aligned about the importance of housing and regeneration, and that gives a clear direction to our officers in the planning department. People often want to come and work here , cut their teeth in the sector in Brent and a lot of them stay a long time, because they have the space to see projects through and make a difference.

But we do need to keep providing that certainty externally – maintaining relationships with developers and Housing Associations, being clear that we want growth and demonstrating that Brent remains somewhere where good development can happen.

Housing has also become more politically contested locally. Opposition parties have campaigned against development of all kinds including social housing, so those of us who believe we need more homes have to be willing to make the argument for them.

I do think attitudes are changing, too. On the planning committee we have had young people come along to speak in favour of housing applications because they wanted the opportunity to find a home in the borough where they were born and raised. The housing crisis is increasingly something people can see in their own families and communities.

RB: How do you make sure Brent is building the right homes to meet all those different kinds of housing need?

You have to manage housing delivery as a portfolio across the borough, rather than judge success by one tenure or the affordable housing percentage on one individual development. Our policy aims for 50% affordable housing across development, with 70% of that total to weighted towards social rent and London Affordable Rent products, as that is our area of greatest need. But that doesn’t mean every individual scheme will deliver exactly 50%. Some will provide less and others can provide 100%. What matters is what we’re securing across the programme as a whole.

So there may be circumstances where a development doesn’t achieve the headline percentage, but what it does provide is more three-bedroom family homes. We have to think about the actual benefit to Brent residents, rather than treating every site as interchangeable.

Sometimes the housing debate gets divided into two camps. There are people who focus on liberalising planning and getting the private sector building more, and others who put the emphasis on delivering more social housing.

I don’t think those ambitions are contradictory. We should make it easier to build more homes, because the fundamental problem is that we have far too few of them. And at the same time, we should be ambitious about delivering social housing and ensuring it remains a permanent and important part of mixed communities. For me, being an activist council means using all the tools and partners available to get the combination of homes our residents actually need.

RB: What could national or London government do to help Brent go further?

If I could make one change to support our social housing ambitions, I would end the Right to Buy in London.

RB editor’s note: The Government took early action to reduce Right to Buy discounts in November 2024. The Social Housing Bill currently going through Parliament would further restrict the Right to Buy, though the Bill stops short of ending the programme in England.

We’re building council housing ourselves. At Church End, for example, we’re delivering 99 new social homes. But when we plan new council housing, we’ve had to make assumptions about how many of those homes could subsequently be lost through Right to Buy.

That matters before a single home has been sold. Council housing requires long-term borrowing and investment. If you know that some of the assets you’re building could subsequently be sold at a discount, that affects the risk, the finances and ultimately how much more housing you can build.

And I don’t think Right to Buy has achieved what it was supposed to achieve in London. It was intended to expand home ownership, but many former council homes have ended up being rented out privately at higher rents or lost to the short lets sector. That means people in Brent have to pay those higher rents, which means they can’t save for a deposit, which means they can’t buy their own homes. Therefore, I believe that in London at least, Right to Buy has completely failed on its own terms. That’s why I’d like to see a London-specific policy, in the same way as Wales has ended it.

There is a more fundamental point too. My grandad lived in the same council flat in Sheffield for his whole life. He had no intention of buying it. Why would he? It was his home for as long as he needed it.

Social housing shouldn’t simply be a residual tenure for somebody who happens to be poor at a particular moment in their life. If somebody moves into a council home when they’re young and struggling, then gets a good job, we shouldn’t suddenly think they earn too much to deserve to live in their home or their community.

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How to increase investment in council housing and capitalise on the economic benefits

The Prime Minister has made clear his ambition: to “oversee the biggest council house building programme since the post-war period”. This is a hugely positive step forward for the Government’s housing policy; it marks a generational break with 45 years of housing policy that failed to articulate a clear aim beyond merely maximising overall output – with little regard to affordability for people on low incomes or at risk of homelessness. And, crucially, it will help to capitalise on councils’ knowledge of local housing need, significant land value capture powers, and masterplanning capabilities.  

Yet the decline of council housing was driven not only by housing policy, but by the rise of restrictive fiscal policy that actively constrains government investment in social homes and has pushed Housing Revenue Accounts (HRAs) into existential financial jeopardy. Despite being justified under the guise of ‘fiscal responsibility’, debt-to-GDP spiked sharply during austerity while investment in public assets like social housing collapsed and vital services were cut – demonstrably impoverishing both people and the state.

At the Autumn Budget, to realise its ambitions on council housebuilding, the Government must reconnect political ends with economic means and drive a change in economic consensus that places social housing investment at the centre of national renewal. In an upcoming report on council house building, we argue the Budget marks a clear opportunity for the Government to cancel £31.8bn in HRA debt to unlock councils’ capacity to build, covered in detail here, and do more to bring forward and increase funding – ensuring its fiscal framework supports rather than hinders greater investment in council and social homes.

