Housing is one of the defining political and moral challenges of our time. It sits at the intersection of fairness, opportunity, health, and economic security. However, for too long, it has been treated as a narrow policy silo rather than the foundation on which people build their lives. This Sprint session was convened in recognition of a simple truth: if we are serious about improving health outcomes, reducing pressure on public services, and creating resilient communities, we must start with the homes people live in.

I come to this discussion not only as a Member of Parliament, but as someone who has spent many years in local government, grappling with the practical realities of housing delivery. I have seen firsthand how decisions made in Westminster land in council offices, housing departments, and living rooms. I have also seen the consequences when policy ambition is not matched by delivery capability or joined up thinking. Housing is where those gaps are felt most acutely.

Across the South East, the pressures are intense. Demand for housing continues to grow, driven by population change, economic patterns, and displacement from higher-cost areas. At the same time, councils face constrained land supply, stretched infrastructure, and rising costs. The result is a system that too often responds to crisis rather than preventing it. Temporary accommodation, overcrowding, and poor-quality housing are no longer edge cases; they are becoming structural features of the system, with profound consequences for health, education, and wellbeing.

What was striking about this Sprint was the breadth of experience around the table and the consistency of the diagnosis. Councillors described families being moved miles away from their communities, children losing access to schools and GPs, and adults struggling to maintain work.

Health leaders spoke about preventable demand flowing into the NHS, driven by damp homes, cold conditions, stress, and isolation. Infrastructure providers highlighted the difficulty of retrofitting solutions into places that were never designed with integration in mind. Despite coming from different perspectives, participants were describing the same problem.

One of the clearest messages to emerge was that housing cannot be separated from health. The home is where people recover, age, raise families, and manage long-term conditions. When homes are unsafe, cold, overcrowded, or disconnected, the consequences show up elsewhere in the system. We see it in respiratory illness, in mental health pressures, in delayed hospital discharge, and in escalating social care needs. Treating housing as a downstream issue, rather than a preventive intervention, is a false economy.

The Sprint also challenged us to confront the reality of digital exclusion. We live in a society where access to services, employment, and support increasingly assumes a level of digital connectivity. Yet millions of people, particularly in social housing, remain effectively offline. This is not a marginal issue.

It affects the ability of residents to book GP appointments, engage with schools, apply for jobs, or manage their finances. It also constrains the ability of public services to modernise and deliver care more efficiently.

Participants emphasised that this is not only a question of resident access, but a practical constraint on delivery. Without reliable connectivity, councils and housing providers struggle to identify voids and empty homes quickly, monitor property condition, or spot emerging risks before they become crises.

Despite significant national investment in digital infrastructure, too many social homes remain unconnected or reliant on insecure, short-term mobile data. This is not simply a technical failure; it is a policy failure. We would not accept homes without electricity or water, yet we have normalised a situation in which lack of connectivity locks people out of modern life. The Sprint was clear that this must change.

Several contributors argued that the same standard should apply to broadband: treating connectivity as optional has normalised exclusion and left services unable to modernise at pace.

What I found most encouraging was the shift in the conversation from problem description to practical solutions. Rather than debating abstract targets, the group focused on a concrete proposition: the idea of the connected home. This is not about technology for its own sake. It is about recognising that reliable, affordable connectivity enables better housing management, more preventive health and care, and greater independence for residents. It creates the conditions for services to work together rather than in silos.

The Connected Homes model discussed in this report is deliberately pragmatic. It acknowledges the realities of different sectors, the need for partnership and the importance of trust. It also recognises that connectivity alone is not enough. Skills, support, and clear governance are essential if technology is to empower rather than exclude. Above all, it places residents at the centre, focusing on what enables people to live healthier, more secure, and more connected lives.

This Sprint was not about producing another report that sits on a shelf. It was about identifying an intervention that can be tested, refined, and scaled. The proposals set out here are grounded in lived experience and delivery insight. They offer a way of aligning housing, health, and infrastructure policy around shared outcomes, rather than competing priorities.

Housing policy will always involve difficult choices. There are no simple fixes, and no single intervention will solve every challenge. But if we continue to treat housing as separate from health, digital infrastructure, and prevention, we will continue to pay the price elsewhere in the system. This Sprint points to a different approach, one that starts from the home as the foundation of wellbeing and builds outwards.

I would like to thank all those who contributed to this session for their honesty, expertise, and willingness to engage across boundaries. The task now is to turn these ideas into action. That will require leadership at national and local level, sustained commitment, and a willingness to work differently. The opportunity, however, is significant: healthier communities, more sustainable public services, and a housing system that truly supports the people it is meant to serve.

Photo: New homes built in Crawley, Surrey (Robin Webster)

Find out more: Curia Healthy Homes Programme

To find out more about Curia’s work on healthy homes, contact Partnerships Director Ben McDermott at ben.mcdermott@chamberuk.com

Not as a social add-on. Not as a discrete planning challenge. But as core national infrastructure in the same way we treat energy, transport, or water.

The Spring was chaired by Crawley MP, Officer of the All Party Parliament Group (APPG) for the Southeast and Gatwick Diamond Growth Gateway, and Chair of the APPG for Wellbeing Economics, Peter Lamb. The South East sprint brought together local authorities, infrastructure providers, health leaders, and industry to co-produce solutions to overcome the combined reality that the pressures facing the NHS, adult social care and local government budgets are inseparable from the conditions people live in.

Cold homes, overcrowding, displacement across borough boundaries, digital exclusion – these are not background issues. They are upstream drivers of demand.

The core recommendation from the report is that treating housing, health, and digital infrastructure as separate policy silos has produced fragmented delivery and rising cost. The consequence is a system permanently reacting to crisis rather than preventing it.

Digital Poverty Is a Structural Failure, not a Lifestyle Choice

Perhaps the most striking finding is the scale of digital exclusion within social housing.

Despite £20 billion of investment in full-fibre infrastructure over the past decade, many social homes – especially in the South East – remain unconnected. Residents frequently rely on pay-as-you-go mobile data, shared devices, and insecure connections.

