General election 2024: A truer picture for housebuilding stats that will surprise you
We need to talk about the main parties’ plans for housebuilding, but before we get to that there’s something important we need to discuss. Everything you thought you knew about the housebuilding numbers in this country is wrong. Quite dramatically wrong. And that has a bearing on, well, rather a lot when it comes to this topic.
I realise this is probably the last thing you need to process, with only a few weeks left until the election and rather a lot going on besides, but bear with me, because this is rather important.
Let’s start with the conventional picture most of us have in our heads about housebuilding in this country (actually in this case we’re talking about England, since most of the main statistics – and political housebuilding pledges – focus on England). It comes courtesy of a dataset published each quarter by the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities.
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This dataset shows us the number of homes built in England – either housing starts (when work begins on a home) or completions (when the work is done).
Now, it’s not as if the government has someone with a clipboard going round the country noting how many buildings are being built; instead, the department uses data on building warranties (you generally get a 10 year warranty with a new home). This might all seem like too much information but, well, bear with me.
These numbers tell quite a simple story. Back in the 1960s and 70s, England was building lots and lots of homes – an annual average between 1969 and 1979 of around 260,000 – and, in some years, more than 300,000.
But then, in the following years, the numbers dropped – and fast. They have never come anywhere close to those 1960s highs. In the past decade, between 2013 and 2023, the average number of homes being built was only 150,000 – way lower than the comparable period in the early 1970s.
Now, when you hear political parties talk about wanting to build 300,000 homes you probably wonder to yourself (I often have) about how on earth they could hit those numbers. But that’s what brings us to the main point here.
When you read in this or that party manifesto about a housebuilding target of 300,000 in England, the parties aren’t talking about the numbers you’re probably thinking about – those ones which show housebuilding at only 150,000 in the past decade. They’re talking about another set of numbers entirely.
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Because it turns out there’s an entirely separate dataset (from the same government department) which attempts to measure housebuilding slightly differently. This one counts the entire housing stock across the country – and when you know how many homes there are you can measure the change from one year to the next.
And that matters for two important reasons. First, because back in the 1960s and ’70s we weren’t just building lots of new homes, we were also knocking down lots of old homes. There were enormous programmes of slum demolitions.
If you really wanted to compare our housing availability today with back then, you really ought to adjust for that. Yet those conventional housebuilding figures do not.
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The second reason the other dataset matters is that it turns out those insurance figures the government has typically used to measure homebuilding no longer cover most of the housing market. There’s a massive gap.
All of which is to say, looking at the other dataset, and how the total number of homes changes from year to year (net addition, as it’s technically called) gives a far better picture of what’s really going on in the housing market.
And what is really going on is rather different to that conventional picture. In fact, the number of homes being built in recent years isn’t markedly lower than the comparable period in the 1970s. It’s higher!
This truer picture shows an average of 207,000 homes being added to England’s housing supply in the past decade, compared with an average of 198,000 between 1970 and 1980. It shows that actually we are building more new homes these days than we have done for some time.
You may or may not find this mind-blowing (I did when it was first explained to me by housing economist Neal Hudson but then perhaps that’s just me) but it’s certainly important. And these numbers are certainly more representative of what’s actually going on than the ones usually trotted out by journalists.
The other upshot of all of this is that those housebuilding figures each of the parties have in their manifestos look somewhat more doable than they did when looking through the other, flawed dataset. All of a sudden the gap between current housebuilding and, say, Labour’s 300,000 home target is not 140,000 but 65,000.
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Even so, it’s an open question about whether those targets are achievable. Labour have provided little extra money for housebuilding, instead committing to planning reform, which may well help, but might not narrow the gap as quickly as they hope.
Indeed, the only main nationwide party to have committed to a specific increase in council housebuilding, with specific sums, is the Liberal Democrats, who promised to spend £6.2bn on 150,000 social homes.
One thing that certainly seems to be the case is that with house prices high and immigration also at record levels, the UK will need considerably more homes in the coming years, notwithstanding the fact that the underlying picture is slightly less dire than the conventional statistics suggest.
UK
Specialist teams and online investigators deployed across England and Wales to tackle ‘national emergency’ of violence against women and girls
Specialist investigation teams for rape and sexual offences are to be created across England and Wales as the Home Secretary declares violence against women and girls a “national emergency”.
Shabana Mahmood said the dedicated units will be in place across every force by 2029 as part of Labour’s violence against women and girls (VAWG) strategy due to be launched later this week.
The use of Domestic Abuse Protection Orders (DAPOs), which had been trialled in several areas, will also be rolled out across England and Wales. They are designed to target abusers by imposing curfews, electronic tags and exclusion zones.
The orders cover all forms of domestic abuse, including economic abuse, coercive and controlling behaviour, stalking and ‘honour’-based abuse. Breaching the terms can carry a prison term of up to 5 years.
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Nearly £2m will also be spent funding a network of officers to target offenders operating within the online space.
Teams will use covert and intelligence techniques to tackle violence against women and girls via apps and websites.
A similar undercover network funded by the Home Office to examine child sexual abuse has arrested over 1,700 perpetrators.
Abuse is ‘national emergency’
Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood said in a statement: “This government has declared violence against women and girls a national emergency.
“For too long, these crimes have been considered a fact of life. That’s not good enough. We will halve it in a decade.
