Reviving Social Housing

Description of impact

Institute for Social Policy, Housing and Equalities Research (I-SPHERE) research has influenced a policy shift towards restoring social housing as a central, long term element in housing provision across the UK. I-SPHERE researchers' findings influenced parliamentary debates on the UK Government’s unsuccessful attempts to impose short-term tenancies on the social housing sector, contributing to the subsequent formal discontinuance of that policy. Research also helped to develop new measures of core homelessness and projections of homelessness into the future, while related research demonstrated the requirement to build up to 100,000 social housing units per year. They have also published a Green Paper on the need to change the quality, reputation, and status of social housing. A large number of organisations and a Select Committee have endorsed a social housing target based on I-SPHERE research.

Who is affected

Social housing - UK

Narrative

The impact of the research on fixed term tenancies in social housing was seen most clearly in the debates on the Housing and Planning Bill in 2016, as documented in Wilson (2018) HOCL Briefing Paper 7173. The Coalition Government in the Localism Act of 2011 gave local authorities and housing associations powers to offer so-called ‘flexible tenancies’ (essentially flexible FTTs), ostensibly to enable them to manage their housing stock and ensure it went to those in most need. In practice take-up was very limited, so the government in 2015 included clauses in the Housing and Planning Bill aimed at preventing local authorities from offering ‘lifetime’ (secure) tenancies. During the Lords debate on this Bill on 18 April 2016 several distinguished members (Kerslake, Beecham, Lister) spoke against these measures, directly citing the Fitzpatrick and Watt research, for example the evidence that social landlords were sceptical of or disillusioned with the measure, that tenants affected were often unaware of their situation, but could be made more anxious by the change, particularly in the case of more dependent groups. Lord Kerslake said: ‘I commend this research to every Member of this House because it gives a very clear understanding of the practical impact of this policy, which creates uncertainty and not value in the way that was originally envisaged’ International acknowledgement of the significance of this evidence and argument are found in a recent OECD Report on Social Housing .

At the time, these arguments were not accepted by the Government, but subsequently, partly influenced by the aftermath of the Grenfell Tower fire, a new more positive approach to social housing was adopted, as set out in the Green Paper A new deal for social housing and other associated policy announcements. Since that time there has been a notable trend by major independent social landlords to abandon FTTs and return to more secure tenancies.

The Green Paper also signalled a marked change of approach in relation to new housebuilding, again quoting Prime Minister May: ‘This Government is committed to getting more of the right homes built in the right places, sold or rented at prices local people can afford – and that includes building a new generation of council home to help fix our broken housing market’. Important parallel or subsequent announcements included enabling social housing to be funded through the expanded 'affordable homes programme' in England, modifying planning policy and lifting the cap on council borrowing to fund council house building. The second and third strands of research fed into this process of policy shift, alongside inputs from other quarters. For example, at the Crisis 50th anniversary conference in 2017 Bramley presented his homelessness projections research on the same platform as the Secretary of State who spoke about the need to tackle homelessness. Both this research and the ‘Housing Requirements’ study were then extensively referred to in the Crisis (2018) ‘manifesto’ Everybody In: How to end homelessness in Great Britain, including in particular the 160,000 core homeless estimates and the 100,000 pa new social rented housing supply requirements, discussion of a ‘predict & prevent’ approach, and a costing of the programme by PWC which used Bramley’s projected numbers as a key input. Both research reports and the Crisis ‘Plan’ received extensive media coverage.

The social housebuilding targets (100,000 pa) proposed by P6 have been endorsed by a range of organisations (NHF, Crisis, CIoH, Centre for Social Justice, Welsh Government, the independent Affordable Housing Commission, Shelter, Local Government Association, London Councils, District Councils Network, Homeless Link, Centrepoint, St Mungos).

David Orr CBE, recently retired CEO, National Housing Federation said: “The work which I-SPHERE has produced on assessing the need for new homes has been an absolute game-changer. It fills a massive gap in the evidence base, forming an absolutely indispensable part of the nation’s understanding not only of how many homes we need to be building, but of the positive economic and social impacts of building those homes”. The Federation reinforced the message by publishing work evidence based on further analysis by Bramley (building on project 6] that there were 3,800,000 people in 1,600,000 households in need and for whom social housing was the most appropriate tenure in terms of affordability, 500,000 more than the number on official waiting lists, that received extensive media coverage. Following publication of this report Bramley was also invited to give an internal seminar on this to analysts and policy staff in the MoHCLG on 10 November 2020. 

In July 2020 the cross-party House of Common Select Committee on Housing, Communities and Local Government produced a report (HC173) on ‘Building more Social Housing’. A key section of this report highlights and quotes extensively from Bramley’s NHF/Crisis study and endorses it as its recommended target basis, quoting support from independent academics as well as the Affordable Housing Commission and other organisations mentioned above. It’s key recommendation is to assert in bold that ‘There is compelling evidence that England needs at least 90,000 net additional social rent homes a year’ (quoting Bramley’s figure) and that the government should have published targets for each affordable tenure. Although ministers are quoted as supporting the need for more affordable homes including social rented homes, and officials have shown interest in the research, they have been reluctant to commit to numerical targets, a situation the Committee labelled ‘disappointing’.

The Government in England adopted targets in relation to the drastic reduction in rough sleeping in England as an election commitment (Conservatives Manifesto, 2017, p58). They also in 2018 set up and consulted on a research programme with the Department of Work & Pensions to model the causes/drivers of homelessness, quoting Bramley’s research extensively, and the Scoping/Feasibility studies commissioned from consultants Alma Economics (2019a & b) makes clear that the Bramley model is the leading relevant example of a policy simulation tool in the British case.

Impact status	Achieved
Impact date	1 Jan 2016 → 31 Dec 2020
Category of impact	Societal, Legal
Impact level	National