Housing: will Andy Burnham walk the walk?

Housing was a central theme of Andy Burnham’s policy speech in Manchester on 29 June, where he set out a vision for a “rewired Britain” and a decade-long plan to raise living standards. At the heart of that vision is a commitment to deliver the largest council house building programme since the post-war period and to make decent, affordable housing a national priority.

Burnham highlighted the scale of the housing crisis. Britain has lost almost 1.5 million council homes since the 1980s, while around 1.5 million people remain on housing waiting lists. He argued that this has created a “housing trap”, with governments spending billions subsidising ever-increasing private rents through the benefits system rather than investing in public housing.

He also pointed to the wider social and economic costs. Freezes to Local Housing Allowance can push more families into homelessness, while councils face rising bills for temporary accommodation which is having a “ruinous impact” on the public finances.

For Burnham, the solution starts with rebuilding council housing. He argued that a renewed focus on public housing would create a more preventative and productive state. “If you don’t give people a good home, what chance have they got of having a good life?” he asked. He linked decent housing to better health, improved educational outcomes and more sustainable public services, arguing that everything starts with a good home.

His plans include making greater use of vacant public land to reduce development costs, devolving more housing powers to regional and local leaders, and supporting higher-density residential development in towns and urban centres. Through a new “No. 10 North”, he hopes to help regenerate high streets and town centres while protecting more green spaces from development.

A key element of Burnham’s approach is support for a national Housing First model, based on Finland’s successful programme. Housing First provides people in temporary accommodation with a permanent home before addressing issues such as health, employment, or addiction. Since adopting the policy in 2008, Finland has significantly reduced long-term homelessness and cut the number of people living in hostels and boarding houses by 76%.

Substantial

Burnham’s ambitions are very substantial. During the post-war decades, councils built more than three million social homes, with annual construction peaking at around 200,000 homes a year. In contrast, over the last decade, local councils have averaged just 1,400 new homes a year.

That decline is closely linked to the impact of the Right to Buy policy. Burnham has repeatedly argued that councils cannot solve the housing crisis if newly built homes are quickly lost through Right to Buy sales. Following his re-election as Mayor of Greater Manchester in 2024, he compared the position to “trying to fill a bath with the plug out”.

He has called for Right to Buy to be suspended for newly built council homes and has repeatedly highlighted that more social homes are being sold than replaced. Now in a position to shape national housing policy, Burnham faces a major test: he has to go beyond suspension and scrap the right to buy to ensure that a new generation of council housing is protected for the future.

In the next article, I will write more fully about Finland’s Housing First programme.