Report calls for social housing boom
A report from Policy Exchange has said that the UK needs to build 100,000 council homes a year and to ensure beauty in their design.
The independent think-tank said that the boost in social housing would ease pressure on public finances, and called for developers responsible for the delivery of council housing to “accept that beauty is important”, and for new sites to learn from the legacy of brutalist estates seen in the 1960s and 70s.
The report’s nine key recommendations include a new ‘Requirement to Build’, proposing primary legislation which would impose a statutory requirement on councils to build one council home for every council home sold.
New Homes Accelerator supports six new sites
The New Homes Accelerator has sped up the delivery of nearly 100,000 new homes across England, according to the government, with the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government (MHCLG) announcing six new large sites set to also benefit from the initiative.
Since its inception a year ago, the initiative has accelerated the delivery of 36,000 new homes, according to MHCLG.
The six new sites are:
- Wisley Airfield, Guildford
- Hampden Fields, Aylesbury
- Comeytrowe Garden Community, Somerset
- North Leigh Park, Wigan
- Billet Road in Redbridge, London
- High Road West, London
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