Government Launches £624m Housebuilding Loan Fund

Housebuilders can now bid for loan funding from a £624 million fund to deliver infrastructure and assemble land, the government has said. The funding is part of £2.2bn announced in the spending review last year to support infrastructure. The funding, to be committed from 2021/22 to 2024/25 with terms of up to 20 years, is part of the £7.1bn National Home Building fund and is also available to small builders. The government says funding will help deliver 116,000 new homes. Read more on the Housing Today website.

https://www.housingtoday.co.uk/news/government-opens-624m-loan-fund-to-house-builders/5114568.article

£8.6 Billion For Affordable Homes

 Thousands of people will be helped onto the housing ladder as funding worth £8.6 billion is allocated across the country. Part of the largest single investment in affordable housing in a decade, the Affordable Homes Programme funding will deliver around 119,000 homes, including 57,000 for ownership, 29,600 for social rent and 6,250 affordable rural homes. The cash injection could support up to 370,000 jobs across the country for homebuilders, SME developers, and wider businesses supporting the house building industry such as electricians and plumbers. This is expected to generate up to £26 billion of other private and public investment. Read more on the GovUK website.

https://www.gov.uk/government/news/86-billion-for-affordable-homes-to-give-boost-onto-housing-ladder

Rough Sleepers To Get £203m Funding To Help Them Off The Streets

More rough sleepers in England will be helped off the streets and into housing this year as part of a £203m programme, the government has announced. Some 2,688 people were estimated to be sleeping rough on any single night in England last autumn. Housing Secretary Robert Jenrick said the money will be given to councils to support shelters and specialist mental health or addiction services. But charity Crisis warned the funding "will only scratch the surface". Read more on the BBC website.

Rough sleepers in England to get £203m funding to help them off the streets - BBC News

Government Launches £150m ‘Help To Build’ Fund

The government has unveiled a new £150m fund aimed at making it easier and more affordable for people to build their own homes. Housing secretary Robert Jenrick announced the new ‘Help to Build’ scheme to make self and custom homebuilding a realistic option to enable people to get on the housing ladder. The fund will provide an equity loan to those looking to take the self-build option. This will work similarly to the Help to Buy scheme. Read more on the Housing Today website.

https://www.housingtoday.co.uk/news/government-announces-150m-self-build-boost/5111549.article 

Building Safety Fund – Parliamentary Written Answer

Hilary Benn: To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, whether, in respect of buildings with unsafe cladding, he has inserted a contract clause to say that leaseholders cannot claim assistance for cladding repairs from the Building Safety Fund unless they can prove that they have sufficient funding to complete all necessary fire safety works; and if he will make a statement

Christopher Pincher: ..we must ensure that the remediation of the unsafe cladding systems is not delayed by any funding shortfalls for any additional works the applicant may want to take forward at the same time that are not eligible for funding. There is no requirement within the contract for applicants to perform other fire safety works at the same time as cladding works, and if the applicant chooses to perform other works as separate projects, this will not affect the payment of funding for cladding remediation.

http://www.parliament.uk/business/publications/written-questions-answers-statements/written-question/Commons/2021-03-03/162511

Government Announces £4 Million For A Renewed Community Housing Fund

The MHCLG announced it will allocate £4m to help community-based organisations bid for funds to support them to prepare bids for the Affordable Homes Programme. The decision was welcomed by the Confederation of Co-operative Housing (CCH). CCH says the renewed Community Housing Fund will help housing co-operatives and other community-led housing organisations apply for money to support them in preparing their bids for the £11.5bn Affordable Homes Programme. The £4m fund will also help projects to potentially access other sources of funding and help progress those schemes that are stuck at the beginning of the process. Read more on the Co-operative News website.

https://www.thenews.coop/152583/sector/housing/uk-government-announces-4-million-for-a-renewed-community-housing-fund/ 

Waking Watch Fund Targeted Towards Eight Cities

A £30m fund to help buildings with dangerous cladding replace costly waking watches with alarms will be targeted towards six cities. Rules for the funding revealed £22m of the pot will be spent in London, Manchester, Birmingham, Leeds, Liverpool, Bristol, Newcastle and Sheffield. The government said this is because these areas are where the highest number of buildings in need of support are located. The funding is only open to buildings above 17.7m in height, where waking watch costs are currently being passed over to leaseholders. Read more on Inside Housing.

