The Conservatives fell thousands of homes short of their promise of building a million new properties across England during the last Parliament, new data suggests.
The pledge was made by Boris Johnson at the 2019 general election, with the Tories claiming in their 2024 manifesto that the promise had been delivered on.
But statistics covering the 2023/24 financial year have revealed that the then-Tory Government overestimated the number of homes created in that period by almost 5,000.
During this year’s election campaign, in the absence of clearer data at the time, the party had been relying on an estimate - based on the number of new Energy Performance Certificates (EPCs) lodged - which claimed that about 226,000 homes were delivered between April 2023 and March 2024.
Data published on Thursday, detailing the number of ‘net additional dwellings’ created across England in that period, shows however that the true figure was 221,071.
It means, according what are now the best available statistics, that a total of 995,349 new homes were started during the last Parliament - or 4,651 short of the million promised.
“The Conservatives said that they hit their housing targets, when in fact they misled the public and under-delivered,” a Labour spokeswoman said.
“Over the course of 14 years of Conservative rule, the dream of homeownership became more and more unattainable as they failed to fix the problem.
“This country desperately needs more housing, and that’s why we’ve pledged to build 1.5 million homes throughout this Government.”
The new statistics underline the challenge Labour faces in trying to hit its own, higher target, with housing minister Matthew Pennycook admitting last week that the task will be “more difficult than we expected in opposition”. While he called it an “incredibly stretching target”, he also said he was “convinced it is deliverable” and “essential”.
Approached for a response to the new data, Kevin Hollinrake MP, the Tories’ Shadow Housing Secretary, said: “Net new housing formations under the Conservatives was at a 50 year high during the last Parliament, surpassing even the 1970’s.
“Contrast this with Labour who have dropped housing targets in London as they know Sadiq Khan is failing to build enough houses in the capital. His plans involve concreting over greenbelt and green fields by means of massive rises to housing targets for rural areas.”
Although Labour is promising to build 1.5m homes over the course of the current Parliament, it has reduced the capital’s annual house-building target to 81,000 properties, down from 99,000 under the Conservatives. Meeting this lower London target will still, however, mean more than doubling the number of homes currently being built in the city.
The Government has also said it wants to enable building on ‘low-quality’ areas of green belt land, which it calls ‘the grey belt’. Mr Khan insists he will “always prioritise brownfield land for new housing development,” while arguing there are sometimes “circumstances where on balance there will be a clear public benefit case” for building on green belt sites.
Thursday’s statistics revealed that London saw a net total of 32,162 homes created in 2023/24, a reduction of nine per cent from the 35,263 homes delivered the previous year.
The boroughs which saw the highest numbers of properties added were Newham, with 2,999 homes created in net terms, followed by Wandsworth (2,720) and Barnet (2,475).
The lowest numbers were seen in the ‘square mile’ of the City of London, which saw a net loss of three homes, followed by Richmond-upon-Thames, with a net gain of only 147, and then Bromley, which gained 168.
Figures published last week and covering the same period revealed an 88 per cent drop-off in the number of new London properties specifically classed as ‘affordable’, compared with the previous year - with some boroughs seeing construction start on just one affordable property each in the entire twelve months.
