Forty councils in England have built no social housing in the past five years.
According to figures from the Department for Levelling Up, the local authorities neither built nor acquired (either via councils or housing associations) any new social rent housing units between 2016-17 and 2020-21, the most recent year for which figures are available.
Kate Henderson, chief executive at the National Housing Federation, said: Over the past decade, government grants have prioritised affordable home ownership and affordable rent. Social rented homes are much more expensive to deliver due to the lower rents charged, therefore most housing associations cannot afford to build these homes without access to specific funding.”
The DLUHC figures show that 122 local authority areas – more than a third of all councils in England – each built or acquired less than 20 social rent properties over the five years.