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The financial and economic case for cancelling HRA debt and increasing investment

Modelling commissioned by Shelter and undertaken by Pragmatix sets out an ambitious scenario for the Government to cancel HRA debt and provide the necessary investment to deliver 284,000 social rent homes within a 10-year trajectory – in addition to those already expected to be delivered through the Social and Affordable Homes Programme. Pragmatix estimates that the economic benefits of the policy would outweigh its costs within twenty years, around a decade after the final homes are built. Over the report’s 60-year appraisal period, the modelling estimates a net economic benefit of £141.5 billion, including substantial savings to the public sector from reducing reliance on more expensive forms of housing. Government departments are estimated to save £64.7 billion over the period, including £26.3 billion for the Department for Work and Pensions, while savings to councils from reducing the number of households in temporary accommodation eventually reach £672 million a year.

Cancelling HRA debt is broadly fiscally neutral; the majority of debt is owed to Treasury, meaning it is largely a series of inter-government transfers, involving cancelling debt that the public sector owes to itself.

The fiscal framework should support rather than hinder investment

Within this Parliament, debt cancellation and delivery, as outlined above, is also compliant with the Government’s ‘investment rule’, using around 56% of the current ‘headroom’ as of the OBR’s 2026 spring forecast. While council and social housing is a more-than-worthy use of investment ‘headroom’, this self-imposed restraint on public investment creates artificial trade-offs with other policy areas and reduces the Government’s appetite to increase funding. More flexibility is therefore needed within the fiscal framework to ensure that the long-term economic net benefit of investing in social housing is recognised.

The Government’s fiscal framework disincentivises social housing investment

The narrow and short-term focus of the current fiscal framework discourages social housing investment and hinders the Government’s aim of delivering a council housing revolution. Firstly, the Government’s rolling target (the ‘investment rule’) requires its chosen debt measure to be falling as a share of GDP in the third year of the OBR’s forecast period – but this disregards the longer-term savings and additional revenue social housing generates.

Secondly, the Government’s chosen debt measure – Public Sector Net Financial Liabilities (PSNFL) – fails to value the physical asset created on the Government’s balance sheet when it funds a new social home.

Thirdly, PSNFL creates a two-tier fiscal system that favours social housing delivery through housing associations and for-profit registered providers over public-led social housebuilding from councils and development corporations. Unlike most EU countries that use a general government debt measure, PSNFL includes the entire public sector. It means that our fiscal rules include the debt of our public social housing providers, even though their debts are paid for by rents and other independent income as opposed to taxation or wider government expenditure – i.e. they are classed by the ONS as ‘market producing’.

Finally, because of this public-sector focus in the debt measure, the central government financial asset recorded under PSNFL when investing in council housing (created by loaning money to HRAs via the Public Works Loan Board) is actually netted off by the liability held by the loan recipient (the council or development corporation) in the national accounts. This leaves only the liability on the Government’s balance sheet created from the borrowing it undertook to ‘fund’ the loan. In contrast, liabilities held by private registered providers to pay back loans to central government are excluded from PSNFL, making these loans more fiscally attractive for central government: the asset (the loan) and liability (borrowing to ‘fund’ the loan) held by central government cancel each other out.

The consequences for social and council housebuilding are stark

Rather than seeing good growth and healthy public finances as the outcome of social housing investment, the current framework forces housing policy towards day-to-day spending on housing benefit and expensive temporary accommodation – which flows outwards from the public sector to private landlords. Investment remains far below what is needed:

  • Social and Affordable Homes Programme grant, while welcome, only enables the delivery of 18,000 social rent homes a year on average – we need to deliver 90,000 a year for 10 years to end the housing emergency.
  • Interest rates from the Public Works Loan Board available to HRAs remain far too high with 50-year maturity lending at around 6%.
  • HRAs and public development corporations are excluded from £2.5 billion in 0.1% interest loans recently provided to housing associations and for-profit providers, a distinction that reflects their different treatment within the fiscal framework.

Fiscal reform is needed to support the scaling up of council housing delivery

To deliver its promise of a council housing revolution, the Government must scale up current grant funding and available low-cost finance to much higher levels. In doing so, it must ensure that councils and development corporations, who were the key players of the post-war social housing boom, are empowered to support the Government’s social housing ambition. In an upcoming report later this month, we argue that, if the Government remains committed to not change the current fiscal rules, it should instead exclude HRAs and development corporations from PSNFL. This would finally end central government incentives to limit their borrowing, devolving power to HRAs and development corporations, and support the Government to provide them with the low-cost loans needed to deliver social housing at scale.

