G15 responds to the consultation on proposed reforms to the planning system

We warmly welcome MHCLG’s proposals to reform the planning system. A revised National Planning Policy Framework is an important first step in allaying the decline in the delivery of new homes and tackling the housing crisis using planning policy measures. The G15 are particularly pleased to see the new government’s intention to build 1.5 million homes across its first parliament, and its plans to address long-standing issues with the planning system in this consultation. This includes proposals to reclassify poor quality green belt land as grey belt and requiring all LPAs to adopt local plans to meet housing targets based on a standardised assessment of housing need.

While we believe the NPPF consultation and wider planning reforms are a positive step in the right direction, we want to emphasise that planning reform alone is unlikely to lead to scale of change that the government has promised.

Last year, housing associations delivered 78% of England’s new affordable homes. G15 members alone started building 14,658 homes, of which over two-thirds were for affordable tenures and 70% were in London. However, absent of further intervention, we will be able to build substantially fewer homes over the coming years. In 2023/24 alone, we have seen starts fall by 76%.

It’s concerning that the number of new affordable and social homes is falling at a time when the need for them is so great. England, particularly London – where G15 members are primarily based – faces a severe housing shortage, especially of genuinely affordable housing. This shortage has serious human consequences: London’s poverty rate rises from 14% to 24% when housing costs are considered and 1 in 23 children in London are living in temporary accommodation.[1]

The planning system is just one of a number of current challenges which are holding back delivery of affordable housing. Recent G15 research finds that these pressures include high build cost inflation (23% in the past year), building safety remediation costs (£4bn by 2030 for our members), social housing rent freezes, decarbonisation, and the ongoing need to invest in homes and associated services to the benefit of existing residents.[2]

To make a success of its planning reforms, we encourage the government to address some of these constraints in the Autumn Statement. It could do this in a number of ways, including:

Linking social housing rents to inflation and giving the sector long-term certainty around the amount of rent it can collect (we welcome indications that this is in flight)

Revisiting the Affordable Homes Programme to ensure that grant funding is adequate to build the number of social and affordable homes that the country needs

Fully extending the Building Safety Fund/Cladding Safety Scheme to the social sector, to reduce the impact that building safety remediation costs have on sector finances

Releasing the Social Housing Decarbonisation Fund in full, to enable the sector to better plan for and schedule energy efficiency upgrades

Ensuring that local authority planning departments are well funded and resourced, so that they can deliver the required efficiencies and growth to facilitate the government’s new housebuilding targets.

We are ready to do more: aided by better policy decisions like this, we can continue to provide the new social and affordable homes London so badly needs. We can multiply whatever money the government chooses to contribute by attracting private investment. And as social landlords as well as developers, we have a long-term interest in ensuring the success of the homes and communities we build.