Planning and Infrastructure Bill

Mike Martin Excerpts

Report stage
Monday 9th June 2025 Commons Chamber

[Florence Eshalomi]

I thank my constituency neighbour for that important point. We have to be honest: the market facing developers is challenging. Their costs have increased, but we see waiting lists across our boroughs increasing daily. More and more people face an acute housing shortage. It is therefore important that when developers consult and go to planning committees with their development plans, they stick to what they have committed to. Developers must build the infrastructure that our communities need, and we must ensure that homes are built to the highest safety standards. We must be in no doubt that, unacceptably, we have for decades failed to build the homes that we need. If we want to give young people homes, stop families facing the scourge of homelessness, and ensure that every child has the best start in life, we must say yes to building more homes. In particular, not enough new social homes have been built. That is why I tabled new clause 50.

[Mike Martin (Tunbridge Wells) (LD)]

I completely agree that not enough social homes are being built. Does the hon. Lady think we should have a target for social homes in the Bill?

[Florence Eshalomi]

I thank the hon. Member for that point, and I am coming to some of the points on targets; essentially, this subject is why I tabled new clause 50, and I am grateful for the support of colleagues from all parts of the House. Social rent, as we know, is the most affordable housing tenure, as the rent is calculated through a national formula. Usually, the rent is set at around 50% of local market rents. That is exactly the kind of housing we need if we want to make progress towards ending homelessness during this Parliament.

The Minister told the Select Committee that the Government want to prioritise the building of new social rent homes as part of their social housing ambitions. My new clause 50 would require the Government to set a national target for the number of social rent homes that they want to deliver per year. The target would not be binding on the Government or the sector, but it would demonstrate the scale of the Government’s ambition. Targets are important to how our planning system works in England. Local and national housing targets make sure that our planners, developers and housing associations know how many homes the Government intend to deliver, and they allow communities to plan effectively.

The Government have been clear on their overall national housing targets, but the Select Committee believes that the Government must set out how they intend to hit that 1.5 million target, and we want to ensure that includes a target by tenure. In the absence of a specific housing target, the number of new social rent homes has plummeted from hundreds of thousands in the 1970s to consistently below 10,000 in the past decade.