This is not just an inconvenience. Participants heard that it locks people out of:

• GP appointments and virtual wards
• Education and employment platforms
• Welfare systems and financial management
• Remote monitoring and preventive care

The sprint characterises this explicitly as a market failure. Social tariffs exist but are complex to access and poorly designed for the households who need them most. In effect, the people who would benefit most from connectivity are least able to secure it.

That mismatch has consequences. Without connectivity, councils cannot manage housing stock proactively. Damp and mould are detected late. Vulnerabilities go unseen. Health systems default to more labour-intensive, reactive models of care.

The question the report forces policymakers – in the South East and nationally – to confront is blunt: if we would not accept a home without electricity, why do we accept one without broadband?

The Connected Homes Proposition

Rather than produce another abstract call for reform, the sprint set out a practical Connected Homes model.

At its core, this means:

1. Universal, reliable broadband as standard in social housing
2. Simplified and automatic access to affordable tariffs
3. Integration with housing management, health, and care systems
4. Local digital skills and device support
5. Clear governance and accountability for data and outcomes

This is not technology for its own sake. It is about creating the conditions for prevention.

A connected home enables predictive maintenance rather than emergency repair. It supports adult social care to blend virtual and in-person support. It reduces unnecessary travel and helps residents access work and training. It underpins Net Zero ambitions through smarter energy use.

Critically, the business case is credible. Evidence cited during the sprint suggests that place-based connectivity pilots can become self-funding over time through service savings and improved asset management. Even a single household moving into sustained work delivers fiscal savings of £25,000–£30,000 per year.

In growth terms, that is not marginal.

The South East Pressure Cooker

The South East context makes the case even sharper.

Population growth, displacement from London, temporary accommodation and constrained land supply are creating structural strain across Kent, Surrey, Sussex, and surrounding areas. Families are moved miles from schools, GPs, and employment. Children lose continuity of care. Adults struggle to maintain work.

Planning debates still focus overwhelmingly on housing numbers. Far less attention is paid to whether those homes are connected, integrated, and capable of supporting long-term wellbeing.

The sprint’s diagnosis is uncomfortable for policy makers – we have embedded exclusion into new developments by failing to treat digital infrastructure as a prerequisite for healthy communities.

From Pilot to Policy Delivery

The report proposes a place-based pilot – connecting a defined number of social homes within a single authority area – with clear metrics on service demand, housing condition, resident wellbeing, and economic participation.

The wider ambition is national alignment. Housing, health, digital and local government departments must stop operating in parallel and start sharing ownership of outcomes.

This is where the report becomes politically interesting. It does not argue for endless new funding streams. It argues for alignment, sequencing, and leadership.

If government is serious about shifting from hospital to community, from analogue to digital, and from sickness to prevention, the home is the obvious place to start.

Where Things Go Next

The challenge now is intent.

The technology exists and the infrastructure investment has already been made. Local authorities are willing to pilot. Industry has indicated it can shoulder significant upfront cost where demand is coordinated.

What has been missing is the political confidence to declare broadband a core housing standard and to align planning, social tariff reform, and health strategy accordingly.

The opportunity is significant, with healthier residents, reduced pressure on acute services, stronger local labour markets, and more resilient communities. In growth terms, connected homes are not a side project – they are foundational.

As the Get Britain Growing agenda gathers pace, this report provides a tangible example of what system reform looks like in practice – a scalable intervention rooted in the places people live.

The real test will not be whether we agree with the analysis. It will be whether national and local leaders are prepared to act on it.

Join the Discussion: Get Britain Growing 2026

To find out more information about the 2026 programme of Get Britain Growing, register to receive more information at www.chamberuk.com/newsletter.

(Photo: Silverstone Communications)

Seven locations have been identified for consideration, with each expected to deliver at least 10,000 homes and several expected to deliver up to 40,000 homes over the coming decades.

The proposed locations are:

• Tempsford, Bedfordshire – up to 40,000 homes built around a new East West Rail station
• Crews Hill and Chase Park, Enfield – up to 21,000 homes
• Leeds South Bank, West Yorkshire – up to 20,000 homes
• Manchester Victoria North, Greater Manchester – at least 15,000 homes
• Thamesmead, Greenwich – up to 15,000 homes
• Brabazon and the West Innovation Arc, South Gloucestershire – up to 40,000 homes
• Milton Keynes, Buckinghamshire – around 40,000 homes as part of a major expansion

The developments are intended to be designed around modern neighbourhood principles, including walkable communities, public transport connectivity, shared green space and local high streets.

Housing Secretary, Steve Reed said the programme represents a major shift in how communities are planned and delivered:

“People want real change – homes they can afford, local infrastructure that works, and good jobs in thriving communities.

Our next generation of new towns marks a turning point in how we build for the future.

From the ground up, we’re planning whole communities with homes, jobs, transport links, and green spaces designed together – so we can give families the security and opportunities they deserve.”

Delivery and Development Corporations

To support delivery, the Government has appointed four interim advisers to the New Towns Unit: Lyn Garner, Ian Piper, Emma Cariaga and David Rudlin. Some new development corporations are also expected to be established to drive delivery, similar to the model used in Stratford and Ebbsfleet.

The developments will follow new placemaking principles focused on affordable and balanced communities, with schools, health services, transport infrastructure and digital connectivity built in from the beginning. The Government says it is taking a cross-government approach to ensure utilities, education, healthcare and digital infrastructure are planned alongside housing.

Sir Michael Lyons, who previously chaired the New Towns Taskforce, welcomed the announcement: “I warmly welcome the Government’s decision to progress seven of the locations recommended by the New Towns Taskforce and to continue discussions in the remaining areas.

“The consultation provides an opportunity to reflect on lessons from the past and inform a new generation of new towns that can support sustainable growth and create places of lasting value. This is just the ambitious response we hoped for.”

National Housing Bank to Launch

Alongside the new towns announcement, the Government confirmed that the National Housing Bank will launch on 1 April with up to £16 billion in financial capacity. The bank is intended to unlock more than £53 billion of private investment and support the delivery of over 500,000 homes.

