Question to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing & Communities:

To ask His Majesty's Government, following reports of stabilisation and growth in the housing market, what steps they are taking to ensure that this translates into an increased housing supply, particularly in areas facing housing shortages.

Housebuilding is a priority for this Government, and we are on track to meet our manifesto commitment to deliver one million homes over this Parliament. In December, the revised National Planning Policy Framework was published, making clear that a core purpose of the planning system is planning for the homes and other development that our communities need. With both the Levelling Up and Regeneration Act and the new Framework now in place, alongside the additional resources for planning departments the Government has recently announced, our planning reforms will accelerate the delivery of new homes.

We are spending billions to support housebuilding, including through our £1 billion Brownfield Infrastructure and Land Fund and our £1.5 billion Levelling Up Homebuilding Fund (LUHBF). We have scaled up the delivery of affordable housing by investing £11.5 billion through the Affordable Homes Programme, which will provide thousands of new homes for rent and sale across the country.

In February, we announced that we are consulting on a range of new measures to boost housebuilding while protecting the Green Belt, through strengthening planning support for brownfield housing development. Legislation was also laid to extend current permitted development rights to support the conversion of commercial buildings of any size into new homes, and we announced an expansion of the ENABLE Build scheme to increase availability of SME finance to the sector.