Home Owners and Home Ownership
Thursday, 10 September 2026
Contributions
Motion to Take Note
Moved by
Baroness Eaton
That this House takes note of home owners and levels of home ownership.
Baroness Eaton (Con)
My Lords, I open this debate with both a sense of history and a sense of urgency. For generations, across parties and across social classes, the desire to own one’s own home has been one of the most powerful and consistent aspirations in our national life. It has shaped communities, underpinned family stability and helped to create the social and economic resilience on which a civilised society depends. It is not a narrow economic goal, but a means for profound social good. Yet today, for too many people, especially the young and those on modest incomes, home ownership feels less like a realistic ambition and more like a distant dream. I want this afternoon to remind the House why this aspiration matters so deeply and to highlight how recent government policies, sometimes by design and sometimes by neglect, are undermining it. I hope to suggest how we might adopt a more hopeful and practical approach. Home ownership is not simply about bricks and mortar; it is about roots, belonging, agency and responsibility. Families who own their own homes are more likely to invest in their neighbourhoods, voluntary groups and civic life. Children enjoy greater stability with deeper ties to schools, friendship networks and community support. People are better protected against economic shocks and the insecurity of short-term tenancies and sudden rent increases. We know from decades of experience that home ownership can be a ladder of opportunity, enabling families of modest means to build an asset over time, support retirement, help the next generation and weather life’s storms. However, the wider context is deeply troubling. Home ownership in England now stands at 65%, broadly unchanged for over a decade but well below the peak of 71% in 2003. Affordability has deteriorated dramatically. The average home now costs 7.6 times average earnings, compared with around four times average earnings at the turn of the millennium. In London the ratio is over 10:1. For young people, the picture is even starker. The average deposit for a first-time buyer is now £78,000, with the median still an eye-watering £36,500. Deposits have grown to the point where they are worth more than a year’s salary for many. The average age of a first-time buyer has risen from 31 to 34, and the proportion of under-25s entering the market has collapsed from 25% in the 1990s to just 6% today. More than half of first-time buyers now need two incomes to purchase a home. Surveys show that while 75% of renters aspire to own, around 60% believe they will never be able to afford to do so. That is not aspiration; it is despair. These pressures are compounded by the Government’s economic decisions. Youth unemployment has reached 16%—higher than during the pandemic—and rental reforms have reduced supply, driving rents upwards. High rents make saving for a deposit harder, trapping families who could afford a mortgage but cannot reach the starting line. Under the previous Conservative Government, 800,000 people bought their first home through Help to Buy and stamp duty relief, yet since Help to Buy ended major developers have reported a nearly 50% fall in first-time buyers. This is simply not sustainable or a fair model for a country that believes in social mobility. The supply side tells a similar story. The Government pledged 1.5 million homes in this Parliament, yet in their first year they delivered just 208,600 net additional dwellings, a fall from the previous year and far short of what is required. On current trends, they will miss their target by 400,000 homes. Worse still, the new mandatory housing targets shift responsibility away from cities and on to our rural communities, cutting housing numbers in London, Birmingham and Coventry while imposing huge increases on rural authorities. This is not a serious plan for meeting demand. It is a political redistribution of targets. Taxation policy is also central to this debate. Stamp duty has become a significant barrier to home ownership. Conservative Governments recognised its distorting effect and acted to limit the damage, including during the pandemic, but the current Government have cut first-time buyer stamp duty relief and now preside over a system that slows the market, penalises mobility and reduces affordability. The housing Select Committee concluded earlier this year: “Stamp Duty Land Tax … puts barriers in front of people seeking to buy a new home … and … damages the economy”. It is simply an unfair tax and yet another hurdle for individuals trying to get on the housing ladder. Meanwhile, Labour’s Social Housing Bill downgrades right to buy, one of the most successful Conservative policies of the past half century that brought more than two million people into ownership and delivered measurable social benefits. Labour’s reforms raise the minimum tenancy period to 10 years, exclude new homes for 35 years and slash discounts. These changes do not expand opportunity, but restrict it. For those who have managed to buy, the leasehold system remains fraught with unfair charges. Progress on reform has been slow and partial, leaving families trapped in unsaleable homes and undermining confidence in new-build flats. Taken together, these trends paint a deeply discouraging picture. Home ownership is becoming simply a distant prospect for too many. If we are to honour the aspiration of home ownership, we need a coherent, long-term strategy, stable planning, fair taxation, well-designed support schemes and robust leasehold reform. Above all, we need a clear statement of principle that home ownership is a public good that we actively wish to promote. When we debate home ownership, we debate the kind of country we wish to be: a country where a young couple with steady jobs can reasonably expect to buy a home or a country where they find themselves permanently locked out, paying ever-higher rents with little prospect of ownership. Government policies either support that aspiration or undermine it. Too often in recent years they have done the latter. We must renew a balanced housing system in which the aspiration to own is respected, supported and attainable. If we fail, we erode not just economic opportunity, but a key element of our national story: the belief that through work, saving and contribution, a secure home can be achieved.
Baroness Gill (Lab)
My Lords, I congratulate the noble Baroness, Lady Eaton, on securing this debate because for a generation across Britain the dream of owning a home has felt entirely out of reach. It is not because they lack ambition but because they have been trapped in an adversarial stop-start system designed to benefit speculators rather than communities. Having led housing organisations providing both social housing and homes for sale right here in London, I know first-hand the delicate balance needed to make a city liveable. I know that a healthy city needs mixed-tenure communities where social rent, private sale and affordable home ownership co-exist seamlessly. Our mission must be to structurally rewrite the rules of British housing to enable those families and others who want to transition out of renting permanently to do so. To understand how this Government are addressing this, look at how buyers were locked out. First, there was the deposit wall. Lenders routinely pulled high loan-to-value options during economic dips, meaning a young couple could work hard and save diligently only to find the goalposts moved overnight under the previous Government. I welcome that this Government solved this by launching the Freedom to Buy scheme, transforming a temporary set-up into a permanent government-backed guarantee. By removing the risk for high-street banks, we changed lending behaviour. Lenders now confidently offer 95% mortgages through all market cycles, meaning that if you can afford the monthly payments, a 5% deposit is permanently enough to secure your foundation. But fixing finance does nothing if buyers are left competing for non-existent supply. For a decade, the “why” behind the lack of houses was local political paralysis. Councils routinely bowed to pressure and scrapped housebuilding targets, choking the market. We broke that logjam by immediately reinstating mandatory housing targets and aggressively streamlining the planning rulebook through the updated National Planning Policy Framework. By introducing brownfield passports and opening underused grey belt land, we have removed the bureaucratic vetoes to clear the path for 1.5 million new homes. This Government are addressing the supply issue too. We have changed who gets new housing by establishing local priority windows. We have blocked overseas investors from buying up entire developments off-plan, ensuring that those new keys go to local families first. This is especially critical for our key workers—the nurses, teachers and first responders who keep our country running but are routinely priced out of communities they serve. For many of them, shared ownership was supposed to be the safety net but let us be honest about what has happened to it: high interest rates and volatile service charges have left many shared owners struggling. In response to this, the Government have injected new protections through the social and affordable homes programme. We have tightened regulations around optional fees, enforcing greater transparency on costs and backing the new Shared Ownership Code to protect buyers from financial hardship. We are also reforming the model so that it serves as a sustainable staircase to 100% ownership, not a dead end. Yet solving this crisis is not just about pouring new concrete or tweaking intermediate tenures; it is about better utilising all the homes that we already have. Right now, there are thousands of older citizens living alone in large multi-bedroom family houses who want to move closer to their children, grandchildren or wider family. They want a home that is easier to manage, but the heavy financial friction of moving stops them. I urge the Minister to look at targeted initiatives that the Government can prepare to help older home owners to right-size. There is data—from the Radix Big Tent housing commission’s landmark Resizing Rightsizing report—that indicates that nearly half of those over the age of 65 find the current stamp duty rates an active barrier to moving. This effectively locks up an estimated 870,000 underused homes across the UK. If we want to bring family-sized properties back into the active supply chain for the next generation, without laying a single brick, I ask the Minister to consider a tailored scheme that will help them to unlock a massive hidden housing supply.