Email your councillor today and ask them to add their name to a letter to the chancellor, urging him to knock down the barriers to getting councils social homes again.  https://campaigns.shelter.org.uk/tell-your-cllr-fight-for-social-homes

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If Andy Burnham is serious about a council housebuilding revolution, what does he need to know about the self-financing settlement for the HRA? 

I was one of the many council housing finance geeks working with councils to influence the self-financing settlement for Housing Revenue Accounts (HRAs) back in 2012.

It was aimed at making council housing finance more accountable and transparent at the local level as well as more business-like and efficient.  The process of moving from a national subsidy system to individual self-financed HRAs was also designed to make the finances sustainable in the long term and allow for growth and investment. 

It was a hard-won deal between tenants, councils and different governments over a number of years that ended up not delivering on its promise from the outset, only to further suffer from a series of policy and financial setbacks in the years following 2012. These have meant that most councils do not have a sustainable HRA – just 14 years after the original settlement.  The sector is now asking the Government to put things right, but there are many options to look at. 

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Why self-financing replaced the ‘tenant tax’

Before 2012, HRA revenue finance was tightly controlled at a national level within the HRA Subsidy System.  The key feature was an annual calculation made to capture surpluses generated by most councils through their rents and redistribute them to others whose rental income did not cover their necessary expenditure. Part of the surpluses also went to the Treasury.

This was dubbed the ‘tenant tax’ by tenant groups who campaigned for change in the years running up to the settlement.  They objected to their rents being used to repair homes at the other end of the country when new homes or improvements could have been made in their areas.  Councils also objected to the lack of control and uncertainty inherent in the annual determinations, which left them with no ability to plan long term or manage maintenance over multi-year projects. 

During earlier years of the subsidy system, the Treasury topped up the pot to ensure that basic management and maintenance could be covered by all councils. But as rents increased and assumed expenditure did not, the overall system went into surplus. By 2008 the vast majority of councils were paying into central government, and the Government was making a surplus on council housing. 

This only increased the arguments for a self-financing deal and could have provided for a more generous and sustainable settlement, had it not been for the financial crash and its impact on wider government finances. 

How a sustainable settlement became unsustainable

The deal that was finally offered to councils by the Coalition Government in 2012 meant most councils had to take on additional debt and did not build in any allowance for investment in new homes. These councils had effectively to buy themselves out of the system to compensate the Treasury for its loss of annual income.  Councils therefore took on debt which the Government calculated would be sustainable for them to hold alongside managing their homes. Collectively, councils took on £8 billion of extra net debt. 

This was not an appealing offer to many councillors or tenants, especially where Housing Revenue Accounts started out debt-free, but ultimately, they agreed it was a price worth paying for a more independent future which would allow them the freedom to make local decisions and plan over the long term. 

Unfortunately, the assumptions underpinning the self-financing deal did not last long –Right to Buy was immediately ‘re-invigorated’ and many more sales were made than assumed, reducing the rental income the 2012 debt calculation was predicated on. 

Rent policy was then changed significantly. Instead of increasing steadily by inflation, rents were reduced by 1% in cash terms each year from 2016 to 2020 taking a significant amount of money out of councils’ budgets.   

Alongside that loss of income have been unforeseen drivers of increased costs; the need for increased building and fire safety work and meeting new decent homes and energy efficiency targets, alongside much higher cost inflation than expected.  Whilst councils were always prepared for some ups and downs, these pressures have pushed some to breaking point. There is simply not enough money in the system to allow council housing to be run properly.

Why debt write-off alone won’t solve the problem

Shelter has recently published further analysis on debt in the HRA by Savills which builds on work they did for CIH in 2024 to look at an updated debt settlement.  Savills conclude that “there is little or no capacity to support the ability for local authorities to contribute meaningfully to the government’s target of 1.5million new homes and therefore to enhance the delivery of social rent homes.” Shelter is therefore calling for the write-off of all HRA debt. 

We agree there is an urgent need for HRA debt to be looked at, but councils’ ability to invest in new homes will still be limited by the needs of their existing homes.  Due to different original rent levels, the type and age of the homes they own and the level of housing need in their areas, each local authority is in a very different position now compared to 2012. London and other inner-city authorities are facing significantly increased costs in dealing with building safety and the need for wider regeneration, whilst others have lost more homes through the Right to Buy and lack the land to replace them.    

A new settlement for a new council housebuilding era

We are therefore calling for the Treasury and MHCLG to be tasked jointly with reviewing these issues to facilitate council house building.  The review should meaningfully engage with councils and tenants as well as sector experts at the earliest opportunity to ensure that key stakeholders concerns and aspirations are fully understood and that lessons from the past are learnt. 