Chancellor, Rachel Reeves said planning reform and investment were central to the Government’s economic strategy: “For decades this country’s planning system has been a direct obstacle to building new homes, ramping up costs and pricing young people out of the housing market.

“Two years ago, I promised that we would grasp the nettle of planning reform. Now we’re planning to build a new generation of new towns, opening up the expansion of our most dynamic cities and raise up new communities.

“Our economic plan is the right one. Through stability, investment and reform we are building a stronger and more secure economy.”

Simon Century, Chief Executive of the National Housing Bank, said: “From day one, we’ll use deep expertise to back innovative, large-scale delivery – accelerating the supply of high-quality affordable homes and thriving places people want to live.”

Peter Vernon, Chair of the National Housing Bank, added: “As a Public Finance Institution, the Bank can move quickly and develop solutions that work for communities. We’ll work with partners across the sector to drive delivery at pace.”

Regional Growth and Regeneration

Several regional leaders said the new towns would support economic growth and regeneration in their areas.

Tracy Brabin, Mayor of West Yorkshire, said: “The Leeds South Bank New Town is a once in a generation opportunity to deliver up to 13,000 new homes in one of the UK’s fastest growing cities.

“The development will be supported by the West Yorkshire Mass Transit System and vital investment in Leeds Station, to unlock jobs and opportunity in the heart of the North.

“Alongside our partner Leeds City Council, we will deliver the new, high-quality homes and communities that local people need and deserve.”

Helen Godwin, Mayor of the West of England, said: “The country’s fastest growing regional economy here in the West of England is the perfect place for a new town: Brabazon and the West Innovation Arc. As we continue to create jobs and growth, we need to build the right homes in the right places – with the services and infrastructure that people need.”

Greater Manchester Mayor Andy Burnham said: “We are glad to see Victoria North getting this backing from the Government. It is one of the UK’s most ambitious regeneration projects right at the heart of its fastest-growing city-region.

“Victoria North will see the building of 15,000 new homes, including many for social rent, alongside high-quality green spaces close to our city centre.

“We believe it is the model of what a new town should be, with modern homes linked to high-quality public transport.”

Additional Funding and Brownfield Development

The Government also announced an additional £234 million grant fund to help Mayoral Combined Authorities unlock 8,000 new homes on brownfield land. Areas expected to benefit include Cambridgeshire and Peterborough, the East Midlands, Greater Lincolnshire, Hull and East Yorkshire, Tees Valley, West of England, and York and North Yorkshire.

Six additional locations – Adlington, Heyford Park, Marlcombe in East Devon, Plymouth, South Barking and Wychavon – were assessed but will not be taken forward as new towns at this stage, although they may still be developed through existing housing programmes.

Consultation

A public consultation on the proposed locations and draft planning policy is open until 18 May. Final decisions on the new towns will be confirmed later this year following consultation and environmental assessments.

Taken together, the new towns programme, the launch of the National Housing Bank and new brownfield funding form part of the Government’s wider strategy to address the housing shortage, support first-time buyers and create jobs across the construction and infrastructure sectors.

Curia’s Housing and Infrastructure Research Group

Curia’s Housing and Infrastructure Research Group will be holding a series of roundtables in conversation with local council and regional council leaders alongside the Yimby groups on a cross-party basis to discuss ways in which these new towns can be delivered. Working with Politics UK, ideas will be communicated to local and regional leaders. To find out more about this programme and to get more involved, please contact Partnerships Director, Ben McDermott at ben.mcdermott@chamberuk.com.

Photo: Housing Minister, Matthew Pennycook visits a housing development (Photo: Ministry of Housing, Communities, and Local Government)

Curia’s new Healthy Homes, Healthy Communities report delivers a clear message: improving Britain’s housing is no longer a matter of urban planning alone. It is a central health challenge, one that shapes everything from life expectancy to NHS demand. Drawing on the first Sprint Workshop held as part of Chamber UK’s Get Britain Growing North West Conference, the report sets out how poor-quality homes deepen inequality and place avoidable pressure on hospitals, primary care, and social care systems.

The argument begins with a simple but powerful observation. A person’s home is the setting where health is either protected or undermined. Cold rooms, damp walls, unsafe layouts, limited accessibility, and fuel poverty are not merely discomforts; they drive respiratory illness, cardiovascular disease, falls, excess winter deaths, and loneliness. These harms disproportionately affect deprived and ageing communities, reinforcing cycles of disadvantage.

Curia frames this as a question of fairness. If people in the most vulnerable areas are the ones most likely to live in unhealthy homes, then tackling those environments is a moral, economic, and public health necessity. The report challenges national and local leaders to stop treating housing and health as separate policy streams and instead recognise the home as foundational infrastructure for a thriving society.

What the Healthy Homes Sprint Found

The workshop brought together local authority leaders, housing specialists, NHS representatives, planners, and innovators to interrogate the links between home environments and health outcomes. Among those contributing to the discussion was Peter Dowd MP, who emphasised how small, proactive interventions – such as the widespread introduction of smoke alarms decades ago – can significantly reduce harm when embedded at scale. His reflections underscored the workshop’s central ambition: moving from diagnosing problems to implementing practical solutions.

One of the key contributions came from Sefton Councillor James Hansen, who presented the group’s emerging framework: Pathways to Healthy Homes. This model sets out two interdependent priorities that must be tackled together if the country is to reverse the effects of unsafe and inefficient housing:

1. Creating New Healthy Homes – ensuring future housing developments are designed to prevent health inequalities before they arise, incorporating high standards for air quality, accessibility, daylight, insulation, and sustainability.
2. Improving Existing Homes – addressing the large stock of cold, damp, and structurally unsafe properties that currently fuel illness and disadvantage across the North West and beyond.

These pathways rest on a shared vision of the home as an active contributor to wellbeing rather than a neutral backdrop. Achieving this requires rethinking planning systems, construction standards, and community engagement so that every new or upgraded home supports physical and mental health, independence, and social connection.

