“We are rebuilding Britain by ramping up housebuilding and delivering the 1.5 million new homes we so badly need.”
Reeves already revealed a swathe of housing announcements in the days leading up to the autumn budget.
The chancellor announced an immediate one-year cash injection of £500 million to top up the existing Affordable Homes Programme (AFP).
The government promised this would deliver up to 5,000 new social and affordable homes and claimed it would bring Labour’s total investment in housing supply to more than £5 billion in 2025/26.
Ministers said a successor to the 2021-26 AFP would be laid out in the spring’s multi-year spending review.
In a bid to build more social housing in the long-term, the government will consult on a new five-year social housing rent settlement. Ministers are also considering the prospect of a 10-year settlement with the consultation.
Social housing rents are regulated and currently rise every April by 1% plus the inflation rate in the previous autumn. However, social housing providers and housing associations have argued that the current framework does not provide the long-term certainty they need to build homes.
Fiona Fletcher-Smith, chair of the G15 and chief executive of L&Q housing association, said a five-year settlement “falls short of what is urgently needed”.
“Not-for-profit housing associations require a minimum 10-year settlement to help ensure the long-term stability and confidence necessary to meet the government’s ambitious target of delivering 1.5 million homes during this parliament,” she added.
Labour also announced measures to protect social housing from falling into private hands. Councils will once again be able to retain 100% of the receipts generated by Right to Buy sales to reinvest in new social housing. The policy had previously been in place for two years before ending in March this year.
Right to Buy discounts will also be reduced, although the government is still facing calls for the Thatcherite scheme to be scrapped.
Reeves also confirmed £128m of funding for new housing projects to deliver 2,000 homes at Liverpool Central Docks, 3,000 energy-efficient homes across the country through a new fund with Muse Places Limited and Pension Insurance Corporation and 28,000 homes stalled due to nutrient neutrality requirements.
The chancellor also laid out an increase to stamp duty for second homes, up 2% to 5%. The rise would help to fund 130,000 transactions for first-time buyers, Reeves said.
The chancellor also announced £1bn to remove dangerous cladding off buildings caught up in the post-Grenfell fire safety crisis.
Remediation efforts to make homes more energy efficient will see £3.4bn spent on Labour’s Warm Homes Plan to improve 350,000 homes, including 250,000 social homes.
Reeves also announced local authorities in England will receive £230m to tackle homelessness and rough sleeping over the next year.
Homelessness charities have called for greater funding to deal with rising demand as more people find themselves homeless and rising costs.
Duncan Shrubsole, chief executive of homelessness charity St Martin-in-the-Fields, told the Big Issue ahead of the autumn budget that the homelessness sector had been facing a financial cliff edge in March.
The charity’s research found 84% of frontline workers reported increasing demand for their homelessness services while 52% of staff were struggling to pay their own bills and 23% worried about becoming homeless themselves.
“The issue is about funding streams, it’s not just the amount of money, but it’s the certainty of it,” said Shrubsole.
“It’s a triple whammy of rising homelessness demand to more people and more complex demand. It’s getting ever harder to help people because the housing to move people into to either prevent homelessness or resolve homelessness is ever harder to get hold of.”
Alexia Murphy, chief executive for homelessness charity Depaul UK, said real terms increases to homelessness funding are “encouraging”.
“Much more, however, needs to be done to try to tackle the homelessness crisis,” said Murphy.
“The 2025 Spring Spending review should include multi-year funding commitments to fill the local authority funding black hole, as well as to deliver safe, affordable homes for people who are sleeping rough. These longer-term measures and many more will be needed to meet the government’s strategic commitment to get back on track to ending homelessness.”
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