It took almost a decade for councils, tenants and the government to develop and agree the principles for the original self-financing settlement. We urge the new administration to start this work urgently so that councils can be placed back onto a sustainable footing to invest in both existing and new homes.  Tenants have already waited long enough.

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Housing-led regeneration in Rotherham town centre is essential to improve opportunities, health and quality of life

The regeneration of Rotherham town centre is one of the top priorities that residents set for us. Like many places, residents here have greeted the decline of the high street, the withdrawal of major shopping brands and decaying public realm with a foreboding sense of permanent decline.

In our case, the downward trajectory probably started earlier than for many others, with our neighbouring centres at Meadowhall, the out-of-town centre at Parkgate, Barnsley, Doncaster, Sheffield and Worksop town centre all within easy driving distance of many of our residents – and this was even before Amazon arrived.

The Council has been successful in securing significant central Government investment over recent years, strengthening the interventions that the Council has been able to make. We’ve brought cinema back into Rotherham for the first time in thirty years as part of our flagship Forge Island leisure development. Our markets complex is undergoing a £40+ million redevelopment, which will also bring our central library back into the heart of the town. Our public spaces are being upgraded, our events programme boosted, and we’re putting in place additional support for traders and local businesses.

Rebuilding the Town Centre Community

But making all that investment sustainable requires more people to live in and around our town centre – in what we’ve begun to call our town centre community.

Our town centre is already home to approximately 3,500 people. Incomes are relatively modest, households are younger than the borough average, and most households live in private or social rented accommodation.

The introduction of additional residential accommodation is a key component in supporting the continued diversification and long-term vitality of the town centre. Increasing the resident population within the centre will help to generate sustained footfall and local expenditure, which are widely recognised as key factors in supporting the viability of high streets and town centres.

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A greater level of town centre living will also contribute to activity beyond traditional trading hours, helping to support the evening economy and a broader mix of uses, including leisure, food and beverage, and community services. This in turn supports a more resilient and vibrant town centre, reducing reliance on traditional retail and aligning with national trends which identify housing-led regeneration as a key driver in the revitalisation of town centres.

Why Council Leadership Matters

In 2023, the Council built the first new affordable homes in decades in the town centre. This Council investment has delivered 171 new homes across three Council-owned sites at key gateways to the town centre.

The focus of this investment was to deliver mixed tenure communities – and whilst the majority of these homes were for council rent or Shared Ownership (forming part of our wider commitment to the delivery of new council homes), we also delivered a small number of homes for private market sale.

The delivery of Council-led housing in Rotherham town centre has required overcoming a number of challenges, including development viability in a relatively low-value market, the complexity of bringing forward brownfield sites, and the need to create a new residential market within a traditionally retail-focused centre. Success has depended on significant public sector investment, strong project management and complementary investment in leisure, culture and public realm to create an attractive and sustainable place to live.

Without the Council taking on the risks associated with site assembly, viability gaps and placemaking, much of the town centre residential offer that now exists would be unlikely to have come forward through the market alone. The market wasn’t failing because nobody wanted regeneration. It was failing because nobody could take the first step.

The Next Phase of Regeneration

Rotherham town centre is now entering a new phase of transformation, with significant opportunities emerging through the delivery of the Town Centre Masterplan and the Council’s programme of Strategic Sites. Building on substantial public sector investment already made across the town centre, the focus is now shifting towards creating an even stronger residential offer that complements new employment, leisure and cultural opportunities. It’s an approach that also helps to reduce the pressure on green belt development, given our National Planning Policy Framework housing delivery target has effectively been doubled.

A key driver of future growth will be the proposed Rotherham Gateway mainline station and the wider regeneration corridor that surrounds it. The station will reconnect Rotherham directly to national rail services, acting as a catalyst for investment, new jobs, commercial development and housing growth. Its strategic location between the town centre and the planned Bassingthorpe Farm development creates a unique opportunity to link a major new residential community with the town centre, supporting demand for new homes and reinforcing the role of the town centre as a key destination for living, working and leisure.

It’s in this context that the work being done by the Northern Housing Consortium’s Renew project is so important. Their recent report found that housing-led regeneration can unlock at least 500,000 good quality homes across the North of England, but only with the right support. In communities like mine, new sustainable housing developments are key to long-term regeneration – not just putting a lick of paint on existing infrastructure. That means that viability gaps will have to be filled. The state must be actively involved if the market is going to be able to deliver. We need advocates in national Government to fill the gap left by the last Government.