Workshop participants highlighted the diverse health issues linked to poor housing: asthma and COPD, anxiety and depression, injuries from falls, digital exclusion, and the broader stresses associated with fuel poverty. Retrofitting emerged as one of the highest-value interventions, reducing hospital admissions, improving energy efficiency, and lowering household costs – all while supporting the shift to a low-carbon economy.

Crucially, the workshop made clear that healthier homes are not simply an aspiration; they are a cost-saving measure. The Building Research Establishment estimates that poor housing costs the NHS more than £1.4 billion per year. Curia’s report argues that even modest interventions could significantly reduce that burden.

From Retrofitting to Planning Reform

The report sets out a comprehensive set of reforms spanning planning, construction, regulation, and community co-design. These include:

• Embedding the Future Homes Standard within local plans so that new builds meet higher thresholds for energy efficiency and environmental safety.
• Mandatory Health Impact Assessments for major planning applications, enabling local authorities to assess how proposed developments will influence long-term population health.
• A strengthened Warm Homes Plan, replacing fragmented regional schemes with a single national framework designed to target fuel poverty more effectively.
• Expansion of Home Improvement Agencies, which provide practical support for older and disabled residents who need adaptations to live safely and independently.
• A national focus on indoor air quality, including proposals for a public register of volatile organic compounds and wider use of affordable home sensors.

These reforms demonstrate the breadth of action required – from regulating the materials that go into a home, to funding retrofits, to embedding public health expertise directly into planning committees. The report also recognises the importance of digital inclusion, noting that many modern home safety and heating systems rely on connectivity that some households lack. Tackling digital exclusion is therefore essential for ensuring that vulnerable groups benefit from modern technologies designed to keep homes safe and warm.

How National, Regional and Local Leaders Can Act

Curia’s report is deliberately structured around shared accountability. Improving homes at scale cannot be left to one department or sector. Instead, the report calls for co-ordinated action across national government, integrated care systems, combined authorities, and local councils.

Nationally, Curia proposes a Healthy Homes and Prevention Taskforce, bringing together the Department of Health and Social Care, the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government, and the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero. This taskforce would align funding, regulation, and policy goals – areas that have historically operated in silos.

At the regional level, the report recommends Healthy Homes Partnerships across ICS footprints. These would pool budgets, share data, and co-ordinate joint programmes such as retrofitting, home adaptations, and community-based prevention schemes.

Locally, the report urges councils to embed public health officers within planning and housing teams, expand local Healthy Homes Hubs, and invest in participatory design processes that give residents real influence over neighbourhood change.

A New Direction for Fairer, Healthier Communities

Curia’s Healthy Homes, Healthy Communities report draws a direct line between Britain’s housing crisis and the health inequalities that hold communities back. Its conclusions are clear: the home is healthcare infrastructure and improving it should be treated with the same seriousness as investing in hospitals or clinics.

With contributions from Peter Dowd MP and leaders across the North West, the report sets out an ambitious but practical roadmap for national, regional, and local action. If implemented, its recommendations could reduce NHS demand, lower energy bills, improve independence for older residents, strengthen communities, and help ensure that every person – regardless of postcode – has the chance to live well, safely, and with dignity.

To find out more about Curia’s Health, Care, and Life Sciences Research Group and the Housing and Infrastructure Research Group, contact Partnerships Director, Ben McDermott at ben.mcdermott@chamberuk.com

Peter Dowd MP

Member of Parliament for Bootle, Chair, Liverpool City Region APPG & Chair, All Party Parliamentary Group, Genetic, Rare and Undiagnosed Conditions

Peter Dowd MP warns that the key to tackling rising NHS pressure may start at home – literally with healthier homes – as new evidence shows how smarter, safer housing could transform health outcomes across the North West.

The first Sprint Workshop of the Get Britain Growing North West Conference on healthier homes placed housing at the centre of the health and care conversation – recognising that the quality, safety, and accessibility of the home are fundamental determinants of wellbeing. The theme Healthy Homes, Healthy Communities – Housing Infrastructure and Health brought together local authority leaders, housing and planning specialists, NHS representatives, and innovators to examine how the places people live can either drive or prevent ill health.

Opening the discussion, participants were reminded that the Sprint methodology is built around practical outcomes. Each Sprint seeks not merely to diagnose systemic challenges but to produce implementable solutions that can shape policy, commissioning, and local delivery. In that spirit, this workshop aimed to translate evidence and local experience into a coherent framework for action – one that demonstrates how the home environment can be designed, adapted and managed to improve health outcomes and reduce demand on NHS services.

I was pleased to be asked to co-facilitate this session and began by placing the issues of health and housing within the wider political and economic landscape. Drawing on experience of regional leadership in Merseyside, a straightforward, low-cost preventive measure – specifically, the introduction of smoke alarms decades ago – had dramatically reduced domestic fire deaths. This illustrated the transformative potential of proactive, place-based prevention. The same mindset must now be applied to housing. By investing in healthier, more efficient homes, the country could reduce long-term healthcare costs, improve workforce participation and deliver measurable social value.

I would like to thank those participants for their enthusiasm for creating new solutions to overcome some of the biggest challenges affecting the North West.

The conversation about housing is, fundamentally, a conversation about fairness. Poor-quality housing, fuel poverty, and unsafe environments remain concentrated in deprived and ageing communities, creating preventable inequality. Addressing this imbalance requires not just national strategy but local empowerment – giving councils and communities the ability to act decisively, supported by sustainable funding and joined-up policy between the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC), Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government (MHCLG), and local integrated care systems (ICSs).

Priorities for creating healthier homes

We were pleased to hear from Sefton Councillor, James Hansen who led the presentation back to the wider group. He introduced the sprint group’s concept of Pathways to Healthy Homes. This framework divided the challenge into two interdependent priorities:

1. Creating New Healthy Homes – ensuring that new housing developments are designed to prevent future health inequalities, with high standards of air quality, accessibility, and sustainability.
2. Improving Existing Homes – tackling the large stock of cold, damp, and unsafe properties that currently drive illness and disadvantage.