“Today we announce a range of measures to bear down on abusers, stopping them in their tracks. Rapists, sex offenders and abusers will have nowhere to hide.”
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The target to halve violence against women and girls in a decade is a Labour manifesto pledge.
The government said the measures build on existing policy, including facial recognition technology to identify offenders, improving protections for stalking victims, making strangulation a criminal offence and establishing domestic abuse specialists in 999 control rooms.
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But the Conservatives said Labour had “failed women” and “broken its promises” by delaying the publication of the violence against women and girls strategy.
Shadow Home Secretary, Chris Philp, said that Labour “shrinks from uncomfortable truths, voting against tougher sentences and presiding over falling sex-offender convictions. At every turn, Labour has failed women.”
There have been no migrant arrivals in small boats crossing the Channel for 28 days, according to Home Office figures.
The last recorded arrivals were on 14 November, making it the longest uninterrupted run since autumn 2018 after no reported arrivals on Friday.
However, a number of Border Force vessels were active in the English Channel on Saturday morning, indicating that there may be arrivals today.
So far, 39,292 people have crossed to the UK aboard small boats this year – already more than any other year except 2022.
The record that year was set at 45,774 arrivals.
It comes as the government has stepped up efforts in recent months to deter people from risking their lives crossing the Channel – but measures are not expected to have an impact until next year.
Debris of a small boat used by people thought to be migrants to cross the Channel lays amongst the sand dunes in Gravelines, France. Pic: PA
December is normally one of the quietest for Channel crossings, with a combination of poor visibility, low temperatures, less daylight and stormy weather making the perilous journey more difficult.
The most arrivals recorded in the month of December is 3,254, in 2024.
Deputy Prime Minister David Lammy met with ministers from other European countries this week as discussions over possible reform to the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) continue.
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France agrees to start intercepting small boats
The issue of small boat arrivals – a very small percentage of overall UK immigration – has become a salient issue in British politics in recent years.
Last month, French maritime police announced they would soon be able to intercept boats in the English Channel.
The King has shared in a television address that, thanks to early diagnosis, his cancer treatment can be reduced in the new year.
In a televised address, Charles said his “good news” was “thanks to early diagnosis, effective intervention and adherence to doctors’ orders”.
“This milestone is both a personal blessing and a testimony to the remarkable advances that have been made in cancer care in recent years,” he added.
“Testimony that I hope may give encouragement to the 50% of us who will be diagnosed with the illness at some point in our lives.”
The King announced in February 2024 that he had been diagnosed with cancer and was beginning treatment.
The monarch postponed all public-facing engagements, but continued with his duties as head of state behind palace walls, conducting audiences and Privy Council meetings.
He returned to public duties in April last year and visited University College Hospital Macmillan Cancer Centre in central London with the Queen and discussed his “shock” at being diagnosed when he spoke to a fellow cancer patient.
Sources suggested last December his treatment would continue in 2025 and was “moving in a positive direction”.
The King began returning to public duties in April last year. File pic: PA
The King has chosen not to reveal what kind of cancer he has been treated for. Palace sources have partly put that down to the fact that he doesn’t want one type of cancer to appear more significant or attract more attention than others.
In a statement after the speech aired, a Buckingham Palace spokesperson said: “His Majesty has responded exceptionally well to treatment and his doctors advise that ongoing measures will now move into a precautionary phase.”
Sir Keir Starmer praised the video message as “a powerful message,” and said: “I know I speak for the entire country when I say how glad I am that his cancer treatment will be reduced in the new year.
“Early cancer screening saves lives.”
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Early detection can give ‘the precious gift of hope’
His message on Friday was broadcast at 8pm in support of Stand Up To Cancer, a joint campaign by Cancer Research UK and Channel 4.
In an appeal to people to get screened for the disease early, the King said: “I know from my own experience that a cancer diagnosis can feel overwhelming.
“Yet I also know that early detection is the key that can transform treatment journeys, giving invaluable time to medical teams – and, to their patients, the precious gift of hope. These are gifts we can all help deliver.”
Charles noted that “at least nine million people in our country are not up to date with the cancer screenings available to them,” adding: “That is at least nine million opportunities for early diagnosis being missed.
“The statistics speak with stark clarity. To take just one example: When bowel cancer is caught at the earliest stage, around nine in ten people survive for at least five years.
“When diagnosed late, that falls to just one in ten. Early diagnosis quite simply saves lives.”
Minor inconvenience of screening ‘a small price to pay’
The King acknowledged that people often avoid screening “because they imagine it may be frightening, embarrassing or uncomfortable”. But, he added: “If and when they do finally take up their invitation, they are glad they took part.
“A few moments of minor inconvenience are a small price to pay for the reassurance that comes for most people when they are either told either they don’t need further tests, or, for some, are given the chance to enable early detection, with the life-saving intervention that can follow.”
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Giving his “most heartfelt thanks” to doctors, nurses, researchers and charity workers, the King added: “As I have observed before, the darkest moments of illness can be illuminated by the greatest compassion. But compassion must be paired with action.
“This December, as we gather to reflect on the year past, I pray that we can each pledge, as part of our resolutions for the year ahead, to play our part in helping to catch cancer early.
“Your life – or the life of someone you love – may depend upon it.”
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