A group of investors, housing associations, architects and the British Property Federation have called on the government to fund modular housing for key workers.
Legal & General, Notting Hill Genesis, Places for People, Assael Architecture, HTA Design and ilke homes have joined forces with the BPF and demanded the government commit to building 100,000 affordable, factory-built homes for people working in the pandemic.
The Homes for Heroes campaign is calling on the government to provide grant funding to deliver the homes on public and housing association land over the next five years.
It echoes the Homes for Heroes drive to provide housing for soldiers after World Wars I and II.
The group says the commitment would give certainty for the emerging modular housing sector, helping to attract further private sector investment.
Ian Fletcher, director of real estate policy at the BPF, said: “We must seek to recapture the can-do attitude of the original post-war Homes for Heroes campaign, and with public land and modern methods of construction there is no reason we cannot pursue the same ambitions of our predecessors, and their determination to build quality homes at pace and scale.”
Helen Evans, chair of the G15 group of London’s largest housing associations, and chief executive of Network Homes, said: “With the collaboration of government and the housing sector, both private and social, we can bring forward a once-in-a-generation number of new homes for our essential workers, including those not eligible for traditional key-worker housing.”
Kate Davies, chief executive of Notting Hill Genesis, added: “It’s time to start a conversation on how we can repay society’s debt to our heroic essential workers.”
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