Government outlines new £44bn homebuilding plans

The Government has confirmed plans to increase the number of new homes being built to 300,000 a year by the mid-2020s in today's Budget.

Related topics:  Finance News
Rozi Jones
22nd November 2017
new build house
"Today’s budget has amounted to little more than the annual dose of rhetoric and empty announcements of bold plans, extolling a robust intent to build more housing."

As part of additional homebuilding plans, the government has pledged a total of at least £44 billion of capital funding, loans and guarantees to support our housing market over the next five years.

Chancellor Philip Hammond says the package of measures will include:

- A £630 million small sites fund to unstick the delivery of 40,000 homes,

- A further £2.7bn to more than double the Housing Infrastructure Fund,

- £400 million for estate regeneration,

- and a £1.1 billion fund to unlock strategic sites, including new settlements and urban regeneration schemes.

The government will also lift HRA caps for councils in high demand areas and launch £8 billion of new financial guarantees to support private housebuilding and the purpose-built private rented sector.

Additionally, it is providing an additional £34m to develop construction skills across the country.

Finally, the Homes and Communities Agency will expand to become “Homes England”. Hammond said the new Agency will have "a clear remit to facilitate delivery of sufficient new homes, where they are most needed, to deliver a sustained improvement in affordability".

Founder and CEO of eMoov, Russell Quirk, commented: "Today’s budget has amounted to little more than the annual dose of rhetoric and empty announcements of bold plans, extolling a robust intent to build more housing.

The Treasury’s ‘pledge’ to build more homes is a story we’ve been told many times before, but these well-worn, heady platitudes have not been fulfilled since way, way back in 1969 when the Beatles were topping the charts.

The likelihood of hitting the ambitious target of 1 million homes by 2050 is slim, to say the least, and one that is unlikely to be hit. The ‘urgent’ review of the gap in planning permission and the actual building of houses is also far too little too late and should have been implemented many budgets ago.  

The Government must actually execute on a housing plan if the current housing crisis is to be remedied and not just grab headlines with their unqualified so-called intentions. This problem is not just about money. It’s about action and it’s about listening to experts within the industry for once."

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