COUNCIL HOUSING RESEARCH Local authority direct provision of housing: an update report
  | Janice is a Visiting Professor in the Bartlett School of Planning at University College London. Janice was a Senior Adviser on local government at DCLG 2000-2005, having been Chief Executive of Rutland CC, Director of Technical Services at Woking, and Professorial Head of the School of Planning and Landscape at Birmingham Polytechnic. Ben is Associate Professor in Spatial Planning and Government at the Bartlett School of Planning, UCL. His research interests centre on the relationship between state modernisation and the planning system in the UK. Recent work has included projects on devolution and spatial planning, planning for national infrastructure, and local authority delivery of housing. |
Janice and Ben last reported in 2024 Spring Terrier the key findings of their 2023 tranche of research. In this fifth report based on their 2026 research, they identify what has changed in local authority initiatives for the direct provision of housing and identify some issues. |
Introduction
The pressure for local authorities to deliver more homes is as strong as ever, but a change in government in 2024 and Prime Minister in 2026 is now bringing more focus and attention to a wider range of ways in which councils are contributing to housing delivery. In this research, which we have undertaken regularly since 2017, we have recorded the growing range of methods and the increased participation of local authorities across England in housing delivery, regardless of whether they still retain a Housing Revenue Account (HRA) to provide social rent homes. While we have undertaken this research in two-year intervals between 2017-2023, we decided that we would wait until 2026 for the fifth round of our research, to allow for any post-general election policy changes to be considered by councils.
Context for 2026
During the 2023-2026 period, local authorities have experienced growing pressures to support homelessness, and the costs for building new homes remains high. Meanwhile, the Housing Regulator’s responsibilities have changed to include a greater focus on the condition of homes, while climate conditions have switched to a focus on heat and water management as necessary components of retrofitting.
Local authorities have also been faced with multiple planning reforms and declining numbers of planners who have been attracted by the private sector. Many local authorities have also been facing Local Government Reorganisation and the role for Strategic Authority Mayors in housing delivery remains positive but unclear in detail. In London, the powers of the Mayor of London to allocate social and affordable housing funding in five-year programmes continue, although this has not been extended to mayors elsewhere, even though the Prime Minister has noted that London Boroughs deliver more homes (1).
The context for the 2026 research has been as complex as in previous rounds, and in this fifth wave of research, we are considering how local authorities in England are responding to these pressures. As in previous rounds, the research is conducted in four stages:
The first is a 100% desk survey of all English local authorities, to investigate their types of housing delivery activity. This year the survey has included some new data that has not been collected before, including activities on retrofitting and where councils have housing sites of 800+ homes. This is in addition to the information collected before on companies, joint ventures, use of council land for housing, and housing delivered through regeneration programmes
The second part of the research is conducted through round tables. There have been nine round tables in 2026, with over 90 participants from all parts of the country and a range of roles in local government. These round tables provide us with information on current issues facing those delivering housing, and helps to shape some of the questions used in the third part of the research
A direct survey to local authority officers in all English local authorities. Some questions in this direct survey remain constant over the different rounds of research, but some relate to current issues that we have found in the round tables. This survey was conducted between July and mid-September
The last part of the research will be about 10 case studies, again from across England and from different types of authority and housing delivery experience. The case study authorities self-nominate through the direct survey process. The research has an Advisory Group comprising of representatives from different professional bodies including RICS, RTPI, CIOH, CIPFA, POS, ADOH and the LGA (2), together with individuals who are experienced in legal matters, planning negotiation and design. The research issues two reports – one on the desk survey and the second on the combined findings of the research.
This article brings the findings of the desk survey with some findings from the round tables. The second report will be published in early 2027 and will be the included in a further article next year.
Findings so far
What did we find in the 2026 desk survey and round tables? Overall, we found that 95% of all English local authorities are taking some action to support the local delivery of housing through a range of means. This level of activity is not generally recognised by government or other participants in the housing sector. However, the survey sets out, authority by authority, what these support activities are, with weblinks, so any council’s housing focus can be examined in some detail.
The level of information in this survey is dependent on how much is available through council reports and publications. One of the key issues is that the range of council activity in delivering housing is spread across a range of departments and programmes and not fully represented in housing strategies. In particular, there is less information about regeneration sites or areas which can often allocate land for large numbers of homes. In this research we have never included council activity in the delivery of supported housing, so the levels and types of activity might be higher in practice.
Looking into the details of how councils are supporting housing delivery is the focus of this part of the research. Firstly, we look at each council’s strategy or plan to determine whether there is a corporate commitment to the delivery of affordable housing. This commitment does not necessarily have an associated delivery plan and some councils that did not include a corporate commitment to affordable housing have very active housing programmes, but nevertheless it is an important indicator of local commitment. In 2026, 82% of English local authorities have made this corporate commitment to support the provision of affordable housing.
The survey then goes on to review the detailed ways in which this support is provided, through direct initiatives or other means, including, land, funding, enabling, and advocacy. One of the main methods used by councils is through the HRA, which is used by 53% of local authorities. There have been hopes from government that HRA reforms since 2017 would encourage more councils to rejoin the system, but this has generally not been the case. In earlier research, reasons given included the persistence of Right to Buy for any new homes provided, and secondly, the HRA financial system complexity is such that it is difficult to recruit CIPFA members to support a small new HRA programme.