Lord Gascoigne (Con)
My Lords, I am delighted to speak in this debate, and I congratulate my noble friend on securing it and on setting a good tone of hope and practicality, as she said, where we can talk about the type of country that we want to be. There are three things I wish to raise. The first is a more general point. I am always struck by how many people in this country care passionately about all aspects of housing and growth. We should surely acknowledge that as a healthy sign. For those of us who want growth, we should, however, look at doing things differently, and articulate a clearer vision that faces the facts and comes up with solutions. In these debates—and you may hear it today—I sometimes get exasperated when hearing the terms “nimby” or “yimby” being thrown around. Too often, it belittles the debate and oversimplifies views. Broadly speaking, people want development. Last year, polling from Public First showed that 55% of the population are in favour of development in their area and, for many who do have concerns, that does not translate automatically into a total rejection of new housing. We greenies should not instantly object to growth and development, because you can do both. Last year, I visited a development in Aylesbury where they are delivering some 2,500 homes, yet biodiversity has flourished simply by planning to put nature and development together from the outset. While I am always delighted to see them, I am particularly glad to see my Chief Whip and leader on the Front Bench today. I never tire of thanking them for giving me the privilege of chairing the Built Environment Select Committee here in your Lordships’ House. Most recently, as the Minister knows all too well, we have been talking about new towns. This great endeavour has bedevilled many a Government, but the Minister knows better than many that, if done properly, they can create a lasting positive legacy. Our committee’s second report on new towns focused on making sure we can create strong communities. Some will say that we just need to build homes, but what those homes look like matters—they need to become places and communities where people want to live and that they want to take care of. To be fair, I would say developers want to build homes that people love and that will stand the test of time. We did a recent report about how to get the views of younger people embedded in the whole process, from education through to employment and through consultations. If we begin to combine this with doing other things differently—such as better ways of engaging, and ensuring people see the uplift locally by making sure Section 106 and CIL payments are being delivered, and looking at why on earth major infrastructure projects like HS2 take so long and cost so much—then I think we can begin to make a difference and change the tone of the debate. Optimism or “cakeism” alone is not enough, and you cannot satisfy everyone. There must be some trade-off, and of course there are challenges. But it is our job as politicians to take them on, to fix the issues we face and own this agenda. Secondly, I was in Downing Street under Prime Minister Johnson; we accomplished some great things on supply-side reforms, and in my view we should have carried on. I confess that, while I still have reservations about the Planning Act and how it will work, I think that the new NPPF, as the noble Baroness, Lady Gill, was just mentioning, should be welcomed. To give confidence and clarity, it would still be good to hear more detail about where exactly these well-connected stations are. If we look at the market right now, we have about 1.4 million homes sitting with approval yet waiting for work to commence. That is not to say we should reverse the policy to unlock land, but the debate should move on to the demand side. The Minister will perhaps say later that the Government will not set out the detail now, but I hope that, in the upcoming Autumn Statement, there will be a lot more on helping first-time buyers to get on to the housing ladder, which will hopefully kick-start the wider housing market beyond first-time buyers. If we look at what previous Governments have done, this area is a rare opportunity for government to step in and have a positive impact. What we did with Help to Buy, for example, when we were in government, had a net benefit to the Treasury, fired up the sector and helped get more than 300,000 first-time buyers over the line. Finally, I will briefly comment on the capital. I briefly worked in City Hall, and sometimes when I speak in these debates it feels a bit like a reunion—particularly when I see my noble friend Lady O’Neill, a good friend, on the Front Bench and the noble Lord, Lord John, opposite. I worked in City Hall for a few years after the crash, and I came to make London my home. As a northerner who made it his home, I can say that Samuel Johnson remains right: if you are tired of London, you are tired of life—it does have everything. However, there are challenges, and they are stark. There is the tragedy of families and children in temporary accommodation, and there are issues relating to the cost of rent, lack of social housing and supply not meeting demand, which are driving those less able to afford the costs out of the city. A fascinating yet sobering recent report from the Centre for London sets out the scale of the problem, as well as measures to tackle the plethora of issues at play that are: “Touching the lives of almost every Londoner”. In that vein, given that this is not a single issue but one requiring a much broader response, do the Government recognise this complexity? Is work taking place to develop a different and more comprehensive package of solutions? This is a vital debate beyond simply building homes. It is not something that has gone awry overnight, but there is a huge opportunity here to not just increase home ownership but create jobs and growth, do things differently and get people more involved in society.
Baroness Seccombe (Con)
My Lords, in this short contribution, I will stress just one point. But first, I congratulate my noble friend Lady Eaton on procuring this debate. I take the opportunity to thank her for her copious contributions to the House and for the many years of service she has given to local government. I grew up with my mother and brother in my grandmother’s house. Ours was not possible to live in due to bomb activity during the war, so when I married, you can imagine the thrill of my husband and me about owning our own home. Early in our marriage, many years ago, we had a painter and decorator named Mr Brown—who was always called “Mr Brown”. He was a rather testy figure, particularly where his young assistant was concerned. One day, he told me that no one in his family had ever owned their home, and he was nervous about doing so. I suggested he talk to my husband, a solicitor, after which he took the plunge. Ever after that, he repeatedly told me that my husband had given him the best advice he had ever had. He was a proud owner and certainly made his home his castle. It mattered to him, as he felt he had a stake in society. Home ownership is always popular with the public. I remember the excitement when the right to buy was introduced, giving those who rented from local authorities the right to buy their council houses. It was remarkable how soon those houses looked different, as the owners cared for them and brightened them up. Some 65% of people now own their homes, but I hope we can find ways to increase that level of ownership. I hope the Government will realise the damage that has been done by their attitude to stamp duty. The value of properties today means that the deposits needed have increased dramatically, making the chance of owning your own home seem almost impossible. I believe it is a noble ambition to try to give future generations an opportunity to buy their own homes, and we have a responsibility to make it happen.
Lord John of Southwark (Lab)
My Lords, before I start, I remind the House of my interests in this area, as a partner in Quoin Partners and as the chair of H4Life. I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Eaton, for bringing this debate, because it has prompted me to really think about the philosophical question of why we truly value home ownership. I commend her and all those who have made contributions so far. As a child of the Thatcher era, I suppose I grew up thinking that the gold standard for one’s housing was home ownership. Over the past 40 years, we have also seen housing become an increasingly prudent investment vehicle: the equity in your house is your wealth. I have been a beneficiary of this thinking, seeing my £72,000 first home, a one-bedroom flat in Bermondsey, as the financial foundation for my current, fortunately mortgage-free, home. Home ownership has historically provided both housing security and financial security for those fortunate enough to have been part of that generation buying their homes since the 1980s. However, of those two, it must be right that we focus our attention on housing security. Now it seems that the era of ever-upwards house price inflation is on pause, so we have to look at pensions, savings and investments to act as the financial growth vehicles which recently we tended to look to our homes to provide. If the most vital importance of home ownership is housing security, how can we as a society best replicate that security outside of ownership? How can we ensure that people who do not own their own homes still feel invested in and part of their communities? I should add that one of the drivers of Mrs Thatcher’s policy of right to buy, which has been discussed today, was the belief that people would take greater pride in, and care of, their homes if they owned them. Initially, that seemed to be true. However, as a consequence of the right to buy, we have seen some instances of the fracturing of those communities, such as in my experience in Southwark, as some of the first-generation right to buyers moved on and their properties became buy-to-let housing. The point I am making is that home ownership has not always demonstrated itself as the only way to achieve housing security in settled and safe communities. This Labour Government’s Renters’ Rights Act makes a very positive contribution towards the housing security I have been talking about, with the overdue end of no-fault evictions. I well remember a conversation with a facilities management worker at Southwark about 10 years ago, where he told me that the following week his daughter would be five and that for each of her five years she had lived in a different home. They had had the misfortune that, every year, their landlord would serve an eviction notice and relet the property at a much higher rent which he simply could not afford. He asked me what I could do to help. Sadly, it took the Renters’ Rights Act to provide that help a decade later. I would not argue that home ownership is not a valuable source of housing security. With that in mind, it is perverse that we live in a world in which someone renting for many years and paying significantly more in rent than they would on a mortgage for the same property, and having demonstrated that ability and reliability to pay over a long period, remains shut out of the home ownership market because their income, even if multiplied by five, does not equate to the purchase price of the home they are living in. Why is that the case? In trying to cure the failures of the subprime market from 2008-09, we allowed a banking and lending system to be created which too often seems to work against the interests of the public and which bears a great deal of responsibility for public disaffection with the system or the establishment. The banks were seen to get away with their failures, and the people who were punished were the Great British public, who found it harder to get a loan and impossible to get a mortgage. What more can be done to radically rethink the approach that the banks and lenders take to those who could meet a mortgage rather than a rental liability? Essentially, whether we see an increase or decrease in home ownership in coming years—I accept that the factors influencing that are many and varied—we need to ensure that housing security is the gold standard for everyone, not just those fortunate enough to be able to buy.