For Rotherham, investment in the town centre is not just a vital place-based regeneration programme, but also a catalyst for improving opportunities, health and quality of life across the surrounding neighbourhoods.

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Two things the new Prime Minister could do immediately to boost social rent supply

Andy Burnham’s commitment to deliver the biggest programme of council and social housebuilding since the post-war era is both ambitious and hugely welcome.

For the millions of people trapped in England’s housing crisis, including the 176,000 children growing up in temporary accommodation, that ambition cannot come soon enough.

The good news is that momentum is already building. Thanks to decisions already made by the Government, councils and housing associations increasingly have the confidence, funding and policy certainty to ramp up delivery of social rent homes. NHF figures show a 57% increase in social rented homes started last year.

These are the green shoots of a renaissance in social housebuilding. But they are fragile and progress could easily stall. To sustain momentum and translate ambition into delivery, there are two immediate steps the new Prime Minister could take.

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The first is to immediately confirm successful bids for Strategic Partnership funding under the Social and Affordable Homes Programme (SAHP). These bids have been submitted and assessed and are now awaiting political approval before they can be announced. Councils and housing associations have schemes waiting, planning secured, and just need the funding confirmed to get building tens of thousands of homes. A summer of delay and uncertainty on grant funding could bring the current momentum to a halt. This creates a real risk that providers will be forced to delay, scale back or even abandon development opportunities, ultimately leaving families trapped in unaffordable temporary accommodation or private rent for longer.

The second is to top up the funding for this and subsequent years of the SAHP – either via redirecting existing budgets immediately or via new funding at the next fiscal event. The £39bn for social housing announced at last year’s spending review was a generational shift in support, but it is spread over 10 years, with the funding profile weighted toward later years, while many schemes are ready to proceed now.

We could build more homes, more quickly, on schemes that are ready to go, if more funding was available early on, for both Continuous Market Engagement and Strategic Partnership funding routes.

Doing these two things immediately would sustain momentum, get spades in the ground and more households into desperately-needed social rent homes as quickly as possible.

There are opportunities to go much further, to deliver the increase in social housebuilding we need, whether through seizing the opportunities of devolution, New Towns, Land Value Capture, reforming council housing debt rules, or exploring new models of public ownership. Councils and housing associations stand ready to work alongside communities and the government to unlock these opportunities, but they will take time to bear fruit. In the meantime, we must maintain and accelerate the progress already being made.

England’s housing crisis is one of the defining social and economic challenges of our time. It damages life chances, drives homelessness, places unsustainable pressure on public services and undermines economic growth. The government has laid important foundations for a new era of social housebuilding. The priority now is to turn that ambition into delivery – building more homes, more quickly, for the people who need them most.

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Can England afford (not) to build council homes?

Before the 2024 General Election, I had the privilege to work with England’s largest council landlords on Securing the Future of Council Housing. The report set out five key recommendations to allow councils to once again play a major role in housing supply, and to refurbish and improve existing homes and neighbourhoods after decades of under-investment.

It is an ambitious vision for a new, better relationship between central government and council landlords. Over 100 councils led by different parties across the country backed the report, laying the ground for a powerful coalition which has successfully influenced Government policy since. Every council involved has been essential in raising the volume of council housing’s voice, but particular credit should go to the London Borough of Southwark under Kieron Williams’ leadership for kickstarting the campaign, and to Sheffield City Council and Leeds City Council for helping it spread.

On Monday, Andy Burnham pledged the ‘biggest council housebuilding programme since the post-war period’ – a period when councils delivered over 4 million homes in 36 years. Since that time, more council homes have been sold than new ones delivered. It’s been a long wait, but it may finally be time for a renaissance in council housing.

But can we afford it?

Yet serious questions are being asked about whether we can afford it. This is not just because it costs money to build low-cost social homes. It is because councils are public bodies, and their borrowing is ‘on balance sheet’. Most social homes in England today are owned and delivered by non-profit Housing Associations, whose borrowing is ‘off balance sheet’. It doesn’t count towards public debt. That difference has shaped housing policy for decades.

In this blog, I’m going to try to demystify the impact of council housing on public debt, and how the UK’s fiscal rules change things.

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How council housing came under financial attack

Council housing is treated differently from all other council-owned assets in accounting terms. Council landlords keep rental income in a Housing Revenue Account (HRA), which is kept separate from other council income. This is to protect social tenants’ money, so it doesn’t get used to fund general council services.