Underpinning both pathways is a vision of the home as an active contributor to health. This requires rethinking planning systems, construction standards, and community engagement, so that every new or refurbished home promotes wellbeing, accessibility, and social connection.

Throughout the discussion, participants drew attention to the breadth of housing-related health issues – from respiratory illness and falls to loneliness and digital exclusion. The group’s evidence was clear: investing in healthy homes delivers savings across the system. Retrofitting reduces hospital admissions. Accessible design keeps people independent for longer. Energy-efficient construction cuts both emissions and bills. And empowering residents through co-design fosters community resilience.

The workshop concluded with a shared understanding that housing is healthcare infrastructure. As the NHS grapples with rising demand, workforce pressures, and an ageing population, the case for prevention through the built environment has never been stronger. The recommendations emerging from this Sprint set out a pathway for national, regional, and local partners to embed housing improvement into the health and care system’s core mission: enabling people to live well, safely, and independently in the place they

To find out more about the report, and the work of Curia’s Health, Care, and Life Sciences Research Group and the Housing and Infrastructure Research Group, contact Partnerships Director, Ben McDermott at ben.mcdermott@chamberuk.com

A landmark reform, the Act formed a crucial part of Labour’s 2024 Plan for Change manifesto. The Act promises to “rebalance the relationship between England’s 2.3 million landlords and 11 million tenants.”

Prime Minister Keir Starmer said: “For too long, millions of renters have lived at the mercy of rogue landlords or insecure contracts, with their futures hanging in the balance. We’re putting an end to that.”

What does this Act mean for renters?

Firstly it’s important to note that this Act applies only to England, as housing is a devolved matter. This means that housing comes under the control of regional assemblies in Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland, who are free to set their own laws.

Central to the Act is its provision to abolish Section 21 ‘no fault’ evictions, under which private landlords have been able to remove tenants even if they have done nothing wrong.

The government said that these ‘no fault’ evictions have in the past “pushed thousands into homelessness.”

“This seismic shift will empower tenants to challenge poor conditions and unreasonable rent increases without fear of retaliatory eviction.”

According to homelessness charity Shelter, 11,400 households in England were evicted by bailiffs under Section 21 no-fault evictions between July 2024 and June 2025.

The Act also introduces a new Private Rented Sector Landlord Ombudsman, under which renters will be able to take up complaints about landlords, and a Private Rented Sector Database which will help landlords better understand their obligations.

The Act will also, according to Housing Secretary Steve Reed, “tackle discrimination head-on” by banning landlords from refusing tenants that receive benefits or that have children.

Tenancies will change under the new legislation – rather than be fixed-term, all tenancies in England will default to being monthly rolling contracts.

Steve Reed said: “Our historic Act marks the biggest leap forward in renters’ rights in a generation. We are finally ending the injustice overseen by previous governments that has left millions living in fear of losing their homes.”

“This is an historic moment for renters across the country and we’re proud to deliver it.”

What does this mean for landlords?

Landlords will still be able to evict tenants under certain circumstances such as antisocial behaviour, damage to the property, or if they fall three or more months behind on rent.

The ability of landlords to increase rent will be restricted to “the market rate”, and “bidding wars” on properties will be ended, as new tenants can no longer be asked to pay more than the advertised rental price. They will also be banned from asking for more than one month’s rent upfront from tenants.

Landlords will also not be able to unreasonably refuse a tenant’s request for a pet to be kept in the property – good news for England’s furry friends.

Awaab’s Law

The Renters’ Rights Act is not the only change to housing that has come in recent days – just yesterday [27th October], Awaab’s Law came into effect in England.

Under this legislation, passed in July 2023 under the previous Conservative government, social landlords in England will be required to fix damp and mould issues in their properties within set timelines.

Named after Awaab Ishak, who died died at age two in 2020 from a respiratory condition due to exposure to mould in his social housing in Rochdale, the new regulations mean that social landlords must inspect reports of damp and mould within 10 working days, and make properties safe from these within five working days after this.

Landlords will also have to offer alternative accommodation to tenants if they are unable to make their properties safe within the alloted timeframe.

As of yet, Awaab’s Law is only enforced for social landlords, but under the Renters’ Rights Act the government plans to bring it into into force in the private sector as well.

What have reactions been from landlords and campaigners?

The reforms have been welcomed by many, particularly those that have campaigned on the issue.

Tom Darling, Director of the Renters’ Reform Coalition, said that the Act is: “Fantastic news for England’s 12 million renters.”

Sean Palmer, Executive Director of homelessness charity St Mungo’s said that the law was: “A watershed moment for tenants across the country, and welcome news for everyone committed to ending UK homelessness”

Ben Beadle, Chief Executive of the National Residential Landlords Association, which represents landlords, described the changes as “an important milestone for the private rented sector.”

He however asked for further clarity from the government about the implementation of the Act: “The sector needs certainty about the way forward.” 

“It is imperative that the new systems work for both tenants and responsible landlords.”

This was backed by Chief Executive of Generation Rent, Ben Twomey, who said: “This new law is a vital step towards re-balancing power between renters and landlords and should be celebrated.”

“The Government must now give clarity to renters and landlords by announcing an implementation date quickly, bringing in renters’ new rights as soon as possible.”

Ministers are set to outline the roll out of reforms in the coming weeks and months.

Featured image via HM Government.

Planning reform as economic policy

For decades, the UK’s planning system has served as a brake on productivity. Both major parties have acknowledged that housing, energy and infrastructure approvals take too long, cost too much, and deter investors. By tying planning reform directly to the Office for Budget Responsibility’s (OBR) growth forecasts, Reeves and Reed have reframed planning as a macroeconomic instrument rather than a departmental headache.

The Treasury’s logic is simple: if liberalising planning rules can unlock development and confidence, it can boost tax receipts, reduce borrowing, and give the Chancellor fiscal room to manoeuvre. In March, the OBR estimated that previous reforms could generate £3 billion in extra receipts; ministers now want that figure to rise, allowing fewer tax increases and more visible growth headlines in November.