Baroness Hodgson of Abinger (Con)
My Lords, I too thank my noble friend Lady Eaton for introducing this debate so ably. I declare my interest as a director of a company that has carried out a very small development—and as a home owner. As we have heard, home is more than an investment or a place; it is one’s sanctuary. A home is more than bricks and mortar. It encompasses general surroundings, community and neighbourhood. Where we live has an effect on our mental well-being and health. As the old adage goes, an Englishman’s home is his castle. As we have heard, home ownership has been a long-held aspiration in this country, more so than for our colleagues on the continent, who have a tendency towards a rental culture. Much of the recent home ownership debate has centred on numbers of houses, but it is much more than this. Most of us value a home by what it looks like, where it is and other factors. You so often hear how housebuilding has fallen behind in recent years, so I was really interested to read in the briefing notes that we were given by the House that housebuilding kept up with the population until 2021. While current ownership data suggests that home ownership here is at a fairly constant level, it has never been easy for first-time buyers to get on the ladder, and it has got progressively more difficult. House prices are rising, and the average ratio of prices to earnings of 7.63 is higher than the five times average affordability benchmark used by the ONS. I think we all agree that we need to do more to help younger people get on to the housing ladder, and that means we need to build more houses. However, just applying a sticking plaster of mass building is not the answer. We should also address the causes. Some is due to the huge influx of people into this country. Also, for many years we have allowed people from all over the world to buy properties in central London, pushing prices beyond affordability for most British people—thus doughnutting our capital city of its settled population. Do the Government have figures on this? How will they enable more British people to buy in their own capital city? The effect of this is rippling out around the surrounding counties. We are the custodians of this country, with its beautiful old towns and villages and an outstandingly lovely countryside. Yes, we need more housing, but it is important that we do not spoil what we have and that new housing is sensitively done in the small rural towns and villages where small numbers of extra houses are needed. We need beautiful housing built in a way that harmonises with the existing community. We need to encourage and facilitate local builders who will build a few houses and are invested in their neighbourhoods. We should make it easier for people to build just one house or two houses. The report Building Homes Better by the Housing Forum recently highlighted: “Government policy has prioritised growth in housing delivery” over quality, and documented “poor-quality workmanship” and falling customer satisfaction levels. Housing should be a long-term asset. We should be building beautiful, not adding to what Roger Scruton called the uglification of the UK, driven by utilitarian modern architecture, corporate greed and a cultural rejection of traditional beauty. We are seeing this too often in the developments going up around the country—often big, unsightly developments inappropriately tacked on to and spoiling small villages. Have we yet implemented the statutory requirements in the Levelling-up and Regeneration Act 2023 for LPAs to prepare design codes? If not, why not? In discussions about the Planning and Infrastructure Bill last year, it was identified that there were 1.2 million brownfield sites, around half a million planning permissions given and over 300,000 empty neglected houses that could be refurbished. We need to end the practice of development companies land banking planning permissions until prices rise. It is perfectly possible to meet the Government’s target of 1.5 million houses without encroaching on greenfield sites. The planning Bill also introduced grey belt, citing examples of disused petrol stations and abandoned car parks as sites in the green belt that could be released for development. However, new research from the Campaign to Protect Rural England reveals that the Government’s grey-belt policy is paving the way for large-scale development on England’s unspoilt rural landscape. What are the Government going to do to stop the misuse of this policy and erosion of genuine green belt? Before I close, I would like to raise an issue that I have spoken about before. Under human rights law, we are entitled to live without our property being interfered with. The party wall Act cuts across this. This can result in damage to adjoining houses and, in some rare cases, houses have collapsed. I declare that I have been a recipient of three party wall notices in the last four years. The noble Lord, Lord Dubs, tried to put forward a Private Member’s Bill in 2016 to address aspects of this. I have tabled some Written Questions about this, and the Government said they would engage with stakeholders and the public to gather insights and explore ways to improve its implementation. During the passage of the planning Bill last year, I tabled some amendments. I understood that the Minister said she would meet further to discuss this, so I hope she will not mind me asking whether we can meet, and not before too long. To conclude, of course we need to help young people to be able to buy their own homes, but in doing so we must ensure that this is not at the detriment of present home owners and existing communities, and that we continue to preserve our countryside.
Lord Frost (Non-Afl)
My Lords, I congratulate the noble Baroness, Lady Eaton, on securing this debate. She set out very eloquently the benefits of home ownership, and I do not need to dwell on them again. We know what they are, and I am sure most of us agree with them: the stability it gives and the stake in society and in your local area that it provides—we all saw the socially transformative effects of the council house sales programme in the 1980s. We can all agree on that. The problem is: how do you deliver home ownership in modern conditions? We need to achieve it. We need an effectively functioning housing market that is capable of providing housing where people want to live, at affordable prices. At the moment we simply do not have that in this country, and we have not had it for quite a long time. Much government policy over the last 20, 40 or even 70 years—it depends where you start—has been going in the opposite direction. Obviously, this all began with the Town and Country Planning Act and the green-belt policy that first came in in the 1950s and has expanded since then. But a lot of the real damage was done in the 1990s and afterwards, with the huge rise in stamp duty that has persisted, and the constant green and environmental restrictions on what can be built, how it can be built, where you can build, the style in which you can build, and so on and so forth. To mitigate all this, successive Governments have engaged in price manipulation, such as the so-called affordable housing scheme—subsidised housing, really. Of course, we have had the latest wave of restrictions on tall buildings, specifically in London, that has brought housebuilding almost to zero. We have had the war on renters across successive Governments that has also destroyed rental stock. This has taken us to a position in which we have a planning process where there are simply too many blockers in the process to get the job done. We have the absurd situation that the green belt now is actually bigger than the developed area of the country. It is quite an unusual belt that is bigger than the area it is trying to constrain, and it is certainly constraining the growth of our cities and towns pretty effectively. Prices are of course super high as a result of all this. It is worth pausing for a moment to contrast the situation in this country with that of other European countries, which are of course our nearest comparators. It is true that the UK is a fairly small and dense country, and England even more so. However, there are European comparators, and the story is not particularly flattering. Belgium is a country I know well. It still has a lot of natural beauty of all kinds and is only slightly less dense in population than England is. Of course, the Netherlands is significantly more dense. Here in England, we have 430 dwellings for every 1,000 in the population, in the Netherlands there are 490 and in Belgium there are 500. Our dwellings are also the smallest in Europe. If we want to give English people the same housing opportunities as those in Belgium and the Netherlands—and that is a reasonable aim—we will have to build 2.8 million houses just to catch up with just the Dutch, 3.6 million to catch up with the Belgians, and 4.5 million if we aim for the European average. That is simply to catch up, not to deal with any of the social changes or trends that are currently driving the problem. We have to face up to this reality. Much of the current debate on this question—not just today but generally—is about trying to avoid this reality and the belief that we can somehow have more houses without changing any of these rules: the magical Tardis-like powers of the brownfield in cities that can supposedly accommodate everything we need. We have a policy that appears designed to maintain the economic geography of the 1950s and 1960s and never allow villages to merge or towns to grow. We have the belief that people can be made to live where the houses are, rather than the other way around, and we have an endless circular debate about social, council and affordable housing—we have one of the biggest sectors in Europe, of course—all of which is avoiding the problem. The Government deserve a bit of credit for the planning Act and for the latest plan, but the solution is not driving the current system to work harder, and still less is it, as some have suggested, to allocate housing to favoured categories of workers. It is not about telling people they need to rightsize and that they are somehow occupying the wrong kind of house. It is about freeing up the system and trying to generate a real housing market with incentives to build, invest and grow, but we are simply not achieving that. I fear we are heading to a social and economic crisis if we do not look this hard in the face and realise we have to do some things that many of us do not particularly like. We have to give opportunities to our young people to settle and to have houses, as we did. We need to get serious about this.
Lord Jackson of Peterborough (Con)
My Lords, I thank my noble friend Lady Eaton for giving us the opportunity to debate the issue of home ownership and the Government’s record on housing delivery. I will focus on one or two areas. One is about family housing, the other is about the current housing crisis and supply and demand, and a few practical solutions to the current malaise. I will not rehearse the comments I made at Second Reading of the Social Housing Bill on 1 June. Suffice it to say that there is little evidence that the Government understand the need to support more home ownership for families and have failed to address, via regulatory policy or legislative changes, the economic and social impact of falling birth rates. What we saw in that Bill was a spiteful ideological assault on right to buy, which will be all but scrapped by raising the required tenancy length and eligibility and reducing the discount to 5%, which will lock 600,000 potential householders out of the scheme. A future Government will and should reverse this pernicious and incoherent policy. There is no doubt that the Government’s housing record is lamentable. Nationally, housebuilding starts are at a 12-year low. There were 261,000 housing starts in the last 18 months, compared to the implied target in the Labour Party manifesto of 525,000. Bloomberg predicts a shortfall of between 90,000 and 100,000 starts each year between 2026 and 2029. The situation under Mayor Khan in London is even worse—indeed, it is dire. In quarter 1 of 2026, 6,325 homes were started, just 7% of the mayor’s target. Some 22,000 homes are unsold or under construction. There is no way that the Government’s annual target, which is broadly supported on both sides, will be achieved to meet their 1.5 million homes aspiration. Are we surprised, given the Government’s mishandling of the economy? We have the highest energy costs in Europe, and there are labour shortages and increased inflationary pressures on materials. Higher national insurance contributions, a higher minimum wage, rising taxes, increased borrowing and mortgage rates have all contributed to and exacerbated what Savills has described as a “particularly gloomy” outlook for the housing sector. On the supply side, the Government’s planning reforms are, to be fair, a small step forward in the right direction, but no more than that. I welcome some aspects of the revised NPPF. Under the NPPF changes, faster infrastructure consent was brought into force in August. There was a redesignation of low-quality green belt and a focus on brownfield and transit land sites, but it is simply not enough to overcome the inherent viability squeeze on new building sites. Planning hold-ups, long decision times, biodiversity rules, nutrient and water neutrality conditions, infrastructure levies, tighter building standards and the forthcoming building safety levy—due later this year—all mean that land which is viable and buildable on paper cannot and will not be developed profitably. The Government should address that. In addition, we have one of the highest levels of affordable housing targets in the western world. It is much higher than most of the developed world. That means that sites are land banked and lie idle and undeveloped. We need to look at this 40% to 50% figure again, because it is not delivering housing that we need. The Government have also failed to look at demand. Only 27% of tenants in social rented accommodation are in work, so the Government intend to borrow £39 billion for their social and affordable homes programme to build more properties to warehouse welfare—a direct capital transfer from business, working people and pension funds to the workless, who will continue to receive benefits. This is economically insane and unsustainable. Immigration and welfare are integral to better housing policy. We must look again at prioritising working families and young people. It is a badge of shame that in 2021, over 100,000 social lettings in London were held by foreign-born tenants. It is indefensible and offends against fairness, efficient resource allocation and social equity, and it is a breach of the social contract. The figure is 12% across the whole of the UK. In conclusion, a future Conservative Government—or, indeed, perhaps even a Reform Government—should cut taxes for SME builders, which suffered so grievously in the downturn in 2008-09. We must reduce regulations; establish a sovereign wealth fund to build new houses; give priority to families, married couples, veterans and young working people; restore right-to-buy eligibility post ante; and relaunch the coalition Government’s very successful new homes bonus policy. The present Government’s anaemic policy response will do nothing to tackle this grievous housing crisis and build enough homes. Much more radical change is needed.
