Speaking at the CIH Conference in Manchester on 26 June,
outgoing Prime Minister Theresa May set out her legacy on housing
and promised publication in September of an action plan and
timetable for implementing wide-ranging reforms of social housing
following the Social Housing Green Paper.
The Prime Minister said the action plan will include:
- The creation of a stronger consumer regulation regime for
social housing, enhancing tenants' rights and making it easier to
enforce them.
- Changes to the way complaints are resolved, so that tenants
know exactly how to raise concerns and can be confident their
voices will be heard and acted on.
- Empowering residents further by requiring landlords to
demonstrate how they have engaged with their tenants, and
- A commitment to further boost the supply of high-quality social
housing through the Affordable Homes Programme and other
funding.
Echoing the title of the paper "Social Housing we can all be proud of" that
ARCH submitted in June 2018 prior to the
publication of the Green Paper, the outgoing Prime Minister also
made reference to the 1919 Addison Act saying that "a hundred years
after the introduction of Britain's first council houses, she
wanted to see not just homes that people have to live in, but homes
they want to live in, homes they can be proud to live in".
The Prime Minister also acknowledged that too many governments,
including the previous one under David Cameron in which she served
as Home Secretary, had concentrated solely on boosting home
ownership, as if supporting those struggling to find a home to rent
was somehow contrary to such an aim.
She said that under her government that attitude has changed and
there had been a recognition that there are people for whom home
ownership will never be a realistic aim. That for others renting is
an unavoidable reality at one time or another and that some people
simply choose to rent, especially if it allows them to live in an
area they would otherwise struggle to afford. She said that being
able to choose to rent a decent home in the place that suits you
best is a vital part of a healthy housing system, one we see in
every major developed economy and no government should ignore the
needs of so many of its citizens.
She referred to the action taken to improve renting
including:
- Moves to increase the supply of affordable rental properties to
meet the rising demand
- Ending the proposals for a High Value Asset Levy on stock
retained councils and the forced sale of high-value council
properties
- Putting £2 billion of extra funding into the Affordable Housing
Programme with an explicit provision for building homes for social
rent, and
- Abolishing the Housing Revenue Account borrowing cap so that
local authorities are free to build once more
- Introduction of a new five- year social rent policy giving
social landlords the financial security they need to borrow,
invest, and build
- Scrapping the so-called "pay to stay" policy
- Confirming that her government will not pursue plans to abolish
lifetime tenancies for new council tenants
- Retaining supported housing in the welfare system.
The Prime Minister also announced that the Ministry of Housing
will shortly be launching a consultation on environmental
performance in new build homes, with a Future Homes Standard that
will give all new homes world-leading levels of energy efficiency
by 2025.
She also said she wanted to see changes to regulations so that
developers can only build homes that are big enough for people to
actually live in and said the next government should be bold enough
to ensure the Nationally Described Space Standard applies to all
new homes and becomes a mandatory regulation.
The Prime Minister also announced that a consultation on repeal
of Section 21 of the 1988 Housing Act will be published shortly,
with a view to introducing legislation later this year to ban
so-called "no-fault" evictions in the private rented sector.
Read the full text of the Prime Minister's
speech
John Bibby, ARCH Chief Executive comments:
"There is no doubt that Theresa May's government has been good
for council housing and stock retained councils are in a far better
position than that faced three years ago under the Cameron
government when the provisions of Part 4 of the Housing &
Planning Act 2016 seemed likely to see a further residualisation of
council housing with the introduction of a High Value Asset Levy,
the requirement to sell vacant high value council housing as it
became vacant, mandatory fixed term tenancies and "pay to stay" for
households with incomes over £31,000.
The Prime Minister's commitment to deliver a new generation of
council housing and the scrapping of the Housing Revenue Account
borrowing cap will allow councils to expand their new build
programmes and build more council housing.
Much of what ARCH was asking for in 2015 has been delivered by
Mrs. May's government but the total stock of council housing
continues to decline as the number of homes sold under the Right to
Buy currently far exceeds the number of new council homes being
built.
It remains to be seen whether Mrs. May's successor as Prime
Minister will continue to support the delivery of a new generation
of council housing. ARCH will continue to make the case for council
housing to the new government and in the year of the centenary of
the Addison Act, we look forward to seeing the detail of the
government's action plan and timetable for implementation of the
Social Housing Green Paper proposals to ensure that council housing
has a sustainable future over the next 100 years."