Urging the Minister to help them grasp the opportunity to ‘deliver the biggest boost to social housing in a generation’, the new social housing coalition aims to ask her how the sector can help deliver the new government’s commitment to build 1.5 million new homes by the end of this parliament.

The Secretary of State has spoken in the past about the transformative effect on her own life of growing up in affordable, safe social housing.

“Given the scale of financial pressures impacting the sector, delivering [the target of 1.5m new homes] will not be possible without urgent government intervention,” say coalition partners in their letter to her.

“As an unprecedented coalition of social housing providers and practitioners, [we want to] outline practical next steps to rebuild the capacity and confidence of the social housing sector. Given the scale and impact of this crisis, we would welcome the opportunity to discuss this further in an urgent roundtable meeting.”

Capped income, crippling cuts, unfunded new requirements and soaring costs have depleted housing association and council housing budgets. Rental income is 15% lower in real terms than in 2015 and yet investment of an average £50k for each social home is needed over the next three decades to maintain their safety and quality and decarbonise them.

If no new money can be found, councils will face a £2.2bn black hole in their housing budgets by 2028. New-build projects are already dwindling – in the housing association sector alone, site start-ups were 30% down in 2023 on the previous year, and are expected to fall further this year.

After years of policy uncertainty and underfunding, the sector is hoping to establish a long-term and collaborative relationship with the new government to bring all existing social homes up to a modern, decent and green standard.

England’s largest local authority landlords have this month published their five solutions to secure the future of council housing. The National Housing Federation has set out its social housing renewal plan and the Chartered Institute of Housing has released a 10-point housing plan.

The Local Government Association’s Local Government White Paper includes its plan for social housing, and all coalition partners are agreed that long-term income certainty is a vital first step for social housing landlords.

An immediate boost to existing grant programmes is needed alongside fairer access to building safety funding. At the next spending review, the coalition is calling for a long-term plan for new and existing social homes, underpinned by a fair and sustainable financial model developed alongside councils and housing associations.

“We share the government’s ambition to build 1.5 million new homes over the next five years and want to do our bit,” said NFA chair Mike Ainsley. “However, this can’t happen in a funding vacuum in which social landlords still have to wait for every government review of rent caps and – in the case of council housing managers – wonder how they will plug the yawning gap in HRA funds. There have to be realistic discussions about the way forward.”