Baroness O’Neill of Bexley (Con)
My Lords, I start by reminding your Lordships of my declaration of interest: I am a vice-president of London Councils and a co-owner of a rental property in Bexley. I congratulate my noble friend Lady Eaton on securing this debate. It is an important subject, and I know she feels as passionately about it as I do. We recently had some conversations about home ownership as part of the Social Housing Bill debate. I hope that this debate will allow expansion of that discussion, especially around the value of right to buy and the potential of the shared ownership model. Contrary to some of the comments from the Government, we should recognise that right to buy council properties gave opportunity to many who would not otherwise have had that chance. Many were on low incomes. It afforded them the aspiration to be a home owner. Ownership did not go without benefits to their communities and, contrary to what is often suggested, the majority of tenants who bought continued to live in those properties and raise their families. If they had not bought under the scheme, they would likely have remained council tenants. It was noticeable that one of the first things that many of them did was to install a new front door. I am sure that most of us saw that when we were out canvassing. I do not know why that was so important, but it seemed to be the first action that most former tenants did when they transferred to being a home owner. As my noble friend Lady Seccombe said, the sense of pride in those who bought through right to buy did not stop there. They got more involved in their surroundings and their community. That benefited others, as well as what was happening within their property. There were other benefits as well. Research says that the children of people who bought under right to buy did better in schools. I am sure that my noble friend Lord Jamieson will remind the House that receipts could be used to build additional social housing. Ownership through right to buy benefited many people and it is such a shame that the Government are looking to water it down. Moving on to shared ownership, as we discussed during the Social Housing Bill, shared ownership can also allow some to get a foot on the property ladder who would not do so otherwise. This often includes the key workers whom we all depend on to run our vital services on a daily basis. However, as we heard during the social housing debate, there can be issues with the current offer around service charges, legal costs and sales. I thank the Government for agreeing to a review and hope that any change brought forward through that review will make the offer more attractive to potential purchasers. Right to buy and shared ownership can help people who want to buy their own home. However, for the vast majority of those who are looking to buy, there are many other barriers, some of which have already been identified. The first, of course, is affordability. The average cost of buying a property now is out of the reach of many, and the multiple of salary, size of deposit or length of mortgage can be eye-watering. Many cannot access the bank of mum and dad, and the cost of private rental often means that they are unable to save the required deposit. Often, the cost of private rental is higher than a mortgage payment might be. The previous Conservative Government’s help-to-buy scheme and saving schemes helped many first-time buyers. There is now a gap in that support. The Minister did say that conversations were being held with banks and building societies to come up with some more attractive products. Maybe she can share some of that information with us this afternoon. Stamp duty is another barrier—one reason why our party is promising to look at that and take action. It is not only expensive but can stop people accessing the housing market. They might not buy that starter flat with a view to moving into a bigger home, or it might discourage those considering downsizing, thereby freeing up valuable family accommodation. Another barrier to home ownership is availability of the right type of properties, whether that be starter homes, flats and apartments for those commuting, student accommodation, family accommodation, supported living or properties for those wishing to downsize. While it is important to build, it is also vital to consider the types of homes that are being built to ensure that need is met. It is also worth considering the knock-on impact to other public sector services if that does not happen. Nobody is suggesting that home ownership is right for everyone or that it is the only type of accommodation, but we should definitely recognise the benefits it can bring.
Baroness Paul of Shepherd’s Bush (Lab)
My Lords, I am grateful for the opportunity to contribute to this debate and I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Eaton, for having brought before the House. Home ownership matters, and the decline in the number of people who are able to buy a home should be of concern to all of us. On that point, I suspect that there is more agreement than disagreement. I begin with a personal matter and a personal perspective. I grew up in a high-rise council flat, my grandparents lived in a council house, my uncles and aunts lived in council houses, and, in the community where I grew up, that was entirely normal. Owning your own home felt like an unattainable dream. Then, in the early 1990s, after a lifetime of hard work—and I really do mean hard work, with multiple jobs and lots of saving—my mum was able to buy our family home through the right to buy scheme. Whatever view noble Lords take of this policy, and I am sure there are differing views across the House, it was transformative for working people. The shame, of course, was that some of the receipts were not able to be reinvested into other homes. I just want to put on record that it did not turn all of us into Tory voters, as was an ambition of the programme. But it was transformative: it gave us our own front door, security and the feeling that we were finally set up for life. It also—I do not think we understood this at the time—turned out to be a defining moment for the generations that followed. It turns out that home ownership, as has already been discussed, is not simply about having a property; it is a way of passing security and opportunity from one generation to the next. It also showed that it was possible to work hard and, because of your own efforts and a helping hand from the state, change the trajectory of your life. That is why some recent research from Cambridge University was so sobering and spoke so loudly to me. It found—this is hardening and lengthening and has taken place over the last decades—that housing wealth and home ownership are increasingly linked to parental home ownership and parental education, even after taking into account an individual’s own work and achievements. However hard you work, or save, or educate yourself, the thing that is most likely to determine whether you will go on to own your own home is whether your mum or dad did. This cannot be right. This is not about the bank of mum and dad; it is evidence that the housing ladder is increasingly becoming an inherited ladder. We know the importance of firsts in working-class families: the first to travel abroad, to go to university, to own your own home. These milestones change horizons and expectations for those who follow. The danger is that, if fewer people become first-generation home owners, these advantages are increasingly concentrated within the same families over time, and that should trouble us. Home ownership should not be hereditary. As noble Lords know, on this side of this House we are not general enthusiasts for hereditary principles. I am therefore delighted that Labour, after many years of policy neglect, has decided that it needs to tackle the issue of supply and build more homes. That is why Labour’s ambitious housing programme matters so much. Delivering 1.5 million homes is significant, but it is a difficult target, which can be achieved only through a pragmatic, partnership-based approach to removing barriers. The Government have already shown a willingness to confront some of the difficult decisions and vested interests that previous Administrations have too often avoided, such as the grey-belt reforms, revised planning guidance, and measures to bring forward land around transport hubs for new developments that will help accelerate delivery. We know that progress will be hard and incremental and will probably involve setbacks, but I am proud of our ambition, purpose and desire to do this, because it is the most difficult thing. Alongside supply, however, there are other practical routes into ownership that matter too. Housing associations, at their best, are not simply landlords. Through shared ownership, which has already been mentioned, and other affordable ownership projects, they help thousands of families take their first steps onto the housing ladder. Organisations such as Clarion demonstrate the important role housing associations can play in supporting aspiration and widening access to ownership. They can be transformative, but they need a review to make sure that they are opening access in the way that was intended, and that these are schemes to be proud of, not a burden to those who take them up. Housing associations have highlighted many challenges with the schemes, including thresholds to participation that have not kept pace with the challenges of rents and wages, and are keeping out the people who they were designed to help. In addition, pressure needs to be applied and incentives developed to encourage innovation among mortgage lenders, helping them to develop new products and new ways of assessing risks that reflect the realities of how we live. I want to call out some of the great new products and some of the companies that are doing just that, such as Nationwide’s “helping hand” mortgage and Skipton Building Society’s “track record” mortgage. That means that if you have a track record of paying your rent on time, you are likely to pay your mortgage as well, and on the basis of that, it will lend you money. This is great, and is rooted in common sense. These are practical solutions that help creditworthy households overcome barriers to ownership, and they should be applauded. The Opposition have brought this debate because they believe home ownership matters, and I agree with them. We should also agree that hard work should be the gateway to improvement, and that is not always the case right now. These things need to change, but that will not happen simply because we talk about it. It means planning reform. It means supporting development in places where too often it has been resisted. It means saying yes as well as no. It means welcoming developments and the people who live in them. Although I welcome this debate, I ask the noble Lord opposite whether they will go beyond diagnosis and commentary, and help to support the remedies as well. The test is not whether we can agree that home ownership matters, but whether we will make the difficult decisions to make it happen. That is the challenge that this House faces, and I hope that we will find common cause in it.
