Local councils have told the government its flagship plan to build 1.5m new homes in England over the next five years is “unrealistic” and “impossible to achieve”, the BBC can reveal.
The vast majority of councils expressed concern about the plan in a consultation exercise carried out by Angela Rayner’s housing department earlier this year.
The responses, obtained by the BBC through Freedom of Information laws, potentially set local authorities on a collision course with Labour over one of its top priorities.
The government has said it will respond to the consultation and publish revisions before the end of the year.
Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer has put housebuilding at the heart of the government’s mission to kickstart economic growth and tackle the housing crisis.
But it relies on local authorities adopting targets for new privately-built housing developments in their areas.
Many councils accept the need for more new homes – but they are concerned about whether the targets handed to each of the 317 authorities in England are realistic or achievable.
The concerns are shared by Labour, Conservative and Liberal Democrat authorities, according to BBC analysis of 90% of the consultation responses.
Many fear the algorithm used to calculate the targets has not taken into account strains on local infrastructure, land shortages, and a lack of capacity in the planning system and construction industry.
Labour-run Broxtowe council in Nottinghamshire described the proposed changes as “very challenging, if not impossible to achieve”.
South Tyneside, another Labour-run council, said the plans were “wholly unrealistic”, while the independent-run council in Central Bedfordshire said the area would be “absolutely swamped with growth that the infrastructure just can not support”.
In some cases, the housing targets are radically different to those set by the previous government, with rural areas expected to shoulder more of the burden than inner-city authorities. Some parts of London have seen their targets go down.
In rural West Lancashire, the yearly housing target for the Labour-run borough council would jump from 166 new dwellings to 605 under the proposed new system.
Deputy leader Gareth Dowling agrees with the general need for more housebuilding after “years of stagnation”, but said his area was already building its “fair share”.
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