In 2012, the Government and councils agreed a ‘self-financing settlement’ aiming to make HRAs more independent and more sustainable. The settlement was supposed to give councils the financial certainty to invest in their homes, but it was quickly ripped up. Social rents were cut and capped with little notice, borrowing rates for councils were increased overnight, and councils had to sell more homes with bigger discounts following Right to Buy reforms. Top it all off with a pandemic, geopolitical turmoil and rising inflation and interest rates, and the unsurprising result is that most HRAs are in poor financial health. A 2024 report from Savills and the Chartered Institute for Housing suggested that debt cancellation of £17bn would be needed to make HRA borrowing sustainable across the board. This means many council landlords cannot invest in homes in the ways communities need.

Accounting for council housing

In the UK’s national accounts, all HRAs are consolidated and treated as a single ‘non-financial public corporation’. This means they count towards public debt for the purposes of the UK’s fiscal rules. Fiscal rules are the Government’s self-imposed limits on how much it can borrow, spend and accumulate debt. They are designed to reassure financial markets that the public finances will remain sustainable and so keep the Government’s borrowing costs lower.

Before the 2024 autumn budget, the UK used Public Sector Net Debt (PSND) for our fiscal rules. Council housing performed particularly poorly under this measure. Borrowing to finance public investment – including in council housing – increased the headline debt figure, even if the Government acquired valuable assets in return.

The current Government switched from PSND to Public Sector Net Financial Liabilities (PSNFL). The new rules still count debt the Government owns, but they also count financial assets the Government owns – though not physical assets like homes.

This is where things get interesting for council housing.

By far the largest source of borrowing for council housing is from the Public Works Loan Board (PWLB): effectively, councils borrow money from the Treasury, which raises the money by selling gilts on the international markets. When the Treasury lends to council landlords in this way, under PSNFL it actually creates an asset for the public sector: the money councils owe to HMT.

The result is that investing in council housing is a lot easier than it used to be. Let’s say the Treasury agrees to ‘forgive’ £100 million of unsustainable HRA debt to give councils some breathing room, and councils then take out £100 million of new PWLB loans.

Under the old debt rules, this would have looked like the Government simply taking on more debt. Under the new PSNFL rules, it is treated more like cancelling an old loan and then making a new one. The council owes the Treasury £100 million, but the Treasury also owns a £100 million loan. That new loan is recognised as a public financial asset and is largely netted off public debt.

So there’s no reason not to invest in council housing?

Not quite.

New PWLB borrowing for council housing still increases the size of the Government’s balance sheet and the amount of money the Treasury has to raise from investors to finance the new PWLB loans: HMT has to borrow to on-lend to councils. It is unclear how markets would react to a large-scale increase in investment for council housing using the current model. That depends partly on the scale of new PWLB lending, but above all on investor expectations of the UK’s wider fiscal position.

There’s another problem for council housing. While PSNFL makes investing in council homes easier, it also makes other models of delivering social housing even more fiscally attractive. In February 2026, the Government announced a £2.5 billion scheme to provide loans to Housing Associations at 0.1% for 25 years. Incidentally, that’s a much better deal than councils are getting from the Public Works Loan Board at the moment!

Under PSNFL, these loans to HAs are ‘financial transactions’ because the Government acquires a financial asset (a loan) in exchange for cash. But unlike councils, when HAs take out loans from the Government it does not create a liability for the public sector, because their borrowing is ‘off balance sheet’.

If you can deliver the same kinds of homes using private borrowing via HAs, you may get the same policy results with less public sector borrowing and less gross balance sheet expansion. That should make it easier to maintain investor confidence and help keep the Government’s borrowing costs lower. And that may actually be key to increasing investment in social housing: if the UK can borrow more cheaply, we have more space to increase the size of funds like the Social and Affordable Homes Programme. That’s essential to unlocking more social housing supply.

Can we afford not to invest in council housing?

It’s complicated and there are no easy answers. But alongside asking if we can afford to build council homes, we also need to ask if we can afford not to. The clearest fiscal argument here concerns the high costs managing homelessness.

Councils in England now spend £7.7 million every day to put people up in expensive – often sub-standard – Temporary Accommodation. HAs play a vital role in tackling homelessness, but the buck for homelessness ultimately stops with councils. No one else is incentivised to act the way councils are. Getting councils off the bench and delivering homes may be the only way England stops managing homelessness and starts preventing it.

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Regeneration means delivering for northern communities

Poor housing touches every part of a person’s life, and the consequences can be profound. Families crammed into overcrowded homes, and the strain this places on children’s ability to learn and thrive. People living with damp and mould, and the damage this does to their physical and mental health. Households in draughty, poorly insulated properties struggling to heat their homes and keep up with rising energy bills.

Housing is a policy area where getting it right can truly transform lives, not only by ensuring people have a safe and secure place to live, but by improving educational outcomes, strengthening health, and helping families make ends meet. That is why this agenda matters so deeply; because a good, safe, affordable home is the foundation on which a good life is built.