https://www.insidehousing.co.uk/news/waking-watch-fund-targeted-towards-eight-cities-government-reveals-69370?utm_source=Housing60&utm_medium=email&utm_content=article_link&utm_campaign=H60

Funding Allocated For 3,300 New Homes For Rough Sleepers

More than 3,300 new long-term homes for rough sleepers and other vulnerable people have been approved. Backed by government investment of more than £150 million the new homes will be made available in every region of England. This will enable people who sleep rough, or at risk of sleeping rough, to be rehoused in secure, long-term accommodation, providing some of the most vulnerable in society with a permanent place to live and help to rebuild their lives. These will be available by the end of March 2021. Read more on GovUK.

https://www.gov.uk/government/news/funding-allocated-for-3-300-new-homes-for-rough-sleepers

Affordable Housing: Construction – Parliamentary Written Answer

James Murray: To ask the Secretary of State for Housing, Communities and Local Government, how much of the funding available for the Affordable Homes Programme 2016-21 will be included in the £12.2 billion announced in Budget 2020.

Christopher Pincher: At Budget 2020 the Government announced we are investing £12.2 billion to build affordable homes between 2021/22 and 2025/26. Of this, £9.5 billion is new funding and £2 billion is for long-term strategic partnerships previously announced in September 2018.

http://www.parliament.uk/business/publications/written-questions-answers-statements/written-question/Commons/2020-07-16/75461

£105 Million To Keep Rough Sleepers Safe

Interim housing for thousands of rough sleepers taken off the streets during the pandemic is to be provided, ministers have announced. The additional £105 million will be used to support rough sleepers and those at risk of homelessness into tenancies of their own, including through help with deposits for accommodation, and securing thousands of alternative rooms already available and ready for use, such as student accommodation. The funding takes the total amount provided this year by government to support rough sleepers and those on the brink of becoming homeless to over half a billion pounds. Read more on the Gov UK website.

https://www.gov.uk/government/news/105-million-to-keep-rough-sleepers-safe-and-off-the-streets-during-coronavirus-pandemic

G15 Calls For Additional Funding To Convert Unsold Units To Key Worker ‘Homes For Heroes’

The G15 group of London’s largest housing associations has urged government to provide financial backing to convert unsold properties into affordable homes for key workers, as part of a new five-year programme to deliver 100,000 ‘homes for heroes’. In a report, the group set out a number of requirements for scaling delivery over time, including an opportunity to “invest in precision-manufactured homes on a scale not seen since the original Homes Fit for Heroes programme” launched in 1918. But it said that to help essential workers in the shorter term there should be an “immediate response to make available completed or nearly completed homes”, with government funding matched to housing associations’ resources. Read more on the Social Housing website.

https://www.socialhousing.co.uk/news/g15-calls-for-immediate-additional-funding-to-convert-unsold-units-to-key-worker-homes-for-heroes-66397?utm_source=Housing60&utm_medium=email&utm_content=article_link&utm_campaign=H60

Government Announces Funding Of £3.2 Million To Help Rough Sleepers To Self-Isolate

The Government has announced initial emergency funding of £3.2 million to help people who are sleeping rough to self-isolate during the Coronavirus outbreak. The funding will be available to all local authorities in England and will reimburse them for the cost of providing accommodation and services to those sleeping on the streets to help them successfully self-isolate to prevent the spread of the virus. Read more on Homeless Link.

https://homeless.org.uk/connect/news/2020/mar/18/government-announces-initial-emergency-funding-of-%C2%A332-million-to-help

No Tenure Breakdown For Affordable Homes Programme

Budget 2020 pitched a new multi-year settlement of £12bn to the Affordable Homes Programme (AHP) – but the MHCLG does not break down programme funding by tenure. Confirmation came in the response from Housing Minister Christopher Pincher to a written Commons question. Pincher confirmed MHCLG did not break down funding by tenure for AHP which aimed to deliver “at least” 12,500 social rent homes to defined high-cost areas. Budget 2020 pitched a new multi-year settlement of £12bn to the Affordable Homes Programme (AHP). This sum represents a rise of £3bn increase on the current five-year AHP worth £9bn and is due to end in 2021. Read more on 24housing.

https://www.24housing.co.uk/news/no-tenure-breakdown-for-affordable-homes-programme/

£1bn Fund To Strip Cladding From Tall Buildings

A £1bn fund to help strip combustible cladding from homes in privately owned tower blocks is “a huge step forward”, but likely to be too little and would still leave thousands of people in financial and safety limbo, leaseholders said. The chancellor, Rishi Sunak, accepted demands to bail out hundreds of thousands of leaseholders living in buildings constructed with combustible panels that are different from those used on Grenfell Tower. His budget included the announcement of new money to remove the materials from private and social tower blocks over 18 metres tall. Read more on the Guardian website.

