Lack of truly affordable homes has been revealed

High rate of office conversions and dearth of social housing

No new social rent homes are being built in Maidstone by the government body charged with boosting the national housing supply.

Labour said a long-term decline in new social rent homes is a disaster for people on council waiting lists.

The latest Homes England data shows 305 homes were started in Maidstone in 2018-19, up from 197 in the previous 12 months.

But there were no builds in either year for social rent homes, which are pegged to local incomes and cheaper than other housing types.

Across England, around 45,700 new houses started on site in 2018-19 – 7% up on the previous 12 months.

Starts for affordable home ownership, which includes shared ownership and rent-to-buy schemes, plus affordable rent housing – capped at 80% of the local market value – went up. Intermediate-rent housing, defined as being between social and market rates, and homes for market sale and rent also increased.

The only decline was for social rent properties – 13% fewer were started.

John Healey, Labour’s Shadow Housing Secretary, said: “This is a disaster for the more than one million people on council waiting lists. The government’s failure to tackle the housing crisis is now more obvious than ever.”

Polly Neate, chief executive of the housing charity Shelter, said only a tiny fraction of new homes are truly affordable social houses.

One of the issues feeding into the lack of cheaper-priced housing is the high number of office conversions, which do not attract the same obligations placed on developers. As the KM has previously reported, in the five years between April 2013 and March 2018, 72 office spaces closed, making way for nearly 600 homes. Blocks which have been lost include Miller House in Lower Stone Street, converted to Miller Heights in 2016, providing around 110 flats and nearby Medvale House in Mote Road is turning 81 flats. Others lost were Star House in Pudding Lane and Concorde House at Rocky Hill. But these changes don’t require planning permission and the Local Government Association warns they can result in poorer-quality housing, and allow developers to avoid building affordable homes.

Research by the LGA and housing charity Shelter highlighted that developers who create homes via this permitted development do not have to make contributions towards affordable housing, which is often required in the full planning process. They claim the law has potentially resulted in the loss of more than 10,000 such properties. Critics also argue this process does not receive the same level of scrutiny as a full planning application. The government has pledged a review of permitted development rights for conversion of buildings to residential use in respect of the quality standard of homes.

It said across England 46,000 homes have been delivered.