Industry reacts to election result

The industry has been reacting to Labour’s landslide win in the general election, with housebuilders hoping the new government will fulfil its various pledges on housebuilding.

Neil Jefferson, the Home Builders Federation’s chief executive, said: “We look forward to engaging with the new government on how we deliver its very welcome ambitions for housing delivery. Recent years have seen sharp falls in both the number of homes being built and the planning permissions being granted and there are some major barriers that need to be removed if we are to meet the challenge.

“We welcome the government’s commitments on planning. The recent weakening of the planning system and the lack of capacity in local authority planning departments are the current biggest constraint on delivery.

“We also need to see effective support for first-time buyers to address the lack of affordable mortgage finance, and workable solutions to the nutrients issue that is holding up around 160,000 homes.

“If government can create a pro-development policy environment the industry stands ready to deliver.”

Andy Hill OBE, the Hill Group’s ceo, said he looked forward to new prime minister Sir Keir Starmer fulfilling his election pledge to reform housing. He urged Labour “to prioritise a comprehensive housing strategy by the end of 2024. Our country needs a complete overhaul of the planning system, removing local politics and empowering professional planning officers to make decisions.”

The new government also needed to create a “robust” supply of affordable housing and introduce a new version of Help to Buy, “potentially as a financial partnership between housebuilders and the government,” Hill added.

David Thomas, Barratt’s ceo, said: “The country urgently needs more new homes, of all types and tenures. We look forward to working with the new government to help them build 1.5 million homes across the next parliament, unlocking planning and helping first-time buyers access affordable finance, ultimately helping more families own a high quality, sustainable, new home.”

James Dickens, md of SME Wavensmere Homes, said it was positive “from an apolitical standpoint”, that a moderate party had been elected “with such a strong mandate”. Alongside receiving assurances on planning reform (Labour recently visited Wavensmere’s live sites), Dickens said he was encouraged that Labour “has pledged to tackle typical brownfield build-rates”. But he cautioned that the new administration “must make sure more first-time buyers can access the housing ladder”.

With this clear mandate, Mike Sambrook, md of SJ Roberts Homes, urged Labour to “act quickly to demonstrate the positive changes that they’ll make, and in housing, this must come via ministerial stability so that demonstrable change is delivered by a consistent team”.

Also picking up on the Help to Buy-replacement theme, he pointed out that the new government’s proposed Freedom to Buy scheme was “little more” than a permanent mortgage guarantee scheme, “which experience has demonstrated to be unpopular amongst lenders and unlikely, therefore, to have the impact that Labour anticipates”. He welcomed Labour’s pledge to fund additional planning officers but added that he wished to see “greater policing of the market” to create a “fairer” playing field for all developers.

While a new Help to Buy would be beneficial, “focusing on demand side incentives without tackling the root causes that are inhibiting the supply of housing would simply drive house prices up further,” warned Ian Jones, ceo of Backhouse. “To get anywhere near delivering 1.5 million new homes in the next five years requires urgent and widespread action as there are many issues to overcome. Targeting long standing and ever increasing supply side constraints swiftly and decisively are key. “

Meanwhile, Mark White, md of Bargate Homes, said he was pleased the “direction of travel” was now “so clear”. But Labour now needed to decide how “bold” it was prepared to be with its manifesto promises. “Reintroducing top down housing targets, turning the clock back on the NPPF changes that have been so catastrophic for housing delivery, and large scale planning reform, should be amongst the first three priorities.”

White stated that the industry was “impatient to know how Labour intends to get Britain building again” – would the current Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities structure remain or be replaced? “Implementing change down to a local authority level will be a monumental task”.

Graham Hutton, deputy md of Baker Estates, agreed that reinstating mandatory housing targets was “critical”. The new government, he said, “can be successful if they concentrate on the difficult and important supply side issues rather than easy announcements with no long term impact. We are keen to play our part in helping the government understand in detail the issues faced whilst offering solutions and delivering on them”.

Andrew Brooks, Bewley’s md, stated that Labour had “put forward some good proposals to stimulate the much-maligned housing market”. But he cautioned that it would “take months before its measures will see any positive results”. Whatever the colour of government, “the housing sector needs a pro-build, pro-planning government because the whole economy benefits from it. We wait with some cautious optimism that things will change for the better in the coming months”.

Similarly, Mark Adams, executive chairman of Pennyfarthing Homes, said the housebuilder “supports any party that focuses on creating more homes during this housing crisis where many are living in unacceptable conditions”. But while he “eagerly awaited” the result of Starmer’s pledge to “change the face of housing”, he warned that “the devil will be in the details and until we see the specifics, it is difficult to feel optimistic”.

HBF’s Neil Jefferson also commented: “Building the homes the country needs will address the social issues our housing crisis is creating, provide young people with access to decent housing, whilst creating tens of thousands of jobs and boosting investment in communities in every area of the country.”