Lord Fuller (Con)
My Lords, it is common ground that we need more homes, but this Government are going entirely the wrong way about it. We are on track to complete fewer new homes in this Parliament than in the last—a period that was disrupted by Covid and the strategic supply shocks unleashed by a European war. It is not hard to understand why we are failing, but to mask the failure to grow in our cities, impossible unachievable new targets have been set in the countryside, and have undermined the equity and collateral in the largest sites with the greatest entry costs. Any old orchard for a handful of homes has economic preference over the strategic allocations, which are being left to moulder. Yes, the five-year land supply is part of the problem, not the solution. New levies, fees and charges amount to between £30,000 and £40,000 for a new dwelling house, and I now learn that regulatory costs for high-rise flats amount to about £70,000—a real fiscal disincentive, borne disproportionately by the young and the first-time buyer making a start. There are three elements to sustainability, but Natural England has been granted a veto on the creation of new homes in the largest parts of the country with the greatest housing potential—as if not building new homes is going to clean up our rivers. All those ecological and archaeological reports, which can only be done at certain times of the year, add delay, cost and increased risk. Failure to dot an “i” or cross a “t” means growth is postponed for a year by quangos acting as judge and jury in their own court, using the consent process as a make-work scheme for university chums and colleagues, while bricklayers, tilers, roofers and ground workers are put out of work. The Labour Party, which was established to represent the journeyman, has nothing to say to these people. Only last week, the Home Builders Federation told me about the case of a small piece of ground suitable for nine homes that cost about £40,000, but was burdened with proposed biodiversity charges of over £200,000. That was before the madness of the nutrient neutrality levies. No wonder the developer walked away—no homes built there. Now there will be more mayoral taxes, and building safety levies in London—£90 a square metre in Fulham—are chilling our capital’s housing growth. The fiscal incontinence of this Government, unable to get spending under control, has led to the highest interest rates for two decades, which have killed off nearly all the small builders. Even the largest operators, public companies, are now struggling with the number of active sites, which is down 20% in London since this Government started. Only this morning, the Times reports that worse is to come: 140 of the 166 developers operating in London are working on projects due to complete in 2027. Without a pipeline of work from 2028 onwards, the Times says they will “effectively exit London”. Of course, the Government try to blame councils for this sorry situation, but to find the culprits they just need to look in the mirror. This is their calamity. Looking at the situation for families who have aspired to, and own, a stake in their own home, we have a Prime Minister who tells them that their land and property is not taxed enough; the politics of envy, and a mansion tax that falls on the old widow eking out a pension while living in a home bought generations ago; second home surcharges that are crashing the tourist economy of coastal communities; a resistance to addressing the injustice in the balance of power, and sharp practice, between shared-ownership owners and the RSLs, where the residents cop all the costs and the landlord gets off scot-free; and crazy stamp duty rates that damage labour market liquidity, trap people in their homes and discourage inward investment in our economy. The Government are trying, of course, but their medicine is making the patient worse. Vibes alone will not build these homes. The new town programme is dead on arrival, not even going so far as to long list schemes with fast rail connections, grade-separated junctions and all the land assembled in the adopted plan, with the unanimous support of the local planning authority. It is just incompetent. The emergency relaxations on high-rises in London will expire before they can do any good, so that is another three years wasted. On 1 January, the Government plan to implement even more taxes—on steel and cement. How many more burdens can the construction industry take? We have to call time on these delusions, because build costs have leapt while house prices have fallen. Can they not see the jeopardy here? Why would anybody want to catch a falling knife like this? The property market is being taxed to death. Whether you are building, buying, selling, owning, renting or being a landlord, this Government are crushing aspiration while missing their own numeric manifesto target by miles. This matters because workers cannot move about, growing families cannot get on, the old cannot downsize and the young cannot upsize. Worst of all, the journeymen are being put out of work. The economist Arthur Laffer, with whom I had dinner last night, says that you cannot tax yourself to success. But Britain is taxing itself to death, no more so than in building, construction and housebuilding, with a dogmatic whole-economy experiment on housing that is killing home ownership and aspiration. It is just not working.
Lord Evans of Rainow (Con)
My Lords, I am delighted to speak in this debate, for which I am most thankful to my noble friend Lady Eaton. It is we on these Benches who have been and proudly remain the party of home ownership. Like the noble Baroness, Lady Paul, I declare that I was born in a council property, on a south Manchester council estate, which my parents had the good sense to buy in 1972 under the Conservative Government of Ted Heath. Unlike the noble Baroness, obviously, I became a Conservative. We are committed to supporting first-time buyers specifically to help home ownership to become a reality, especially for younger generations. Under the previous Government, 800,000 people bought their first home through schemes such as Help to Buy and stamp duty relief. The lifetime ISA was also introduced to help young people save towards their first home. We understand the Government are seeking to introduce a new ISA scheme. Any assurances the Minister can give to existing lifetime ISA scheme users and clarity on how they will be affected, if at all, would be greatly appreciated. Savers should not be punished for doing the right thing. As for stamp duty relief, Labour let the threshold expire. My party has pledged to scrap stamp duty altogether on all primary residences. If implemented, the average buyer could save over £4,500. The policy is there for the Government’s taking, but, alas, millions of prospective buyers face exorbitant stamp duty bills, slowing the housing market, disincentivising those who want to downsize and keeping larger family homes and home ownership out of reach. If noble Lords do not believe me, the Housing Select Committee reported in June this year: “Stamp Duty Land Tax reduces the affordability of home ownership, slows the property market, and ultimately damages the economy. While it is a valuable source of revenue for public finances, Stamp Duty Land Tax must not be maintained in its current form and needs to be reformed”. The tax did generate £15.2 billion in the most recent financial year, but this is a question of priorities. Do the Government care more about increasing levels of home ownership or would they rather increase welfare budgets? We have done the work for them. This is not an unfunded announcement. We have identified £47 billion of savings, around half of which could come from the ballooning welfare budget. Would the Government rather see that increase or would they rather see more people get their keys to their first home? Some 76% of renters—
Baroness in Waiting/Government Whip (Baroness Ramsey of Wall Heath) (Lab)
My Lords, I apologise for interrupting, but the noble Lord has two minutes in the gap.
Lord Evans of Rainow (Con)
I apologise. I simply ask the Minister whether the Government will consider scrapping the stamp duty land tax for primary residences. I thank my noble friend Lady Eaton for giving me the opportunity to voice this cause, and I look forward to the response from the Minister.