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2020/mar/11/budget-2020-1bn-fund-to-strip-cladding-from-tall-buildings

Government Pledges £236m To Tackle Rough Sleeping

The government has announced extra funding to tackle rough sleeping, as well as a review into the wider causes. The twin announcement, including an extra £236m in funding to help people off the streets, comes a day before the publication of annual figures on the problem. The money will go towards accommodation for up to 6,000 people who are already sleeping rough or at risk of homelessness based on the housing first model. It will create new housing through refurbishments or leasing new private-rented sector properties, which will be set aside for those affected by rough sleeping. Read more on the Guardian website.

https://www.theguardian.com/society/2020/feb/26/government-pledges-236m-to-tackle-rough-sleeping

RSLs Among Biggest Beneficiaries Of Temporary Accommodation Contracts

Three current RSLs are named among the biggest beneficiaries of a “billion-pound-a-year temporary accommodation industry” exposed by a joint investigation between Shelter and BBC Panorama. Shelter says the stats as a whole show a need for the government to prioritise “a new generation of social homes” in the upcoming budget. A2 Dominion, Notting Hill Genesis, and Network Homes were together recipients of more than £16m from councils in 2018/19 over temporary accommodation in 2018/19. The panorama programme can be found on the iplayer website.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/m000f1wr/panorama-cashing-in-on-the-housing-crisis

Extra £112m For Rough Sleeping Programme

Extra funding has been issued to councils to fund “up to 6,000 new bed spaces and 2,500 support staff across the country”, the government has announced. Unveiled by Robert Jenrick, the funding “could mean a roof over their head, access to specialist mental health or addiction services, or advice on how to secure a home in the long term.” But in a subtle bit of phrasing, the government seemed to suggest the rise in rough sleeping was largely down to “a large increase in the number of non-UK rough sleepers coming to the UK.” Read more on 24housing.

https://www.24housing.co.uk/news/government-pledges-extra-112m-to-rough-sleeping-programme/

MHCLG Funds Research Into Housing-Related Loneliness Solutions

MHCLG has allocated £125,000 funding for research into housing solutions to tackle loneliness, a new report reveals. The Loneliness Annual Report 2020 released by the Department for Digital, Culture Media and Sport (DCMS) recognises the research pilot MHCLG has underway to evaluate the value for money and impact of housing interventions on loneliness. That pilot also looks to land insight into the impact of community-led housing and co-housing on reducing loneliness across all ages; and explore best practice in housing schemes that promote social cohesion. Read more on 24housing.

https://www.24housing.co.uk/news/mhclg-funds-research-into-housing-related-loneliness-solutions/

Funding Boosts To Help Councils Tackle Lettings Legislation Enforcement

Several funding boosts in recent years should mean local authorities are better equipped to tackle the enforcement of lettings legislation in 2020. Using the additional funds to train more enforcement officers could lead to more penalties being issued, including banning orders for the worst offenders - which have been used sparingly since their introduction. Earlier this month, it was announced that 100 local councils will receive an additional £4 million in funding to combat rogue landlords and letting agencies.  Read more on the Property Reporter website.

https://www.propertyreporter.co.uk/landlords/funding-boosts-to-help-councils-tackle-lettings-legislation-enforcement.html

£450,000 Funding Boost For Housing First Projects

Homeless Link has announced a funding injection of £450,000 to five existing Housing First provider across the UK. The Housing First Fund, funded by Comic Relief, aims to extend and improve the support offered to people experiencing chronic homelessness and multiple disadvantage, including physical and mental ill health, substance misuse and histories of offending. Homeless Link’s grants programme sits alongside and will feed back into its Housing First England project, which has been working since 2016 to promote and grow a “national Housing First movement.” Read more on the Homeless Link website.

https://homeless.org.uk/connect/blogs/2019/nov/25/funding-awarded-to-housing-first-services-to-enhance-support