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The Government understands this and its transformational investment in social and affordable housing marks a pivotal moment in national policy.  It does more than allocate funding; it signals a shift in purpose. After years of fragmented initiatives, we are beginning to see the emergence of a more ambitious, more place sensitive approach to tackling the housing crisis. It is an approach that recognises the diverse realities of our towns, cities, and rural communities, and the different tools required to support them.

Crucially, the Government has acknowledged that delivering on both housing and regeneration is central to its future mission. Tackling housing poverty, expanding the supply of social and affordable homes, and revitalising neighbourhoods are not marginal add‑ons, they are fundamental to economic growth, social stability, and national renewal. The Pride in Place programme, with its focus on reviving high streets and improving public spaces, underlines this commitment, linking physical transformation with wider social outcomes across education, health, and community safety.

What makes this moment especially significant is that ambition is now backed by serious investment. The Social and Affordable Homes Programme, the introduction of new low interest loans for social housing providers, and the launch of a decade-long Plan for Neighbourhoods show a willingness to think long-term. Many of the communities that stand to benefit from this investment are in the North. For them, these announcements are not abstract policy concepts, they represent the building blocks of a better future.

Many funding programmes under Conservative-led governments neglected communities in the North, but important changes to the Treasury’s Green Book have altered how public funds are assessed and allocated. By placing greater weight on social value, wellbeing, and local need, the system now opens the door to investment in places that have too often been overlooked. For those working at the intersection of housing and regeneration, this shift is more than a technical reform. It creates a policy environment where long-term, community-led renewal is more achievable, more defensible, and more likely to be sustained.

Regeneration is not simply about bricks and mortar. It is about restoring pride, creating opportunity, and building resilience. Ultimately, it is about ensuring that people not only have a decent home, but a meaningful stake in the place they live. That is why housing-led regeneration must be central to the national housing agenda. New homes are essential, but they are not enough. We must also invest in the homes that already shape people’s everyday lives and the neighbourhoods that define their sense of belonging. Regeneration cannot be treated as an optional extra. It is a core component of building a fairer, greener, more prosperous North.

The Northern Housing Consortium’s Renew inquiry is a key component of this. By bringing together housing providers, local leaders, developers, policymakers, and regeneration specialists, the inquiry demonstrates that collaboration is the key foundation for success. If we want to deliver regeneration that lasts, we need to work across boundaries, share knowledge openly, and build partnerships rooted in trust and shared ambition.

This is precisely why the Renew inquiry is so important. It embodies the collaborative, evidence-driven approach that this moment demands. Findings from the Renew Call for Evidence are launching tomorrow (9th June) in parliament. The inquiry received submissions from housing associations and local authorities who own or manage nearly one million homes,over 70% of the North’s social housing.  This report will help shape a deeper understanding of how regeneration can drive growth, reduce inequality, and strengthen the social fabric of Northern communities.

Housing-led regeneration is uniquely positioned to act as a bridge between policy areas and to help articulate a coherent national narrative. It demonstrates, in a tangible way, what investment in neighbourhoods looks like in practice. From the home to the high street, regeneration joins up the physical and social aspects of placemaking. It helps counter feelings of mistrust and division by showing that change is being delivered with communities, not imposed upon them. In this way, it provides a powerful exemplar of the Government’s ambition: visible, local, and rooted in everyday life.

But to deliver on this promise, the work cannot be left to central government alone. Everyone must be involved. Local authorities, housing associations, developers, investors, community organisations, and residents all have a role to play. We must create the conditions where collaboration is the norm, where barriers are reduced, and where every partner is empowered to contribute. The most successful regeneration is grounded in local insight. It listens to communities, respects their knowledge, and builds solutions that reflect their aspirations.

Parliament also has a crucial role. The Renew inquiry offers MPs a direct line to the people and organisations shaping regeneration on the ground. By visiting projects, hearing from residents, and staying close to the evidence, parliamentarians can ensure policy reflects lived experience rather than abstract models.

As we look ahead, the message is clear: this is a moment we cannot afford to waste. The frameworks are improving. The investment is growing. The partnerships are emerging. What we need now is the resolve to turn ambition into action.

Housing-led regeneration gives us a way to do just that. It provides a practical route to deliver better homes, stronger neighbourhoods, and more confident communities. It allows us to connect national objectives – growth, opportunity, and fairness – with the everyday places where people live their lives.

If we seize this moment, we can deliver something truly transformative. Not piecemeal change, but lasting renewal. Not short-term fixes, but long-term investment in the future of the North. The tools are now on the table. It is up to all of us – government, local leaders, the housing sector, and communities themselves – to use them well.