The reform package – and its limits

The Planning and Infrastructure Bill already includes measures to fast-track developments, relax environmental offsetting rules, and give ministers greater powers to overrule local refusals. The latest amendments go further:

• Extending planning permissions during legal challenge periods to avoid expiry;
• Preventing councils from blocking major projects while ministerial “call-in” decisions are pending;
• Compulsory purchase reforms to free up land supply; and
• Streamlining environmental regulation, including easing the burden on Natural England.

Ministers also plan to resolve long-standing Ministry of Defence objections to onshore wind – potentially unlocking 3 GW of capacity – and to classify privately financed reservoirs as nationally significant infrastructure. The package, Reed argues, will “rewrite the rules for a Britain that builds.”

Yet experts warn that these measures, while pragmatic, are incremental. Without addressing systemic fragmentation, capacity shortfalls, and accountability gaps, the risk is another round of procedural tweaks that fail to deliver sustained growth.

What the Government can do next

If the Chancellor is serious about bulldozing barriers, three priorities stand out:

1. Rebuild local planning capacity – Many councils lack the staff, expertise, and data infrastructure to process applications at scale. Ring-fenced funding or a new Planning Skills Fund could restore capability and reduce decision times without undermining local accountability.
2. Create regional infrastructure frameworks – Economic geography matters. Devolving spatial planning powers to combined authorities and embedding “Growth Zones” linked to transport, energy, and housing investment could align national ambition with local delivery.
3. Modernise the evidence base – The Government should mandate the use of shared digital planning platforms, real-time housing demand data, and environmental metrics to reduce duplication and legal vulnerability. This would also give the OBR a more reliable model for forecasting the growth impact of planning reform.

Beyond these structural moves, the Treasury could incentivise build-out through fiscal levers – such as time-limited capital allowances for infrastructure projects or linking Stamp Duty adjustments to completions rather than transactions.

Balancing growth and legitimacy

Reed’s rhetoric of “taking the fight to the blockers” may resonate politically, but sustainable reform requires legitimacy as well as speed. Communities will not support accelerated development unless they see genuine benefits: affordable housing, resilient infrastructure, and environmental safeguards that are enforced rather than traded away.

Equally, if the Government hopes to persuade the OBR to credit its reforms with measurable growth, it must demonstrate a clear delivery pipeline – not just permissions on paper. The challenge for Reeves will be converting potential energy into visible economic output before fiscal tightening begins to bite.

Final thought

Britain’s growth problem is not a lack of ambition but a lack of alignment between fiscal, planning, and spatial policy. The Chancellor’s Budget offers a rare window to reconnect these levers. If planning reform becomes more than a slogan – if it rebuilds state capability, empowers regions, and gives investors confidence that the UK can actually deliver – then Reeves and Reed will have done more than bulldoze barriers. They will have laid the foundations of a state that knows how to build.

Curia’s Housing and Infrastructure Research Group is convening a group of Conservative and Labour YIMBY leaders to consider options to update planning reforms.

Photo: Chancellor of the Exchequer Rachel Reeves and Steve Reed, Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government visit Telford (Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government)

Housing and energy development

With opportunity comes challenge, and Esterson moved swiftly on to the issue of housing quality and accessibility. He described the government’s new Warm Homes Plan as a ‘big step forward’; it aims to improve UK housing’s energy efficiency, reduce heating costs, and tackle fuel poverty. The other benefit of the plan will be job-creation: ‘it will create jobs in every community, it will create economic activity in every community’, a cog in the wheel of the UK’s ‘energy revolution’.

Clean energy jobs more generally, he insisted, will become the way to economically supercharging the country, and in particular, regions which have flailed financially during the Tories’ austerity such as the North West. Not only housing, but the retrofit agenda too (the government’s ambition to hit net zero carbon emissions by 2050) are ‘fantastic’ job-opening opportunities.

Esterson also celebrated the government’s apprenticeship agenda, because for the 15-year period of his time in Parliament, ‘skills has been the number one issue raised for me’ in terms of employment. The flexibility offered by Labour’s apprenticeship policy (supported by a historic £3 billion apprenticeship budget) is cause for ‘great hope’. Another aiding factor is the North West’s crucial role in nuclear; both essential to the climate change committee and to job investment.

Threat of Reform

Although Labour have come under recent scrutiny for their rhetorical and media attacks on their political rivals, Reform UK, Esterson does not shy away from invoking their menace to investment in clean energy and job creation: ‘whether it’s transport or whether it’s investment in energy, we’ve seen Reform politicians threatening those companies or that investment in people […] a very, very sinister threat. This cannot be allowed to stand. This is not how we do things in this country. It’s a threat to democracy as well’.

He cites the rise of populism more generally: ‘we can’t afford to sit around and let it happen’. But as well as pushing back against Reform, he insists, the government need to make their work clearer – to demonstrate the tangible differences their schemes and policies are making to people’s lives.

Economic Stability

Esterson considers three Labour policies the greatest indications of the UK’s newfound economic stability:

• The creation of the industrial strategy
• The success of the last offshore auction round
• The success of the private investment event last autumn
• The fact that we have (albeit relatively small-scale and early days), the fastest growth in the G7

The Government’s Next Steps

Esterson feels that ‘the problem with the government is communication’. People need to feel that they are ‘better off at the end’ of Labour’s term in government, a harbinger of Keir Starmer’s conference speech: ‘Because growth is the pound in your pocket, it is more money for trips, meals out, the little things that bring joy to all our lives’. Labour’s growth project, delineated both through government policy and here in Esterson’s speech, is about tangible, felt improvements – growth which manifests itself both in grandiose, country-wide developments, but also in the seemingly humble, mundane benefits felt in daily life.

Esterson insisted that people need to ‘feel that the NHS is better, they get better treatment and they and their families are healthier [and] to feel and believe the country is safer’. The media’s fixation with Farage and immigration is another challenge; the government need to change the narrative, ‘demonstrate some success’.

Ultimately, as with the other panel discussions shared at the North West Conference, development, growth and direct improvements in people’s lives were explored by Esterson through the areas of improved housing, skill development, and sustainable and equitable innovation. 

