“A more consistent approach to social housebuilding over the past 20 years could have saved the government £7bn in housing benefit payments, research has found.
If the government had built 100,000 social rent homes each year over the past two decades, renters could also have benefited from an extra £1.8bn in disposable income, analysis from the Local Government Association has concluded.
The government currently has a commitment to build 300,000 new homes each year by the mid-2020s, but spreading this target out over the past 20 years could have saved both the government and renters significant sums, according to the analysis done in partnership with Capital Economics.
Overall, government would have had to borrow an additional £152bn (in 2017 prices) to build 100,000 social rent homes each year between 1997-2017, the LGA said.
But the report out today said building 100,000 annually would have meant all housing benefit claimants living in the private rented sector could have moved to cheaper social rent homes by 2016.
Every pound spent on construction output stimulates an increase of £2.84 in GDP, according to research referenced in the report. …”
East Devon Watch 
Very true Owl. But the policy was to prevent councils from building housing because that should be the job of the private sector? So you might say that the policy was to put public money into private sector development. And the private sector makes the profits that the public sector would have re-invested into public services, but transfers them into the pockets of the managers and the shareholders? Or have I got this wrong and thee public sector makes money by taxing the results of development to pay for services. Or maybe they should do?
Yours Aye
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