Labour’s housing gamble: Can 1.5 million homes become reality?

During her interview with Laura Kuenssberg on Sunday Morning, Angela Rayner reaffirmed Labour’s commitment to building 1.5 million homes over the course of this Parliament. She emphasised the urgency of housing reform, stating: “There are no excuses not to build those homes that people desperately need.”

Her comments come as house prices hit yet another record high, underscoring the scale of the housing crisis. Meanwhile, the Government has announced plans to deliver 10 new 10,000-home towns, which it hopes will contribute approximately 100,000 homes toward its overall housing target.

1.5 million homes works out at 300,000 homes per year, a figure not achieved by a single government since the 1970s, so it is not difficult to see why the government is panicking about this target and becoming increasingly incoherent in its strategy to achieve it. 

Keir Starmer has positioned Labour as “the builders, not the blockers”, despite planning approvals hitting a record low in September. He sees the delivery of so-called New Towns as a key solution to the housing crisis—a policy that has seen success in the past. From the 1940s to the 1960s, developments like Crawley and Milton Keynes rapidly emerged, though not without criticism of their design and character. 

The very same policy has been announced in some guise by Tony Blair, Gordon Brown, David Cameron, Theresa May, and Boris Johnson. Modern attempts at New Towns in the UK have largely struggled due to planning restrictions, local opposition, lack of infrastructure investment, and shifting political priorities. Unlike the post-war period, when the government had strong central control and could compulsorily purchase land at low cost, today’s planning system is slow, complex, and heavily influenced by local resistance. Many proposed new towns, such as eco-towns and garden villages, have faced years of delays, funding shortfalls, and infrastructure challenges, making large-scale delivery difficult.

The Prime Minister met with the King this week to inspect one of his new towns. Nansledan, built in 2013, is a kind of large pastel Pride and Prejudice meets Balamory set located in Cornwall. Nansledan has its own school, shops and market alongside 3,700 homes. This, in theory, should stop NIMBYS who bemoan the lack of infrastructure. 

Clearly seeking inspiration, the PM made a series of comments which provide a good basis for us to judge future new towns.

Firstly, the design. The PM has requested ‘beautiful’ communities. This may come as a surprise to those who have read the revised NPPF, in which the government very deliberately removed the requirement for development to be beautiful. Angela Rayner herself stated that “Beautiful means nothing really, it means one thing to one person and another thing to another […] all that wording was doing was preventing and blocking development and that’s why we think it is too subjective.”

Starmer was also struck ‘by the fact that you couldn’t tell which was social housing.’ However, tenure-blind development has been standard practice for at least 20 years, meaning well-designed affordable housing is already indistinguishable from private housing. It’s unclear whether Starmer was unaware of this or simply making a redundant observation.

When asked where the workforce would come from, Starmer ruled out any reliance on imported Labour. Stating, “I don't accept that we can never shift the dial on this. If a developer is told you’ve got a massive contract for 10,000 houses for a new town, but what you’ve got to do is help us make sure we’ve got the training in place for the construction workers that you need.” 

The shortage of available labour is one of the key reasons why the target of 1.5 million new homes has remained out of reach. While these homes may not have been realistically achievable even before Brexit, the post-Brexit loss of foreign labor has significantly increased costs, rendering many construction projects unviable. While I agree that the UK must place greater emphasis on domestic skills and training, expecting to recruit and develop a workforce capable of meeting such ambitious targets in just four years seems unrealistic.

Finally, while the initial costs may fall on the taxpayer, Starmer argued that historically, the government has been able to “reap a reward” and ultimately break even as homes are sold. It is not yet clear how such towns with either be funded, or delivered.

All in all, we must remember that this Labour government’s promises and targets are meaningless anyway, so it doesn’t really matter. Ask a WASPI women about her compensation, a small business owner about tax-rises or a cold pensioner about their winter fuel allowance.