Claim

Labour will build 100,000 council houses a year by the end of the next parliament, a significant increase on the 6,287 built in 2018-19. In addition, there will be 50,000 housing association homes.

Background

The party has promised a “housing revolution” focused on a programme to build council houses. It plans to provide the homes for social rent – currently this is linked to local incomes, but the party is proposing changing this to link it to rents on the open market.

The 50,000 housing association homes will be “genuinely affordable” the party says. They will need to meet new rules on cost – rents will either be social rents, or linked to a third of local incomes, while homes to buy will have mortgage costs linked to a third of local incomes.

Reality

The target of 100,000 council homes is in line with the needs identified by housing experts. The property company Savills, for example, found that there were 100,000 households who could not afford to access the housing market each year because they could not afford mortgages or rent at the current market rate.

The Chartered Institute of Housing has called for a 10-year programme to build 145,000 affordable homes a year, including 90,000 at social rents.

Figures published on Wednesday show that 57,485 affordable homes were created in England in 2018-19, so Labour target would require a large increase in construction. Experts are divided on how easy it will be to find the labour for that.

Emily Williams, a research analyst at Savills, said: “Aiming to build an additional 100,000 affordable homes is a major development programme that equates to a tripling of current levels of delivery. It would require a significant increase in capacity in all its forms – planning, build capacity and building management.”

But Neal Hudson, a housing market analyst, said that while expertise had been lost by councils, the construction industry should be able to provide enough workers.

Land is also a factor. It is often a stumbling block for building. If councils have land, the pledge may encourage them to commit to building on it, but if they have to acquire land, that could be a problem.

Money will be key. Labour has not put a cost on this part of its plan in its latest announcement, talking instead of a £75bn fund that will be used for housing. But at its conference in September a motion was approved that ringfenced £10bn in grants to deliver 100,000 homes for social rent.

This seems a reasonable figure. In its research, which was done in 2017, Savills said providing 100,000 homes would require grants of £6.8bn to councils and housing associations, assuming they were built in London and the south-east, where they were most needed.

Hudson said that the target was achievable with the right budget. “£10bn for 100,000 homes is £100,000 each, which sounds about right,” he says. “Ultimately it comes down to whether they are prepared to pay for it and I think they are.”

Verdict

If Labour is prepared to put up enough in grants then the target should be achievable. The capacity of the construction industry, and the availability of land, will also be crucial.