Strategic Economic Development in the Northwest 

Aphra Brandreth opened discussions on Strategic Economic Development in the Northwest by celebrating the North West’s immense contribution to the sector: ‘we are […] the third biggest contributor to the UK’s defence industry. And what we contribute is more than the Welsh and Scottish defence industries put together’. Combined with sheer statistical power (49,000 jobs and 128 ‘really important companies’), to Brandreth, is the ‘big heritage’ of the North West’s long history of defence production.  

From heritage shipbuilding at Cammell Laird to the nuclear submarine programme in Cumbria, the defence sector anchors regional prosperity and national security. She discussed the need for a coordinated strategy between technology and defence, bringing advanced manufacturing, supply chain, economy and AI together to put forward a coherent case to government to secure investment. Brandreth is keen to conjoin existing industrial forces with burgeoning innovation strategies, to ward off stagnation or arrested growth.  

Infrastructure, Housing, and Connectivity 

Councillor Judith Derbyshire drew the oft-cited comparison between growth constraint and poor connectivity and infrastructure, including limited broadband access and weak transport links. She explained the importance of upgrading the A66 and A590, electrifying the North Wales main line, and improving links between Southport, Cumbria, and Merseyside. 

Inextricably connected, of course, is housing. Derbyshire highlighted the challenge of ‘social rented housing, especially in Central Lake District’ – a marked struggle due to high numbers of ‘important but low wage jobs working in the hospitality, tourism industry’, without the infrastructure to house employees. Local initiatives such as Barrow Rising and Marina Village, she explained, are repurposing brownfield land and bringing empty homes back into use, while tackling the impact of second homes and energy inefficiency on communities and affordability. 

Skills, AI, and Future Workforce Growth

Laura Randall from NOCN described the coordinated regional Skills Compact, which has been proposed to connect employers, training providers, and awarding bodies. The other participants celebrated this, calling for flexible, inclusive qualifications that address real-world gaps and embed transferable skills such as digital literacy, sustainability, and problem-solving. 

Randall celebrated the major opportunities for productivity and public service transformation afforded by AI and digital innovation. But she also called for clearer pathways, improved practical training, and greater public and institutional confidence to adopt these technologies responsibly: ‘it’s about future proofing really, rather than just developing qualifications for now. We’ve got to be thinking more into the future’.  

Local Procurement and Economic Inclusion 

Aphra Brandreth explained the advantage of local procurement (encouraging sourcing and supply from local businesses), to generate growth for smaller businesses. She insisted that they need ‘security […] so they can scale up and grow’: ‘supporting them to become the big businesses of tomorrow is really vital’. Collaboration between councils, businesses, and anchor institutions will be key to unlocking this potential. 

Devolution and Collaboration 

Devolution was largely welcomed as an opportunity to align decision-making with local priorities, but Brandreth raised concerns about the risk of added bureaucracy: ‘the devolution piece I’m slightly staying out of […] I do have some concerns about whether you’re just going to end up with an extra layer of government’. She explained that collaboration and devolution need to ‘really champion an area’, and not just ‘end up costing a lot of money and not delivering the actual outfits that we really want’. Participants called for greater cross-council collaboration, particularly between mayors across the political spectrum, to accelerate progress on transport, housing, and economic strategy. 

Ultimately, the panellists agreed, if Britain is to grow, it will start in places like the North West, where innovation meets industry, and collaboration drives change. The challenge now is to turn strategy into delivery, ambition into action and promises into real, experienced, growth.

Growth with Purpose 

Liverpool Local Councillor James Hansen emphasised that residents care most about the optics: when they can see and experience the visible impacts of growth. Jobs, area improvements and housing are thus prized, among constituents, over abstract growth statistics. Hansen cited Maghull, home of the largest mental health facility in Europe. He celebrated its plans for new digital health facility there which will focus on mental health, and bring thousands of jobs into the local area. Councillor Laura Robertson-Collins echoed Hansen’s emphasis: that strong local government is vital for delivering the housing, services, and community infrastructure upon which residents rely. 

Housing and Regeneration 

Laura Robertson-Collins described the chasm in Liverpool’s infrastructure: the city has 10,000 empty homes while 15,000 people are in housing need. She explained that many empty homes are privately owned, and that local government needs more flexibility and powers to reclaim and refurbish empty homes. Such housing shortage breeds aggravated, widespread resentment and social unrest, which manifests more often than not in a hike in anti-asylum and anti-refugee sentiments.  

Circular Economy and Waste Management 

The circular economy was identified as a key growth sector, due to its advocacy of both environmental and employment benefits. Upcoming changes from the Environment Act will reshape waste collection and disposal, Robertson-Collins claimed; but she pushed beyond this, insisting on the desperate need for anaerobic digesters for city-wide for food waste collection. Reuse, recycling, and food waste initiatives can provide opportunities, she insisted, but they require collaborative support and incentives from national and regional levels of local government. 

Planning and Infrastructure 

The speakers agreed that planning delays and red tape are obstacles to growth; systemic inefficiencies disproportionately focus on objections, often stalling projects that could deliver significant economic and social advantages.  

Not only those local to Liverpool, then, but national infrastructure shortcomings, such as the delayed Heathrow expansion, also impact regional growth. It is a developmental butterfly effect: expanding Heathrow would free up capacity at Liverpool John Lennon Airport, attracting more international investment and tourism to the North West. 

Skills, Apprenticeships, and Graduate Retention 

Liverpool boasts three universities, making higher education one of the city’s most major economic and talent assets. The retention of the city’s total 50,000 full-time students are vital for its vibrant economy – but their retention relies (and will increasingly rely) on housing availability, career opportunities, and continued investment in local services. More devolved education budgets, the speakers agreed, would allow local leaders to respond to regional skill demands, most of all in life sciences, digital technology, and the circular economy. Apprenticeships were also celebrated for their creation of a debt-free path into stable, skilled work.  