Baroness Thornhill (LD)
My Lords, I thank the noble Lord, Lord Evans, for speaking in the gap, because it saved me from pouncing immediately on the noble Lord, Lord Fuller, whose comments were so provocative—I should know by now. I also thank the noble Baroness, Lady Eaton, for securing this timely debate and introducing it with her customary experience and insight. I agreed with much of what she said, although obviously not all. We have heard a thoughtful and wide-ranging discussion from across the House. Coming at this point in the debate, I knew that noble Lords would have covered all the key aspects and asked all the main questions, so I am going to take a slightly different tack. I particularly enjoyed the thoughtful contributions from the noble Lords, Lord John of Southwark and Lord Gascoigne, and, interestingly, the noble Lord, Lord Frost. I felt they had something slightly different to say and what I am going to say might chime with them. We may have completely different perspectives, as was all too evident, but there is a striking degree of agreement about the scale of the challenges facing aspiring home owners today. We have heard contributions on housing supply, on planning, good or bad, on infrastructure—a real issue when we are trying to get people to agree to housing—on mortgage access, on rental costs, and on the wider functioning of the housing market. All noble Lords have posed detailed questions to the Minister, and I do not intend to repeat them. Instead, I want to focus on two issues that have only been touched on: affordability and intergenerational fairness. As former Mayor of Watford, I met many people whose experiences illustrated why this issue matters. They were not looking for special treatment; they simply wanted the opportunity that previous generations often took for granted—the chance to buy a home, put down roots and build a future. Several noble Lords have spoken about the need to build more homes, and it is difficult to avoid the conclusion that, as a country, we have not built enough homes for many years, and certainly not enough social homes. I want to publicly disagree with the noble Lord, Lord Jackson, for his use of the phrase “warehousing welfare”. My question is: where should the most vulnerable people in society live? As today’s debate has demonstrated, supply alone does not explain everything. Of course more homes need to be built; I doubt anyone in this House would seriously disagree with that proposition, though some housing experts do. But perhaps we should be honest about the limitations of what building can do. Do we really believe that we can build our way to affordability alone? If so, over what timescale? Five years, 10 years, 20 years? Even if ambitious housing targets are reached, targets do not build houses; builders do. I get fed up of the “Our targets are higher than yours” kind of willy-waving that goes on where targets are concerned. Even if they are achieved, are we confident, as somebody said, that homes will be built in the places where the demand is greatest, where the jobs are concentrated and where people want to live and work? These are not arguments against building more homes. They are arguments against believing that a complex problem has a simple answer: just keep building. If affordability is the objective—and we on these Benches believe it should be—should we not be honest enough to say that building more homes is a means to an end and not an end in itself? Affordability lies at the heart of almost every aspect of housing policy. It determines whether young people can save for a deposit, whether families can afford mortgage repayments, whether people can move as their circumstances change and, ultimately, whether home ownership remains a realistic aspiration. One of the difficulties in housing policies is that political debate, as evidenced today, often searches for a single cause and a single solution. We are told that housing would become more affordable if the planning rules were changed, if there were not all the extra taxes that we have to pay, if only interest rates were lower or if one element of the market behaved differently. The reality is far more complicated than that, and it is important to say that where we are now has been decades in the making, not just the past few years. Housing affordability is shaped by supply, definitely by planning rules, by land values—an interesting one—but also by wages, interest rates, demographics, construction costs and wider economic conditions. It is also affected by how effectively people can move through the housing system at different stages of life and by the availability of supported and specialist housing. Now, no one mentioned that today, so I immediately look over and say, “Lord Best, where are you?” as that is something that he always reminds us of. During my years in local government, I would encounter two very different conversations about housing. One resident would proudly tell me how much the value of their home had increased since they bought it, but another, a renter, would tell me they had all but given up hope of ever buying a home; sometimes, those conversations were on the very same street. This captures the dilemma at the heart of housing policy. Those seeking to enter the market understandably want greater affordability and, as we have heard a lot today, those who already own their own homes often see rising house prices as a source of security, which for many is an important component of their long-term financial planning. In truth, we celebrate affordability when we are trying to get on the ladder and rising house prices once we are on it. That is why housing remains one of the most politically difficult areas of public policy. Almost everyone agrees there is a problem. The disagreement begins when we discuss who should bear the costs of solving it, because every serious solution creates winners and losers—and I am sure the Minister is very aware of that. More development can place pressure on existing communities and infrastructure. Lower house price inflation may be welcomed by aspiring home owners, but not necessarily by those whose wealth is tied up in their homes. Reforms to planning, taxation, land use and incentives involve trade-offs. The challenge is not that the choices are unknown but whether Governments are prepared to make them. An equally important theme arising in today’s debate is intergenerational fairness—mentioned ably by the noble Baroness, Lady Paul, and I agree with her challenges. The reality for many young people is that they are attempting to enter a housing market that is fundamentally different from the one that we entered and that was entered by their parents and grandparents. Deposits take longer to save for, high rents consume the income that might otherwise have been used to build a deposit and mortgage affordability remains challenging. Increasingly, access to home ownership appears to depend not simply on work and saving but on whether someone has access to support from parents, grandparents or inheritance. That is a stark reality that I believe we on these Benches and the Government are trying to address. This is a question not of whether one generation has worked harder than another but of whether opportunities available to successive generations are broadly comparable. Increasingly, many people doubt that they are, and this should concern us all. I hope the Minister will address two issues in particular. First, does she accept that affordability pressures are increasingly creating a housing market in which access to home ownership depends more heavily on parental wealth and inheritance? If so, what do the Government see as the answer to that challenge? Secondly, if affordability is the objective, how should success be measured? Is it by the number of homes built or whether a young person on an average income in 10 years finds it easier to buy a home than they do today? It will take that long. We all know that home ownership should remain an aspiration achievable through work, savings and endeavour, not a consequence of inheritance. We know many of the drivers behind the affordability challenge and many of the potential solutions. The difficulty is not that the problem is misunderstood but that the solutions involve trade-offs, winners and losers, competing interests—some very powerful—and difficult political choices, with electoral consequences at the ballot box. I will leave with a final question for the Minister. Does she believe the Government accept that the real obstacle is no longer understanding the problem of housing affordability but having the potential courage to confront the trade-offs required to solve it and to confront the consequences of what we already know?
Lord Jamieson (Con)
My Lords, I first declare my interest as I am still a councillor in central Bedfordshire. I thank my noble friend Lady Eaton for bringing forward an essential debate on housing and home ownership. It has been quite an enlightening debate across the House. I think there has been quite a lot of agreement and I would not say disagreement but puzzlement because, as the noble Baroness, Lady Thornhill, rightly says, this is a very complex issue. It will require trade-offs and there is no simple solution. I do not think anyone knows what outcome we all desire. There are so many different outcomes, whether it is housing numbers, affordability, security of tenure and so forth. However, I think we can identify the biggest problems. Housing is the single biggest cost facing most families. It puts enormous pressure on household budgets. Too many people are living in overcrowded accommodation, paying too much rent or mortgage and increasingly unable to live anywhere near where they work. My noble friend Lady Eaton gave some statistics about how many people would like to own their own home. I will not repeat them, but there are some other good statistics from that survey. Some 65% of people believe it is harder to buy or rent today than it was for their parents, and 62% believe that housing is on the wrong track. Many noble Lords, including my noble friend Lady Seccombe, the noble Baroness, Lady Paul of Shepherd’s Bush, and the noble Lord, Lord John of Southwark, raised the benefits of being able to own their own home and how it helped them or people related to them in their lives. We are unashamedly the party of home ownership. We recognise that not everyone will want to buy—that is perfectly legitimate—but everybody should have the opportunity to do so. Those who rent should have access to affordable, secure alternatives. Sadly, this situation has deteriorated since Labour came into power. One-year mortgage costs have risen from around 5% to 5.7% and average rents are up 10% to £1,450 a month. This is not simply a housing crisis; it is a growth crisis. Building homes creates jobs, investment and economic activity, but the wider economic benefit is even greater. If people can afford to live close to where they work, businesses can recruit more easily, productivity improves and our towns and cities become more vibrant. Look at London, as raised by the noble Lord, Lord Jackson of Peterborough. Rents for a two-bedroom flat in central London are above £2,000 a month. Someone needs to earn close to £100,000 a year to be able to afford to live in the centre of our capital city. That is not realistic. Alternatively, people face a punishing daily commute or overcrowding. Is it any wonder that London is losing its appeal as a destination for graduates and skilled workers? We have repeatedly debated housing in this House. Since Labour’s election, every time I speak on this subject the position appears to worsen. The Government talk about building 1.5 million homes, but this is an ambition; it is not delivery. Delivery fell again last year, by 3%, to around 200,000 homes. By contrast, the last Conservative Government delivered their target of 1 million homes in four and a half years. The pipeline is getting weaker, as others have mentioned. Only 1,220 sites for private housing received planning permission in England in the first quarter of this year, down from the 2,000 sites approved in 2022. When I first became a councillor in 2009, my priorities were about improving services, rebuilding the local leisure centre, reducing costs and fixing potholes. Those things all matter, but I quickly learned that in the long term nothing is more important than planning, than building great communities, good housing, infrastructure, local jobs, schools, leisure, public services and beautiful homes, as mentioned by the noble Baroness, Lady Hodgson of Abinger, and my noble friend Lord Gascoigne. We have all seen the transformative effects of successful regeneration, whether it be King’s Cross, Brindleyplace in Birmingham or Kidbrooke Village in Greenwich. The Minister has on occasion suggested that I am a little too focused on London and brownfield development. I make no apology. Yes, there will be need for development on greenfield land, but our greatest missed opportunity is the failure to build enough homes in our towns and cities where there is the greatest demand. MHCLG’s own figures show that two-thirds of local authorities failing to meet the housing delivery test of 75% are essentially urban areas, and 21 of London’s 33 boroughs are also failing this test. The housing crisis is particularly acute in London. Since 2016, the number of households in temporary accommodation has increased by 50% to 76,000. There are more statistics, but we do not have the time. The cost of building has also soared. It is not one regulation or levy: it is the cumulative effect of layer upon layer of additional costs, building levies, landfill tax, building safety requirements, Section 106, the future homes standard and others. That is not to say that any one of them is not valid in its own right, but the cumulative effect is clear: the Home Builders Federation estimates that the cost of building a low-rise home has increased by £76,000 since 2020. The Government argue that that will be reflected in lower land prices and so forth, but that ignores the reality. The problem is particularly acute on brownfield land, where remediation and build costs are often higher and the land value has higher alternative use. If we genuinely want to regenerate our cities, gentle densification of urban areas is essential. We must make brownfield land viable. We cannot load so many costs on to a development that the finished product costs more than people can afford. Manchester is an example: the council and the mayor recognised the need for compromise, including on affordable housing targets, and homes were built. The principle is simple. If you want more affordable homes, the cost of building them must be below the price that people can afford to pay, whether to buy or to rent. The Government need to change direction. You cannot tax your way to growth, as my noble friend Lord Fuller said. The Social Housing Bill will undermine the right to buy—one of the greatest engines of social mobility that we have seen. If the proceeds are reinvested, this will also drive more housing and more availability of social housing. The Renters’ Rights Act risks yet more landlords leaving the sector, reducing supply and putting upward pressure on rents while undermining the build-to-rent sector. By contrast, the Conservatives have proposed positive measures, such as removing stamp duty on housing—as mentioned by my noble friends Lady O’Neill of Bexley and Lord Evans of Rainow—which would free up the market and reduce the cost of buying your home. It is not just the deposit; when you have to find another £20,000 for stamp duty, buying a home gets even more difficult. Removing stamp duty would allow people to do what we used to do: buy a very cheap one-bedroom studio somewhere that is maybe not the most salubrious location and move up the housing ladder. That is no longer possible with stamp duty. Finally, the Government should stop distracting councils with top-down local government reorganisation. We warned that this would consume local authorities’ time and resources, and that the Government’s proposals would not work. I am sad to say that we have been proved right not once but twice—please do not prove us right a third time. Will the Government commit to reviewing the burdens placed on urban brownfield development? Will they look at what support they can give buyers, such as Help to Buy, and when will they publish the report they commissioned on Help to Buy? On the grey belt, will they ensure that those commitments in the NPPF are held to by developers, and that they do not walk back from them on the basis of viability? The Minister committed to a shared ownership review, which—as we discussed during the debates on the Social Housing Bill—if done properly, is another great way to get on the housing ladder. When will the Government move forward with that review and publish it? Is there a timetable? Britain does not need more targets—it needs delivery. It needs homes people can afford in places where they want to live and work. It needs a planning system that enables rather than obstructs development, and a Government prepared to remove the burdens that make new homes unaffordable. If we get housing right, we do more than solve the housing crisis; we unlock growth, improve productivity, strengthen communities and give the next generation something that too many are being denied today: the chance to call a home their own.
Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)
My Lords, I thank the noble Baroness, Lady Eaton, for securing this important debate. I also thank her for her enormous contribution to local government over many years. I very much remember her tenure in the Local Government Association, and I thank her for that. I also extend my gratitude to all speakers for their very valuable contributions to this important discussion. As ever, the House has brought a wealth of experience and perspective to an issue that matters deeply to people across this country. The Motion before us is broad, and that is appropriate. Home ownership cannot be separated from wider questions around housing supply, affordability, economic opportunity or community; it is bound up with all of them. For generations, owning a home has represented something important: stability and independence. It has given families a stake in their community and confidence in their future. For many people, it remains one of the clearest expressions of aspiration and security. The noble Baroness, Lady Eaton, spoke powerfully about roots, belonging, aspiration and security. That aspiration is still very much alive; the challenge is that, for too many people, the pathway to achieving it has become increasingly difficult. It would be wrong to pretend otherwise. I am sorry but I am not prepared to absolve the party opposite from the legacy of the worst housing crisis for generations, which was our legacy when we came into office. As the noble Baroness, Lady Thornhill, said, many of the themes raised during this debate reflect pressures that have been building over decades: house prices have outpaced earnings, saving for a deposit has become more difficult, and housing supply has failed to keep pace with need. For many across the country, people who work hard and do the right thing nevertheless find themselves unable to take the next step towards home ownership. The consequence is that too many people feel that opportunities available to previous generations are becoming harder to reach. That matters not only to individual households but society as a whole. A strong housing market should allow people to move through different stages of life. It should allow young people to leave home and establish themselves, renters to buy if they wish to do so, growing families to find homes that meet their needs, and older people to move when that is the right choice for them. That is why the Government see housing as both a social and economic priority. Housing is about more than bricks and mortar. It affects productivity, labour mobility, health, community cohesion and opportunity. It shapes people’s confidence in the future, and nowhere is that more apparent than in the debate about home ownership. My noble friend Lady Paul clearly articulated some of those issues. This Government want a country in which more people have a genuine choice about where and how they live. We want a housing market that works better than it has in recent years and a fairer system in which opportunities are not determined solely by geography, wealth or family circumstance. That requires a long-term approach, as the noble Baroness, Lady Thornhill, rightly diagnosed. There are no quick fixes to challenges that have developed over many years, nor is there a single policy lever capable of solving them. Instead, progress depends on addressing the fundamentals. It means increasing the supply of homes, because we cannot tackle a housing shortage without building more homes. That is why we have taken urgent action through bold planning reforms—which was recognised by my noble friend Lady Gill and the noble Lord, Lord Jackson—and a record £39 billion investment to kick-start social and affordable housebuilding at scale across the country. In response to the noble Lord, Lord Jackson, I say that it is not the case that all social and affordable housing is occupied by those on benefits. Many occupiers of social and affordable housing are working people who continue to contribute to communities, in the same way that, in my town, when I was growing up, the majority of homes were council housing and they developed an entire community from that housing. We need to increase the supply of homes, so we have also launched the £16 billion National Housing Bank to unlock private capital, support delivery on large and complex sites and accelerate the construction of new homes across the country. Together, these measures are designed to address the root cause of many of the challenges discussed today: the simple fact that, for too long, we have not built enough homes. It also means ensuring that aspiring home owners have realistic routes into ownership. That is why we are supporting first-time buyers through a range of measures, including shared ownership and reforms to mortgage lending that will help more people access suitable mortgage products. We have also consulted on a new first-time buyer savings product to replace the lifetime ISA, and that means making the experience of buying and owning a home simpler and fairer. That is why, on 19 June, we published a road map setting out actions the Government will take over the course of this Parliament to reform the home buying and selling process. I am very grateful to the cross-sector partners who have worked with me to deliver this. At a time when families are feeling the squeeze, these changes will cut home-buying times by around four weeks, save first-time buyers an average of £650 and stop the nasty surprises in the house-buying process that cost time, money and heartbreak. Overall, first-time buyers are set to save a total of more than £200 million a year from these reforms. Finally, it means recognising that housing policy must work for existing home owners as well as future ones. That is why we are taking action to improve the experience of home ownership itself. The King’s Speech confirmed that the commonhold and leasehold reform Bill will be introduced this Session, delivering long-overdue reforms for millions of leaseholders and helping to make commonhold the default tenure for new flats. At the same time, we remain committed to ensuring that people are safe in their homes, accelerating the remediation of unsafe buildings and removing barriers that prevent vital works being completed. Our aim is to create a system that offers more choice, more opportunity and greater security for people at every stage of life. Whether you are taking your first step towards ownership, moving to meet the needs of a growing family or considering a move later in life, everyone should have confidence that the housing system is working for them. Throughout today’s debate, there has been a common thread running through many contributions, regardless of political perspective, and that is a recognition that home ownership remains important. There may be different views on precisely how to expand access to it; there may be disagreements about individual policies or interventions; but I suspect there is broad agreement across this House that we should be striving for a society in which people have a realistic opportunity of buying a home if that is what they choose to do. In fact, I agreed with much of what the noble Lord, Lord Frost, said in this respect; we cannot just keep doing what we did when it has not worked. That is certainly this Government’s ambition. We want aspiring home owners to feel that this ladder is once again within reach. We want existing home owners to have confidence that the system works fairly. We want future generations to look ahead with optimism, rather than resignation. Achieving that ambition will take time. The barriers facing many households today were not created overnight. We have to take sustained action with our partners across the sector. I will address some of the issues that were raised individually by noble Lords, but I am sure I will not get to them all. I will respond in writing where I do not reach any particular issue. I appreciate that there were different approaches on these issues, so I will set out our government view. First, I want to talk about first-time buyers. This was an issue mentioned by many noble Lords, including the noble Baronesses, Lady Eaton, Lady Gill, Lady Seccombe and Lady Hodgson. In addition to increasing the supply of homes for all tenures, the Government are supporting people into home ownership, including through the shared ownership scheme and the lifetime ISA. On first-time buyers, I want to tackle the stamp duty myth. The noble Lord, Lord Evans, and the noble Baronesses, Lady O’Neill, Lady Eaton and Lady Thornhill, all spoke about stamp duty from slightly different perspectives. First-time buyers benefit from paying no stamp duty land tax up to £300,000 and are able to claim relief on purchases up to £500,000. From noble Lords on the Conservative Benches, I keep hearing about all this money they are going to spend from what they are taking out of the welfare bill, stamp duty being yet another one of those—following on from defence, tax cuts and so forth. I wait to hear which part of the welfare bill that is coming from, and I look forward to those discussions later. The Government have also introduced a new permanent mortgage guarantee scheme to support and sustain the availability of low-deposit mortgage products for prospective buyers. The Bank of England has eased the loan-to-income limit. My noble friend Lord John mentioned the need for flexibility on finance, and he is quite right. The Financial Conduct Authority has an ongoing review of the mortgage market, which means many borrowers can now borrow 10% more towards a property purchase, and I commend Lloyds and Santander, both of which have reintroduced their 5% mortgage deposits. In June, the FCA published proposed new mortgage rules to support first-time buyers and underserved customers, including wider access to interest-only mortgages and greater flexibility for borrowers on variable and non-traditional incomes. The noble Baroness, Lady Paul, mentioned some of the great examples that building societies are taking up. I really commend the Building Societies Association on its “Think again” campaign. The noble Baroness, Lady Seccombe, mentioned an example of someone who did not think they would be able to buy and could—that is what the “Think again” campaign is looking at. There is a much more flexible consideration now around, for example, fluctuating income levels and taking payment of rent into consideration as a guarantee of mortgage payments. A number of noble Peers, including the noble Baronesses, Lady Eaton, Lady Hodgson, Lady Paul and Lady Thornhill, and the noble Lords, Lord Jackson, Lord Fuller and Lord Jamieson, mentioned supply and the 1.5 million homes. We inherited this acute housing crisis after decades of not building enough homes. That is why the Government are committed to delivering 1.5 million safe and decent homes this Parliament. I do not apologise for the ambition of that target. We are pulling every lever at our disposal. We have taken