A more popular method to support housing delivery used by 69% councils, whether or not they have an HRA, is some kind of company format. These might be wholly owned companies or joint ventures for single or multiple sites, and include a range of activities from development to letting agencies. The partners in joint ventures can be housing developers or contractors and/or housing associations, other local authorities, institutional investors, community land trusts or faith organisations.
Councils have also remained active in the development of sites and buildings in their ownership, including car parks and depots, and local landmark buildings as part of town centre regeneration strategies such as town halls, police stations and schools. Some councils are also acquiring land for housing development both by agreement and through Compulsory Purchase Orders.
The pressures on councils to meet housing targets within the context of high development costs, and to find enough homes for those who are homeless, has meant that 57% of councils are acquiring homes. These are from a range of providers, such as developers or housing associations, or on the open market. Councils have a range of acquisition strategies, including only buying former right to buy properties for longer-term estate management with existing stock, using a budget or number cap or purchasing in specific locations. Where councils have joint ventures with developers or housing associations, these acquisitions can be based on renegotiation of existing tenure agreements. Some councils have purchased whole, new blocks of accommodation when offered them by developers.
The research also reviews councils engaging with housing delivery outside main housing programmes, such as through regeneration or special government inspired initiatives such as garden or new communities. In 2026, this issue has been addressed more widely in the survey, extending beyond regeneration and master planning, as in previous rounds, to include urban extensions and garden communities. The survey found that 71% of councils have at least one housing site for more than 800 homes, and some councils have numerous such sites that stretch to 12,000 homes. These sites will be in various stages of approval and development, but have some local political commitment to their delivery.
We also reviewed local authority support for retrofitting, not primarily on their own buildings but where there is assistance and advice to householders. In this, we found that 85% of local authorities provide support in this way
While it is difficult to assess the implications of coming changes for some local authorities, including LGR and the new mayoral strategic authorities in this part of the research, we will report on this later when we have the findings from the direct survey. However, it has been possible to review the effects on the level and range of housing initiatives present in some district councils before LGR was enacted, in the period since the last survey. Here, regrettably, many local housing initiatives appear to have been lost, although some have subsequently been resuscitated by town councils in the new Unitary Authority areas.
Issues from the round tables
While this report on our research would normally cover only the desk survey results, in this year’s summary of these findings, we have also added some of the issues which have emerged from the round tables, to contribute to current government policy considerations. These have included a number of barriers to increasing local authority housing delivery, such as local authorities having higher interest rates from the Public Works Loan Board than housing associations, as well as not having equal access to the Housing Bank. Many authorities expressed the need for access to Homes England partnership programme funding, which has not been available before (3) although the funding on offer represents a very small percentage of total Homes England budget. Recent government initiatives have opened this source of funding for local authorities’ bids. However for local authorities, most would prefer the Mayor of London system for programme allocations rather than bids, which would enable them to support their expertise and housing development teams to be used across the whole council. While other recent reforms such as rent convergence have been regarded as helpful, many councils do not consider that they go far enough, and more reforms are sought, such as a relationship between level of subsidy and size of dwelling, rather than a flat rate approach.
There are also changes in the inclusion of social rent housing needs in the NPPF (4) but no common methods to assess this need, nor any other ways in which this need can be translated into site allocations in local plans with associated delivery funding.
Finally, we have identified from this research for 2026 that there are some practical steps that councils can take which can improve their housing delivery performance. These include bringing together all housing delivery activity into a single programme, rather than keeping projects in departmental silos for supported homes, regeneration, planning and housing.
Secondly, it has been suggested that ensuring the scheme of delegation for the councils provides members and officers with the powers to take action quickly, if this makes the difference in delivery on particular schemes, as a form of emergency powers. Some councils have reorganised to have a single housing delivery team which is concerned with all housing negotiation and delivery across the council, and can identify where there are opportunities to bring together different types of housing initiatives. Some councils are working with their local anchor institutions to review land and buildings, to determine whether there are joint opportunities for housing delivery.
In terms of finance, we found an assumption that there was a requirement to capitalise housing development over 30 years, but this does not exist and it can be longer. Also, some councils are being more proactive in their procurement processes to secure more training places. Some councils are exploring the benefits of using standard housing types, in the same way as developers, as a mechanism to reduce local authority costs on schemes which are delivered through bespoke designs. Finally, some councils are managing their stock in the same way as owner occupiers by creating larger homes through side, return and loft extensions.
If you want to look at the survey findings in more detail it can be found here https://www.ucl.ac.uk/bartlett/publications/report-local-authority-activity-directly-support-housing-provision-round-five-research . Local authorities are listed A-Z in a common table format and weblinks for each council’s activities are provided. There are also tables for each MSA area and London for ease of comparison.
References
Historic council housebuilding comeback to help families into secure homes 24 August 2026 https://www.gov.uk/government/news/historic-council-housebuilding-comeback-to-help-families-into-secure-homes
Some acronyms: CIOH – Chartered Institute of Housing; POS – Planning Officers Society; ADOH – Association of Directors of Housing
£21.8m funding boost to help councils build more affordable homes
National Planning Policy Framework 2026 https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/6aabe97844ec1aa417346c0b/National_Planning_Policy_Framework.pdf
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