Image: Places for People
Delivering thriving communities
Housing providers must work closely with the government – and each other – to deliver not only new homes but also connected communities for people to live in
GROWTH, REGENERATION & DEVELOPMENT
Greg Reed
Group CEO, Places for People
Greg Reed
Group CEO, Places for People
Issue 73 | September 2024
The relationship between the housing sector and the government is the backbone of a healthy housing market. Regardless of which party is in government, we must work closely with them but also challenge them when we need to. We must fight for our customers and indeed those sadly without somewhere to call home, so we can help ensure the right volume, quality and mix of housing is available and accessible.
In England alone, there are currently 1.3 million people on social housing waiting lists and more than 110,000 households living in temporary accommodation, which effectively means they are homeless. In addition to this, our own research as part of our #TimetoBuild campaign highlights that one in five people fear they, or someone they know, could become homeless in the next 12 months.
Broken housing system
Let me be frank, this is absolutely not good enough and is quite clearly a symptom of a broken housing system. Something desperately needs to change and a new government offers us an opportunity to tackle the major challenges we face.
There isn’t a problem that can’t be helped by building more homes, in particular affordable and social homes. So, it was a huge boost for the housing sector to see the government immediately put housebuilding front and centre of its first King’s Speech, tackling many of the barriers that have been standing in our way for too long, including reforming the planning system and reinstating housing targets.
Image: Places for People
Importance of infrastructure
The government’s exciting ‘new towns’ plans are also something we fully support. Our own #TimetoBuild research illustrated that approximately three-quarters of people also want greater investment in local infrastructure to support new housebuilding.
To really drive delivery of the right homes, in the right places, supported by the right infrastructure, local planning authorities need to provide their own local plans. However, only 22% of them have adopted one in the past five years. So, if I was to have another ask of the government, it would be to address this and really push for the creation of local plans.
Places for People is ready and raring to go to be a partner of this government and we have written to the Secretary of State in recent weeks to make this clear. Our infrastructure, resources and plans to do more are already in place.
We’re one of the UK’s leading affordable housebuilders, and have the biggest pipeline of any organisation in our sector with more than 13,000 homes expected over the next five years – and more than 2,000 completions set for this year alone.
households living in temporary accommodation in England
of councils have adopted a local plan over the past five years
homes to be built by Places for People over the next five years
Further and faster
But we want to, and need to, go further and faster. We invite this new government to work with us, other housing associations and local authorities to build social housing at scale and significantly increase homes each year – ideally 90,000 new social homes per year.
As well as being able to advise on policy that directly impacts housing in the UK, we’re willing to put ourselves forward to drive new ways of working. For example, we know that building 90,000 social homes a year will be a challenge, but we’re ready to help.
We see an opportunity to deepen our collaboration with partners and work closely together as part of public-interest-led development groups. This would bring developers, local authorities, members of the public and others together on larger schemes so we can get it right and deliver the quality homes needed in a more joined-up and community-focused way.
This could be supported by giving Homes England greater flexibility over funding to deliver on more challenging sites. We want to put ourselves forward to work closely with Homes England and a local authority on a specific site to trial this model.
I’m really encouraged by what I’ve heard from the government so far and we can play a major role in bringing its vision to life. The need for new homes is desperate and we have no time to waste. It’s Time to Build.
“As well as being able to advise on policy that directly impacts housing in the UK, we’re willing to put ourselves forward to drive new ways of working.”
Places for People is a social enterprise which owns or manages more than 245,000 properties in the UK across all tenures, 73,000 of which are social homes. It also operates more than 100 leisure centres that aim to improve health and wellbeing for its customers and communities.