Renew is an inquiry led by the Northern Housing Consortium and supported by Homes for the North and Muse, to explore housing-led regeneration’s role in delivering growth, tackling the housing crisis, and strengthening communities across the North.  

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What should a national tenant body for England do?

It feels like it’s past time to set up a national tenant body for England. Parts of the Government have been talking with various groups about doing just that – predominantly Baroness Taylor, the Government’s Parliamentary Under-Secretary for housing in the House of Lords, but some other representatives from both houses too.

Why England needs a national tenant body

Beyond asking how to get it off the ground, we should ask what such a body should be for, and what, if anything, national and local government should be doing to drive progress. A properly resourced national tenant body would make the work of politicians, staff at departments involved in the regulation of the social housing sector, and ultimately landlords, easier.

England has been here before. The 2007 Cave Review into social housing regulation argued that tenants needed a far stronger role within the regulatory system, helping pave the way for the National Tenant Voice programme established by the last Labour government in 2009. National Tenant Voice was intended to provide an independent national platform for social tenants to influence policy and regulation, and was set up remarkably quickly once political momentum existed. But the Coalition government abolished it in 2010 before it had fully embedded itself institutionally or built a strong national profile. One lesson from this experience is that any new tenant body will need not only meaningful independence, but also deep roots in local communities and broad public legitimacy if it is to survive changes of government and become a lasting part of England’s housing system.

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In Wales, the National Independent Tenant Voice Cymru is already taking part in national policy debates with both landlords and the Senedd. The political landscape is different in Wales than in England, but there are certainly lessons to be learned from Wales about embedding  tenants’ priorities within policymaking and creating an effective national tenant voice.

Coincidentally, just after I was asked if I’d like to contribute my thoughts about a national tenant group to Red Brick, I attended a pair of workshops hosted by the National Tenant Alliance – one of the groups setting out the case for a tenant voice in England. These events explored what tenants want from a national body, how it could operate in practice, and what resources would be needed to sustain it.

Having facilitated some of the discussions at these workshops, I have heard first-hand what tenants want a national body to achieve.

Rebalancing power in social housing

One of the core essential features that keeps cropping up is the need to rebalance power between tenants, landlords and government. Much has been made of the changes introduced through the Regulation of Social Housing Act 2023, but many tenants rightly feel it has not met the promises made in the 2018 Social Housing Green Paper.

Rebalancing power means redistributing it.  Parts of the social housing sector seem resistant to the changing regulatory environment, but many tenants feel the promises of the 2018 Social Housing Green Paper still have not been fulfilled. From tenants’ perspective, expectations around professionalism, competence and respectful treatment can still feel secondary within the regulatory system. While organisational culture is difficult to legislate for, many other professions manage to uphold clear standards without resistance or lobbying.

Giving tenants a voice locally, regionally and nationally

Tenants also place a lot of value in ensuring that any national body actually operates at the regional and local level. Tenants need an ‘unmediated voice’ in national policymaking, but the issues shaping those discussions are usually rooted in communities and everyday local experience.

A tenant network could be a much better way of spreading what works and what is best practice. The current methods are landlords trying are apparently failing to get better outcomes. Lacklustre tenant satisfaction measures, unambitious Consumer Gradings and warnings from the Ombudsman that the scale of complaints is only getting wider and deeper suggest that the absence of a tenant body treated as equals is creating more work for everyone else, not least Members of Parliament who face a deluge of housing-related casework due to a lack of ambition or progress. Some recent housing policies have not only failed to resolve the many quality issues in social housing, but have been worsening the cost of living crisis for tenants for many years.

Independence, funding and legitimacy

One of the more innovative ideas about the purpose of a national tenant body I heard recently was as a starting point for mediation. Currently tenants have only two mediation routes: formal court-directed mediation once legal proceedings have begun, or ‘alternative dispute resolution’ processes aimed at resolving issues before they escalate to disrepair claims or other legal action. Such processes can still feel heavily weighted towards landlords. I found it fascinating to ponder a situation where a national tenant body could offer not just signposting to other resources, but real advocacy in these situations to rebalance power between tenants and landlords.

So, what should the Government and local authorities and landlords do to support a national tenant body? There are surely going to be a lot of different views among tenants about this, but for my part I think they should largely agree to recognise its validity and then get out of the way.

This doesn’t mean their involvement in funding solutions isn’t important. One of the more popular suggestions for funding is a small annual payment from rents, perhaps taken out of the significant sums paid per home for services from the Ombudsman and Regulator. Although this could take the form of a voluntary membership fee paid per tenancy (as in Wales) no doubt there will be some wrangling over the amounts needed to run a tenant body – and over what implications this funding could have on the independence a tenant body so desperately needs.

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