My vision for social housing

In 1996 Tony Blair told The Independent that “I fully understand the very human aspiration to own your own home”, adding that he was “the first to acknowledge the success of the right to buy”.

Yet in practice, the Labour party has made buying and owning your own home much more difficult by introducing a series of stealth taxes. First, people buying a home are now hit by stamp duty. The average stamp duty bill has almost trebled, from just £680 in 1997 to £1754 today. And people owning or renting a home are hit by Labour’s increases in council tax, which has risen by more than 70% since the party came to power. And while Blair has acknowledged the success of right to buy, he has effectively abolished it by cutting discounts and reducing eligibility.

Today, people have to stretch much further to get onto the property ladder. Indeed, for many, the ladder is now completely beyond their reach. Everybody knows that we need to provide more housing. The question is, how?

We do not support John Prescott’s approach. Under Labour, housebuilding has fallen to its lowest level since the 1920s. The root cause of this problem is that housebuilders have been weighed down by unnecessary regulation (especially in relation to brownfield developments) and delay, and by artificial targets for affordable housing.

But the government is not addressing either of these issues. Instead, it says it wants to build 3.8 million houses in the next 20 years, and has decided to give regional authorities the power to overrule any objections from local communities about where they go. This approach is especially wrong-headed: it may have the remarkable treble effect of making all housebuilding unpopular; putting green fields at risk unnecessarily; and leaving unaddressed the root causes of its failure on housebuilding.

Conservatives recognise the need for more homes and we will shortly publish our detailed plans on housing supply. As many housebuilders tell me, many of the new homes could be built in the heart of existing towns and cities, where the proper infrastructure already exists. It is in regeneration, renovation and redevelopment that the opportunities exist for imaginative developers, and where opportunities for social renewal lie. Yet our bureaucratic and unresponsive planning system frustrates innovative schemes to redevelop brownfield sites. Tragically, Labour’s approach misses the opportunity to renew urban Britain.

As well as providing new housing, we need to make it easier for people to buy their own homes. We have always been the party of the homeowner. The last Conservative government gave 1.7 million people the chance to buy their council house. Now we want to bring those kinds of opportunities to a new generation.

First-time buyers who can’t afford to buy their home outright might be able to afford a half or two-thirds. Yet Labour has greatly reduced support for such shared-equity schemes. In 1995/6 the Housing Corporation supported the provision of 16,871 low-cost homes for sale. By 2001/2, this figure had fallen to 3481. There are currently more than 50,000 unsuccessful applications for these schemes every year.

Under the right to own, we will give much greater priority to shared-equity schemes within the housing budget so that its full potential can be realised. At least 50% of Housing Corporation grants will be dedicated to shared-equity schemes. As a result, many more people will have the opportunity to become homeowners.

We will also build on the principles of the right to buy to provide social housing tenants with a range of options that increase their chances of becoming homeowners. These policies go beyond the right to buy. Through these policies we will also tackle the scandal of homelessness by increasing the turnover of social housing. We will help tenants to buy any home of their choice, not just their current house, by extending the availability of transferable discounts beyond social housing. By using transferable discounts in this way, we will also free up existing social housing so it can be let to those most in need.

We will extend the right to buy to more than 1 million housing association tenants. The proceeds of this new right to buy will be made available to be reinvested in new social housing. We estimate that a new home could be provided for every two sold under the scheme. And we will give all social housing tenants a right to shared ownership. Tenants will be able to steadily build up a stake in the equity of their homes. As tenants build up their stake, the amount of support they receive via their rent will decrease. This support can then be used to help those most in need.

Labour has made it more difficult for people to buy their own home by failing to regenerate our inner cities and loading homeowners with stealth taxes. We will help families across Britain to fulfil the aspiration to own a home of their own. The Conservatives will bring the property ladder back within reach of those who now have no choice under Labour.