Sign the open letter to the Chancellor: this budget, let's get councils building again

Sign our open letter to Chancellor John Healey ahead of the Autumn Budget -  let's get councils building again, so no child has to grow up homeless. 

Dear Chancellor, 

We are calling on you to put hope back into housing with a historic 'council building budget'. 

We haven't built enough social rent homes for decades. Now there are a record 177,530 children who are homeless, stuck in damaging and unstable temporary accommodation. Many must even share a bed with parents or siblings. 

However, with the Prime Minister promising the 'biggest council housebuilding programme since the post-war era', the government have an opportunity. They can create transformational change for people facing homelessness. 

To make this a reality we need urgent, ambitious changes to get councils building at scale again, so everyone has a decent home they can afford. 

We've done it before, and we can do it again. In the 1950s, 60s and 70s, councils built more than 120,000 social rent homes each year on average. 

Chancellor, to make sure everyone has a decent home they can afford, please take this vital opportunity for change and make this Autumn Budget the council building budget. 

Here's how you can put hope back into housing with the budget on 28 October: 

1. Remove the Housing Revenue Account debt that stops councils building 
2. Give councils access to fair, low-cost loans  
3. Bring forward and increase the £39bn Social and Affordable Homes Programme 
4. Change public borrowing rules to enable greater investment in social homes 

We urge you to take the bold steps above to make the government's promises a reality. 

Yours sincerely, 

The undersigned 

• How to make this budget a historic council building budget

  If we want councils to build again and put the hope back into housing, we must use the autumn budget to:

  - remove the debt that stops councils building

  Councils are spending their money paying interest on £31.8 billion of Housing Revenue Account (HRA) debt, and it's stopping them from building social homes. The debt is held mostly by the government — owed from one part of the public sector (councils) to another (the Treasury). This means that cancelling the debt has limited immediate impact on its fiscal rules and, as our research shows, would free up councils to build around 280,000 new social homes.

  - give councils access to fair, low-cost loans

  Housing associations and for-profit providers can borrow at 0.1% from the government. Councils, however, are getting a far worse deal — having to borrow at around 5-6% and this is preventing them from building. Lower interest loans will support councils to build more social homes.

  - bring forward, and increase, the £39 billion Social and Affordable Homes programme

  The funding for social housing in the Social and Affordable Housing programme that was announced last year is much needed, but it remains below what is required with more of it being spent in the later years, rather than now. Families in temporary accommodation can't wait. Bringing forward a greater share of spending sooner, and increasing the amount in the overall programme, is vital to kickstarting social house building.

  - change public borrowing rules to enable greater investment in social housing

  Treasury rules too often treat public spending on council and social housing delivery as a financial burden, rather than as an investment. The government should make investing in council and social housing easier by changing the way it treats the loans and grants required to build social housing at scale.

  Please sign the open letter today to tell Chancellor John Healey to get councils building again at the budget.