An influential
committee of MPs has concluded the UK will miss its housebuilding target by a
"wide margin".
The Public Accounts
Committee has accused the Government of effectively sabotaging its own
programme and wasting a one-in-a-lifetime opportunity.
The committee
claimed the Government is in fact prolonging the national housing crisis by
failing to sell enough land for affordable and social housing.
The government said
it had delivered 222,000 new homes last year and is working closely with
stakeholders to accelerate housebuilding schemes.
Yet the committee
has calculated the government's land sale failure would result in 91,000 fewer
homes in 2020 than anticipated, equivalent to 57% of its overall target.
"The UK needs
more houses," said committee chair Meg Hillier. "As a major land
holder, the government is in a unique position to release land for new homes;
and yet the objectives of its land disposal programmes are chaotic and
confused.
"We are baffled
that the programmes were not designed with a view to how many homes were needed
of what type, and where - nor how the proceeds will be used."
The plan to release
land was stymied from the beginning by muddled thinking and unrealistic
targets, the committee said. "This failure is largely because of the
unrealistic targets the centre of government imposed on departments without
enough thought about the issues that would need to be overcome to make sales
happen."
Targets were set
from the top down, and were "not supported by any evidence on what could
realistically be delivered", the committee said.
In addition, the
government did not look at what type of houses were needed, and where, in
deciding whether to sell land, it said.
Instead, it looked
at what surplus land it had, and whether it could be sold, the committee said.
The government
department responsible for housing, the Ministry of Housing, Communities and
Local Government, has not counted the number of houses built on the land being
sold, including affordable and social housing, arguing that local authorities
are responsible for this.
But it is
"unacceptable" that the department "pays so little attention to
how the release of public land could be used to deliver affordable homes
including social homes for rent," the committee said.
The government is
expected to meet a second target of raising £5bn from land sales, but this is
mainly down to luck, the committee concludes.
