Gordon Brown and John Prescott also confirm purchase of 100 NHS sites for housing and announce three more sites for the £60,000 home competition.

English Partnerships is considering building affordable homes on 700 vacant public sector sites. Gordon Brown and John Prescott said that the sites being considered included Ministry of Defence land and public sector sites next to railway stations in London. They also confirmed that English Partnerships had acquired 100 surplus NHS sites for affordable housing.

Brown and Prescott were speaking at the pre-war Isokon building in Camden, which had been restored to provide shared ownership accommodation.

John Prescott also announced three further public sector sites for the Design for Manufacture competition, which challenges housebuilders to design high quality homes with a build cost of around £60,000.

The sites are on ex-NHS land. They are Renny Lodge, Newport Pagnell; Park Brewett, Basingstoke; and Laybourne Grange, Maidstone. These sites will provide 400 new homes, and in all, the scheme will provide nearly 1,000 homes.

Sites already announced include Oxley Park, Milton Keynes; Oxford Road, Aylesbury; Upton, Northampton and Allerton Millennium Community near Leeds.

Further sites and the names of the 33 bidders who will go through to the next round of the competition will be announced next week.