According to the Empty Homes Agency (EHA), effective action should be taken on empty homes.
It welcomed the consultation on the Housing and Planning Delivery Grant and the government’s recognition of the role that filling empty homes could play in housing supply, but questioned whether the government’s proposed approach would deliver results in practice.
Official figures showed there were 675,000 empty homes in England, of which 288,000 had been empty for more than six months.
The government suggested that an effective empty property strategy would be an eligibility criterion for receiving a grant. However the EHA has called for key recommendations to be made.
These included bringing empty homes back into use as part of the council’s housing supply and encouraging councils to act on empty homes by offering a premium level of rent for long-term empty homes brought back into use over new build – in recognition of the regeneration and environmental advantages of re-using empty buildings.
Henry Oliver, policy adviser at the EHA, said: “Just having an empty property strategy on its own is no guarantee of effective action to tackle the scandal of empty homes. We need to design the grant to encourage councils to make the effort to tackle empty property. Above all we need to count empty homes brought back into use as a crucial part of housing supply.”
Housing Minister, Caroline Flint MP, said: “Housing in Britain doesn’t require moderate reform. It needs urgent attention and swift action. The acute housing shortage, with all its problems and implications, is well known and well debated. The emphasis on new supply doesn’t mean that we can afford to neglect our existing stock.”
