A major shake up of Right to Buy policy by the government looks set to prevent more social housing tenants from purchasing their own homes.
Under fresh proposals, tenants may have to wait more than 10 years to purchase their homes and those living in newly built social homes may never be able to buy.
The government also wants to cut Right to Buy discounts back to pre-2012 levels and discourage social tenants from selling the homes they have purchased.
Housing secretary Angela Rayner said its changes will address the loss of social housing, but the Conservatives said Labour is “limiting aspiration and social mobility”.
Since the Right to Buy policy was introduced in 1980, under Margaret Thatcher’s government, there has been an annual net loss in social housing stock as successive governments have failed to replace the housing that has been acquired or bulldozed.
Analysis by Shelter reveals that there are 1.4 million fewer English households in social housing than there were in 1980.
“Too many social homes have been sold off before they can be replaced, which has directly contributed to the worst housing crisis in living memory,” said Rayner. “We cannot fix the crisis without addressing this issue – it’s like trying to fill a bath when the plug’s not in.”
Among the new measures the government seeks to introduce, it wants to reduce the maximum discounts for tenants using Right to Buy to between £16,000 and £38,000 depending on the council – bringing them back to pre-2012 levels.
Under the current rules, tenants have to repay this discount to the council if they then sell the property on within five years of buying. The government wants to extend this to 10 years.
Shadow housing secretary and former head of Hunters, Kevin Hollinrake, accused the government of “pulling up the drawbridge on home ownership and limiting aspiration and social mobility”.
“The Right to Buy has helped millions into home ownership. It has given something back to families who worked hard, paid their rent, and played by the rules,” he said.
Rayner has made social housing her mission in government, having previously told the press that she wants to see “the biggest wave of council housing in a generation and that is what I want to be measured on”.
