West Midlands to get £409 million to build 3,200 'affordable' homes

The West Midlands is to get an extra £409 million to provide 3,200 new homes for people in temporary accommodation or on housing waiting lists, it was announced tonight (Monday).

Richard Parker, the region’s elected mayor, said the money would be on top of the funds he had made available for his target to build 2,000 social rental homes a year by 2028.

The money is part of a near-£10 billion commitment by the Prime Minister who said he wanted to embark on ‘the largest council housebuilding programme since the post-war era’ to tackle the severe housing shortages and homelessness.

Mr Parker said the money, which is a result of a partnership with the Government and Homes England, would be used alongside his own housing funds to build thousands more homes that were genuinely affordable for local people.

He said since taking office in May 2024, he had overseen the biggest social housing programme the West Midlands had experienced in decades, setting a target for the region to be building 2,000 social rent homes a year by 2028.

Mr Parker said he contracted a record 7,237 new homes over the past year, more than 10 times the annual 623 average achieved before he took office.

Of the new homes, he said 2,452 were affordable, including 1,086 for social rent, the most affordable type of housing.

Mr Parker said: “For decades there’s been a chronic underinvestment in council homes and genuinely affordable housing - and it’s left us with the housing crisis we face today.

“I believe people deserve better, which is why my focus has been on fixing the mistakes of the past and rebuilding our housing stock.

“We've already started turning around years of underinvestment in social housing but the Prime Minister’s announcement today will see us work together as a region and take this social housing mission to the next level.”

He said nearly 15,000 children in the region were living in temporary accommodation.

“I want that number coming down and I want it coming down quickly,” he said.

“When you listen to the experiences of people in temporary accommodation or stuck on housing waiting lists you realise just how much their lives are blighted by not having a secure and decent home.

“We will change that by giving people the housing stability and security they need to get on in life.”

Mr Parker said the West Midlands had 7,450 households, including 14,976 children, living in temporary accommodation, costing local councils tens of millions of pounds a year in additional housing costs.

A further 65,335 households were on social housing waiting lists, with many in expensive and often poor-quality private accommodation, he added..