The Week in Housing: shared ownership and Section 21 changes, and what we learned about council housebuilding

Good afternoon.

As the banning of Section 21 evictions, as part of the government’s Renters’ Rights Bill, returned to parliament this week, Inside Housing has published our second-ever list of the top 50 councils in Britain building the most homes.

We asked every council in England, Wales and Scotland for details on how many homes they have built – and what they intend to build.

We used this to put together our list of the top 50 councils building the most homes and you can read our three biggest takeaways here .

Angela Rayner, deputy prime minister and secretary of state for housing, said she was determined to ban Section 21 ‘no-fault’ evictions “as soon as possible” , as MPs debated the Renters’ Rights Bill in parliament.

During the debate, Kemi Badenoch slammed the bill, saying the Conservatives “tried to make it work and we couldn’t”.

The shadow housing secretary claimed that the previous government’s attempt at rental reforms was abandoned because “it was having negative effects”.

Ms Badenoch, who is standing to be the next Conservative Party leader against former housing secretary Robert Jenrick, claimed that Labour’s new bill would lead to “more chaos” .

She went on to complain about the government’s record on housing supply and immigration since it was elected by a landslide in July. Her party was in power for 14 years.

As part of the changes under the bill, social landlords operating shared ownership are being urged to prepare for major changes to their legal options around the tenure.

Lawyers are warning that landlords will see a “significant shift” in?how they can recover rent and service charge arrears , with extra staff training expected to be needed.?The changes will potentially give more powers to residents.

There has been a flurry of merger activity. The boards of Longhurst and Grand Union have approved a tie-up to form a 36,000-home landlord, and Housing Plus and Wrekin?also revealed they will complete coming together into a 34,000-home landlord in January.

A huge error at house builder Vistry will result in a change in its management team after it discovered that build costs on nine of its projects had been understated by ￡115m.

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