Government hits back at media claims about housebuilding targets

The Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLHUC) has hit back at media claims about its housebuilding targets.

The Times newspaper published an article last week that claimed the Government has failed to deliver on its manifesto pledge to deliver a million homes over the course of this Parliament. 

Despite data showing housebuilding has slowed and a FullFact investigation criticising Prime Minister Rishi Sunak’s suggestions that record numbers of homes being built, the Government went to the effort of a dedicated blog to refute the claims.

It said: “We are building more homes and are on track to deliver our manifesto commitment to deliver 1m homes over this Parliament – we have delivered over 90% of this target already.

The blog suggests that claims that the Government has dropped targets are “completely false.”

That is despite mandatory targets being excluded from the Government’s flagship levelling up legislation.
 

The blog said: “Our goal of delivering 300,000 homes a year remains, and local authorities will continue to have to calculate and justify their local housing need, informed by the standard method. Last year alone we delivered over 234,000 homes which was higher than at any point between 1997 and 2010.”

A Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities spokesperson, added: “Our target of delivering 300,000 homes a year and one million over the course of this Parliament remains – we are clear councils must play their part and have clear plans on how they will help us achieve this.

“However, homes must be built in the right places and the greenbelt must be protected. We will shortly be publishing our response to the National Planning Policy Framework consultation which sets out how we will encourage the adoption of local plans, deliver the homes we need as well as wider changes to speed up the planning system.”