Our asks are a mixture of tweaks to existing policy alongside new investment in regeneration:

• Adjust and further devolve existing funding to better support regeneration.
  • Give Mayors and combined authorities greater flexibility to use the Social and Affordable Homes Programme (SAHP) for regeneration projects that meet local needs. “Continuous Market Engagement” funding should not have a cap on regeneration – introducing one risks capping Mayors’ ability to address local challenges.
  • Introduce Homes England performance measures focused on homes renewed and replaced, not just new homes delivered. Current indicators are heavily weighted towards new supply, limiting investment in regeneration projects across the North.
  • Allocate National Housing Bank funding specifically for housing-led regeneration to help unlock schemes that are stalled by viability and funding challenges.
  • Implement zero-rate VAT on building safety works and extend the zero-rating of energy-saving materials until 2030. This would maintain momentum in retrofitting, improving, and regenerating older and colder homes.
• Establish a new “Centre for Regeneration” in the North to build the capacity and capability needed to deliver regeneration at scale, while supporting Mayors with workforce development.
• Extend the term of the National Housing Delivery Fund to ten years to unlock all the North’s brownfield land and 320,000 new homes.
• Provide northern Mayors and combined authorities with devolved, place-based flexible funding of £500m per year alongside existing funding. Over ten years, this investment would help make sure no one and nowhere is left behind, as well as transforming the North’s 100,000 end-of-life social homes. This support would plug current funding gaps, enabling Mayors to:
  • Replace or refurbish end-of-life housing so residents can live in good quality social homes.
  • Buy poor quality private homes, including empty homes, and turn them into safer and healthier social housing.
  • Provide viability gap funding for strategically important regeneration schemes that deliver local benefits but are currently financially unviable.

Further detail on the NHC’s policy asks at the Autumn Budget can be found in the NHC’s Budget representation.

Our policy recommendations are a mix of tweaks to existing policies, following feedback from members, and recommendations from the Renew report Unlocking over 500,000 good quality homes in the North. This is based on evidence from providers who own or manage 1 million of the North’s social homes, alongside engagement with academics, combined authorities and the commercial sector.