urgent action through bold planning reforms and a record £39 billion investment to kick-start social and affordable housing at scale across the country. We have launched the National Housing Bank, unlocking over £53 billion of private investment, as well as our programme of new towns—I am grateful to the noble Lord, Lord Gascoigne, for all the work he has done on that programme. Our interventions are showing positive signs of change, with new-build starts in March 2026 up 15% on the previous year and residents in outline applications up 54%. That mission signals our commitment to the country and to the market that we are serious about solving the housing crisis and ending this ingrained break on aspiration. It was always the case that we were going to have to take some time to put these steps in place before we started to see the outcome that we are looking for. A number of noble Lords raised the issue of planning reforms: the noble Baronesses, Lady Gill, Lady Hodgson and Lady Paul, and the noble Lords, Lord Gascoigne, Lord Frost and Lord Jamieson. I thank the noble Lords, Lord Frost and Lord Jackson, for their support for the planning reforms—it is good to hear that. This has been a very important step: a set of pro-supply, pro-growth planning reforms to support our commitment to build those 1.5 million homes. The changes we have introduced to the National Planning Policy Framework involve a wider set of growth-focused interventions that will help us build the homes in places people want to live, but also supported by the right infrastructure that needs to go alongside it. The new NPPF confirms those reforms to make planning policy easier to use. To specifically answer the question asked by the noble Lord, Lord Gascoigne, about well-connected stations, there is a definition of that in the National Planning Policy Framework, and I think I am meeting the noble Lord, Lord Banner, next week to discuss that further. We are building on our landmark Planning and Infrastructure Act, a major step in the reform programme to unlock a new scale of housing delivery, especially focusing on the right type of housing, mentioned by the noble Baroness, Lady O’Neill. Noble Lords raised the issues around right-to-buy reforms. We are reforming right to buy to deliver a fairer, better value and more sustainable scheme. We want a scheme that helps long-standing tenants to buy their own homes, while protecting much-needed social housing stock and ensuring that more homes are built to last. As my noble friend Lady Paul said in her thoughtful and analytical speech, echoed by the noble Baroness, Lady Thornhill, for too long, social homes have been sold off without being replaced. That is why we have already acted to reduce maximum right-to-buy cash discounts to their pre-2012 levels. The Bill will implement more comprehensive reforms to right to buy, including minimum tenancy requirements and allowing councils to keep 100% of the receipts generated by right-to-buy sales. This is an important move which will enable the building of much-needed council homes, and it is something that councils have called for for a long time. A number of noble Lords raised issues about London. The noble Lord, Lord Gascoigne, spoke about the complexity of building in London, as did the noble Baroness, Lady Hodgson, and the noble Lords, Lord Frost, Lord Jackson, Lord Fuller and Lord Jamieson. In March, the Government and the Greater London Authority confirmed a package of temporary emergency measures providing targeted, time-limited support for housebuilders, to improve the viability of schemes and get quicker approvals on new housing schemes across every borough. That includes the GLA’s fast-track planning process for sites with at least 20% affordable housing, removal of guidance that constrains density, expansion of the mayor’s planning powers, temporary partial relief from development levies and £324 million for the GLA to establish the City Hall developer investment fund to unlock stalled sites and increase supply. We are backing London with a major long-term investment, with up to £11.7 billion from the social and affordable housing programme confirmed for London over the lifetime of the programme, and an allocation of £1.5 billion of the new low-interest loan scheme for social and affordable housing. I am very aware that we need to give some assistance to London to deliver the housing it needs. The Renters’ Rights Act was mentioned by the noble Baronesses, Lady Eaton and Lady Thornhill, the noble Lords, Lord John and Lord Jamieson, and by the noble Lord, Lord Frost, who mysteriously called it a war on renters. I think it was actually a big support for renters. It is transforming the experience of private renting for the 11 million private renters and 2.3 million landlords in England, delivering our manifesto commitment to end Section 21 no-fault evictions, which were an enormous cause of homelessness in this country. Tenants also have stronger protections against unfair practices. The Act also prevents landlords from demanding excessive amounts of rent in advance and helps remove barriers that can prevent renters from accessing accommodation. I am very proud of the Renters’ Rights Act. It is going to deliver much greater security of tenure for renters, and we do not expect those reforms to have a destabilising effect on the supply of rented homes and the rental market. So far, that has proved to be the case. I will comment briefly on the support we are giving to SME builders, which the noble Baroness, Lady Hodgson, mentioned. She also mentioned rural homes; we have specific policies around making sure we have rural exception sites, to make sure that local people can think about what homes they need in their local areas. The noble Lord, Lord Fuller, also mentioned that issue, on SMEs. There is a package of financial support for SMEs. We will unlock £53 billion of private investment through the National Housing Bank and support the building of over 500,000 new homes, including supporting SME housebuilders. We have also doubled the ENABLE Build guarantee scheme to £2 billion to increase SMEs’ access to finance. We recognise the challenge SMEs have in accessing suitable land and, to support them, Homes England has committed to sell more of its sites through SME-only sales, with a less bureaucratic sales process to help level the playing field. I will respond in writing to other issues that I have not got to. Lastly, a number of noble Peers raised shared ownership, including the noble Baronesses, Lady Gill, Lady O’Neill and Lady Paul, and the noble Lord, Lord Jamieson. Shared ownership continues to have an important role to play in supporting households. However, the Government are aware that some people who entered the shared ownership process have faced challenges. As many noble Lords will know, this was recently discussed on Report of the Social Housing Bill. As I set out in that debate, we have a programme of improvements in place to make shared ownership work better for customers, but there is more to come in the improvement programme. We are continuing to consider what more can be done to improve our customer experience for shared owners. My right honourable friend the Housing Minister is in discussion with the noble Lord, Lord Young, on many of those issues. There are no quick fixes to these housing issues. The barriers to home ownership were not built in a single Parliament, and they will not fall in a single Parliament. But the direction is settled: building the homes the country needs, opening the route to a deposit and a mortgage, rebalancing the market towards people who want somewhere to live and making ownership secure for those who already have it. I am proud that Labour has picked up the challenge of tackling the housing crisis we inherited from the previous Government. To pick up the analogy from the noble Lord, Lord Fuller, we grabbed that knife that was falling and turned it into steel for building. I am grateful to the noble Baroness, Lady Eaton, for giving this House the opportunity to debate this issue.
Lord Jamieson (Con)
Before the Minister sits down, may I just clarify a couple of things? First, there was a lot of discussion on planning and there was some recognition that some of the things in the NPPF—not necessarily all—are positive. The biggest issue now is not just getting planning permission but the viability of the site. The Minister did not address that issue, other than mentioning a temporary measure in London. If it is not viable to build in London, then it is not viable not just on a temporary basis. Will the Government consider extending that? What else will they do, as I mentioned in my contribution, to make sites viable, possibly by reducing these levies and regulations on sites? Secondly, if the Minister wishes me to share with her the full calculations of how we would fund the stamp duty cut, then I would be happy to do so.
Baroness Taylor of Stevenage (Lab)
My Lords, we continue to have active discussions with the sector on viability. There are elements in the National Policy Planning Framework that look at that, and we continue to debate this very important issue. The immediate crisis was in London, and we worked with the mayor and his team to introduce measures that we hope will help with that. Homes England is looking at it as well, so we continue to explore that. We have to be careful about broad statements about how we are going to cut away at the welfare bill. It is easy to say we are going to chop the welfare bill and do this, that or the other with the money. It is when it comes to actually saying which bit of the welfare bill you are going to cut that the difficulties start to arise.
Baroness Eaton (Con)
My Lords, I thank all Members who have taken part in this debate today. The many contributions have shown and highlighted that, across the parties of the House, we see clearly the value of home ownership to society. As the Minister said, this was a broad title for the debate, and that was deliberate. I have seen, as we all have, the contributions from many different angles about this complex agenda. They have shown that we have a consistent interest in delivering more homes for people. I thank the Minister, because she addressed with great detail and thoroughness the questions and issues we raised for her today and she has again shown her commitment. Although we do not always agree with her solutions to the problems, she certainly is committed to the housing situation in the country. One of the things that the many contributions have shown is that there are no easy fixes, and we need to look at changing many of the restrictions that have been raised, such as planning complexities and infrastructure and financial policies. If they are addressed appropriately, it might alleviate the problems arising with home ownership. I thank all noble Lords for their contributions and I hope that our deliberations will bear fruit.
Motion agreed.
House adjourned at 5.36 pm.
Source: UK Parliament Hansard API. Debate ID: 5404701.