Call for self-build homes

Up to 40,000 extra homes could be built every year in the UK if more land was made available for people to build their own properties, a review on housing has found.

Richard Bacon, Conservative MP for South Norfolk, is a long-standing champion of self-build and custom-build housing.

The politician was asked by Prime Minister Boris Johnson to “develop a plan for a major scaling up of self-commissioned homes”. These are properties commissioned by a customer who will then live in it once it is built.

Bacon found there was a “missing market” in the UK, with opportunities to expand.

In his report, the MP said more homes were needed but “quite simply, new housing is feared”.

He said: “There is a solution. It involves creating conditions in which customers are treated as if they matter the most, rather than, for the most part, scarcely mattering at all.”