The time is right for more nuanced housing policy – collaboration is key

I currently chair Homes for the North – an alliance of 17 large developing housing associations that are working together to put housing at the heart of the North’s economic revival.

In 2019 we commissioned two research reports that evidenced the need for a new approach for assessing housing need and allocating investment in the North.

Our Role of Housing in the Northern Powerhouse research was carried out in conjunction with Transport for the North. It found that two million new homes will be needed in the North by 2050 in order to achieve the ambitions set out in the Northern Powerhouse Independent Economic Review. This is significantly higher than historic levels of provision.

However our second research report, The Spatial Distribution of Housing Investment, highlighted that a focus on areas where affordability is most pressed means that public funding is actually being targeted away from the North, to where house prices are highest, especially in the South East. It found that UK public spending on housing targeted at the North had reduced from 24 per cent of a total to 17.8 per cent over the past 20 years. And looking forward, the prospects for future investment in housing are grim:

• Only four of 72 northern councils are able to access 80 per cent of funding set aside for five targeted funding programmes designed to stimulate housing growth. This could lead to as little as 10 per cent of this funding being allocated to the North. When this targeted funding is overlaid with measures of deprivation, there is a clear mismatch. Areas experiencing high levels of deprivation are largely being excluded from funding based on affordability pressures alone.
• Only 11 northern councils are able to bid for future grant allocations for social rented housing.

Taking this together, the research found that the North’s share of public money made available to support the delivery of new housing faces a dramatic fall of up to 50 per cent unless government takes a fresh approach.

Collaboration, not competition

We are witnessing a shift in the way government investment to support housing provision is being targeted, with profound geographical implications. In the same way planning numbers are determined through the objectively assessed need formula, the geographical allocation of housing funding is primarily determined by historic market conditions, rather than aligned to wider growth and economic development objectives implicit in the Northern Powerhouse Strategy and becoming explicit through local industrial strategies.

So in 2020 Homes for the North members will continue to work with our northern partners, such as the combined authorities and Transport for the North, to develop a pan-northern housing vision and strategy, and to make the case to Whitehall for a change in housing planning and investment methodology.

As part of this, we’ll be setting our sights on a review of the Treasury Green Book. This is the government methodology to evaluate infrastructure projects, and its cost-benefit analysis approach puts the North at a huge disadvantage because of the difficulty of demonstrating short-term economic benefits. This goes directly counter to the government’s express ambition to level up the economy.

“We need an approach based on collaboration, not competition – not just at a northern level but also at a national level”

However it is important that this isn’t pitched as a North vs South argument. We need an approach based on collaboration, not competition – not just at a northern level but also at a national level. All parts of the country need new homes. Homes for the North’s aim is not to take away from thriving economic areas in London and the South East, but to create a more balanced economy that sees all parts of the country grow and realise their full potential.

In fact, in the run-up to the general election we partnered with the G15 group of London housing associations and Homes for the South West to make the case for more government investment for social and affordable homes. After all, as housing associations we have the same basic ask: a long-term commitment to public investment, with more certainty over funding to allow housing associations to continue to build the homes that the UK needs.

In 2020 let’s continue working together, within the sector and with our regional partners, to make sure that housing takes its rightful place as an enabler of economic growth as well as providing somewhere for people to call home.

Carol Matthews, chair, Homes for the North, and chief executive, Riverside