HCA welcomes new money and focuses on immediate delivery
30 June 2009
< Back to news index
The HCA is ready to begin delivering a significantly enlarged programme of public house building immediately, the Agency’s chief executive has confirmed.
The HCA, responsible for housing and regeneration delivery in England, will take responsibility for an additional £1.5bn channelled into affordable housing over the next two years, following yesterday’s announcement on Building Britain’s Future by the Prime Minister. The money will be used to build an additional 20,000 new affordable homes on top of the Agency’s existing programme.
The funding will be allocated through a number of new and established delivery routes including the HCA’s National Affordable Housing Programme (NAHP), and the existing bidding processes to kickstart stalled schemes and for direct development by local authorities.
HCA chief executive Sir Bob Kerslake welcomed the announcement of further funding for the HCA and confirmed that the Agency is well placed to begin delivery immediately:
“This is a renewed commitment from Government to boost housing numbers and get people into high quality homes and I am pleased that the HCA has been trusted with quick delivery. The sector’s capacity and appetite for housing delivery is strong, and the knock-on effect house building has in terms of jobs, businesses and the wider economy is well established.
“We are well prepared for this. We have had an excellent response from our housing association and developer partners to our flexible grant rates through which we were able to fully deliver our programme last year, and the response to our existing £400m Kickstart programme has also exceeded expectations showing that we will have more than enough schemes of the right quality. With this new money we will be able to meet many more of these bids and begin to look at new schemes for the future, and the housing and regeneration sector will welcome the opportunity to deliver completions over a third year.
“Local Authorities too will have an essential role here, both in leadership in identifying new sites, and through direct development of new homes, building on the £100m announced in the recent Budget. We will also look to them to lead on local labour initiatives and job creation as one of the associated benefits of this funding.
“This is a cash injection that will also have a positive impact on house builders, simultaneously meeting the need and demand for new houses. The public land package is a particularly exciting new initiative to bring new players into the market and to drive forward the quality of our new homes. Public sector land owners of all kinds have expressed interest and the HCA has major land holdings of its own to contribute that will ensure we make rapid progress.”
Building Britain’s Future announced by the Prime Minister today contains a series of pledges across different sectors. The Housing Pledge – and the £1.5 billion funding – breaks down into four key areas, with indicative funding amounts as follows:
- Up to £750 million for the HCA’s approved investment partners – housing associations, ALMOs and private developers – through the Agency’s National Affordable Housing Programme (NAHP) for around 12,500 new homes
- Up to £500 million to kickstart stalled housing and regeneration schemes, to deliver around 4,000 new homes in addition to the £400 million Programme announced in April’s budget. In view of the new funding, and the high level of bids already received, the Agency anticipates taking forward more than £400 million worth of schemes from the initial bidding round
- Up to £250 million for direct development by local authorities of around 3,000 new homes, again in addition to the £100 million announced in the Budget
- A public land programme for around 500 new homes initially, designed to bring new construction players into the housing market using land in public ownership which the HCA and other public sector organisations would contribute in return for an equity share in the development; and
The HCA anticipates being flexible in allocating the full funding package in order to tailor investment according to local priorities and maximise its impact, but will use the established NAHP process, as well as the existing Kickstart and local authority development bidding process.
The Homes and Communities Agency also confirmed today that it has received 305 bids for its existing Kickstart Programme, funded by an additional £400 million announced in April’s Budget, equating to over 600 projects with bids from every English region. Bidders have requested a range of support from investment only through to a combination of investment plus HomeBuy Direct; investment along with NAHP; HomeBuy Direct alone, or a combination of all three.
Successful bidders are expected to be announced by the HCA in late July. Successful bidders for the £100 million for direct development by local authorities, again under an existing bidding process, are expected to be announced in September.
ENDS
For more media information contact Robert Davies on 020 7881 1624 / robert.davies@hca.gsx.gov.uk, or Gemma Thompson on 020 7881 1054 / gemma.thompson@hca.gsx.gov.uk in the HCA press office
Notes to editors:
Housing stimulus package – as a result of April’s Budget the HCA received an additional £635 million. This is broken down as follows: £400m to unlock developments (Kickstart Housing Development); £50 million social housing grant to allow local authorities to deliver new social housing (complemented by £50 million capital cover for associated prudential borrowing); up to £80 million to support delivery of the Mortgage Rescue Scheme; £84 million to provide cavity wall insulation in the social sector; £21 million for investment in innovative low-carbon heating systems.
This will now be added, along with the £1.5bn announced today, to the HCA’s existing programme for the 2008-11 Comprehensive Spending Review Period of £8.4bn for the National Affordable Housing Programme and £8.9bn for other programmes including Decent Homes, Private Finance Initiatives, Property and Regeneration and Growth Funding.
The Homes and Communities Agency is the single, national housing and regeneration agency for England. Our role is to create opportunity for people to live in high quality, sustainable places. We provide funding for affordable housing, bring land back into productive use and improve quality of life by raising standards for the physical and social environment.