MIPIM VIDEO + GALLERY | Realistically delivering government housing targets
Positive steps taken towards reinvigorating housebuilding by the government nine months into its term are not to be sniffed at – but does the ambition match the reality on the ground? Place North’s MIPIM breakfast conference focused on this topic with a panel of private and public sector experts.
This event is sponsored by DAY Architectural, Alliance Investments, WSP, and Peel Land.
The Labour party positioned housing at the top of its agenda during the recent elections, and won with a majority landslide. Since then, Starmer’s government has not just talked the talk, but has made positive steps around housing, including – but not limited to – its commitment to build 1.5m homes in the next five years.
Other recent developments include the Planning and Infrastructure Bill, introduced on Tuesday, which amongst other reforms aims to reduce the size and workload of planning committees and strengthen development corporations.
However, the problems have not gone away and a sluggish planning system and viability gaps threaten to undermine that ambition.
At the Place North breakfast briefing, Stephen Wild, managing director, Peel Land, Jonathan Wilson, managing director, Citu, Tom Stannard, chief executive, Manchester City Council, and Sarah Ashurst, head of partnerships & investment, Salford City Council debated how the government’s housing push is panning out in their areas, and what they are doing to turbocharge the delivery of new homes.
Affordable housing was an ever-present topic, raised first, by Tom Stannard: “I think the key thing is the long term vision… The message I want to give overall is Manchester’s ambition for the alleviation of poverty. There’s lots of different ways to do that but one of the key ways is to make housing affordable.”
The billion dollar question
A key theme that kept rearing its head was viability. “Central government needs to walk with us in solving the viability challenge at scale. Good though the planning reforms that we heard yesterday are, the fundamental problem is not about the speed and performance of the planning system. The problem is the viability. We’re missing a trick, the million dollar – in some cases billion dollar – question,” said Stannard, a sentiment that was echoed by Citu’s Jonathon Wilson.
Detailing Citu’s 10-year journey to reach where it is today, he said: “We took a risk, we had to self-fund, and that can’t be the solution. It has to be supported by government.” Stannard returned to this point later, when he discussed how government has to work with Homes England to deliver more housing.
Describing the viability situation as “close to breaking point,” he discussed the risk involved with development for both local government and the developer. “The public sector has had 15 years or so of very substantial financial entrenchment. What cannot go on forever, is that the people expected to take risk is the maxed-out local governments and the developer; there has to be another ingredient in that mix… I don’t think there’s an acceptance that, at scale, [the viability issue] is going to take national intervention.”
Partnerships at scale
The sheer scale of the housing challenge did not go unnoticed, with Peel Land’s Stephen Wilding noting: “The major point with those numbers is about delivering at scale, and I’m not sure what we heard yesterday [re: Planning and Infrastructure Bill] is about scale.
“All these schemes require infrastructure. We need a delivery solution for that to build at scale. We need more skills, we need more people, more process – it needs to be clearer, because the private sector needs the confidence to invest.
“Planning is not the sole blocker but the whole process needs ironed out.”
Focusing on the long-term nature of delivering at scale, Salford Council’s Sarah Ashurst highlighted the move towards high-density housing in her borough, and the role that public-private partnerships play. “Over the last five years housing delivery has been crucial to the city and we’ve delivered 15,000 homes…
“That comes down to public and private partnerships. Long term public-private partnership is crucial. We have another £2.5bn regeneration scheme in Salford and the first project on site is delivering affordable homes, which is what the city most needs. But we need the long-term partnership for that to happen. You need the right public and private partnerships in place.”
Bringing it across the Pennines, Wilson also underscored the importance of working well together to get schemes off the ground. “One of the things we’re seeing, particularly from Sheffield, is they’re really ambitious, really up for it.
“The leadership in Sheffield, the leader and the chief executive, they’re a force. They work incredibly well together. They’re doing that in a classic Sheffield way – very plucky, very underdog.
“As a result, recently, we got planning in 12 weeks. Without the partnerships that we’ve had with South Yorkshire Combined Authority and the local authority, that wouldn’t have been possible. It’s a good example of: We’ve got shared ambition, and they’ve put their trust in us.
“Leeds is harder. It’s bigger, they’ve got different constraints. We’ll use Sheffield as an example, and maybe get some competition going.”
The future’s bright?
And in four and a half years’ time, what do the panel hope and expect to see? Wilding was both realistic and optimistic: “We won’t have 1.5m delivered, we’re not going to have that… But what would I like to see in the press in four years time is – it should be fantastic. To turn this around completely and for them to say, ‘this is absolutely brilliant, they’re going to invest £100m in our city to deliver against the needs of people’… if we could change the story [in the press] it will also change the speed and viability.”
Wilson had a similar air of optimism: “Without hope we have nothing, so I hope we’re given something that helps with viability. But my biggest hope is that in four years’ time, Citu isn’t seen as ‘that niche developer doing green stuff over in Yorkshire’; that we create a positive ripple effect. It is possible, and you can make money whilst doing it.”
This event was sponsored by DAY Architectural, Alliance Investments, WSP, and Peel Land.
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