A flurry of detail but still no strategy

Originally written as a column for Inside Housing.

After weeks and even months of significant announcements delayed and promised ‘in due course’ it feels as though, like buses, they have all arrived at once. 

From the Warm Homes Plan and energy efficiency to commonhold and leasehold reform, from the Decent Homes Standard to rent convergence and from Section 106 to a new social housing taskforce the list goes on and on. 

On social and affordable housing, the announcements are summarised in an update to last July’s plan for ‘a decade of renewal’.

The flurry of activity seems intended to clear the decks for the opening of bids for the Social and Affordable Homes Programme in February by giving providers increased certainty about their finances.

On housing in general, the common factors seem to be removing obstacles in the way of development and giving owners and tenants more control over their lives and better conditions.

In most of these decisions, the government has faced a choice between two or more competing views or interests. It has usually gone for the middle ground.

On rent convergence, for example, last year’s consultation asked whether below-formula social rents should increase by an extra £1 or £2 a week but social landlords were pressing for £3. 

In deciding on this, ministers had to weigh the costs to tenants and the Department for Work and Pensions against the positive impact on landlord investment in improvements and new homes and balance the interests of existing tenants against people waiting for a social home.

The decision to allow an extra £1 a week from April 2027 and £2 from April 2028 splits the difference but the delay means the extra income will be slow to arrive and in any case it will probably not be enough to make up for the rent cuts imposed in the 2010s.