North West Collaboration and Devolution 

The panel’s speakers all agreed on the need for stronger collaboration across the North West – essential for sustainable development and growth. The Liverpool-Manchester rail link was cited as a prize opportunity – and mutual learning and shared expertise were touted, with the specific examples of Liverpool gaining from Manchester’s bus franchising model, and Manchester’s education via Liverpool’s rail innovation. 

Public Perception of AI 

Discussion also turned to artificial intelligence and its relationship with public trust. Although AI can, and in areas, has, improved healthcare through faster diagnoses and more efficient services, public anxiety remains high. The panel speakers agreed that used responsibly, AI can help reduce workloads, improve access to services, and enhance quality of life. 

Next Steps 

Local Governments are now committed to three key areas: 

• Lobbying national politicians for Green Gas scheme support to enable new anaerobic digestion facilities. 

• Presenting a Cabinet report to bring several hundred empty homes back into use. 

• Hosting regional workshops to strengthen collaboration between metropolitan and non-metropolitan areas across the North West. 

Ultimately, the panel agreed, a healthy ecosystem, a robust building system and having all the infrastructure and skills to unite those areas is critical. 

This week the Scottish Parliament will debate one of the most important pieces of legislation of this session, the Housing (Scotland) Bill. 

The Housing Bill was introduced by Patrick Harvie MSP as part of the Scottish Greens’ New Deal for Tenants. It included rent controls, eviction protections and new rights such as the right to decorate homes and keep beloved pets.

At the heart of this bill is a simple but vital principle. That everyone should have a safe and secure home that they can actually afford.

For far too long, tenants in Edinburgh where I live and across Scotland have been at the mercy of a broken rental market. Average rents for a two-bedroom flat in Edinburgh have soared by more than 60 percent since 2010 and in some parts of the city the figures are even worse. 

Families, young people and even those who have lived here their entire lives are being priced out of their communities, forced to choose between rent and other essentials.

This is why rent controls and stronger protections for tenants are so necessary. No one should be spending most of their pay packet just to keep a roof over their head, while landlords make record profits. 

Homes are for living in, not for profiteering.

The Housing Bill is only happening because of the Scottish Greens. From the very beginning, we insisted that rent controls and new rights for tenants must be at the heart of the legislation. The Bill will help to redress the imbalance of power between renters and landlords, making sure that tenants have stability and security.

We are tabling amendments that we believe will make this bill even stronger and allow more security and peace of mind for individual renters and families. We hope that the government will work with us to make it as bold and robust a bill as it can be and that we can ensure Scotland’s renters are the best protected anywhere in the UK.

Rogue landlords have been allowed to get away with ripping off tenants for far too long. It’s easy to say the private rental market is broken, but it isn’t. It is rigged. It is doing what it set out to do which is enriching greedy developers and rogue landlords.

The current system has left renters vulnerable to sudden rent hikes and insecure tenancies. That is not good enough. 

With this Bill, we can finally start to change that, giving people confidence that their homes will remain affordable and that they will not be forced out by unjust increases. We have the opportunity to start fixing a broken housing market that is punishing people all over Scotland. We must not water down or dilute our ambitions by building in loopholes, exemptions and handouts for big developers.

I am proud of the role the Scottish Greens have played in bringing this legislation forward, but passing the Bill is only the beginning. We need to make sure it is implemented properly and delivers the real change that tenants across Scotland so desperately need.

All families deserve financial stability. Nobody should have to worry about losing the roof over their head because their landlord decides to cash in. By backing this Bill, Parliament can take a major step towards making unaffordable rent hikes a thing of the past and creating a fairer, greener Scotland where everyone has a home they can afford.

This week, I urge MSPs from all parties – including the many that are landlords themselves – to support rent controls and protections for tenants. Edinburgh’s families cannot wait any longer.

Featured image via Justin Black / Shutterstock.

The outrage comes after councils gained powers in April to charge up to a one hundred per cent premium on second homes, beginning a “war” on holiday homes.

Her office rebuts claims that the Deputy PM is dodging her own tax, saying she pays full council tax in Greater Manchester and the second-home premium on the new Hove property. 

The Hove flat, reported to have been bought for a little over £700,000, adds to Ms Rayner’s constituency home in Ashton-under-Lyne and a grace-and-favour apartment at Admiralty House in Westminster.

Critics argue the optics of the housing minister with three homes during a housing crisis contradicts Labour’s push for affordable home building, while her allies stand by her saying that since she is following all the rules, there is no issue.

A Commons Library explainer, published in April, sets out how the second home premium works, and the limited exemptions that may apply. It also notes that councils had to make determinations one year in advance to introduce the charge in 2025. Several have done so, including Brighton and Hove.

Opposition figures, including Sir James Cleverly, have pressed for clarity on Ms Rayner’s council tax status and residence declarations following the Hove purchase.

Supporters counter that the second-home premium power was legislated before Labour took office and that Ms Rayner’s arrangements comply with the rules. The Times and other outlets report that the Cabinet Office handles council tax for the Admiralty House flat, as is standard for ministers. 

Beyond property questions, official transparency data provides a record of Ms Rayner’s ministerial expenditure since taking office in July last year. The Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government’s travel return for January to March shows an overseas trip to Ethiopia and Ghana in February totalling £7,531.80 in travel costs, £141 in associated costs, £7,672.80 in total. 

There has been wider media scrutiny of ministerial spending, including foreign travel travel, with a primary focus on on whether ministers’ overseas visits align with their briefs and pledges.

Reporting around Ms Rayner’s Africa trip captured that debate, while the departmental CSV sets out the costs and purpose. As with all such returns, totals are modest compared with wider departmental spending but form part of the transparency regime. 

The Cabinet Office’s March list of ministerial responsibilities confirms Ms Rayner’s roles as Deputy Prime Minister and Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, providing the frame for judging her portfolio and obligations.

That backdrop explains why her personal housing arrangements attract attention, but the available records show declared travel, gifts and hospitality, and a stated commitment to paying the second-home premium. 

Everything appears to be above board, apart from her PR team, who are still scrambling to claw the headlines back.

Featured image via repic / Shutterstock.