Spending cuts could be catastrophic for affordable housing, claims NHF
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Affordable house building is set to fall to its lowest level for 20 years because of spending cuts and planning changes, the National Housing Federation claims.
The NHF, which represents English housing associations, predicts a 65% slump in affordable home building this year, to 20,390.
Just 100,000 homes are expected to be built in 2010 in total, the lowest for a century and far short of the previous government’s target to build three million by 2020 - the equivalent of 250,000 a year.
David Orr, chief executive of the NHF, says: “The Prime Minister and deputy Prime Minister have re-peatedly said that spending cuts will not disproportionately hit the most vulnerable but if these mea-sures go ahead the impact on house building could be catastrophic.”  
The federation has written to housing minister Grant Shapps to urge the government to honour its spending commitments and block changes to the planning system.
But Shapps says there is a £780m funding gap for projects and blames the slow rate of house building on the top-down control of the previous government.
He says: “Houses can’t be built to targets that don’t work with money that doesn’t exist.”
But Roger Hepher, head of planning at Savills, is not impressed with the government’s sudden abandonment of regional plans.
He says: “We are concerned that the government has not grasped the complexity of the planning and development process, as well as the
The NHF claims many housing associations have already invested millions of pounds in developing sites for homes and funding could be withdrawn.
The scrapping of regional housing targets, planning gain agreements whereby private developers are given planning permission in exchange for building social housing, and the redesignation of gardens as greenfield sites has also been criticised.
The government has said that £100m will be cut from the National Affordable Housing Programme.
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